We celebrated several of our students for their accomplishments at our end-of-year reception on June 16. The following undergraduate majors in Comparative Literature were awarded Citations for Outstanding Performance in the major: Andrea Hernandez (B.A. awarded summer 2022), Kenton Cheng (B.A. awarded winter 2023), and Alexia Rydfors (B.A. awarded spring 2023. Kudos to all!
At the reception we acknowledged several graduate students as well.
Leonardo Giorgetti was awarded his doctorate this year. Leonardo’s dissertation is entitled Lucrezia Marinella’s Rime sacre: Engendered Spirituality, Devotional Piety, and Affective Poetry in Post-Tridentine Venice. He worked with Brenda Schildgen as his major professor; Juliana Schiesari, Ralph Hecter, and Michael Subialka made up the rest of his committee. Dr. Giorgetti, congratulations on this important achievement (and your second doctorate!).
Five of our graduate students attained their Master’s degrees in 2023:
- Irina Goncalves, whose Master’s thesis is entitled Long Live the New Flesh: Anthropophagic Encounters and a New Anatomy of Alterity in 20th C. Brazilian Fiction. Her committee members were Leopoldo Bernucci (major professor), Ana Peluffo, and Michael Subialka.
- Negin Kaykah, who presented a translation and critical introduction as her Master’s thesis: An Annotated Translation and Introduction of Fariba Vafi’s The Dream of Tibet. Negin worked with Amy Motlagh (major professor), Jocelyn Sharlet, and Archana Venkatesan.
- Houston Saxon, whose Master’s thesis is entitled Lucretian Anxiety. Houston’s work was directed by Ralph Hexter and his other committee members were John Rundin and Carey Seal, both of Classics.
- Ava Walter presented a Master’s thesis entitled Persona: Conflicting Identity and Ideological Extremism in the Works of Mishima Yukio and Zinaida Gippius. Her committee members were Jenny Kaminer (major professor; German & Russian), David Gundry (EALC), and Michiko Suzuki.
- Zhenyu Xu’s Master’s thesis is entitled A Brand New Panther: Animal Poems of Shang Qin and Zang Di. He worked with Michelle Yeh (major professor), Sheldon Lu, Michael Ziser (English), and Cheri Ross.
Heartiest congratulations to all on these accomplishments! We are delighted to have photographic evidence of the celebration, featuring all five of our new Masters of Arts (from left: Negin, Irina, Ava, Houston, and Zhenyu). And we thank all the faculty, especially those outside of our department, who helped guide the work of these students.
During the awards program we singled out Agueda Berlot for special recognition for her service as our Peer Advisor this year (the second year she has served in this role). We are delighted that Agueda has agreed to serve again in the coming year. Thank you Agueda!
COM 4 student Rishit Das received the Amy Lee prize for his paper, “The Decomposition of the Narratological Framework in Pedro Peramo.” Congratulations to Rishit and his instructor, Ross Hernandez, who has now achieved a three-peat: he is the only COM 1-4 instructor to have supervised three Amy Lee-prize-winning essays. Congratulations to Rishit and to Ross!
Warmly,
Cheri Ross