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Samuel Aftel

Research Interests:
20th-Century British and American Literature
Gender and Sexuality Studies
Queer Theory
Postcolonial Studies
Affect Theory
Marxism
Jewish Studies

Samuel Aftel is a second-year M.A. student in the English department. He received his A.B. in History from Princeton University in 2020. Aftel is interested in the articulation of sexuality, desire, postcolonialism, and late capitalism across various text types and genres, including the 20th-century Anglophone novel, film, and sociopolitical discourse. He also seeks to comprehend how expressions of queerness in literature affirm both writers and readers’ commitment to structural reimagination, especially in terms of postcolonialism and anti-capitalism. 

Before entering graduate school, Aftel served as a teaching fellow for AmeriCorps in a Newark, New Jersey, high school. There, he taught English language arts to ninth-grade students.