Dr Sarah Arens M.A., PhD

Personal Statement

I joined the University of Liverpool in 2021 as a British Academy Postdoctoral Fellow (2019-2023) and as a Lecturer in French (since March 2023), having previously worked at the Universities of St Andrews, Glasgow, Edinburgh, Bristol and Yale University. My research focuses on the histories, texts, and visual cultures produced during and in the aftermath of Belgian and French colonialism. I have a broad range of research interests, from Environmental Humanities (especially Critical Animal Studies), via the histories of far-right politics in France and Belgium to ideas of Francophone African writing as 'world literature'. I welcome MRes and PhD enquiries in any of those areas mentioned above.

I'm the editor of the Bulletin of Francophone Postcolonial Studies, the bi-annual journal of the Society of Francophone Studies, and on the editorial board of the Comparative Literature section of Modern Languages Open

My research and biography overlap at certain points: I'm a first-generation university graduate and grew up in Germany and in Algeria, my father's native country (unfortunately without picking up much Arabic). I speak French, German, and English and have started learning Yiddish and Russian.

I'm currently the Deputy Academic Lead for Equality, Diversity and Inclusion of the School of Histories, Languages and Cultures, as well as the Research Co-Lead (for Semester 2 2023-24), Research Environment Lead, and the Early-Career Researcher Rep of the Department of Languages, Cultures and Film.