Fellow 2023/2024Luis Alberto Pérez-Amezcua
Fellowship Term: 03/2024 – 08/2024
Luis Pérez-Amezcua is Professor-Researcher at the Department of Arts and Humanities of the University of Guadalajara. Following his degrees in Hispanic Literature (BA) and Mexican Literature Studies (MA) at the University of Guadalajara, he earned his PhD in Literary Theory at the Autonomous Metropolitan University.
A member of Mexico’s National Research System, Pérez-Amezcua has published scientific papers in national and international books and journals, as well as several books related to Mexican literature and myth. Guest professor at University of Castilla-La Mancha (Spain) and Comenius University of Bratislava (Slovakia), and Erasmus+ fellow at University of Sofia (Bulgaria) and University of Oviedo (Spain), Pérez-Amezcua has tried to spread the importance of myth criticism and Mexican literature internationally. He was the researcher responsible for “Ideal Worlds”: a multidisciplinary research project to promote reading and social inclusion for children, approved by the National Science and Technology Council as part as its National Strategic Programs. His lines of research are: 1) the intermedia study of myth (myth criticism) in pop culture, 2) Mexican literature, and 3) academic literacy.
A study of significant literary representations of “apocalypses” caused by viruses from a transcultural perspective and a symbolical approach
The project will study significant literary representations of viruses from a transcultural perspective, providing information on how literature frames apocalyptic events.
The comparison of works from different cultures will be used to explore symbolisms of real-life perceptions and human behavior.
If the novel as such is a symbolic genre (in the sense that it aims to provide readers with orientation in the 'real' world through fiction), how is its effect changed when the manifest fiction becomes reality? How are these novels discussed, re-marketed, re-visited? The objective is to offer interesting insight into the place of the novel in public discourse in the various cultural contexts and explore what can we learn from apocalyptic-symbolic text.