Website: http://complit.rutgers.edu

Undergraduate Director: Jorge T. Marcone

Graduate Director: Andrew C. Parker

Core Faculty:

Ousseina Alidou, B.A., Niamey (Africa); M.A., Ph.D., Indiana
African literature and folklore; African and comparative women's studies

Karen Bishop, B.A., Ph.D., California (Santa Barbara)
Twentieth-century literatures in Spanish, English, and French; human rights; torture and disappearance; exile studies; translation; genre studies; cartography

Edyta Bojanowska, B.A., Barnard College; Ph.D., Harvard
Nineteenth-century Russian literature and cultural history; empire and nationalism studies; postcolonial theory; Polish literature

Elin Diamond, B.A., Brandeis; M.A., Ph.D., California (Davis)
Drama and performance; dramatic theory and critical theory; feminism and gender studies

E. Efe, B.A., Istanbul University and EUP Rome; Ph.D., Columbia
Philosophy of literature; religion and literature; world literature; Oriental Jewry and Ladino; cultural legacy of the Ottoman Empire; modern European letters; Ottoman and modern Turkish

Uri Eisenzweig, B.A., Tel Aviv (Israel); M.A., Doctorate, Paris
French literature; literary theory; Western literature of the 19th and 20th centuries

Sandy Flitterman-Lewis, B.A., M.A., Ph.D., California (Berkeley)
Feminist theory; cinema and cultural studies; World War II and Holocaust; television and contemporary culture; theories of national identity; French cinema and culture

Martha Helfer, B.A., Washington (St. Louis); M.A., Wisconsin (Madison); Ph.D., Stanford
Literature of the age of Goethe; romantic aesthetic and philosophical theories; German intellectual history (18th-19th century); questions of gender and the construction of subjectivity; philosophical approaches to literature; representations of Jews in German critical discourse

Michael Levine, B.A., Cornell; M.A., Ph.D., Johns Hopkins
Nineteenth- and 20th-century German literature, literary theory, and intellectual history; intersections among literary, philosophical, and psychoanalytic discourses; Holocaust studies

Nelson Maldonado-Torres, B.A., Puerto Rico; Ph.D., Brown
Comparative race and ethnic studies; comparative critical theory; Caribbean philosophy; decolonial thinking

Preetha Mani, B.A., Tufts; Ph.D., California (Berkeley)
Modern Hindi and Tamil literature; Indian literature; feminism and gender studies; world literature; translation studies; genre studies; postcolonial theory

Susan Martin-Márquez, B.A., M.A., Chicago; Ph.D., Pennsylvania
Modern Spanish peninsular cultural studies and Spanish-language film; cinema studies

Yolanda Martínez-San Miguel, B.A., Puerto Rico; M.A., Ph.D., California (Berkeley)
Hispanic Caribbean and Latino literature; literary theory; colonial and postcolonial theory; migration studies; Latin American literature

Anjali Nerlekar, B.A., M.A., M.Phil., Pune (India); Ph.D., Kansas
Multilingual Indian modernisms; Marathi literature; Indo-Caribbean literature; poetry studies; translation studies; Caribbean and postcolonial studies; print cultures and the Indian book

Nicholas Rennie, B.A., Princeton; Ph.D., Yale
Literature of the Enlightenment and the age of Goethe; modern aesthetics and intellectual history; the Frankfurt School; 20th-century German novel

Paul Schalow, B.A., Hampshire College; M.A., Ph.D., Harvard
Japanese literature (Edo period); gender and sexuality in Japanese literature; Japanese women's writing

Richard Serrano, B.A., Stanford; M.A., Ph.D., California (Berkeley)
Maghrebi and Sub-Saharan African literatures in French; modern French poetry; the Qur'an and Arabic poetry; Chinese poetry (especially Tang and Qing); Korean poetry

Ben Sifuentes-Jáuregui, B.A., M.Phil., Ph.D., Yale
Latino/a literature and culture; 20th-century Latin American literature and cultural thought; gender theory and sexuality studies; melodrama; psychoanalysis

James Swenson, B.A., Brown; M.A., Ph.D., Yale
Eighteenth-century literature and intellectual history; 20th-century criticism and theory

Emily Van Buskirk, B.A., Princeton; Ph.D., Harvard
Russian and Czech literature, film, and literary theory; autobiography; in-between genres; everyday life; representations of war and the Leningrad blockade; the culture of the thaw; gender and sexuality; memory and history; theories of the self

Alessandro Vettori, Dottore in Lettere, Firenze (Italy); Ph.D., Yale
Medieval poetry and Dante; rewriting of biblical texts in literary texts of the Italian tradition; the devil in European culture; autobiography

Janet Walker, B.A., Wisconsin; M.A., Ph.D., Harvard
The novel from its European beginnings to its transformations by East, South, and Southeast Asian writers; hybrid modernity in material culture, literature, and the arts; modern Japanese fiction and the West

Steven Walker, B.A., Wisconsin; M.A., Ph.D., Harvard
Interface of ancient Greek and modern texts; Jungian interpretation of myth; modernist cryptic intertexts

Affiliate Faculty:

Nicola Behrmann, M.A., Free University Berlin; Ph.D., New York
European avant-gardes; literary theory; women and gender studies; visual culture

Stephen Bronner, B.A., CUNY (City College); M.A., Ph.D., California (Berkeley)
Critical theory; political theory

Abena Busia, B.A., M.A., St. Anne's College (Oxford); Ph.D., St. Anthony's College (Oxford)
African women in British and American fiction

Ed Cohen, A.B., Georgetown; Ph.D., Stanford
Sexuality; health and healing; political philosophy; social theory; cultural history; transformational technologies; popular culture

Drucilla Cornell, B.A., Antioch; J.D., UCLA Law School
Contemporary continental thought; critical theory; grassroots political and legal mobilization; jurisprudence; women's literature; feminism; aesthetics; psychoanalysis; political philosophy

Jerry Aline Flieger, B.A., Wisconsin; M.A., Ph.D., California (Berkeley)
Twentieth-century and contemporary literature and theory; gender studies; psychoanalytic literary theory

William Galperin, A.B., Chicago; A.M., Ph.D., Brown
Late 18th-century and early 19th-century British poetry and fiction; literary and cultural theory; film studies

Paola Gambarota, Ph.D., Pavia (Italy);  Ph.D., Yale
Modern Italian literature; theories of language and nation; European prewar avant-garde; film

Mary Gossy, B.A., Bryn Mawr College; M.A., Ph.D., Harvard
Spanish and Latin American literature; feminist and critical theory; lesbian and gay literature

Ann Jurecic, B.A., Bryn Mawr, M.A.T., Brown; Ph.D., Princeton
Literature and medicine; writing studies; contemporary literature

Ryan Kernan, A.B., Princeton; Ph.D., California (Los Angeles)
African-American and African diaspora literature; postcolonial literature

Michael McKeon, B.A., Chicago; M.A., Ph.D., Columbia
Seventeenth- and 18th-century English literature; critical theory; historical criticism

Fatima Naqvi, B.A., Dartmouth College; M.A., Ph.D., Harvard
German; Austrian literature and culture; film studies

Louis Sass, B.A., Harvard; M.A., Ph.D., California (Berkeley)
Schizophrenia; assessment; philosophy of psychology; intersection of clinical psychology with philosophy, the arts, and literary studies

Louisa Schein, B.A., Brown; M.A., Ph.D., California (Berkeley)
Cultural politics, ethnicity, nationalism and transnationalism; diaspora, gender and sexuality; representation, media, postcoloniality, postsocialism; China; Asian America

Jeffrey Shandler, B.A., Swarthmore; M.A., Ph.D., Columbia
Yiddish language, literature, and culture; Jews and media; Holocaust representation; Jews and visual culture; American Jewish vernacular culture

Weijie Song, B.A., Xi'an Jiaotong (China); M.A., Ph.D., Peking (China); Ph.D., Columbia
Modern Chinese literature and film; cultural studies; sinophone and diasporic writings

Michelle Stephens, B.A., Stony Brook; Ph.D., Yale
African American; Caribbean and American literature and culture; race, sexuality, psychoanalysis

Camilla Stevens, B.A., Tulane; M.A., New Mexico; Ph.D., Kansas
Twentieth-century Spanish American drama, theater, and performance theory; Caribbean cultural studies; contemporary Dominican theater and performance

Wendy Swartz, B.A., California (San Diego); M.A., Ph.D., California (Los Angeles)
Early medieval Chinese poetry; literary theory and criticism; comparative poetics

Ching-I Tu, B.A., National Taiwan; Ph.D., Washington
Chinese poetry; literary criticism; Chinese thought

Rebecca L. Walkowitz, A.B., Radcliffe College (Harvard); M.Phil., Sussex (UK); Ph.D., Harvard
Twentieth-century and contemporary British, Irish, and Anglophone literatures; the history and theory of the novel; comparative modernisms; new world literature; translation studies and the history of the book; cosmopolitanism; postcolonial theory; critical theory

Alan Williams, B.A., M.A., Washington; Ph.D., SUNY (Buffalo)
Film history; theories of spectatorship; the economic history of film; study of film genres; influence of social events and configurations of filmmaking

Yael Zerubavel, Ph.D., Pennsylvania
Collective memory; history and memory; Zionism and Hebrew national culture; myths and ritual; Modern Hebrew literature; Jewish immigrant literature

Comparative literature is an exciting, interdisciplinary program that allows you to study literature as it shapes and is shaped by the world of science, economics, religion, politics, sexuality, and other cultural and historical forces. It is a major that attracts students with wide ranging interests in literature, theory, cultural and media studies, and who wish to read literature in the original language as well as in translation.

The program draws upon faculty from a wide range of disciplines and offers individualized guidance in the construction of the major. Our diverse and talented graduate students also help to mentor undergraduate students.

Students who major in comparative literature may go on to study literature in graduate school, and, because of the nature of their training in research, critical thinking, and writing, are also prepared for a variety of professional careers.