Maya Haidar, Newnham

Biographical Information

I received a BA (Hons) in English at Ashoka University in India in 2021. After graduating, I spent a year teaching English in two secondary schools in Picardy, France. In 2023, I completed a master’s degree in Comparative Literature at University College London. Prior to coming to Cambridge, I worked for two years as a lectrice d’anglais at the Sorbonne in Paris.

My PhD will be supervised by Professor Clare Pettitt, and is generously co-funded by the Open-Oxford-Cambridge AHRC DTP and Newnham College.

Research Interests

My research explores the performance of female subjectivity in cross-cultural contexts in late 19th and early 20th century colonial India. I'm interested in mapping the evolution of the modern female subject through Indian and European women's literary exchanges. I work with English and French sources and in my work, I study various autobiographical genres including memoirs, letters, advice manuals, and travelogues, along with fiction.    I welcome supervision inquiries for dissertations related to my research interests, which are anchored in 19th and 20th century literature, women's writing, Empire and postcolonial literatures, and comparative literature.   I am happy to be contacted for supervision opportunities for Paper 1 (Part IA, IB, and II), Paper 7A and 7B (Part I) and Paper 10 (Part II).