Megan E. Fourqurean

Profile

I joined the School of English as an MA student in 2018, where I worked on representations of gender in twenty-first century Nigerian fiction. In 2020, I began my doctoral research on water deity religious practices and nonconforming gender identities in twenty-first century Nigerian literature. I hold a BA in literature from Seattle University.

Research interests

My broad research interests include:

• postcolonial and decolonial studies
• gender and sexuality
• ecocriticism and environmental humanities
• Afrofuturism and Africanfuturism
• religious studies

My doctoral research explores literary conceptions of nonconforming gender identities in Nigerian and diasporic fiction. I am interested in how local water deity religions are used to theorise gender fluid and nonbinary identities outside the context of western biomedical structures. Water deity ritual practice extends into considerations of the intersections of environment, colonisation, gender and sexuality. My thesis examines constructions of gender fluidities that draw on the experiential, religious and historical nuances of water deity worship in Nigeria and the diaspora, focusing on the political and theoretical impact of contemporary Mami Wata worship.  

Awards

• AHC Faculty Research Dissemination Award (2023)
• Turing Scheme Grant (2022)
• AHC Faculty Research Dissemination Award (2022)
• Charles Barber Prize (2018–2019)
• Trustee Scholarship (2007–2010)

Teaching Commitments

• Global African Writing (2024-25) [Level 3]
• Race, Writing and Decolonization (2022-23) [Level 1]
• Creative Africas (2022-23) [Level 1]
• Race, Writing and Decolonization (2021-22) [Level 1]

Research Activities and Positions

• I sit on the Advisory Board of the Leeds University Centre for African Studies as a Postgraduate Representative.
• From 2024, I am the Secretary of the Queer African Studies Caucus of the African Literature Association.
• From 2023, I am a member of the Collaborate Research Group (CRG) on African Literatures in the AEGIS network of African Studies in Europe.
• From 2022, I am a member of the Graduate Student Caucus of the African Literature Association.

Conferences

• Fourqurean, Megan E., ‘Collective Literary Production, Racial Justice and Afrofuturism in Multi-Authored Fiction,’ Collective Form and National Liberation Symposium, Newcastle University. June 2024.
• Fourqurean, Megan E., ‘Cosmological Relations in Contemporary Nigerian Literature,’ ALA Annual Conference, University of Louisville. May 2024.
• Fourqurean, Megan E., ‘Igbo Literary Realism in Akwaeke Emezi’s Freshwater,’ African Realisms and Related Forms Symposium, University of Southampton. October 2023.
• Fourqurean, Megan E., ‘”This is the ancient way”: Ritual Archive and Water Deity Worship as Decolonial Resistance in Contemporary Los Angeles.’ ASLE Biennial Conference. Portland. July, 2023.
• Fourqurean, Megan E., ‘”There will never be no more River”: The Decolonial Possibilities of Mami Wata in Los Angeles.’ EACLALS Triennial Conference. Sorbonne Nouvelle University. June, 2023.
• Fourqurean, Megan E., ‘”An unusual incarnation”: Re-imagining Gender and Tradition in Akwaeke Emezi’s Freshwater.’ ECAS Biennial Conference. University of Cologne. May-June, 2023.
• Fourqurean, Megan E., ‘Mami Wata and Spirit Kinship as Fluid Social Commons.’ ACLALS 19^th Triennial Conference. Toronto Metropolitan University. July, 2022.
• Fourqurean, Megan E., ‘Gender Nonconformity, Nonhuman Embodiment and Multiform Co-presence in Contemporary Nigerian Literature.’ ASAA 4^th Biennial Conference. University of Cape Town. April, 2022.
• Fourqurean, Megan E., ‘Mami Wata and Queer Citizenship in Nigerian Literature.’ “African Knowledges for Global Challenges” Sadler Seminar Series. Virtual. April, 2021.

Other Commitments

I am a member of the following groups and associations:

• Leeds University Centre for African Studies
• Institute for Colonial and Postcolonial Studies
• Postcolonial Research Group
• Medical Humanities Research Group
• Critical Life Research Collective

Qualifications

• PhD, University of Leeds (2020-Present)
• MA in Postcolonial Literary and Cultural Studies, University of Leeds (2018-2019)
• BA in English Literature, Seattle University (2007-2010)