Fatimah Al-Shahrani

Supervisory team: Professor Minoli Salgado and Dr. Blanka Grzegorczyk

Thesis title: Trauma and Identity in Selected Work by Arab-American Women Writers Before and After 9/11

In my thesis I explore the evolving representation of womanhood and trauma in Arab- American women’s literature, with a particular focus on the shifting portrayals before and after the tragic events of 9/11. Through a comparative framework, the study examines how narratives of female identity transform across these temporal contexts, paying special attention to the intersections of gender, race, and trauma. Central to this inquiry is the representation of multiracial women who experience rejection both within Arab-American communities and in the broader American racial discourse.

Jack Bartley

Supervisory team: Dr. Matthew Carter, Prof. Minoli Salgado, Dr. Beccy Kennedy-Schtyk

Thesis title: “A Spirited Celebration and a Tearful Catharsis”: Representations of Korean Indigenous Religious Practices and Folklore as Processors of Colonial Trauma

My doctoral thesis interrogates depictions of Korean indigenous religious practices and folklore in popular culture as symptomatic of self-policing and processing societal trauma following colonial rule. I approach this by analysing various representations of mudang and the gumiho through an interdisciplinary theoretical framework of postcolonial, trauma, and feminist film theories. By using this hybrid methodology of Western and Eastern perspectives, a timeline of trauma response can be unearthed in Korea’s collective cultural memory.

Devjani Bodepudi

Supervisory team: Dr Sarah Ilott, Dr Muzna Rahman, Dr Malika Booker

Thesis title: The Ghosts are Watching from the Banyan Tree: Seeking Self, Solace and Transformation through Ecological Narratives and Landscapes of Bengali Folklore and Mythology.

I’m researching the significance of the ecology found within Bengali folktales and Indic mythic traditions to create my own novel in verse in order to investigate grief and loss through mixing languages and narratives.

Brontë Crawford

Supervisory Team: Dr Sarah Ilott and Dr Muzna Rahman

Thesis Title: Feed the World: Food and Appetite in the Literature of Empire

My doctoral dissertation explores how contemporary authors use irrealist modes of writing to explore food can both perpetuate and resist colonial power. Adopting a world-systems approach to my literary analysis, I track particular commodity chains throughout the works of Sayaka Murata, Han Kang, and K-Ming Chang, identifying how these stories draw on the historic significance of certain foods to articulate the complex and haunting legacies of colonial power and trade.

Sumithreyi Sivapalan

Supervisory team: Prof Minoli Salgado and Dr Malika Booker

Thesis title: Borders and Belonging: exploring ‘home’ through the persona poetry of Sri Lankan women.

My creative-critical thesis explores how the persona poem, with its distinct voice and idiosyncratic materiality, is an apt vehicle to examine the various forms in which the longing for home manifests itself. Specifically, it addresses the diverse avenues taken in an attempt to fulfil or pacify this yearning which, especially in the Sri Lankan civil war and post-war context, affects residents and migrants alike.