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Biography
I studied English, Portuguese and Education at undergraduate level.
In 2010, I was awarded a PhD by the 糖心原创. My doctoral thesis is titled "A Casa por Fabricar: Aspects and Spectres of a 'portuguesmente eu'- Reading Fernando Pessoa through Jacques Derrida".
In 2011, I started a post-Doctoral project financed by the Funda莽茫o Ci锚ncia e Tecnologia (Lisbon; reference SFRH/BPD/7145/2010).
Before my current roles, I worked as a Graduate Teaching Assistant in the 糖心原创 and as the Instituto Cam玫es Instructor in Queen Mary College, University of London.
Teaching Summary
Year 1
I have designed and taught for over a decade on popular culture in the Portuguese-Speaking world (music, sports culture, media) while addressing the modern process of nation-building in Brazil and Portugal, the rise of authoritarianism and colonialist repression in the first half of the twentieth century, and finally the anti-colonial struggle and post-independence projects in Mozambique, Angola and Cape Verde as well as the construction of post-authoritarian democracies on both sides of the Atlantic. Currently, the module ends on the challenges faced by the rise of authoritarianism in the digital age.
I have also contributed to team-taught modules addressing the work of artists in the Global South addressing the legacies of the Transatlantic slave trade, post-socialism and neoliberalism.
Year 2
I have co-designed and co-taught on a Cinema module, focusing on film and sociopolitical context in Latin America.
I have co-designed and co-taught for the last four years a Year 2 module that addresses the history of colonization of the "New World", the cultural processes underlying the wave of independence in the 19th century, on the ideological projects and struggles of the 20th century (authoritarianism and Marxism; developmentalism, dependency; neoliberalism) that draw from and/or contextualize the legacy and history of colonialism, and, finally, on the decolonial approach currently framing discussions in Central and South America.
Final Year
I have designed and delivered a module on Conflict and Post-Conflict Societies through Literature and Film and I am currently teaching a module titled Memories and the Future in Iberian and Latin American Culture and Politics. The module focuses on documentaries and feature films addressing the legacy, memorialization and "memory wars" in the context of the new democratic states and challenges to reactionary neoliberalism surrounding the Military Dictatorships in South America (Brazil, Chile, Argentina), the fascist regimes in the Iberian Peninsula, the "Dirty War" in Mexico, and the Civil Wars in Guatemala and Mexico. The module focuses therefore on attempts to move away from presentism and to counteract the slow cancelation of the future, addressing projects that critique the current regimes of neoliberal historicity and semiocapitalism.
MA
I am Co-Director of the Dual MA Future of Heritage (Universyt of Nottingham- Catholic University of Ukraine, Lviv). I have taught in MA modules across the Department and Faculty.
Research Summary
My research focuses on the relationship between culture, history and politics from a comparative and interdisciplinary angle.
You can find my ORCID profile here: .
You can find details of my research interests under the tab RESEARCH
Recent Publications
RUI GON脟ALVES MIRANDA, 2024. . In: ANA GABRIELA MACEDO, MARGARIDA ESTEVES PEREIRA, JOANA PASSOS and M脕RCIA OLIVEIRA, eds., Women, the Arts, and Dictatorship in the Portuguese-Speaking Context: Tensions, Disputes, and Post-Memory Heritage De Gruyter.
RUI GON脟ALVES MIRANDA, 2023. . In: VLADIMER LUARSABISHVILI, ed., Cultural Rhetoric: Rhetorical Perspectives, Transferential Insights IV. New Vision University Press. 133-154
RUI GON脟ALVES MIRANDA, 2022. 骋谤补驳辞补迟谩. 27(59), e54292
I am one of the Directors of the Centre for Memory Studies and Post-Conflict Cultures, alongside Dr Ute Hirsekorn. The Centre is a dynamic hub for scholars with an interest in the field. It has an established track record in the organizing of international conferences and symposia, which brought together researchers from the Global South and the Global North, as well as publications. My interests in these fields are visible throughout most of my published work, which includes a volume in the Studies in Post-Conflict Cultures series.
Past Research
I have worked with different contexts, including South America, Europe and Sub-Saharan Africa in late 20th and 21st century. My work focuses on resistance to colonialism and authoritarian right-wing dictatorships; on the historical role of cultural products and discourses in revolutionary periods and democratic transitions; on their present role as both symptom and diagnosis of reactionary neoliberalism and ensuing authoritarian discourses.
I have an interest in comparative, transnational studies (South Atlantic, Indian Ocean, the Southern Cone), with a focus on anticolonial and decolonial approaches, on memory and archival work in post-authoritarian contexts, and on the resistance to oppressive neoliberal governmentality.
My research engages with a tradition of critical theory via the writings of Jacques Derrida, Annette Kuhn, Jacques Ranci猫re, Roberto Esposito, Achilles Mbembe, Wendy Brown, Nancy Fraser, David Harvey, Franco Bifo Berardi and Mark Fisher.
I am part of international research networks with Universities in Spain, Portugal and Ukraine, as well as on a number of activities with colleagues based in Brazil, Chile and Argentina.
Modernism and Poetry
My PhD thesis addressed literary discourse and Critical Theory, focusing on Modernist poet Fernando Pessoa and Jacques Derrida. I have continued to publish and research on Modernist literature and on poetry, with recent interests on the relationship between literature and philosophy, and between poetry and A.I.
Narratives in postcolonial and post-authoritarian contexts
I have published critiques of postcolonial ideologies and hybridism in travel writings in Sub-Saharan Africa (Gilberto Freyre), on memory and culture wars in 21st-century Brazil (focusing on the rhetoric of right-wing authoritarian movements in Brazil), and on postcolonial literature in Angola and Mozambique, deploying an interdisciplinary apparatus which critiques Transatlantic, Indian Ocean and World(-)Literature frameworks. I am currently interested in the critique of the decolonial.
Cultural Memory, violence and resistance
I have researched and published on feature and documentary films (Margarida Cardoso, Susana de Sousa Dias, Maria de Medeiros) that intersect personal and cultural memories, and that illustrate the challenges of fighting political repression and historical injustice..
I have published on questions related to memory, intermediality and genre on directors such as Miguel Gomes, Jo茫o C茅sar Monteiro and Manoel de Oliveira.
Future shocks and AI
I have presented and submitted a paper on the role (challenges and opportunities) on co-creation with Large Language Models in poetry. My book project discusses speculative fictions which engage with the cybernetic and the digital worlds.
Future Research
My current book project aims to investigate the ways in which the contemporary generation of intellectuals and artists in the Southern Cone (Argentina, Brazil, Chile) engage with the challenges posed by an either acritical or weaponized discourse on the recent past and with the narrowing options of political agency on offer by the current socioeconomic model. I am interested in addressing the mechanisms structuring specific forms and genres that authors and intellectuals draw from globally (the thriller, sci-fi, satire), modes of fiction (weird and the eerie), frameworks (critical irrealism, speculative fiction) and the prolific use of intertextual and cultural references (through the lens of cultural rhetoric). I think there is a lot to learn from the way these nations process and articulate visions of difficult pasts (Military Dictatorships), and how the fight for a stronger democracy - very much as in the "West" - is ongoing and fraught with challenges.
The vigorous critique of 21st -century democratic, post-dictatorship societies in a globalized world developed by these authors and intellectuals aims to fight the return of authoritarian rhetoric (and rule) which echoes, and in many ways prefigures, global (North and South) concerns about the rise of "strongmen" and populism.
They also force us to confront the cancellation of the future, and to consider neoliberal policies implemented under the military dictatorships as specific challenges facing Southern Cone post-transition societies. It will further