Mariana Akawi is a doctoral student in the Department of English at the University of Pennsylvania, specializing in novel theory, Global Anglophone literature, and Victorian studies. She is especially interested in tracing the rhetorics of the coming-of-age plot and the registers of women's education in the realist novel. Her research constantly draws from narratology and archival theory. 

Mariana received a BA in English and Political Sciences and an MA in English Literature from the University of Haifa, both summa cum laude. There, she was the recipient of the Council for Higher Education Excellence Fellowship (2021-2023), as well as of the New Questions in Postcolonial Studies Fellowship (2022-2023). At Penn, she was a Steinberg English Fellow (2024-2025), and an Auerbach Fellow in Victorian Studies (2025-2026). 

At Penn and beyond, Mariana has taught and/or TAed across several fields, including Literary Theory, African and Asian American Literatures, and Academic English/Writing. In addition, at Haifa, she served as a mentor to Arab and/or first-generation students, helping them acclimate to the university environment.