Sneharika Roy
Associate Professor, Writing Program Administrator
- Department: Comparative Literature and English
- Office:G-117
- Office Hours:Tuesdays & Fridays 14:0015:00 or by appointment
Professor Roy studied English, French, and Indian literature at the University of Mumbai before pursuing a Ph.D. at La Sorbonne Nouvelle. During her doctorate, she taught courses in Postcolonial Studies and Literature as well as history and civilisation courses in French universities and grandes 矇coles. She joined the American University in 2014 where she teaches English and Comparative Literature courses, often drawing from her research in classical and contemporary trends in epic. Her forthcoming book Postcolonial Epic, a revised version of her thesis manuscript, identifies a contemporary avatar of classical epicpostcolonial epicprefigured by Herman Melvilles Moby Dick, a founding text of North America, and exemplified by Derek Walcotts Caribbean masterpiece Omeros and Amitav Ghoshs South Asian saga Ibis trilogy. Postcolonial Epic demonstrates the epic genres rich potential to articulate and interrogate postcolonial concerns of cultural hybridity, historical revisionism, and post-independence nation-building across the Global North/South divide. Professor Roy has continued to explore hybrid theoretical frameworks bridging classical and postcolonial paradigms in articles published in Commonwealth Essays and Studies and Journal of Postcolonial Writing. She is currently working on varied projects, notably a chapter for a volume on Amitav Ghosh in the MLA series Approaches to Teaching World Literature and entries for Le Dictionnaire des litt矇ratures de lInde.
Education/Degrees
- Ph.D. (2013), Langues et Litt矇ratures trang癡res, Universit矇 Sorbonne Nouvelle-Paris III
- MA (2010), Litt矇rature G矇n矇rale et Compar矇e, Universit矇 Sorbonne Nouvelle-Paris III
- MA (2007), French and Francophone Literature, University of Mumbai
- BA (2005), English Literature, University of Mumbai
Publications
Co-editor of an issue of a Journal . 2014. With Madeleine Laurencin, Commonwealth Essays and Studies 36.2.
Articles in Peer-reviewed Journals
- 2016. Review of Karthika Na簿rs Until the Lions: Echoes from the Mahabharata. Journal of Postcolonial Writing. 52.3: 374-5.. 2016. Review Le Postcolonial compar矇: anglophonie, francophonie, ed. Claire Joubert. tudes anglaises 69.2 (2016).
- 2014. Postcolonial Epic Rewritings and the Poetics of Relation: A Glissantian Reading of Shashi Tharoors The Great Indian Novel and Derek Walcotts Omeros in Journal of Postcolonial Writing 51.1: 59-71.
- 2014. An Empires Bookends : vers une po矇tique de linach癡vement dans les r矇矇critures postcoloniales d矇pop矇es chez Shashi Tharoor et Derek Walcott in Linachev矇 ou l癡re des possibles dans la litt矇rature anglophone : r矇cits ouverts et incomplets. Ed. Fran癟ois Gallix, Armelle Parey, and Isabelle Roblin. Caen: UP of Caen, 219-230.
- 2014. Shining in Paradoxical Splendor: The Staging of the difficult Relation in Faulkners Sagas as a Prefiguration of Postcolonial Epic. Commonwealth Essays and Studies 37.1: 79-87.
- 2011. Postcolonial Engagements with the Epics: Multiple and Movable Tectonic Plates in Commonwealth Essays and Studies 34.1: 25-32.
- 2009. The White Tiger: The Beggars Booker in Commonwealth Essays and Studies 31.2: 57-67. Chapters
唬堯硃梯喧梗娶莽泭
- 2012. An Ever-Extending Dialogue with the Dead Poets: Nekuia as a Site of Dialogization in New World Epics in The Epic Expands: Rereading and widening the Epic Corpus / Relecture et ouverture du corpus 矇pique. Ed. Vincent Dussol. Brussels: Peter Lang, 267-276.
- 2011. Hybridizing Homer: A Case of Epic Genes and Genre in Hybridity: Forms and Figures in Literature and the Visual Arts. Ed. Vanessa Guignery, Catherine Pessoa-Miquel, and Fran癟ois Specq. Newcastle-Upon-Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 312-321.
Conferences & Lectures
- Facets of Freedom: Social Death and Karmic Rebirth in Amitav Ghoshs Sea of Poppies. Relations and Networks in Indian Ocean Writing. Autonomous University of Barcelona.November 2015.
- Whats Postcoloniality got to do with it? Classical, Modern, and Postcolonial Perspectives on the Post- War Expatriate Experience of Neurosis. Empire and Neurosis. University of Dortmund. October 2015.
- Why Faulkner? Aporetic Nonpassage and douard Glissants difficult Relation. 54th Congress of the S.A.E.S. University of Caen. May 2014
- Moby Dick and the Narrative of the Heroic Slave: Affinities with Epic and Slave Narratives, Anticipations of Postcolonial Epic. The Ninth Melville Conference, George Washington University. June 2013.
- La d矇s-h矇llenisation dHom癡re et la d矇s-orientalisation de Ved Vyas : la r矇appropriation postcoloniale de l矇pop矇e chez Shashi Tharoor et Derek Walcott. Litt矇ratures et Th矇ories Postcoloniales. E.N.S. dUlm. January 2012. Invited speaker.
- The Great Indian Novel and the little Indian traditions: Situating Shashi Tharoors Great Indian Novel in the Pre-Colonial Traditions of Epic Allegory in India. Chotro 4: Imagining the Intangible: Languages, Literature and Visual Arts of the Indigenous, co-organised by E.A.C.L.A.L.S. and Bhasha. University of Vadodara, India. January 2012.
- An Empires Bookends : vers une po矇tique de linach癡vement dans les r矇矇critures postcoloniales d矇pop矇es chez Derek Walcott et Shashi Tharoor. The Unfinished / Linachev矇. University of Caen Lower Normandy. December 2011.
- New World Epics: Multiple and Movable Tectonic Plates. 51st Congress of the S.A.E.S. La Sorbonnne Nouvelle, Paris. May 2011.
- Epic Rewritings as Postcolonial Gateways: A Comparative Approach to Shashi Tharoors The Great Indian Novel and Derek Walcotts Omeros. 14th Triennial E.A.C.L.A.L.S. Conference. University of Istanbul. April 2011.
- An Ever-Extending Dialogue with the Dead Poets: Nekuia as a Site of Epic Dialogization. The Epic Today / Lpop矇e aujourdhui. Paul Val矇ry University-Montpellier 3. October 2010.
- Hybridizing Homer: A Case of Epic Genes and Genre. Hybridity / Hybridit矇. E.N.S. de Lyon. October 2010.
- Epic Horizons and Intertextuality in Moby Dick. 50th Congress of the S.A.E.S., doctorials. University of Lille. Mai 2010.
Affiliations
- Modern Language Association
- European Association for Commonwealth Literature and Language Studies
- Soci矇t矇 des Anglicistes de lEnseignement Sup矇rieur
Research Areas
- Postcolonial Studies
- Indian Literature
- Classical Studies