Jason Mezey, PhD

• BA,, Swarthmore College, 1993.
• MA, The Ohio State University, 1995.
• PhD, The University of Iowa, 2001.

General Fields of Professional Interest

Anglophone Indian Fiction
Postcolonial Studies
Contemporary British Fiction
Literature and Psychoanalysis
Narrative

Pedagogical Style

I structure my courses to consist of both student-generated and directed discussion, along with occasional lectures to provide historical or theoretical background for the texts we read and the issues we raise. Over the course of the semester, my students produce a combination of short, informal responses and longer academic essays on literary topics, and I expect them to be as active and engaged in their writing as I do in their reading and participation.

Other Information/Interests/Memberships

Bollywood film (Hindi cinema from Bombay; my two favorite films are Lagaan and Dil Se, but I'm always open to recommendations).

James Joyce (I was a Joycean before moving on to India, and I'm still up for teaching and talking about Ulysses).

Member of the MLA and the MMLA.

Selected Publications

• “‘A Cross, a Lion, and a Scroll or Two’: The Victoria Cross and the Substance of British Imperial Identity.” The Objects and Textures of Everyday Life in Imperial Britain. Eds. Deirdre H. McMahon and Janet C. Myers. Ashgate, 2016. 157-86.
• “‘A Multitude of Drops’: Recursion and Globalization in David Mitchell’s Cloud Atlas.” Modern Language Studies 40.2 (2011): 10-37.
• “The Gospel of Gandhi: Whiteness and State Narcissism in Thatcherite England.” Thatcher & After: Margaret Thatcher and Her Afterlife in Contemporary Culture. Eds. Elizabeth Ho and Louisa Hadley. Palgrave Macmillan, 2010. 75-95.
• “Franchises and Fetishes: Critiquing State Power in Arundhati Roy's Nonfiction.” South Asian Review 29.2 (2008): 56-82. 
• “Neo-Colonial Narcissism and Post-Colonial Paranoia: Midnight’s Children and the ‘Psychoanalysis’ of the State.” Interventions: International Journal of Postcolonial Studies 8.2 (2006): 178-92.
• “Mourning the Death of the Raj? Melancholia as Historical Engagement in Paul Scott’s Raj Quartet.” Studies in the Novel 38.3 (2006): 326-52.
• “‘My heart it beat like a drum’: Transference as Therapeutic Performance in Raja Rao’s Kanthapura.” Journal of Commonwealth and Postcolonial Studies 9.2 (2002): 73-94.
• “Ireland, Europe, The World, The Universe: Political Geography in A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man.” Journal of Modern Literature 22.2 (1999): 337-48.

• Summer Research Grant, awarded by the Board of Faculty Research and Development. Summer 2015.
• Faculty Merit Advising Award, Saint Joseph’s University, Fall 2014.
• Faculty Merit Teaching Award, Saint Joseph’s University, Fall 2007.
• Diversity Commission, College of Arts and Sciences, Saint Joseph’s University Course Development Grant. Summer 2007.
• Summer Research Grant, awarded by the Board of Faculty Research and Development. Summer 2006.
• Diversity Commission, College of Arts and Sciences, Saint Joseph’s University Course Development Grant. Summer 2005.