MA candidates
Charlotte Cook
BA Hons English (Otago)
Topic: Nature, the natural world, and eco-criticism in CS Lewis
Email cooch447@student.otago.ac.nz
Supervisor: Dr Paul Tankard
Leslie den Toon
BA Honors combined - English and Classics (Otago)
Topic: The Last Days of Pompeii and the Victorians.
Email denle934@student.otago.ac.nz
Supervisor: Associate Professor Thomas McLean
Sandra Jones
BA Hons English and Old Norse (Wales)
Topic: Are we on the same journey? The exiled wanderer and the practical pilgrim in the early medieval period
Email sandra.jones@postgrad.otago.ac.nz
Supervisor: Professor Simone Marshall
Chris Lam
BSc in Genetics, minor in Zoology; BA(Hons) in Media and Communication Studies, minor in Sociology
Topic: Precarity, Play and Posthumanism: Tracing the New Weird from Gothic Literature to Art Games
Email chrislam@keemail.me
Supervisor: Associate Professor Dave Ciccoricco
Briar McBurney
BA English Studies (Otago)
Topic: Recreating the Medieval: Fantasy Media and Medieval Beliefs
Email mcbr662@student.otago.ac.nz
Sam Stevens
BA Hons Art History and Theory (Otago)
Topic: Use of light in Medieval Art
Email stesa138@student.otago.ac.nz
Supervisor: Professor Simone Marshall
PhD candidates
Rachel Connor
PhD Topic: Richard Holland’s Buke of the Howlat
Email: conra395@student.otago.ac.nz
Sarper Dorter
Topic: From Yesterday’s Rubble to the Futuer Edgelands: Designated Temporalities and the Ruinscapes of Africa
Email dorsa219@student.otago.ac.nz
Jasmine Gallagher
PhD Topic: The New Sincerity in Contemporary New Zealand Poetry and Art
Email galja734@student.otago.ac.nz
Roberto Suazo Gomez
(or Robert, if you prefer)
Topic: Women’s Laughter in Classical and Medieval Literature and Culture
Email suaro026@student.otago.ac.nz
Md. Rakibul Hasan Khan
Qualifications: MPhil, MA, and BA (Honours) in English (University of Rajshahi, Bangladesh)
PhD Topic: Globalization, the Environment, and the Postcolony: Studies in Selected South Asian Novels in English of the Twenty-First Century
Research Interests: postcolonial and eco-postcolonial studies, globalization, and diaspora studies
Email khara602@student.otago.ac.nz
Robyn Maree Pickens
Qualifications: MA in Art History
PhD Topic: An eco-poetics of love: eros, saina and syntropy in the work of Juliana Spahr, Craig Santos Perez, Sarah Smuts-Kennedy.
Research Interests: Ecological aesthetics in critical and creative practices. Robyn's poetry and text-based work was exhibited at Artspace, Auckland in March 2018, and she curated an exhibition on ecological themes at Blue Oyster Project Space, Dunedin in May-June 2018. Robyn’s poetry has appeared in SAND (2018), Cordite (2018), Plumwood Mountain (2018), Matador Review (2017), Jacket 2 (2017), and her poetry criticism has appeared in Rain Taxi (2018) and Jacket 2 (2017). She was a finalist of the 2018 Sarah Broom Poetry Prize judged by Eileen Myles, and the winner of the takahē Monica Taylor Poetry Prize 2018.
Email robynmareepickens@outlook.co.nz
Web https://robynmareepickens.com/
Essa May Ranapiri
MA in Creative Writing (Victoria University of Wellington), and BA (Honours) in English (University of Waikato) BA in History (University of Waikato) Undergraduate Diploma in Māori and Indigenous Studies (University of Waikato)
Topic: Takatāpui Toikupu and the Cyborg, an investigation into poetry by contemporary takatāpui writers and how they utilise the cyborg in content and form to realise Mana Takatāpui
Primary Supervisor: Professor Jacob Edmond
Research Interests: Contemporary Poetry and Poetics, Indigenous Studies, Queer Studies, Philosophy of Technology.
Email essawrites@outlook.co.nz
Adam Stewart
Qualifications: BA Hons. English Literature/Music Studies (Victoria University, Wellington), MA Creative Writing (IIML)
PhD Topic: "Toitū: the story of a stream" - Deconstruction, the New Historicism and Digital Historical Fiction
Research Interests: deconstruction, narratology, gaming and the digital humanities
Email stead429@student.otago.ac.nz
Pamela Treanor
Qualifications: BA in History, Massey University; PGDip Librarianship, Victoria University of Wellington; GradDip Russian, University of Otago, MA English, University of Otago.
PhD Topic: “Layers of Intent and Meaning in Medieval European Lettered Textiles, and Their Portrayal in Literature”
Research Interests: Medieval literature, textile history, bibliography, NZ theatre history
Rushi Vyas
Education: BS (University of Michigan), MFA (University of Colorado-Boulder)
PhD Topic: Creative/Critical: Rituals of Relinquishment and Poetry of the Extreme Present
Research Interests: Creative Practice, Creative Writing, Contemporary Poetry and Poetics, Decolonial Theory, Race and Poetry, Performance Studies
Web rushivyas.org
Email vyaru178@student.otago.ac.nz
Louise Wallace
PhD Topic: Womanhood in Contemporary Long-Form Narrative Poetry
Email mealo128@student.otago.ac.nz
Eileen Yu
Topic: Virginia Woolf and the cinema
Primary Supervisor: Dr Rochelle Simmons
Research Interests: Virginia Woolf, Modernism, cinema studies, visual cultures, feminism.
Email yuei5909@otago.student.ac.nz
Yu Zhang 张宇
PhD Topic: Reading Poetry in English through the Chinese Poetic Concept of “Idea-scape,” or yijing 意境
Email zhayu888@student.otago.ac.nz
