Dr. Anna Casas Aguilar

I received a B.A. in Spanish and Latin American literature (Filología Hispánica) and a D.E.A. (Diploma de Estudios Avanzados) in Romance Literatures from the University of Barcelona. In 2013, I completed my Ph.D. in the Department of Spanish and Portuguese at the University of Toronto. Before joining UBC, I held tenure-track appointments at Wright State University and Whitman College.

My teaching and research focus on gender and cultural studies in contemporary Spain, with a particular interest in literature, cinema and photography. My book manuscript, Masculine Subjectivity and Self-writing in Spain, examines how numerous authors who grew up during Francisco Franco’s dictatorship confronted and reconstituted the regime’s model of fatherhood and masculinity. The book focuses on the autobiographical and autofictional works of writers born in Catalonia, including Carlos Barral, Juan Marsé, Terenci Moix and the brothers Juan and Luis Goytisolo. In their works, these writers question the father as an all-powerful and repressive figure, firmly at the head of his family. Drawing on psychoanalysis as well as feminist, gender and autobiographical theory, the project contributes to current debates about gender identity and masculine subjectivity in the Spanish-speaking world.

Research Interests

• Contemporary Peninsular Literature and Culture
• Catalan Studies
• Spanish and Latin American Cinema
• Photography
• Gender Theory, Feminism and Psychoanalysis
• Autobiography and Self-writing
• Material Culture