dr hab. Katarzyna Nowak-McNeice, prof. UWr
Department of American Literature and Culture
katarzyna.nowak-mcneice@uwr.edu.pl
Katarzyna Nowak-McNeice is an associate professor at the University of Wrocław, working in the Department of American Literature and Culture. She has been associated with the University of Wrocław since the beginning of her education: she completed her bachelor’s degree (1999), master’s degree (2001), and doctoral studies at the Institute of English Studies (she defended her doctorate, “Traveling Subjects: Post-colonial Identities in Liminal Spaces on the Example of the Prose of Women Writers of Indian Descent,” in 2005). She also completed her habilitation there in 2019 based on the publication series “California and the Melancholic American Identity.” Since 2024, Katarzyna Nowak-McNeice has served as Deputy Director for Research and Finance.
In 2004, she spent a year at the University of California, Los Angeles, as a Junior Fulbright Scholar. In 2005 and 2006, she received a scholarship from the Foundation for Polish Science for outstanding young scientists. In 2008, she spent three months at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles under the auspices of the Kościuszko Foundation. In 2010, she completed a library research stay at the Freie Universität in Berlin. In 2010-2011, she was a visiting researcher at King’s College London. In 2014, she was awarded a scholarship from the Foundation for Polish Science mentoring program (mentor: Prof. Michael Steiner at California State University Fullerton). In 2015, she received a “Conex” fellowship under the Marie Curie Actions program sponsored by the European Union and spent three years at the Carlos III University in Madrid, conducting research under the supervision of Prof. Julia Checa. In 2019, she received a translation fellowship from the SGAE (Sociedad General de Autores y Editores) foundation in Madrid. In 2024, she completed a short research stay at the Freie Universität Berlin as part of an IDUB scholarship.
Katarzyna Nowak-McNeice is the author of two monographs, California and the Melancholic American Identity in Joan Didion’s Novels: Exiled from Eden (2019) and Melancholic Travelers: Autonomy, Hybridity, and the Maternal (2007); co-editor of the volumes Hinterlands: Cultural and Literary Perspectives (2023), Representations and Images of Frontiers and Borders: On the Edge (2022), A Dark California: Essays on Dystopian Depictions in Popular Culture (2017), and Interiors: Interiority/Exteriority in Literary and Cultural Discourse (2010); and author of over 40 other scholarly publications, reviews, and translations. Her academic interests include contemporary American literature and issues at the intersection of Animal Studies, Gender Studies, Disability Studies, and critical posthumanism.
More information: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7267-8732
Monografie autorskie / Monographs
Nowak-McNeice, K. California and the Melancholic American Identity in Joan Didion’s Novels: Exiled from Eden. New York: Routledge, 2019; paperback edition 2020. ISBN: 978-1-1383-7041-8. 224 pages.
Nowak, K. Melancholic Travelers: Autonomy, Hybridity and the Maternal. Peter Lang, 2007. ISBN 3-631-55627-6. 158 pages.
Redakcja monografii / Edited volumes
Kębłowska-Ławniczak Ewa, Dominika Ferens, Katarzyna Nowak-McNeice i Marcin Tereszewski, eds. Hinterlands: Cultural and Literary Perspectives. Routledge, 2023. ISBN: 9781032617718, 304 pages.
Nowak-McNeice, Katarzyna i Alejandra Maria Aventín Fontana, eds. Representations and Images of Frontiers and Borders: On the Edge. Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2022 (paperback edition 2023). ISBN: 1-5275-7608-6, 220 pages.
Nowak-McNeice, Katarzyna i Agata Zarzycka, eds.A Dark California: Essays on Dystopian Depictions in Popular Culture. Jefferson, NC: McFarland, 2017. ISBN: 978-1-4766-6783-6. 205 pages.
Nowak, Katarzyna i Sonia Front, eds. Interiors: Interiority/Exteriority in Literary and Cultural Discourse. Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2010. ISBN13: 978-1-4438-2280-0, ISBN: 1-4438-2280-9. 245 pages.
Publikacje w czasopismach / Essays in peer-reviewed journals
Nowak-McNeice, K. “The Misanthropocene in California: Susan Straight’s Blacker Than a Thousand Midnights and Joan Didion’s The Last Thing He Wanted”. Critique: Studies in Contemporary Fiction, vol 64 issue 5, 2023. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/00111619.2023.2270413. Pp. 983-995.
Nowak-McNeice, K. “Madness, Authorship, and the City: Elvira Navarro’s A Working Woman”. Critique: Studies in Contemporary Fiction, DOI: 10.1080/00111619.2022.2097048, 2022.
Nowak-McNeice, K. “The Turn toward the Non-human in Susan Straight’s A Million Nightingales”. CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture, DOI: 10.7771/1481-4374.3798, 2022.
Nowak-McNeice, K. “Belonging to the Human and Non-human Animals in J.M. Coetzee’s Recent Novels”. Special Issue of C21 literature: Journal of 21st-century Writings 6(1): “The Literature of the Anthropocene”, 12 Feb 2018. DOI: http://doi.org/10.16995/c21.29 . ISSN: 2045-5224.
Nowak-McNeice, K. “Joan Didion’s California: Literary Representations of History, Melancholy and Transgression”. The Quint: An Interdisciplinary Quarterly from the North, vol. 7.1 (December 2014). Pp. 82-99. Reprinted in vol. 11.1 (December 2018). Pp. 193-211. UCN, Canada. ISSN 1920-1028. https://www.ucn.ca/sites/academics/facultyarts/programofferings/arts/humanities/The%20Quint/The%20Quint%20v11.1.pdf
Nowak-McNeice, K. “The Californian Exopolis: Hector Tobar’s and Tim Z. Hernandez’s Literary Interventions”. The Watchung Review: the Journal of the New Jersey College English Association, 2017. Pp. 76-83. ISSN 2573-1750. https://watchungreview.omeka.net/items/show/1
Nowak, K. “The Girl of the Golden West: European and American Fictions of California after the U.S. Conquest”. Polish Journal for American Studies, vol. 6. ed. Marek Paryż, 2012. Pp. 13-24. ISSN: 1733-9154. http://paas.org.pl/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/002-146-PJA-6-2012.pdf
Nowak, K. “The Orphic Myth and America: The Representation of Immigrants in Puccini’s La Fanciulla del West”. Anglica Wratislaviensia vol. 48. ed. A. Michońska-Stadnik. Wrocław: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Wrocławskiego, 2010. Pp. 57-63. ISSN: 0301-7966. http://awr.wuwr.pl/category/-16
Nowak, K. “A Utopian Project of Identity: The Case of Helena Modrzejewska”. Anglica Wratislaviensia vol. 46, ed. A. Michońska-Stadnik. Wrocław: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Wrocławskiego, 2008, pp. 53-61. http://awr.wuwr.pl/category/-125
Nowak, K. “Cyclicity, Melancholia, Emigration: The Case of Helena Modrzejewska” (in Polish). Er(r)go vol. XIV, ed. W. Kalaga. Katowice: Wydawnictwo Uniwersyteckie “Śląsk,” 2007. pp. 53-63. ISSN: 1508-6305. https://www.academia.edu/43221467/No_14_1_2007_prze_twory_kultury_pickles_of_culture_waste_man_agement_in_Polish_
Nowak, K. “History vs. histories: Arundhati Roy’s The God of Small Things and Kavery Nambisan’s The Scent of Pepper”. Anglica Wratislaviensia XLIII. Wrocław 2005. pp. 45-54.
Nowak, K. “In Search of a Voice: the Figure of a Little Girl in Chosen Short Stories by Women Writers of Indian Origin” (in Polish). Er(r)go vol. VIII. Katowice: Wydawnictwo Uniwersyteckie “Śląsk,” 2004. pp. 109-121.
Nowak, K. “Science, Narration and Representation in Mircea Eliade’s Chosen Texts”. Anglica Wratislaviensia XXXVII. Wrocław 2001. Pp. 113-120.
Rozdziały w monografiach / Chapters in edited volumes
Nowak-McNeice, K. “’We have always been posthuman: Towards a Post-anthropocentric Reading of Westworld” in Return of the Western: Refracting Genre, Representing Gender, ed. Sue Matheson, Edinburg UP, 2025. ISBN: 1399524720. Pp. 266-279.
Nowak-McNeice, K. “Joan Didion’s California”, in Polish [“Kalifornia w pisarstwie Joan Didion”]. In Joan Didion, ed. Marek Paryż. Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego, 2024. ISBN: 978-83-235-6408-9. Pp. 23-38. https://doi.org/10.31338/uw.9788323564164.pp.23-38
Nowak-McNeice, K. “Autism and Comedy: Ambiguity and Compatibility. On the Examples of Naoki Higashida’s The Reason I Jump and John Elder Robinson’s Look Me In the Eye.” In Representaciones cómicas de la discapacidad, ed. Susanne Hartwig, Soledad Pereyra. De Gruyter, 2024. Pp. 139-150. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783111546278-009
Nowak-McNeice, K. “Post-anthropocentric Hinterlands in Susan Straight’s Novels”. In Hinterlands: Cultural and Literary Perspectives. Eds. Ewa Kębłowska-Ławniczak, Dominika Ferens, Katarzyna Nowak-McNeice and Marcin Tereszewski. Routledge, 2024. ISBN: 978-1-032-61771-8. Pp. 124-135.
Nowak-McNeice, K. “Diary of a Bad Year” in The Bloomsbury Handbook to J. M. Coetzee, eds. Lucy Valerie Graham and Andrew van der Vlies. Bloomsbury, 2023. ISBN: 9781350152052. Pp. 181-189.
Nowak-McNeice, K. “Susan Sontag’s In America: Towards a Post-anthropocentric Subjectivity” [“W Ameryce Susan Sontag: ku podmiotowości nieantropocentrycznej”]. In Susan Sontag, ed. Marek Paryż. Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego, 2022. Pp. 119-134. https://doi.org/10.31338/uw.9788323555650.pp.119-134
Nowak-McNeice, K. “Madness, Femininity, Resistance: Pushing the Borders of Representation, on the Example of Laura Restrepo’s Delirium and Olga Tokarczuk’s Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead.” Eds. Alba Gómez García, David Navarro Juan, Javier Velloso Álvarez. Ficciones y Límites (Functional Diversity and Creativity: the Limits of Fiction). Berlin: Peter Lang, 2021. Pp. 147 – 163. ISBN: 978-3-631-85882-0. DOI: https://doi.org/10.3726/b18755 Open access.
Nowak-McNeice, K. “Madness, Femininity, Vegetarianism: Post-anthropocentric Representations on the example of Olga Tokarczuk’s Drive Your Plow over the Bones of the Dead and Agnieszka Holland’s Spoor.” In Posthumanist Perspectives on Literary and Cultural Animal, ed. Krishanu Maiti. Cham: Springer Nature, 2021. Pp. 167 – 177. ISBN 978-3-030-76158-5. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-76159-2_14
Nowak-McNeice, K. “Autism and the Challenges of Translation: on the Example of Rafał Motriuk’s Autistic Son, Desperate Dad (2018)” in Inclusion, Integration, Differentiation. Functional Diversity in Literature, Cinema and Scenic Arts / Incusión, integración, diferenciación. La diversidad funcional en la literatura, el cine y las artes escénicas, ed. Susanne Hartwig. Berlin: Peter Lang, 2020. Pp. 121-130. ISBN: 978-3-631-81506-9. DOI: https://doi.org/10.3726/b16655 Open access.
Nowak-McNeice, K. “Representation of the Displacement of California’s Native American Population: Helen Hunt Jackson’s Ramona” in Cultures in Movement, ed. Martine Raibaud, Micaéla Symington, Ionut Untea, David Waterman. Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2015. Pp. 58-69. ISBN (13): 978-1-4438-7189-1.
Nowak-McNeice, K. “Remembering the Loss, Constructing the Future: Time and Memory in Helen Hunt Jackson’s Ramona” in Hours like Bright Sweets in a Jar” – Time and Temporality in Literature and Culture, ed. Alicja Bemben, Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2014. Pp. 69-80. ISBN: 978-1-4438-6523-4.
Nowak-McNeice, K. “Grieving the Loss of Native American California: Helen Hunt Jackson’s Ramona” in Culture and Rites/Rights of Grief, ed. Zbigniew Białas, Paweł Jędrzejko and Julia Szołtysek, Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2013. Pp. 100-107. ISBN: 978-1-4438-5059-9.
Nowak-McNeice, K. “Melancholic Opera: Representation of Emigrants in Puccini’s La Fanciulla del West and Manon Lescaut” in Words and Music, ed. Victor Kennedy and Michelle Gadpaille, Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2013. Pp. 21-28. ISBN: 978-1-4438-4916-6.
Nowak, K. “California after the U.S. Conquest and the Status Anxiety: Maria Amparo Ruiz de Burton’s The Squatter and the Don” in Narrating American Gender and Ethnic Identities, eds. Aleksandra Różalska, Grażyna Zygadło. Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2013. Pp. 145-155. ISBN: 978-1-4438-4784-1.
Nowak, K. “The Myth of Eternal Return: Melancholic Formation of Identity and Production of Cultural Icons” in A Culture of Recycling /Recycling Culture? ed. W. Kalaga, M. Kubisz, J. Mydla. Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 2011. Pp. 21-26. ISBN: 978-3-653-00941-5.
Nowak, K. “In the Name of the Father: Identity, Disruption, Difference. A Study of Jhumpa Lahir’s The Namesake” in Mapping Literary Space(s), ed. W. Kalaga, M. Kubisz and J. Mydla. Katowice: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Śląskiego, 2009. Pp. 106-117. ISBN: 978-83-226-1836-3.
Nowak, K. “Postcolonial Narrations of Women Writers of Indian Origin: A Migrating Family” (in Polish) in Great Topics of American Literature, Vol. III, ed. T. Pyzik. Katowice: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Śląskiego, 2007. pp. 182-192. ISBN: 978-83-226-1671-0.
Nowak, K. “Subversive versions of femininity in the South African context on the example of Olive Schreiner’s The Story of an African Farm” (in Polish) in The ‘Gender’ in Translation, ed. Piotr Fast. Katowice, Czestochowa: Wydawnictwo Naukowe „Śląsk”, 2006. pp. 83-89. ISBN: 978-83-7164-504-4.
Nowak, K. “American Journeys, Hybrid Subjects: Writers of Indian Origin Map North America” in Traveling Subjects: American Journeys in Space and Time, eds. Dominika Ferens, Justyna Kociatkiewicz. Kraków: Rabid, 2004. Pp. 161-166. ISBN: 83-88668-73-0.
Nowak, K. “Bisexual Body as Theoretical Space on the basis of Judith Butler’s, Helene Cixous’s and Clare Hemmings’s Texts” (in Polish) in Gender in the Humanities, ed. Małgorzata Radkiewicz. Kraków: Rabid, 2001. Pp. 245-250. ISBN: 83-88668-14-5.
Inne publikacje: / Other publications:
Tłumaczenia / Translations
Autistic Son, Desperate Dad (from Polish into English). By Rafal Motriuk. Prebonus Publishing, 2018. ISBN: 978-8395020407, 202 pages.
Fig (from English into Polish), a volume of poetry by Adrianne Kalfopoulou. Bielsko-Biała: Wydawnictwo Wyższej Szkoły Humanistyczno-Ekonomicznej, 2003, 51 pages.
J.M. Coetzee’s short story “The Novel in Africa” (from English into Polish). Er(r)go VIII
2004, Katowice: Wydawnictwo Uniwersyteckie “Śląsk,” pp. 9-19.
Erhard Reckwitz’s essay “‘Man and His Bestial Other’ in the Colonial Encounter – A Literary Case” (from English into Polish). Er(r)go VIII 2004, Katowice: Wydawnictwo Uniwersyteckie “Śląsk,” pp. 139-162.
Recenzje /Reviews
Nowak-McNeice, K. Women in the Western. Sue Matheson, ed. Edinburgh: Edinburgh UP, 2020. The Journal of Popular Film and Television, vol. 49 no. 4, 2021. Pp. 234-5. DOI: 10.1080/01956051.2021.1987833
Nowak-McNeice, K. Deconstruction, Feminism, Film. Sarah Dillon. Edinburgh: Edinburgh UP, 2018. The Journal of Popular Film and Television, vol. 47 no 3. 10 Sept. 2019. DOI: 10.1080/01956051.2019.1642720. Pp. 181-182. ISSN: 1930-6458.
Nowak-McNeice, K. The Euro-Western: Reframing Gender, Race and the ‘Other’ in Film. Lee Broughton. London: I.B. Tauris, 2016. The Journal of Popular Film and Television, vol. 46 no 3. 2018-07-03. DOI: 10.1080/01956051.2018.1527607. Pp. 183-4. ISSN: 0195-6051.
Nowak-McNeice, K. The Filth of Progress Immigrants, Americans, and the Building of Canals and Railroads in the West. Ryan Dearinger. Stanford: University of California Press, 2016. The Journal of American Culture, vol. 41:1, 09 March 2018, Wiley. DOI:10.1111/jacc.12859. Pp. 102-3. ISSN: 1542-7331.
Nowak, K. An Imaginary England: Nation, Landscape and Literature, 1840-1920, Roger Ebbatson. Aldershot: Ashgate, 2005. The European Legacy: The Journal of the Society for the Study of European Ideas. Vol 13 no 6. October 2008. Basingstoke: Taylor and Francis. Pp. 786-787. ISSN: 1084-8770.
Nowak, K. Towards a Transcultural Future: Literature and Society in a ‘Post’-Colonial World ed. Geoffrey V. Davis, Peter H. Marshden, Benedicte Ledent and Marc Delrez. Amsterdam, New York: Rodopi, 2004. The European Legacy: The Journal of the Society for the Study of European Ideas. Vol 12 no 4. March 2007. Basingstoke: Taylor and Francis. Pp. 522-523. ISSN: 1084-8770.
Nowak, K. Karen Piper’s book Cartographic Fictions: Maps, Race and Identity (in Polish). Er(r)go X. Katowice: Wydawnictwo Uniwersyteckie “Śląsk,” 2006. Pp. 203-208. ISSN: 1508-6305.
Nowak, K. “Footprints in the sand: colonial encounters, post-colonial interpretations.” A review of Aristippus Meets Crusoe: Rethinking the Beach Encounter (in Polish). Er(r)go VIII, Katowice: Wydawnictwo Uniwersyteckie “Śląsk,” 2004. Pp. 193-195. ISSN: 1508-6305.
Publikacje pokonferencyjne / Post-conference publications
Nowak-McNeice, K. “The City of the Anthropocene: A Literary Example. Arundhati Roy’s The Ministry of Utmost Happiness.” In the proceedings of The City: Images and Imaginaries, International Conference, Universidad Carlos III, Madrid, Spain. Congreso Internacional Interdisciplinar: La ciudad: imágenes e imaginarios. (2018, Getafe). Ana Mejón, Farshad Zahedi, David Conte Imbert (eds.). Getafe: Universidad Carlos III de Madrid, 2019, pp. 699-706. ISBN: 978-84-16829-44-6. https://e-archivo.uc3m.es/bitstream/handle/10016/29949/24_city_nowak_CII_2018.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y
Nowak-McNeice, K. “The Anthropocene, the Capitalocene, the Chthulucene: Some Literary Examples”. Published in the proceedings of The Anthropocene and Beyond: Towards a Shared Narrativity in Interdisciplinary Research. Shue Yan University, Hong Kong. Pdf. Pp. 437-450.
