Postcolonial Studies

Postcolonial studies in Modern Languages at Nottingham is a multidisciplinary area of research, incorporating:

Anthropology
Economics
Politics
History,
Sociology
Literature and cultural studies.

We take a keen interest in the colonial histories interlinking France, Germany, Spain and Portugal with their former colonies in Sub-Saharan Africa, Latin America, the Caribbean and Francophone Canada.

We explore the cultural legacies of colonial history both overseas (in the former colonies) and within Europe, the uses of postcolonial methodology for cultural critique, and the postcolonial re-reading of intra-European imperial history.

Research and activities

Nottingham combines a rich portfolio of established research into the Francophone, Lusophone and Latin American worlds overseas with a range of projects in German, French, Spanish and comparative postcolonial studies.

We have the UK’s only Centre for Research on Cuba, we established the Centre for the Study of Post-Conflict Societies and we have a research group, Memory and the Politics of Memory. A major AHRC-funded project in the area is Building Images: Exploring 21st century Sino-African dynamics through cultural exchange and translation.

Other projects address the question of the:

Falklands/Malvinas
Postcolonial travel writing
Transoceanic exchange in the Lusophone world
The memory of colonialism across Europe.

We have expertise on intra-European imperialism in the context of the Russian and Habsburg empires and slavery in Brazil.

Postgraduate study

Research students explore colonial legacies and postcolonial conditions in Francophone Africa, Brazil and Cuba, or they work across languages, investigating national histories, literatures, and cultures from a comparative perspective.

Current and recent projects include: