Graduate Profiles

Lara Bourdin

is completing a cotutelle/dual doctoral degree in Hispanic Studies at McGill University and Sorbonne-Université. Her research centres on the theme of hospitality in contemporary Latin American literature and culture. This project is supported by doctoral awards from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC) and the Fonds de recherche du Québec—société et culture (FRQSC), as well as a 3-year "contrat doctoral" from Sorbonne-Université. After a Joint Honours B.A. in Art History and Philosophy at McGill, Lara completed an M.A. in Art History at the Université de Montréal (2013) and an M.A. in Portuguese, Brazilian and Luso-African Studies at Sorbonne-Université (2020). Inspired by her interdisciplinary studies and work experience in the cultural and non-profit sectors, her research interests centre on critical migration & border studies, translation, and cultural exchanges between Latin America and Africa. At McGill, she has taught Contemporary Brazilian Literature & Culture, in addition to working as a TA. Her first book, Caminhos da migrância em Paulo Nazareth, is forthcoming at Edições Carolina (Brazil).

Annika Burkard

Annika Burkard is completing her PhD in German studies at the Department of Languages, Literatures and Cultures. She holds a Bachelor’s degree in German language and literature with a minor in Middle Eastern studies from Philipps University in Marburg, Germany, and a Master’s degree in German studies from the University of Manitoba. Her Master’s thesis The Flight Across the Sea in the Context of the European Refugee Crisis in 2015/2016: The Political Steering of Recipients in Literature and Film examines Wolfgang Fischer’s film Styx from 2018, Reinhard Kleist’s graphic novel Der Traum von Olympia (An Olympic Dream) from 2015, and Merle Kröger’s crime novel Havarie (Collision) from 2015. Specifically, she analyzed the emotional, cognitive, ethical, and political steerings of the recipients and the depiction of Europe, its responsibilities, and the traces of colonialism as projected in films and literature.

Her research interests include the depiction of flight and migration in current films, literature, and artworks, the relations between literature, films, and politics, and developments in modern Europe.

She currently lectures Beginning German at McGill University.

Meghri Doumanian

Dayana Fernandez Molina

Paul Fritz Gamarra Yanez

Michiko Hara

Michiko Hara is a Ph.D. student in Italian Studies. After having practised law in the field of international business for over 25 years, she took early retirement to pursue her interest in the Italian Renaissance at McGill University. In her B.A. Honours thesis, she discussed Pope Leo X’s contributions to the Renaissance in Rome. Her Master’s thesis on Giacomo Puccini’s opera Gianni Schicchi shed light upon the question of social justice and his conscious departure from its source, Dante’s Divine Comedy. Her focus remains on the analysis of Puccini’s operas by highlighting his denunciations of social injustice through a literary rather than a musical approach. On a personal level, she maintains her passion for the Italian Renaissance.

Ingrid Lassek

Ingrid Lassek is in her second year of a Doctor of Philosophy in German Studies at McGill University. She received her Bachelor of Arts (Honours in English) from the University of British Columbia in 2020, and completed her MA Degree in German Studies at McGill University in 2022. Her MA Thesis "'On Your Imaginary Forces Work': Shakespeare in Eighteenth-Century Germany," is a historical-literary survey, and is the foundation for her doctoral research on the concept of wonder in Shakespeare’s plays in context with his reception in eighteenth-century Germany. She is a TA and course lecturer at McGill University. Her research interests include the literary movements Sensibility and Sturm and Drang, Shakespeare in South Africa, the history of emotions, and the concept of wonder.

Edgar Lazo Cornejo

is currently a PhD student in Hispanic Studies. He is completing his Ph.D. dissertation focusing on 21st Century Contemporary Mexican literature. In his thesis, he postulates that the literary representation of discourses and social practices highlights the mutual dependence between several types of violence (subjective, symbolic, and systemic), thus illustrating social theories that underline the interdependence between individual agency and social structure, as well as offering a story that reveals social, economic, and vital expulsions. Edgar completed his Master's in Hispanic Studies at McGill University, and he holds a BA in Hispanic Studies from Concordia University, and a BEng in Chemical Engineering from the Tecnológico de Monterrey (ITESM). His research interests are Latin-American literature from XX and XXI centuries, Latin American Cultural Studies, human migration, and Affect Theory.

contact: edgar.lazocornejo [at] mail.mcgill.ca

Teboho Makalima

Rania Metni

Julio Meza Diaz

is a PhD student (AbD) in Hispanic Studies. He holds a Master of Arts in Hispanic Studies from Western University (London, Ontario), and a Master's degree in Cultural Management from the University of Buenos Aires (UBA), where he wrote a thesis on strategic planning, accessibility rights, and artistic development for individuals with disabilities in local art museums. Furthermore, he earned a Law Degree from the Pontifical Catholic University of Peru (PCUP), focusing on the legal capacities of individuals with disabilities in the context of current debates on Human Rights.

His ongoing research centers around the development of the Arguedian/Andean model of disability. This model integrates the Andean episteme as portrayed by Arguedas in his anthropological works, showcasing a unique perspective on mental disability.

Julio has a keen interest in disability activism. In 2007, he was invited by the Government of Panama and the Organization of American States (OAS) to the Inter-American Conference for the Rights of People with Disabilities charged with discussing the implementation of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of People with Disabilities in Latin America. He has also served as a member of the Special Commission for the Review of the Civil Code in the Congress of the Republic of Peru in 2014. Through this commission, the UN convention was introduced in the country, leading to significant changes in its legal system.

His academic contributions include the publication of research papers in various journals, such as Illapa Illapa Mana Tukukuq, focusing on museums, cultural management, heritage, and art. He has also contributed to the book Pensar las cárceles en América Latina (2016). Additionally, he has presented his work at academic events hosted by PUCP, UBA, and the National Autonomous University of Mexico.

Finally, Julio Meza Díaz has worked as a cultural journalist for the newspaper El Comercio and the magazine El Buen Salvaje. He has authored short stories, novels, books of poetry, and comics. His most recent publications include Vargas Yosa (Mexico, 2020; Peru, 2023) and La Máquina del Orgasmo Infinito (Mexico, 2021; Chile, 2023).

Matteo Ottaviani

Matteo Ottaviani is a Ph.D. student at McGill University. He received his B.A. in History of Art, Medieval art specialization, from the Università di Bologna with a thesis in Digital Humanities and an M.A., also from the Università di Bologna, in Medieval History. After his degree he attended the Specialization School of Archival science, Paleography and Diplomatic at the State Archives of Bologna and he received a Diploma from the National School for editing of documentary sources at the Historic Italian Institute for Middle Ages (ISIME). His main interest is Dante and the genesis of the Commedia during the Casentino exile. He is also interested in medieval society and politics, and in the relation between Dante and political power. He promotes an interdisciplinary approach on his research that combines history and literature. He worked as a freelance researcher for The Study Center on Charities, Fondazione del Monte di Pietà di Bologna e Ravenna and as a secondary school teacher in Italy with a project about local history. He also teaches Italian languages at McGill University and for APIQ association.

Carlos Antonio Pajuelo Jara

Carlos Antonio Pajuelo Jara is a doctoral student in Hispanic Studies. He holds a Master of Arts in Hispanic Studies from the University of British Columbia with a thesis on Codex MS. 11017 Trinity College, Dublin: Regula Sancti Benedicti, and an Honours BA in Spanish Literature and Society from Concordia University. His current research focuses on Modern and Contemporary Latin-American identity representations in cultural productions in analog and digital publications by Hispanic-Canadian authors living in Quebec. He is also interested in medieval and colonial paleography, historiography, disability studies, and translation studies. Before joining McGill, Carlos Antonio held instructor, TA, and RA positions at the University of Toronto, Universidad Nacional Mayor de San Marcos, the University of British Columbia, and Concordia University. His academic work has been funded by SSHRC, McGill's Graduate Excellence Award (Ph.D.), and the Gordon J.A. Whitehorne Fellowship (Ph.D.). Carlos Antonio has presented his work at the Canadian Association of Hispanists, the Levy-Wasteneys Symposium, the UBC-FHIS Graduate Student Conference, and the Concordia Hispanic Studies International Colloquium. His creative writing has been published in AErea, The Apostles Review, and Helios.

Fernando Pomareda

Fernando Pomareda is a Ph.D. candidate in Hispanic Studies. He holds a master's degree in Advanced Studies in Spanish and Hispanic-American Literature from the Universitat de Barcelona. There he wrote a final project focused on the mythical transformation of the hero in the novel Los detectives salvajes (1998) by Chilean writer Roberto Bolaño. He also holds a licenciatura from Pontificia Universidad Católica del Perú in Hispanic Literature. His thesis focused on the reminiscences of the Andean myth of Inkarrí in the novel Adiós, Ayacucho (1986) by Peruvian writer Julio Ortega, set during the Armed Internal Conflict in Peru during the 1980s and 1990s.

His ongoing Ph.D. dissertation project continues exploring the presence of the Andean myth of Inkarrí within contemporary Peruvian cultural expressions to comprehend the political violence during this tragic chapter in Peruvian history. His research questions how Peruvian creators in the last two decades of the 20th Century and the early 2000s, individually and collectively, used this myth as a conceptual tool to interpret the violence and the possibilities of healing the trauma.

Samiksha Puri

Samiksha Puri is a doctoral student in Hispanic Studies. She graduated from Delhi University with a B.A. in Advertising, Sales Promotion and Management and an M.A. in Hispanic Studies, focused on Colonial, Postcolonial and Decolonial Studies in 20th-century Peruvian Literature. She has also worked as an English Language Assistant in Spain and as a Spanish language instructor at McGill University.

Currently, her PhD research studies the tales about the privatization and contamination of natural resources and mining activities in Latin America. Her research interests include Eco-criticism, Ambiental Studies, and Colonial and Post-colonial Literature.

Maria Fernanda Riva Palacio Rabadan

is a Ph.D. student in the Program of Hispanic Studies. She holds a Licenciatura in English Literature from the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM), where she graduated with Honors. She also works as a freelance dubbing translator for production companies such as Disney, Netflix and Universal. Her research interests are contemporary Latin American literature, gothic fiction, and the relationship between the Latin American and the anglophone gothic tradition. She is particularly interested in Argentinian writers Mariana Enriquez and Samantha Schweblin, and the gothic both authors are creating.

Ricardo Antonio e Silva Afonso Ferreira Filho

Katrin Rohrbacher

Katrin Rohrbacher is a PhD student in German Studies at the Department of Languages, Literature and Cultures. She holds a master’s degree in Comparative Literature from the University of Vienna. In her master’s thesis, Katrin catalogued and studied for the first time the unpublished literary work of the Austrian writer and artist Helga Michie, twin sister of the writer Ilse Aichinger. This was made possible by the close collaboration of Michie’s family. In her thesis Katrin examined how the notion of Exile can be used as a fruitful aesthetic category in both Michie’s literary work as well as her work in the visual arts in regard to its social-historical context.

Her current research interests include: 19^th and 20^th century German literature, computational literary studies, space and place in narrative theory, digital cultures, and urban studies.

She is editorial assistant for the Journal of Cultural Analytics and course lecturer in German at McGill. Prior to coming to McGill, she worked as research assistant at the Austrian Academy of Sciences.

In addition to her academic path, Katrin worked as curatorial assistant at Künstlerhaus, Halle für Kunst und Medien (Exhibition Space for Art & Media) in Graz, Austria.

Contact: katrin.rohrbacher [at] mcgill.ca

Hernan Rojas

Samantha Ruckenstein

Samantha Ruckenstein is currently a PhD student in Hispanic Studies at McGill University with a focus on Contemporary Spanish literature. Samantha completed her Master's in Hispanic Literatures and Cultures with a specialization in Medieval studies at the University of Toronto, in addition to her Undergraduate degree in Hispanic Studies at Queen's University. Samantha has an internship with the Canadian Association of Hispanists and is a TA and course lecturer at McGill University. Along with her research position at the Centre for Early Modern Visual Culture, she has two articles that are forthcoming. Her research interests include: Medieval and Contemporary Iberian Literature, Transatlantic Spanish Studies, Feminist theory, Queer theory, Minority studies, Jewish studies, and Spanish law. For more information, please contact samantha.ruckenstein [at] mcgill.ca

Daniel Esteban SALAS HOYOS

Daniel Esteban Salas Hoyos is a Ph.D. student in Hispanic Studies at the Department of Languages, Literatures, and Cultures. He received his B.A. in Literary Studies from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia in Bogotá and specialized in Spanish chivalric romance. He later completed a B.A. in Arabic studies from the Aix-Marseille and Lyon Lumière universities and participated in the yearly Arabic language program of IFPO at Amman, Jordan. He holds a master’s degree in Medieval History and Literature of the Islamic and Christian Worlds from Lyon Lumière University with a thesis entitled: “La traduction espagnole des Chétifs incluse dans la Gran Conquista de Ultramar: interpretation des variantes”. 

His research interests include medieval and early modern Spanish literature as well as medieval Islamic history and literature in Arabic and Persian languages. He is interested in studying and fostering connections between Latin America and the Middle East.

Sophie Marie Schönberg

Sophie is a PhD student in German Studies; her research focuses on the representations of human-animal relationships and conceptions of nature in literature and film. She holds a Masters in German Studies from McGill University, and two BAs in Journalism and Communication Studies, and in Romance Studies from the University of Vienna. While completing her undergraduate degrees, Sophie studied at the University of Lyon 2 (France) and at the University of Montreal. In her master’s thesis, entitled “Kafka’s animots: Challenging Anthropocentrism,” she examined questions of animality within the works of Franz Kafka. Sophie loves teaching, and has a passion for whetting her students’ curiosity about, and enthusiasm for, the German language and culture. Having won a Fulbright scholarship, she taught German for two semesters at Bowling Green State University (USA). Since coming to McGill, she has been teaching German language courses, as well as working for McGill’s Student and Learning Services as a Student Skills Assistant, where she facilitates skills development workshops for graduate and undergraduate students.

Aarshiyaa Sharma

Ekaterina Tutatina

Ekaterina Tutatina is completing her PhD in Russian studies under the supervision of Dr. Daniel W. Pratt. She also works as a course lecturer in elementary Russian at the Department of Languages, Literatures, and Cultures at McGill University. She has a Kandidat Nauk degree in philology from Moscow Polytechnic University in Russia and a Master's degree with distinction in editing and publishing from Moscow State University of Printing Arts. She examined more than 6,000 book titles for her Kandidat Nauk dissertation in order to identify trends in contemporary book naming. She also worked as an editor and translator from English to Russian on a localization team in Saint Petersburg, Russia, before enrolling at McGill to continue her academic career. A current focus of her studies is contemporary queer young adult literature in Russia. Her research interests include Russian literary heritage expressed in LGBTQ+ novels and fan fiction and creating queer identity in Russia. Additionally, she studies censorship issues and current book distribution in Russia.

Roberto Viviani

is a Ph.D. student at McGill University. He received is M.A in Law from the University Of Macerata (UniMc) with a thesis in Philosophy of Law intitled "The Crisis of Western Democracies", inspired by the texts of Norberto Bobbio.

He also holds a M.A. in Philosophy from University of Montreal (UdeM). Here his thesis was based on a cross-reading of Antonio Gramsci and Michel Foucault reflections on "Power and its Displaying".

The main interest of his current research project is "Pier Paolo Pasolini's Aesthetic and the Representation of Oppression in his Mature Works". He uses "Post-Structuralist" and "Neo-Marxian" approaches as his theoretical frameworks. He promotes an interdisciplinary approach on his research that combines Philosophy, Genealogy, Literature and Cinema.

He is the promoter and organizer of the annual conference Rethinking Gramsci and a member of the International Gramsci Society.

He also teaches Italian languages and Italian Culture at McGill University and for the Istituto Italiano di Cultura of Montreal.

Mira Wiczak 

is a PhD student in Hispanic Studies at the Department of Languages, Literature, and Cultures. She holds a Master's degree in Modern Languages from the University of Oxford and a Bachelor’s in Spanish and Portuguese from the University of Gdansk. In her Master’s thesis, she focused on the literary representation of family in the face of state violence in twenty-first-century Peruvian fiction.

In her current research, she focuses on contemporary first-person texts from Peru and Chile, particularly interested in youth studies and autobiographical narratives. She worked as a course lecturer in Spanish at McGill University.

Contact: mira.witczak [at] mail.mcgill.ca

Alexandre Zaezjev

I am a film and media researcher, course lecturer, and multimedia artist based in Montreal, Canada. Ever since completing my MA thesis on the role of new media in the Ukrainian Euromaidan Revolution at the University of Geneva, Switzerland, I've been delving into the cultural and political landscape of the post-Soviet region. 

My PhD dissertation project examines how major traumas of the region’s twentieth-century history – such as the Holocaust and the Stalinist repressions, have been addressed in two site-specific projects by contemporary artist and film director Ilya Khrzhanovsky – the Babyn Yar Holocaust Memorial Center (Kyiv, Ukraine) and the multimedia project DAU (Kharkiv, Ukraine). Through my research, generously supported by the FRQSC doctoral scholarship, I aim to understand the potential of site-specific artistic practices in processing historical trauma in the post-witness era.

Drawing upon my research expertise and profound understanding of historical discrimination, I also consider community advocacy to be an integral part of my professional activities. In my role as the Equity and Diversity Commissioner at McGill PGSS for the 2023-2024 term, my utmost dedication lies in creating an inclusive and welcoming environment for all marginalized groups, including the newly admitted groups of refugees who have fled from war-torn regions.

Ambroise Bernier

is an M.A. student working on Dante’s Comedy. He is interested in the resolution of the tension between terrestrial and celestial goods in Dante’s poem.
He has completed a B.A. in Literature, a Certificate in Great Books and a Certificate in Classics at Université Laval.

Juan Carlos Flores Turrubiates

Sil Hamilton

Hailie Jackson

Sandra Lauzon

Zoe Paul

Sean Weaver

As a student of the Digital Humanities program, I’m interested in what new insights technology, particularly with machine learning and large language models, can bring to our understanding of narrative theory. It’s an interest that’s followed me since completing my undergrad at the University of New South Wales, in English literature and creative writing, where I acquired a deep fascination with narratology. 

From a humanities perspective, narratology could be viewed as a study of narrative structure, through the use of literary mechanisms, etc. However, in parallel, I also saw narratology as a study of how information is conveyed, data passed onto the reader, through a considered use of narrative. Consider, as an example, the impact of some of your favourite literary works on your perspective, and the influence of narrative in that impression.  

It is with this interest that I aim to explore narrative patterns of certain authors through the use of ML/LLMs, particularly in the comic medium. Though I am excited by the contemporary interest and tools available in this space, my interest isn’t as much in building better narrative machines (i.e. ChatGPT) but in what new insights can be gained about the process of narration through the use of narrative machines. 

Please don’t hesitate to reach out or connect if you’re working in similar spaces.

Sophie Wu

Yizhang Yang

Jingxuan Zhao

Haiqi Zhou