51勛圖厙

Alexander Manshel

Alexander Manshel
Contact Information
Phone: 
514-398-4400 Ext. 00330
Email address: 
alexander.manshel [at] mcgill.ca
Address: 

Arts 390
McCall MacBain Arts Building
853 Sherbrooke Street West
Montreal, QC H3A 0G5
Canada

Group: 
Faculty Members
Position: 
Associate Professor
Stream: 
Literature
Specialization by geographical area: 
United States
Specialization by time period: 
20th-Century
21st-Century
Contemporary
Area(s): 
Digital Humanities
Fiction
Genre Studies
History & Theory of the Novel
Identity & Representation
Sociology of Literature
Areas of interest: 

20th and 21st century泭American literature; multi-ethnic American literature; sociology of literature; literary canon formation; historical fiction; literature and technology.

Biography: 

My research and teaching focus on twentieth- and twenty-first-century American literature, multi-ethnic American fiction, and the cultural institutions that organize the contemporary literary field. How do the people and institutions that contribute to the production, circulation, and reception of contemporary literature influence the various forms that it takes? How do they shape our sense of what is considered literary in the first place? These are just some of the questions that motivate my research.泭My first book,泭Writing Backwards: Historical Fiction and the Reshaping of the American Canon泭(Columbia University Press, 2023), provides a new history of contemporary fiction that documents how the politics of historical recovery have fundamentally altered American literature and defined the canonization of writers of color.泭My other published writing examines the influence of literary prizes on what we read, teach, and study; the divergent representations of technology in more popular and more prestigious fiction; and the impact of new (and newly important) venues for literary experience, such as literary adaptations to television and the digital audiobook. I am currently at work on a second monograph, tentatively titled泭High School English: A History of American Reading.

Degree(s): 

M.A., Ph.D. (Stanford University)
M.A. (Bread Loaf School of English)
B.A. (Middlebury College)

Selected publications: 

Books

(Columbia University Press, 2023).

Book cover of Writing Backwards: Historical Fiction and the Reshaping of the American Canon

Articles and Chapters

Post45 Data Collective (December 2024).

.The Cambridge Companion to the American Short Story. Eds. Michael Collins and Gavin Jones. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2023. 6279.

PMLA泭(January 2020).

MELUS: Multi-Ethnic Literature of the United States泭(December 2020).

.泭Post45: Peer Reviewed泭(September 2017).

Reviews and Public Scholarship

New American Studies Journal泭(February 2025).

The American Vandal Podcast泭(January 2025)

. Interview with The American Vandal Podcast (October 2024).

Interview with The American Vandal Podcast (October 2024).

"." The Nation (September 2024).

. Novel Dialogue (April 2024).

""泭Interview with WNYC's On the Media (December 2023).

.泭Public Books泭(November 2023). Co-authored with Melanie Walsh.

". Literary Hub (November 2023).

.泭Los Angeles Review of Books泭(May 2023). Co-authored with Laura B. McGrath and J.D. Porter.

"." Interview with WNYC's泭On the Media泭(March 2023).

.泭The Atlantic泭(July 2021). Co-authored with Laura B. McGrath and J.D. Porter.

Public Books泭(September 2019). Co-authored with Laura B. McGrath and J.D. Porter.

Awards, honours, and fellowships: 
  • Principals Prize for Excellence in Teaching, 51勛圖厙, 2023.
  • Louis Dudek Award for Excellence in Teaching, 51勛圖厙 Department of English, 2023.
  • Race and the Formation of the Contemporary Literary Canon, SSHRC Insight Development Grant, 20222024.
  • La race et la formation du canon litt矇raire contemporain, FRQSC Soutien la recherche pour la rel癡ve professorale, 20222025.
Graduate supervision: 

I am eager to supervise graduate students interested in contemporary literature, 20th泭and 21st泭century American literature, multi-ethnic American fiction, literary institutions and literary canon formation, historical fiction, and/or literary genre.

Taught previously at: 

Stanford University

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