We are proud to share that Aileen Zerrudo, a distinguished alumna of UC Berkeley’s Comparative Literature program, has been named the campus’s next Associate Vice Chancellor for Communications & Public Affairs and Chief Communications Officer.
Frank Cahill, a doctoral student in comparative literature at UC Berkeley, is the national word list coordinator for the Scripps National Spelling Bee.
Marcus Gabbert/For the S.F. Chronicle
Roni Masel is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Comparative Literature, and holds the Norma and Sam Dabby Professor of Jewish Studies. Professor Masel’s main research interests include Hebrew literature, Yiddish literature, Jewish history, queer theory, and postcolonial theory. Masel is currently completing a book for which the working title is, Bad Readers: Misreading, Mistranslation, and Other Textual Malpractices in Hebrew and Yiddish.Dr. Masel received a PhD from New York University, and a B.A. from Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
Comparative literature student Frank Cahill competed in the Scripps National Spelling Bee as an eighth grader. This year, on May 28 and 29, he’ll be on the other side of the stage.
Angel's passion for Comparative Literature continues to drive her exploration of literature, history, and philosophy across cultures. For the second year in a row, Angel has been awarded the prestigious Foreign Language and Area Studies (FLAS) Fellowship. This summer, she will travel to Almaty, Kazakhstan, where she will continue her studies of Russian.
Congratulations to Angel on receiving her second FLAS Fellowship!
Roxana (Qinhong) Wang, a recent graduate of the UC Berkeley class of 2024, has been awarded a 2025-26 Schwarzman Scholarship. Wang, who studied Comparative Literature and Ancient Greek and Roman Studies in the College of Letters & Science, was selected as one of 150 scholars from a pool of nearly 5,000 candidates. She is Berkeley’s sixteenth recipient of the award since its inception in 2013.
Professor Beth Piatote is cited ... as an inspiration for Sariel Sandoval, a math and engineering Native American student from Montana. You can read the full story from Berkeley News here
Selby Wynn Schwartz (Ph.D., 2005)... was recently awarded the 2021 Reflex Press Novella Award for her first novella, A Life in Chameleons (forthcoming 2022), and her debut novel After Sappho
We are pleased to share our new ... web page, celebrating our part of one hundred and fifty years of women at the University of California. We hope you enjoy these remembrances from our faculty, staff, and alumni! This page can also be accessed in the top left of our site, by the link labeled '150W.'
We are delighted to announce ... this year's Outstanding GSIs in Comparative Literature: Matthew Gonzales, Max Kaisler, and Laila Riazi! Congratulations to Matt, Max, and Laila on your excellent teaching, and thank you for all you contribute to our community.
The last Big Give took place ... on March 12, 2020 - just moments before our world changed. Since then your UC Berkeley community has kept the blue and gold spirit strong: repurposing labs for COVID research and PPE fabrication; making sure students have what they need to thrive in challenging times; innovating ways to keep connections strong for classes, clubs, and cohorts; and shining light on expert perspectives that illuminate pathways through some of the most complicated times in modern history.
EL GRUPO PRESENTS /EL ... GRUPO PRESENTA
(in conjunction with UC Berkeley's Department of Comparative Literature, and the UCB Department of Spanish & Portuguese)
--A CONVERSATION/CHARLA:
"WORKS IN PROGRESS / ESTUDIOS EN CURSO"
Monday, February 22, 5 pm (Pacific Coast Time)
A Zoomcast event, featuring three grupistas speaking briefly and informally about their current research, and then taking questions from--and engaging in discussion with--event attendees.
Our Three Presenters:
Bella Chavez is a recent graduate ... from the University of California, Berkeley where she double majored in Comparative Literature and Latin American Languages & Cultures. She is a recipient of the competitive Benjamin A. Gilman International Scholarship. During her undergraduate career, she studied abroad in Brazil, Italy, Portugal, and Spain. She also volunteered in Medellin, Colombia where she completed her education minor practicum. She is currently interning with the Office of the Director of National Intelligence through a Virtual Student Federal Service program.
"The Borderlands of Culture in Election-Urgency: Charla/Conversation with Ramón Saldívar (Stanford University)"--Responses from Ivonne del Valle (UC Berkeley) and Alejandra Decker (UC Berkeley), followed by discussion with the audience
Monday, October 26, 5-7 pm Webinar (webcast hosted by the University of California, Berkeley)
Co-Sponsors: Department of Spanish & Portuguese; Department of Comparative Literature
Third year Comparative Literature ... student at Cal Kayla Cohen is studying English, Hebrew, Arabic literatures. Drawing from her travels and the interviews that she conducted with Jewish Diaspora leaders in 2017 and 2018, her new book (titled "The Full Severity of Our Connection") carefully examines the Jewish people’s links to the non-Jewish world and how these links have impacted different conceptions of Jewishness.
Juneteenth marks the end of slavery... and we are asked to look back upon that horrific institution that debased, exploited, and dispensed with black life. Some will say that slavery came to an end and take this chance to congratulate the United States for its emergence from slavery. But what of slavery still remains? We can point to contemporary slave labor in the US and elsewhere which, though illegal, still continues to afflict the lives of many migrants.
News archive and events happening in the Department of Comparative Literature.