Our Students

Breanna Simpson is a Doctoral Candidate at York University. She works on gender studies and queer theory, classical reception, world literature, and late Victorian fiction. Her doctoral research examines the coding of desire in ancient and Victorian prose narratives, with a focus on how it influenced power negotiations and identity formation in both periods. This work expands on her MA thesis, entitled “A Purposeful Infection: Lovesickness and Gender in Heliodorus.”

As well as her doctoral degree, Breanna is working on a diploma in world literature. She has presented papers at ACCUTE (2019), and the British Association of Canadian Studies (2018, 2019), and has been a recipient of the Ontario Graduate Scholarship (2019-20).

Breanna holds a BA in Classical Studies and English Literature (2015), as well as an MA in Ancient Culture, Religion, and Ethnicity (2017), from the University of British Columbia.

Dorota Biedrzycki’s Ph.D. research is focused on aesthetic play, exile, and identity in Vladimir Nabokov’s works. She is also interested in the avant-garde, primarily Surrealism, and cinema studies.

She received her honours B.A. (from Glendon College) and M.A. (from Concordia University) in English.

Jasmine Gui is a doctoral student attentive to decolonial, diasporic literature and media, and an interdisciplinary artist working in paper, ceramics and collage. Her SSHRC-funded work takes a research-creation approach to the diasporic zine as material art object and literary text,  its modes of production, circulation and documentation, to push for decolonial visions of transnational relations.

She is the co-founder of TACLA, a documenting commons initiative. Her work has been exhibited at Xpace Cultural Centre, and featured in publications such Hungry Zine, Canthius, Room Magazine, Held Magazine, SineTheta, GUTS Magazine, and The Spectatorial amongst others. She was the managing editor for (re)Rites of Passage: Asian Canada in Motion, a special anthology featuring Asian Canadian media artists on the contributions, maturations and evolving sensibilities of Asian Canadian film and media creation.

Jasmine holds a B.Ed. (2014), a B.A. in English & East Asian studies (2014), and M.A in English, Diaspora and Transnational studies (2016) from the University of Toronto. She also works at the Toronto Reel Asian Film Festival as their special projects programmer.

Joti Bilkhu (she/her) completed her Specialized Honours BA in English at Glendon College (2018) and her MA at York University (2019). She is currently a PhD candidate at York University, and her research examines depictions of violence in Victorian children’s adventure fiction between 1880–1914 at the height of the British Empire. In her dissertation, she juxtaposes well-known adventure narratives (such as those by R. L. Stevenson, Rudyard Kipling, and J. M. Barrie) with the texts of lesser-known nineteenth-century writers (including G. A. Henty, L. T. Meade, Bessie Marchant, and Angela Brazil) to propose a re-definition of the adventure genre. Her approach primarily uses theories of violence and employs Orientalist discourses to examine how the children’s adventure novels interact with issues of race, gender, class, varying levels of ability, and the animal body. Additionally, her dissertation studies how illustrations contribute to and/or undermine the violence that the novels depict.

Joti has presented at a Victorian symposium (2022) about sympathy for Asian bodies in late nineteenth-century adventure fiction, and has published articles about child rape in South African theatre, sexual violence in young adult graphic novels, and monstrous mothers in children’s literature. Recently, she presented at a Queer Comics Symposium (2023) about using fairy tales as alternative languages to discuss queerness. She is also the author of several short stories, including “The Hag of Beara” in the Canadian anthology Still (Dec 2020), “Two Mouths” in Night Frights (Sept 2020), “Scales” (May 2020) in The Write Launch’s online magazine, and “Omophagus” (2019) in The Monsters We Forgot, Vol. 1 anthology.

As a teacher’s assistant, Joti believes that literature can help all students develop a critical perspective that they can apply to not only stories but also to themselves and their lives so that they can engage more meaningfully with the world. Recently, she has earned her Teaching Junior Record of Completion Certificate (2021). Joti has been a TA for a variety of courses in the English, Children’s Studies, and Humanities departments.

Mark Buchanan is a PhD Candidate in English at York University. His dissertation examines depictions of food and alcohol in Canadian fantasy literature. His dissertation uses the lens of food studies to investigate the way depictions of food and alcohol in the genre reflect issues of gender, race, and class. The commonplace reality of eating and drinking expose deeply entrenched power structures. His study goes beyond simply stating the fact that racism, sexism, and classism exist in much Canadian fantasy literature, but examines depictions of food and alcohol that affect how social hierarchical power structures are created in the texts. He also examines the ways food and alcohol illuminate how authors are working to subvert traditional entrenched ideologies of racism, sexism, and classism in the genre.

Mark completed both is BA (Hons.) (2014) and MA (2016) at the University of British Columbia’s Okanagan campus. His MA thesis was titled “How Alcohol Use in J. K. Rowling’s Harry Potter Perpetuates Late-Victorian Traditions of Racism, Sexism, and Classism.”Mark has presented his research at venues such as the International Conference on the Fantastic in the Arts (2015, 2016, 2018, 2019, 2020) the International Conference of the Children’s Literature Association (2018), and the Academic Conference on Canadian Science Fiction and Fantasy (2019), among others.

Matthew Dunleavy received his BA (Hons. with Distinction) from Concordia University and his MA from York University. His work examines the gender politics among the inhabitants, philanthropists, and journalists of the Late-Victorian/Early-Edwardian East-End London slums in a dissertation tentatively titled “Cleaning Up the Streets and the Sheets: The Reform Work of Clementina Black and Margaret Harkness, 1880–1915.” The work will also interrogate the intersection of language that illustrates a preoccupation with poverty, dirt, and sex when dealing with these slums.

He is the recipient of the SSHRC Doctoral Fellowship (2019–20), the SSHRC Joseph-Armand Bombardier Canadian Graduate Scholarship (2014–15), St. George Society of Toronto Endowment (2015–21), Ontario Graduate Scholarship (2016–19), and the York University Entrance Scholarship (2014–16).

Maybelle Leung (she/her) is a Ph.D. candidate studying late medieval literature, critical theory, and the history and theory of embodiment. She completed her Hons. BA in English at University of Toronto and her MA in English at York University. Her research is funded by the SSHRC Doctoral Fellowship, the Ontario Graduate Scholarship, and the St. George’s Society of Toronto Endowment for Graduate Student Award.

Maybelle is interested in historicizing the critical theories used to describe subject being today, including psychoanalysis, sexuality and gender studies, and aesthetics. She studies the emergence of cultural thought on desire in the Middle Ages, looking at how they (imperfectly) reflect our present understandings of the erotic self. Her dissertation, titled “Le Roman de la Rose in Late Medieval England: A History of Unpleasure,” argues that the infamous allegorical poem, the Rose, influenced both courtly and religious English literatures on love in the centuries after, shaping a model of sexual “unpleasure” that questions, for us today, unpleasure’s equivalents in critical theory.

Maybelle published her first peer-reviewed article on embodied reading and anchoritic devotion in Magistra: A Journal of Women’s Spirituality in History; her second article on Robert Glück’s queer medievalism is forthcoming in Translating, Rewriting, and Recreating the Middle Ages, a special issue of Palimpsestes. As of 2021, she is scheduled to present at the upcoming International Kalamazoo Congress on Medieval Studies, Leeds International Medieval Congress, and New Chaucer Society Congress.

As a Teaching Assistant, Maybelle believes that all students, from any background, can find fulfillment in reading literature. She has assisted courses on Fantasy and Horror fiction at University of Toronto-Mississauga, and led tutorials in the English Department at York University. She uses hands-on activities and collaborative approaches in the classroom; most of all, she is passionate about applying literary analysis to everyday life. Having worked in various fields, from music instruction to technical copywriting, Maybelle brings a focus on art and practical application to literary study.

View Maybelle’s updated CV.

MLA Chernoff is a SSHRC Doctoral Fellow, focusing on Jewish literatures within the socio-political landscape of Canada. Their dissertation, Ordinary Eternal Machinery: Radical Poetry and Revelation in Jewish Canada, attempts to effectively reroute the liberal humanist criticism surrounding Jewish-Canadian literature by theorizing its poetry as radically experimental and demonstrative of a leftist political inclination, one that veers towards messianism. MLA has thus far presented their research at ACCUTE, ACQL, and various colloquia; a chapter-length adaptation of their NeMLA presentation on Jewish gematria and conceptualism will be included in an upcoming collection on Canadian digital poetics, via McGill-Queen’s University Press. Their other research interests include deconstruction, psychoanalysis, queer theory, and Xenofeminism. A practising “poet,” MLA’s debut chapbook, delet this: pomes, memes, n dreams, is forthcoming from Hybrid Heaven in 2018.

Monica Sousa received her B.A. (Honours) in 2017 and her M.A. in 2018 from Brock University. She is currently a doctoral candidate in the Department of English at York University. She is a recipient of the Ontario Graduate Scholarship (2019–2020).

Monica specializes in contemporary literature, and her research focuses on animal studies, posthumanism, and biotechnology in contemporary science/speculative fiction. Her dissertation focuses on human and nonhuman animal relations in contemporary science fiction, with a focus on technologically engineered animals (or “biotech animals”, as she calls them) which can include genetically modified animals, animals with cybernetic/robotic enhancements, and other animals manipulated by more speculative biotechnologies. She is interested in the ethics regarding how we treat these animals and how we (if possible) can show care toward them after they have been created.

Monica’s scholarly work has appeared in chapters in edited books, such as Critical Insights: Life of Pi (2020), Transhumanism and Posthumanism in Twenty-First Century Narrative (2021), Posthumanist Perspectives on Literary and Cultural Animals (2021), and Animals in Narrative Film and Television: Strange and Familiar Creatures (2022). She has also a chapter forthcoming in late 2023, in a book titled Animals and Science Fiction and a book titled Screening Children in Post-Apocalyptic Film and Television. Her scholarly work has also appeared as articles in the academic journals SFRA Review and Journal of Posthumanism.

She has presented papers at many conferences, some of which include WorldCon, the Academic Conference on Canadian Science Fiction and Fantasy, the Science Fiction Research Association (SFRA), the North Eastern Modern Language Association (NeMLA), the Association of Canadian College and University Teachers of English (ACCUTE), and the International Conference on the Fantastic in the Arts.

While at York, she has been working as a Teaching Assistant (TA) in the English, Writing, and Humanities department. In the Fall of 2023, she is working as a course instructor for EN 4005: Literature and Animals.

Monica’s other research interests include feminist theory and women and gender studies, horror, gothic literature (including Southern gothic), and ecocriticism.

Email address: monisousa93@gmail.com

Monique Attrux is a doctoral student in the English program at York University. Her research centers on the intricate interplay between language, ethnic identity, and literary production in Chinese Canadian literature. She is deeply passionate about exploring how language shapes and reflects ethnic identities in the realm of literature.

Her academic journey has been enriched by the generous support of the York Entrance Scholarship (2020), Vivienne Poy Hakka Research Award (2020), the Ontario Graduate Scholarship (2021), the SSHRC Joseph-Arman Bombardier Canadian Graduate Scholarship (2022), the Canada-China Initiatives Fund (2022), and the Clara Thomas Scholarship in Canadian Studies (2023).

Before embarking on her doctoral journey, she earned her Bachelor of Arts degree in English and linguistics from the University of Hong Kong in 2017. She further honed her scholarly skills by completing her Master of Arts in English at York University in 2019.

Teaching is not just a profession for Monique; it’s a passion. She firmly believes that education is a cornerstone of personal growth and societal transformation, not only for students but also for educators. Her teaching philosophy is rooted in the idea that education has the potential to shape lives and perspectives. To that end, her teaching style blends the roles of coach and facilitator, aiming to empower students to understand literature and to engage with it actively and critically.

Nasra Smith is a PhD candidate in the Graduate Program in English, completing also a Masters of English (2016), Masters of Education (2014), and a Spec. Hons. BA (with distinction) in Individualized Studies at York University. Her research intercedes East African literature and Indian Ocean studies to centralize coastal eastern Africa from Eritrea to Mozambique and its archipelagoes. Her dissertation draws from the historiographic longue duree, oceanic humanities and vast global trade of the Indian Ocean ports to explore the relations between space, place and literature. By arguing the port is a polyvalent space of real, imaginative, and aesthetic conditions, her work interrogates the dialectics between class, history, language, geography, and migration from the medieval era to our contemporary world. Fluent in Somali, Swahili, and with (working knowledge) of Arabic, her interdisciplinary methodology engages with questions of indigeneity and African sovereignty, Euro-imperialism and Arab-Islamic servitude, Marxist geography, subaltern studies, archaeology, environmental studies, and postcolonial studies.

Nasra will conduct archival research at Yale University, the Library of Congress, Cornell, and CUNY as part of a Trudeau fellowship (2019-20). In addition to library fellowships in the US and Canada, she is awarded the PSA (2019), Anne Simone Award (2018), York Graduate Scholarship (2014-2016), and two UN Student awards. She has presented at MLA International Symposium (2019), CACLALS (2019), ACCUTE (2018), BCPS (2018), York Glendon (2017), and PCA/ALA (2015), and invited talks to African Students Association and the UN in Central America, Mexico, and New York.

Nasra will be the Visiting Lecturer/Research Fellow at the Obama Institute for Trans-American Studies at the Johannes Gutenberg Universitat in 2021or 2022. She is also awarded and will attend the Black Europe Summer Institute (BESS) in Netherlands in June-July 2021. Her articles in CCLA (2021), Studies in Canadian Literature (2022), a chapter in Cultures of Citizenship (2022) and two in ASQ (2021) are forthcoming.

Nasra writes poetry, non-fiction, and current affairs articles.

Olivia De Sanctis is a Ph.D. student in English and has also completed her Honours B.A. and M.A. degrees here at York University. She loves the campus and its community. Her research interests are mainly in modern and contemporary poetry, particularly experimental or avant-garde work, the intersections between poetry and the visual arts, how the material aspects of poetry shape the reading experience, and the ways in which literature can exist in physical space.

Her Major Research Paper for the completion of her M.A., The Poetics of Filling Space: Understanding Experimentation with Material Forms in the Poetry of Bruce Nauman, Steve McCaffery and derek beaulieu focuses on work which involves innovative uses of poetic media including Nauman’s Human Nature / Life Death / Knows Doesn’t Know, Human Nature / Life Death, and Human Nature / Knows Doesn’t Know (1983), McCaffery’s Carnival The Second Panel: 1970–75 and beaulieu’s Prose of the Trans-Canada. The project borrows from Michel Foucault’s notion of the book as experience in order to unpack the ways in which the material aspects of these poems can alter the reading experience by emphasizing not only psychological but also bodily interaction with poetry. In doing so, the project investigates the ways in which the use of media commonly associated with visual art emphasizes or reimagines common elements of poetry while also considering the cultural contexts which shape the reading experience.

Peter Unwin is the author of numerous books, including Searching For Petronius Totem (2017). His most recent novel, Written in Stone, was released in October, 2020, and his latest collection of poetry The Infinite Park is set for release in the spring, 2021. His academic work investigates the narratives of old and new media, the material makeup of the written word, and the discourse known as “the death of the book.” His essays and critiques have been published by the Canadian Journal of Communications, the Oxford Press, Penninsula: A Journal of Inter-relational Politics, and special issue of Convergence: the International Journal of Research into New Media Technologies. He lives in Toronto with his wife and daughters.

Sandra Lau received her H.B.A. from the University of Toronto and her M.A. from York University. She’s also a member of the Editorial Board at Pivot, York’s interdisciplinary journal by the Graduate Program in English. Her poetry and writing have appeared in PRISM international and TasteToronto.

Tamara Frooman (she/her) is a second year PhD student. She holds a BA from UofT with a double major in English and Gender Studies and completed her SSHRC-funded MA in English in the field of Creative Writing at UofT. Her research interests include psychoanalytic, queer, and deconstructionist frameworks at the intersection of auto-theory, auto-fiction, and auto-biography. Her first true love was critical theory.
Email address: froomant@yorku.ca

Theo Fox (he/him) is a PhD student in English at York University. He specializes in drama, Renaissance literature, and representations of the disabled body on early modern and modern stages. His dissertation, “‘by my lookes into my manners prie’: Early Modern Representations of Disability as Symbol, Cipher, and Censure,” examines early modern drama through the lens of critical disability studies, focusing specifically on the perceived relationship between disability and ethos. Through comparative analysis of literary representations of Richard III across verse biographies, chronicle narratives, and playscripts, he problematizes the relationship between metaphor and disability, disease and perceived deviance, and narrative and national memory. His project both demonstrates and rejects the extensive literary tradition that frames disability as a mere cipher through which authors can explore aesthetics, ethics, or moral perversity. By extension, Theo critiques the scholarly impetus to further marginalize disabled people through studies of disability as a set of symbols rather than a lived experience. Instead, he utilizes contemporary theories and models of disability studies to suggest that early modern playscripts offer a vital opportunity to analyze how disability has been codified in literature as simultaneously a symbol with multiple significations, a cipher for moral perversities, and a censure against cultural deviancy. Across his doctoral research, he seeks to illustrate how new perspectives in disability studies allow for resistance, self-definition, and autonomous counter-narratives.

Theo completed both his MA (‘19) and his Spec. Hon. BA (‘18) in English at York University. He also has a background in creative and commercial writing, having previously worked in copywriting and communications, and is passionate about accessibility and knowledge mobilization.

Tita Kyrtsakas received her BA(H) in English and Drama (2015) and B.Ed. from the University of Windsor (2019) and her MA with a SSHRC grant from the University of Toronto in Theatre, Drama, and Performance Studies (2016). She finds great joy in teaching and she is excited to be a PhD student at York, researching representations of grief and hope in contemporary Young Adult fiction and theatre from the perspective of age.

In 2019, Tita received the Ada Slaight Award in Drama from Young People’s Theatre and is currently their scholar-in-residence. She is also editor of Feminist Space Camp Magazine, an online digital art collective, and is a creative writer (Sandpiper Journal, Type/Cast Magazine and Shameless Magazine.) Outside of school, Tita loves eating food all across the city, attending art shows, and practicing yoga.

Zaynab Ali (she/her) is a doctoral student in English at York University. Her interests lie in the field of world literature and exilic writing. Her dissertation “World Narratives of Internal Exile: Critical Remains” explores figures of internal exile in three spaces and times of crisis since World War II. Her project redeploys Bakhtinian concepts of genres and discursive identities to delineate the chronotope of world narratives of internal exile. It aims to forge new pathways to the past and to represent a “now” that could generate an altered future. Her dissertation examines vectors inflecting individual and communal lives (memory, identity, and language) in order to question how silence is met, echoed, and conveyed through the narratives of internal exile.

Zaynab is the recipient of the SSHRC Joseph-Armand Bombardier Canadian Graduate Scholarship (2021). She completed her BA (Hons.) (2018) and MA (2019) at York University. Along with her MA, Zaynab also completed her Graduate Diploma in World Literature (2019) and is working towards receiving a Graduate Diploma in Refugee and Migration Studies alongside her doctoral degree.

She has presented papers at conferences and colloquia for the Canadian Association for Theatre Research at Congress (2019), Transgressions (2019), Intersections/Cross-Sections (2020), the Institute for World Literature (2020), and the Canadian Comparative Literature Association (2022). Her scholarly work has been published in peer-reviewed journals Culture (2017), Contingent Horizons (2018), Journal of Comparative Literature and Aesthetics (2022), and her creative work has been published in Inkling (2017). She has also published a co-written chapter, “Demonstration of Scientific Salesmanship: An Introduction,” for Blowing Up the Skirt of History: An Anthology of Early Canadian Women’s Drama, 1880-1929 (McGill-Queen’s UP, 2021)