I am an Associate Professor in the Cultural Studies Program, Department of Film and Media, Department of Languages, Literatures and Cultures, and Department of Global Development Studies (Cuba). My teaching areas include Gender Studies, German Studies and International Studies.
After completing a Comparative Literature PhD from UC Berkeley, I was a Stanford Fellow in the Humanities until coming to Queen’s in 2007. I have published on literature, film, critical theory and neuroscience, digital technology, and the women’s movement. My book analyzes the cultural influences of the global South on the North through Cuba and Germany. Sun, Sex and Socialism: Cuba in the German Imaginary (University of Toronto Press, 2012) has received external support from the Berlin Studienstiftung des Abgeordnetenhauses, the DAAD, the National Coalition of Women in German, and the Humboldt and the Mellon Foundations. An article stemming from it won the 2008 Coalition of Women in German Best Article Prize and has been published in three languages.
I have publications in several languages on literature, film, critical theory and neuroscience, digital technology, and the women’s movement. My manuscript that analyzes the cultural influences of the global South on the North through Cuba and Germany has received support from the Berlin Studienstiftung des Abgeordnetenhauses, the DAAD, the Humboldt and Mellon Foundations, UC Berkeley, and Queen’s. An article stemming from it won the National Coalition of Women in German Best Article Prize 2008. I am currently working on a tri-national scholarly film series and my next large project is on urban Heimat.
The next two large projects — a monograph on film, cities and movement and the peer-to-peer language exchange e-tool www.linguaelive.ca — are each funded by Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada grants. I am also participating on an SSHRC-funded group grant about decolonizing cosmopolitanism.