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We caught up with the incoming 2022 PhD cohort to find out why they choose UCLA, what they love about studying literature, and the research they hope to explore while in the program. Learn more about this class below!

Beth Chapman
BA, University Of Otago
MA, University Of Otago

Why pursue a PhD in English?

I am pursuing a PhD in English because the stories we tell are important.

What made you decide to study at UCLA?

First and foremost, it was the faculty and expertise at UCLA that encouraged me to apply, but the professionalization and the emphasis on teaching in the department were also very attractive.

What interest areas do you plan to research and explore in the program?

For my PhD, I hope to work in ecocriticism, poetics, post-colonial studies, and critical settler studies, looking at texts from Moana-nui-a-Kiwa (the Pacific) and Aotearoa (New Zealand) specifically. However, I’m also very much looking forward to taking courses outside of my research areas and getting a chance to dip my toes into a number of pools (we tend to specialize quite early in Aotearoa).

What books are you currently reading? Any recommendations?

Oh my gosh! Like many English students, I’m sure, I’m very guilty of having far too many books on the go. Some of these include Kurangaituku by Whiti Hereaka, The Environmental Imagination by Lawrence Buell, Mothers, Fathers, and Others by Siri Hustvedt, Translations from Bark Beetle by Jody Gladding. I’ve also read a couple of poetry collections recently that I really enjoyed—How to Live with Mammals by Ash Davida Jane, and Unseasoned Campaigner by Janet Newman (whose PhD thesis on New Zealand Ecopoetry I am also currently reading). I also read Diana Wynne Jones’s Howl’s Moving Castle not that long ago for a bit of fun.

Do you have any hobbies?

Drinking coffee? I also like hiking, music, learning languages, film, and good food.

Kaliyah Dorsey
BA, University of Pennsylvania

Why pursue a PhD in English?

Books, writing, and education have been a safe and transformative space for me my entire life. I am pursuing a PhD in English because I want to learn more about the potential impact of English scholarship on African Americans’ sense of possibility and become a professor to positively impact students down the line.

What made you decide to study at UCLA?

The culture of the city, the weather, and the professors I’m really excited to work with.

What interest areas do you plan to research and explore in the program?

I plan to research contemporary AA experimental poetry, which I presume will lead me down a bunch of different interest areas like sound studies, music studies, and general AA literature.

What books are you currently reading? Any recommendations?

I’m reading Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man and Zora Neale Hurston’s Moses, Man of the Mountain right now! My favorite books are Toni Morrison’s Sula and Kiese Laymon’s Heavy.

Do you have any hobbies?

I like going on runs, writing poems, journaling and I’m learning how to draw.

Luta Fast Dog
BA, Yale University

Why pursue a PhD in English?

If you have a lot of passion for your particular field of study, I feel it’s worth pursuing in a space where your perspective can continue to grow and evolve. There are also countless opportunities to share that passion with others, which I’m most excited about.

What made you decide to study at UCLA?

The decision was actually very agonizing for me, because I really liked all the programs I got into, but then I had a conversation with someone from the department over Zoom, and they mentioned that everyone is very friendly and just a little weird, to which I thought “Just what I’ve been looking for.”

What interest areas do you plan to research and explore in the program?

My two “things” are Indigenous horror and Indigenous kinship, which I think contain a lot of aspects you can find across different subjects and genres. I especially like reading about how other cultures write about life, death, and family because of all the ways it can bridge physical and emotional distance no matter your perspective and background. Based on what I’ve seen already, UCLA seems like a good place to help make the world feel a little smaller in that aspect.

What books are you currently reading? Any recommendations?

I read Monkey Beach by Eden Robinson a few months ago, and I still think about it almost daily. The Pacific Northwest is such a good setting for supernatural mysteries.

Do you have any hobbies?

I’m really into making beadwork (brick and flat stitch). I can’t sit in silence while I’m beading though, so I end up listening to a lot of true crime and horror podcasts in the meantime.

Alec Mapes-Frances
BA, Brown University

Why pursue a PhD in English?

In the broadest terms, I’m interested in how media and technology condition and structure our relationships to one another, to our imaginations, and to the world. Literature, among other cultural forms, has explored this in great depth. I want to learn more about how it has done so, and to write and teach about it.

What made you decide to study at UCLA?

I chose UCLA because of the breadth of the English department, as well as the presence of the Information Studies and Design Media Arts programs, which cross over into my areas of interest quite a bit. I’ve also always been fascinated by Los Angeles as a city.

What interest areas do you plan to research and explore in the program?

Primarily, the history of media and communication technologies, especially digital technologies. I’m interested in science fiction (and especially “economic science fiction”), design fiction, German media theory, the Californian ideology, the poetics of branding, ambience and atmosphere, immersion, and game studies.

What books are you currently reading? Any recommendations?

I’ve been reading The Long Twentieth Century by Giovanni Arrighi, which traces the emergence of capitalism as a world system through four cycles of material expansion, financial expansion, overaccumulation, and decline since ~1400. I recently finished Fred Turner’s From Counterculture to Cyberculture, which I enjoyed, and which provides some important correctives to received narratives of both 1960s counterculture and 1990s cyberculture in the U.S. I’m really looking forward to reading Bernard Dionysius Geoghegan’s Code: From Information Theory to French Theory.

Do you have any hobbies?

I bike and hike regularly. I also like to spend a lot of time cooking.

John Henry Merritt
BA, Howard University

Why pursue a PhD in English?

I just can’t imagine not studying literature, so this is a logical next step for me.

What made you decide to study at UCLA?

UCLA has a great English department and I’ve always wanted to live in Southern California. Plus, I was an intern through the UC-HBCU Initiative in undergrad, a program that encourages HBCU students to pursue graduate degrees in the University of California system. I had a really great time, so I knew that California was for me.

What interest areas do you plan to research and explore in the program?

I plan on studying African American literature. At the moment I’m really excited about digital humanities and critical geography, but I’m even more excited to learn about other areas I haven’t been exposed to in my classes.

What books are you currently reading? Any recommendations?

I just finished PUSH by Sapphire, and right now I’m reading Myal by Erna Brodber.

Do you have any hobbies?

I like to skateboard and play online Pokémon in my free time.

Rebecca Wong
BA, Middlebury College
Law Degree, Stanford University

Why pursue a PhD in English?

I love reading literature.

What made you decide to study at UCLA?

The faculty and the location.

What interest areas do you plan to research and explore in the program?

Law and literature, critical race theory, critical prison studies

What books are you currently reading? Any recommendations?

I recently read The Moonstone by Wilkie Collins and loved it.

Do you have any hobbies?

Knitting and lying in bed with my cat.