Mariana Akawi is a doctoral student in the Department of English at the University of Pennsylvania, where she focuses on Victorian literature, postcolonial studies, and novel history/theory. She is especially interested in studying the uses and circulation of the English language across different temporal and geographic contexts, and in exploring the ways in which nineteenth-century novels continue to shape our reading and writing practices today. 

Mariana received a BA in English and Political Sciences and an MA in English Literature from the University of Haifa, where she was the recipient of the Council for Higher Education Excellence Fellowship for Arab students, as well as of the New Questions in Postcolonial Studies Fellowship. At Haifa, Mariana worked as a Teaching Assistant for the introductory Theory and Criticism course. In addition, she had previously taught an English for Academic Purposes class to students for whom English is a second or third language.

As a multi-lingual and non-native reader/writer of English, Mariana is interested in fostering conversations about how we can make the English Department an accessible space for a wider network of Anglophone readership.