Allison Nick, Ph.D.

I am a Visiting Lecturer of American Studies in Professor Mita Banerjee’s team. I earned my Ph.D. in English from the University of Mississippi in Oxford, MS in May 2023. My research and teaching interests include transnational modernism, mid-century literature, WWII literature and politics, women, gender, and queer studies, feminist history, and middlebrow or popular literature.

Research

I am in the process of revising my dissertation into a book manuscript. “Reimagining the Radical: Gender, Genre, and Anti-Fascism in Women’s Writing at Mid-Century” looks at the feminist, anti-fascist strategies of stylistic and aesthetic experimentation with genre in the writing of four women writers: Martha Gellhorn, Elizabeth Bowen, Pearl S. Buck, and Rebecca west. “Reimagining the Radical” focuses on the temporal gap between modernism and postmodernism and is inspired by work from scholars like Marina MacKay, Lyndsey Stonebridge, and Beryl Pong to claim and define mid-century literature. By rethinking the bounds of modernism, “Reimagining the Radical” also seeks to fill the gaps in feminist history— between the suffragism of the early 20th century and the liberation efforts of the 1960s. I argue that these writers use genre experimentation to: reflect on complicated national political alliances; propagate their ideas about wartime violence; disrupt heteronormative expectations of gender and sexuality; and expose the global racial inequalities inherent in the imperialist agendas of war.

Teaching

As a teacher,  I strive to create a classroom environment that encourages shared knowledge and empowers students to take responsibility for their education. In the past, I have taught courses in Gender Studies, American and British literature, British WWII Literature, and writing and composition.

Contact

Allison Nick, Ph.D.
Philosophicum II
Jakob-Welder-Weg 20
Room 02.222

Phone: +49-6131-39-24156
anick@uni-mainz.de

Office hours:
Thu, 1-3 pm and by appointment