Rhian Atkin

Postgraduate Teaching Fellow in Portuguese and Brazilian Studies

0113 343 3516

Research Interests

My main area of research is Portuguese literature of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. The provisional title of my PhD thesis is 'Lisbon as the site for crisis in the works of Fernando Pessoa, Luís de Sttau Monteiro and José Saramago', in which I focus on representations of the city, the flâneur and masculinity in literature set in Lisbon, and how these have changed with the socio-political structure of the city (and country) over the course of the twentieth century.

My other main research interests lie in the areas of narratology and the structure of the written text; literary representations of masculinities; the creative influence of Fernando Pessoa on subsequent cultural production in Portugal and beyond; and popular religion in Portugal. I am currently editing a volume of essays on digression in literature and working on a monograph on José Saramago.

Publications

  • 'Bernardo Soares, Flânerie and the Philosophy of Inaction', forthcoming in Hispanic Research Journal, vol. and page numbers tbc.
  • 'The Unembodied Self in Luís de Sttau Monteiro's Um Homem não Chora', in MHRA Working Papers in the Humanities, 3 (2008), pp. 33-42: http://www.mhra.org.uk/ojs/index.php/wph/article/viewFile/57/60
  • 'Are You Sitting Comfortably? Reading Saramago Aloud', in ellipsis 6 (2008), pp. 107-22
  • 'From Theseus to Daedalus: Sr. José, Saramago and the Reader in the Labyrinth of Todos os Nomes', Portuguese Studies, 23: 2 (September 2007), pp. 191-207
  • (with Paul Castro and Raquel Ribeiro), 'Contemporary Portuguese Literature: 1928 - present', review article for The Year's Work in Modern Language Studies, 69 (2007), 373-81 and 70 (2008), 412-21.
  • Translation of Milton Hatoum, 'Arabescos Brasileiros', in Alef Magazine 7 (Summer 2008), pp. 132-35.
  • Review of Adriana Alves de Paula Martins and Mark Sabine (Eds), In Dialogue With Saramago: Essays in Comparative Literature (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2006), in Bulletin of Hispanic Studies 84: 4 (July 2007), pp. 539-40.

Recent Conferences and Seminar Papers

  • 'Thoroughly Modern Bernie'. Invited paper at Leeds Annual Fernando Pessoa Seminar, 4 February 2010.
  • 'Sttau and the City. An analysis of flânerie in Um Homem não Chora'. Association of British and Irish Lusitanists Conference, National University of Ireland at Maynooth, 11-12 September 2009.*
  • 'Gender Roles in Contemporary Portugal: The Case of Saramago's História do Cerco de Lisboa'. Association of Contemporary Iberian Studies Conference, Dublin City University, 8-10 September 2009.*
  • Going Nowhere in Voyage autour de ma chambre and "Viagem Nunca Feita"'. Invited paper at Fernando Pessoa: Influences, Dialogues, Responses, King's College, London, 11-12 December 2008.
  • 'Bernardo Soares, pig of destiny!' Conference paper at the American Portuguese Studies Association Conference, Yale University, 9-11 October 2008.
  • 'A Stroll Through the Arcades of Disquiet' Invited seminar paper at the School of English Research Postgraduate Seminar, University of Leeds, 15th May 2008.
  • 'Bernardo the Builder' Seminar paper at the School of Modern Languages and Cultures Research Postgraduate Training Seminar, University of Leeds, 14th April 2008.
  • 'Meditation on a Stripy Tie: Expression of the Self in Luís de Sttau Monteiro's Um Homem não Chora' Conference paper at the Association of British and Irish Lusitanists Conference, Bristol University, 11-12 January 2008.
  • 'Are You Sitting Comfortably? Reading Saramago Aloud' Conference paper at Reading: Images, Texts, Artefacts, University of Cardiff, 28-29 June 2007
  • '"The unnameable exists": Reading Saramago's Blindness as Experience' Seminar paper at the School of Modern Languages and Cultures Research Postgraduate Training Seminar, University of Leeds, 16 April 2007
  • 'Intertextual Intricacies in José Saramago's Ensaio sobre a Cegueira' Conference paper at the Association of British and Irish Lusitanists Inaugural Conference, University of Nottingham, 15-16 September 2006
  • 'Amazing Mazes: Labyrinth Imagery and Discourse in Saramago's Todos os Nomes' Conference paper at the Association of Hispanists of Great Britain and Ireland Conference, University of Liverpool, 24-26 April 2006.

*Bursary awarded for attendance at conference.

Research and Conference Funding

  • AHRC Studentship for PhD study - 2007-2010 (with additional bursaries for a research trip and attendance at the 2008 APSA conference).
  • Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian Bursary for research trip to Portugal, July-December 2009.
  • Brotherton Library Scholarship for research trip to Lisbon, June 2009.
  • Banco Santander travel award for a research trip to the Biblioteca Nacional in Lisbon (March/April 2008).
  • LLAS Subject Centre and Faculty of Arts Graduate School - joint funding for a workshop for new language teachers (September 2008).
  • SMLC and School of English funding for interdisciplinary literature seminars (2008-09).
  • Banco Santander scholarship for Spanish language summer school at the Universidad Pontificia de Salamanca (August 2008).
  • Roberts' Funding for the conference, 'Textual Wanderings: The Theory and Practice of Digression in Literature' (Leeds, November 2007).
  • Nice-Pak International MA fees bursary, 2005-2007.

Conferences and Workshops Organised

  • Co-organiser (with Richard Cleminson): 'Perspectives on Contemporary Iberian Society' (2 lectures and a workshop by Prof. Miguel Vale de Almeida, ISCTE, University of Leeds, 28-29 May 2009)
  • Co-organiser (with Honor Aldred, Antonio Martínez Arboleda and Paul Cooke): 'Enhancing MFL Teaching for New Tutors' (University of Leeds, 19 September 2008).
  • Co-organiser (with Owen Clayton and Alberto Fernández Carbajal) of 'Literature without Borders', a series of interdisciplinary literature seminars (University of Leeds, 2008/09).
  • Organiser: 'Textual Wanderings: The Theory and Practice of Digression in Literature' (University of Leeds, 30 November 2007).

Teaching

  • SPPO1080 and SPPO1081: Portuguese Language for Beginners
  • SPPO2410 and SPPO2411: Culture and Society in the Portuguese-Speaking World
  • SPPO2420 and SPPO2421: Introduction to Writing in Portuguese