Coordinator of the World Literature Minor & Professor
mookerdx@jmu.edu
Contact Info
Office: Keezell 411
Fall 2024 Office Hours:
TH 12:30-2:30pm
Professor of English and World Literature
Coordinator, World Literature Minor
Teaching and Research Interests:
World Literature, South Asian Literature and Film, Colonial and Postcolonial Literatures, Postcolonial Theory, Women's Literature, Feminist Theory and Gender Studies, Literature of the Partition of India
Education:
Ph.D., South Asian Studies, University of Chicago
M.A., South Asian Studies, University of Chicago
M.A., Cultural Studies and Comparative Literature, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis
M.A., Comparative Literature, Jadavpur University, Calcutta, India. First Class, First in University
B.A., Comparative Literature, Jadavpur University, Calcutta, India. First Class Honors, First in University
Selected Awards:
Madison Scholar Award, James Madison University
Provost Award for Excellence in International Education, James Madison University
Edna T. Shaeffer Humanist Award, James Madison University
Faculty Leave, James Madison University (Competitively awarded research sabbatical)
National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowship-American Institute of Indian Studies Senior Fellowship
Feminist Scholarship Award, Women’s Studies Program, James Madison University
Summer Research Grant, College of Arts and Letters, James Madison University
International Development Grant, James Madison University
Faculty Research and Travel Grant, Cornell University
International Doctoral Fellowship, American Association of University Women
Percy Buchanan Graduate Prize for the best graduate research paper on South Asia, Midwest Association of Asian Affairs Essay Competition
Dissertation Research Fellowship, University of Chicago
Ruth Murray Memorial Graduate Prize for the best essay in the area of women’s studies, feminist criticism or gender studies, Center for Gender Studies, University of Chicago
Florence James Adams Prize, University of Chicago
Residential Fellowship, University of Chicago
MacArthur Fellowship, University of Minnesota
National Scholarship, Ministry of Human Resources Development, Government of India
Pratibhamoyee Medal awarded to “the best all-round girl-graduate of the year,” Jadavpur University
Hirendranath Dutta Memorial Gold Medal for modern Bengali Literature, Jadavpur University
B.C. Basu Memorial Prize for excellence in Comparative Literature, Jadavpur University
Nripendra C. Bandyopadhyay Memorial Prize for excellence in Comparative Literature, Jadavpur University
University Medals: B.A. and M.A., Comparative Literature, Jadavpur University
Selected Publications:
Books .
In the Shadow of Partition: Seventy-Five Years and Beyond. Co-edited with Nalini Iyer. New Delhi, India: Routledge 2024 (Forthcoming in Decemeber 2024)
The Continents Between. Translation of Bani Basu's Janmabhoomi Matribhoomi. New Delhi, India: Penguin Random House India, 2024.
Blood. A translation of Sunil Gangopadhyay’s novel Rakta. New Delhi, India: Juggernaut, 2020.
Literature, Gender, and the Trauma of the Partition: The Paradox of Independence. Routledge Research on Gender in Asia Series. London and New York: Routledge, March 2017
The Indian Partition in Literature and Films: History, Politics, Aesthetics. Co-edited with Rini B. Mehta. Routledge Contemporary South Asia Series. London and New York: Routledge, 2015
Unfinished Histories: Gendered Violence and National Identity in Women’s Writings. University of Chicago Libraries. Also, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor: University Microfilms International, 2004
Refereed Journal Articles and Chapters in Books
“A Mother in a War: Jahanara Imam’s Memoir Ekattorer Dinguli” in Muslim Women’s Writing from across South and Southeast Asia. Feroza Jussawalla and Doaa Omran (Eds.). New York and Abingdon, Oxon.: Routledge, 2022. 125-38
“Borders and Bodies: Women, Violence, and Martyrdom in Shauna Singh Baldwin’s Partition Fiction.” Revista Canaria de Estudios Ingleses 76, Special issue on the Partition (essay invited by Dr. Juan Cruz for the special issue), 2018. 137-48
“Futuristic Technologies and Purdah in the Feminist Utopia: Rokeya S. Hossain’s ‘Sultana’s Dream.’” Feminist Review, Special issue on Dystopias and Utopias. 2017
“Difficult Choices: Work, Family, and Displaced Women in Partition Writings” in Revisiting India’s Partition: New Essays on Memory, Culture, Politics. Amritjit Singh, Nalini Iyer, and Rahul Gairola (Eds). Lanham, MD: Lexington Books (Rowman and Littlefield), 2016. 91-105
Introduction to TheIndian Partition in Literature and Films: History, Politics, Aesthetics. 1-7
“Quarantined: Women and the Partition” in The Indian Partition in Literature and Films: History, Politics, Aesthetics. 11-35
“Masculinity in Crisis: Nasreen’s Lajja and the Minority Man in Postcolonial South Asia.” Social Text 108 (29:3), 2011. 31-49
“to be pure or not to be: Gandhi, women, and the Partition of India.” Feminist Review 94, 2010. 38-54
“The Diminished Man: Partition and ‘Transcendental Homelessness’” in Partitioned Lives: Narratives of Home, Displacement and Re-settlement. Anjali Gera Roy and Nandi Bhatia (Eds.). Pearson Longman, India, 2008. 50-64
“Divided Homelands, Hostile Homes: Partition, Women
—REPRINTED in Interpreting Homes in South Asian Literature. Malashri Lal and Sukrita Paul Kumar (Eds.). Pearson Longman, India, 2007. 3-15
“Jyotirmoyee Devi: writing history, making citizens.” Indian Journal of Gender Studies 12:1, 2005. 1-39
“Quarantined: Women and the Partition.” Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa and the Middle East 24:1, Special issue on Sex, Gender and Family Structure, 2004. 35-50
“Disenfranchised Bodies.” Genders 38, 2003. <http://www.genders.org/g38/g38_leonard.html>
“The Nationalist Construction of Femininity: Sarat Chandra Chattopadhyay’s Srikanta.” Jadavpur Journal of Comparative Literature 39, 2002. 131-54
Journal Issues Edited
Guest Editor (with Nalini Iyer), South Asian Review Special Issue on “The Partition of India: Seventy-Five Years and Beyond.” 45:1-2, 2024.
Editorial Board Membership
- South Asian Review, 2021-Present
- Postcolonial Interventions: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Postcolonial Studies, 2016-2022
- Genders, 2008-2016
