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Anna Bernard

Dr Anna Bernard

Reader in Comparative Literature and English

Research interests

  • Arts
  • Literature
  • Media

Biography

I came to King’s in 2012, following my first appointment as a lecturer in the Department of English and Related Literature at the University of York. I received my BA from the University of California at Berkeley and my PhD from the University of Cambridge. I have held a Leverhulme Research Fellowship (2016-17), a Visiting Research Fellowship at the University of Sydney (2017), an AHRC Research Network grant (2013-16), and a University of York Anniversary Lectureship (2010-11).

Research Interests and PhD Supervision

  • Postcolonial and world literature in English, Spanish, Arabic, and Hebrew
  • Decolonization and culture from the 1960s to the 1980s
  • Literature and 20-21C political movements, especially the Palestinian national movement
  • Cultural activism and advocacy including manifestos, documentary film, and protest poetry
  • Solidarity, internationalism, anti-colonialism, human rights
  • Theories of postcolonial, comparative, and world literature

My research is concerned with the literature and culture of anti-colonial struggles that have persisted after the formal end of European imperialism. I am the author of Rhetorics of Belonging: Nation, Narration, and Israel/Palestine (Liverpool UP, 2013, available open-access) and Decolonizing Literature (forthcoming 2023, in Polity Press’s Decolonizing the Curriculum series).

I am currently working on a book called International Solidarity and Culture: Nicaragua, South Africa, Palestine, 1975-1990. The book considers appeals for solidarity in literature and film that circulated among participants in the Nicaragua solidarity campaign, the anti-apartheid movement, and the Palestine solidarity movement. Drawing on archival records of international solidarity activism in Britain, I examine texts and films that resist a broader shift towards humanitarianism by promoting a solidarity based on shared political commitments.

I welcome PhD supervision enquiries from students interested in anti-colonial and third-worldist literature and culture, literature and transnational movements, and cultural activism and advocacy. 

Teaching

Postcolonial and world literature and theory, literature and solidarity movements, Arabic and Hebrew literature in translation.

    Research

    Eco, Soc, Pol, Theory
    Critical Economic and Political Thought

    The group approaches the study of politics and economics from critical cultural perspectives including, but not limited to, history, literature, visual culture, performance and social activism.

    Events

    03JunPicasso Guernica

    Building Usable Pasts

    How is solidarity depicted and actioned through the idea of building usable pasts?

    Please note: this event has passed.

    20MayPhoto by queulat00 (Flickr)

    Doing Solidarity

    At this online panel event, three speakers reflect on what it looks like to 'do' solidarity and how this is carried out.

    Please note: this event has passed.

    07MaySolidarity Aesthetics 1

    Writing and Performing Solidarity

    Discussing representations of solidarity in writing and performance with three renowned academics.

    Please note: this event has passed.

    24AprDecolonizing Higher Education - A Virtual Book Launch

    Decolonizing Higher Education: A Virtual Book Launch

    Join the International Solidarity Action Research Network (ISARN) as our partners launch three new books.

    Please note: this event has passed.

      Research

      Eco, Soc, Pol, Theory
      Critical Economic and Political Thought

      The group approaches the study of politics and economics from critical cultural perspectives including, but not limited to, history, literature, visual culture, performance and social activism.

      Events

      03JunPicasso Guernica

      Building Usable Pasts

      How is solidarity depicted and actioned through the idea of building usable pasts?

      Please note: this event has passed.

      20MayPhoto by queulat00 (Flickr)

      Doing Solidarity

      At this online panel event, three speakers reflect on what it looks like to 'do' solidarity and how this is carried out.

      Please note: this event has passed.

      07MaySolidarity Aesthetics 1

      Writing and Performing Solidarity

      Discussing representations of solidarity in writing and performance with three renowned academics.

      Please note: this event has passed.

      24AprDecolonizing Higher Education - A Virtual Book Launch

      Decolonizing Higher Education: A Virtual Book Launch

      Join the International Solidarity Action Research Network (ISARN) as our partners launch three new books.

      Please note: this event has passed.