Leeds Beckett University - City Campus,
Woodhouse Lane,
LS1 3HE
Dr Emily Zobel Marshall
Reader
Dr. Emily Zobel Marshall’s research is informed by Postcolonial theory and spans a broad range of concerns, including examinations of constructions of identity (in particular hybrid and liminal identities), race and racial politics and Caribbean carnival cultures. She is particularly interested in forms of cultural resistance and cross-cultural fertilisation in the face of colonialism. Her work also often focuses on the ways in which hybrid identities, languages and literatures challenge and modify existing social and cultural structures.
Emily is also an expert in the role of trickster figures in the literatures and cultures of Africa and its Diaspora and has published widely in this area.
Current Teaching
Dr. Emily Zobel Marshall's has been a full-time Lecturer at the School of Cultural Studies since 2007. at undergraduate level, she teaches three modules on the English Literature Degree: Contemporary Literature Studies (Level 1); Postcolonial Writing (Level 2); Cultural Crossings: Race, Writing and Resistance (Level 3).. At postgraduate level, as part of the Contemporary Literatures MA programme she offers the module Translating Tricksters: Literatures of the Black Atlantic. She is also a PhD supervisor to several students within the school.
She has a great deal of experience in supervising undergraduate students writing dissertations on migrant and postcolonial literatures and welcomes research students interested in many areas of contemporary literature, especially topics related to African, Caribbean, African-American and Black British literatures and cultures, postcolonial theory and interdisciplinary approaches to postcolonial writing.Research Interests
Emily's research specialisms are Caribbean literature and Caribbean carnival cultures. She is an expert on the trickster figure in the folklore, oral cultures and literature of the African Diaspora and has published widely in these fields. She has also established a Caribbean Carnival Cultures research platform and network that aims to bring the critical, creative, academic and artistic aspects of carnival into dialogue with one another.
Emily regularly hosts and chairs literary events and has organised international conferences on the literature and cultures of the African diaspora. She is a regular contributor to BBC radio discussions on racial politics and Caribbean culture. Her books focus on the role of the trickster in Caribbean and African American cultures; her first book, Anansi’s Journey: A Story of Jamaican Cultural Resistance (2012) was published by the University of the West Indies Press and her second book, American Trickster: Trauma Tradition and Brer Rabbit, was published by Rowman and Littlefield in 2019.
Emily is also a published poet.
Ask Me About
- Caribbean
- Literature
News & Blog Posts
Leeds Beckett hosting special event celebrating the role of women in carnivals
Yinka Shonibare in conversation with Emily Zobel Marshall: identity, history and honouring the legacy of David Oluwale
Black Abolitionists in Yorkshire: Cunning Better Than Strong
Funding Success: Exploring Women in Caribbean Carnival
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