Sofia Duarte

Sofia Duarte is a PhD candidate in the Doctoral Programme in “Language, Literature and Culture, and its Applications” at the University of Valencia, Spain. Her research revolves around the interdisciplinary field of Animal Studies, a critical framework that in her PhD thesis she is applying for the interpretation of Margaret Atwood’s works and the presence of nonhuman animals in them. Her aim is to examine how the presence of nonhuman animals can be related to topics such as national identity, the perception of minorities, superstitions and beliefs, as well as the perishing of nonhuman animals as a consequence of the Anthropocene. Additionally, she studies the interrelatedness between feminist movements and Animal Studies, as women and nonhuman animals are often portrayed as absent referents. Accordingly, in order to grasp a better understanding of the works being studied, Speculative and Dystopian Fiction as well as Posthumanism, Ecofeminism and Canadian Studies are part of her research interests. Due to the widespread presence of nonhuman animals, she has also ventured into studying how they are portrayed in children’s books such as Coraline (2002) and television series like Sweet Tooth (2021 –). Furthermore, given her work on the portrayal of animals in X-Men in her Master’s thesis and her study of graphic novels published by Margaret Atwood, Comic Studies also constitute an important part of her research.  

Email: duarso@alumni.uv.es