Benjamin Morgan

Benjamin Morgan is the Department Chair and Associate Professor at the University of Chicago, Department of English. He received his Ph.D. from the University of California at Berkeley in 2010 and has been teaching at UChicago since 2010.

• Ph.D., University of California at Berkeley, 2010

His research focuses on literature, science, and aesthetics in the Victorian period and early twentieth century, with specific interests in nineteenth-century sciences of mind and emotion; aestheticism and decadence; speculative and science fiction; and environmental humanities topics like extinction, energy cultures, and the literary history of climate change. Methodologically, his work engages aesthetic theory, affect theory, and science studies.

His publications explore scalar disjunctures, the interplay of geological time with human narratives, and materialist approaches to art and literature. Key themes include the Victorian origins of cognitive science, the politics of aesthetic autonomy, and formal strategies for representing ecological devastation.

Benjamin Morgan advises students on projects spanning nineteenth and early-twentieth century British literature, literature and the environment, embodiment and affect, science fiction, and aesthetic theory. He is affiliated with the University of Chicago's English Research Labs and contributes to intellectual life through collaborative projects like the V21 Collective.