Previous research

I have been interested in and investigated conceptions of borders and border-crossings since my dissertation Fictions of (In)Betweenness, which engaged with border issues in Coetzee, Malouf, Erdrich, Bhabha, Derrida, and Said. I have also worked with the international Border Poetics Research Group (housed at the University of Tromsø ) to develop theoretical and practical strategies (a "border poetics") for examining the function of these forms of representation in the intersection between territorial borders and aesthetic works.

Current research

My project traces the critical engagement in literature and art today with traditional conceptions of animality (and humanity), in particular the role language and the body play in these. With its focus on the fundamental questions arising from the relationships and encounters between human and nonhuman animals, my study seeks to contribute to contemporary reflections on the moral status of animals and humans. (Descartes, Bentham, Darwin, Agamben, Derrida, Beckett, Coetzee, Kafka, Köhler, London, Woolf, Joseph Smith, William Forsythe).

Categories

Literary theory, world literature, animal studies