Cyraina Johnson-Roullier

Cyraina Johnson-Roullier is an Associate Professor in the Department of English at the University of Notre Dame, with concurrent appointments in American Studies, Gender Studies, and Romance Languages (French). She is also a Curatorial Member of the Claudia Rankine Racial Imaginary Institute. Her academic career spans over three decades, beginning with her appointment as Assistant Professor in 1992 and promotion to Associate Professor in 2000. She holds a Ph.D. in English and Comparative Literature from SUNY Buffalo (1992), alongside degrees from Ohio State University and Ohio University.

Her research focuses on Modernism and Modernity, African-American Literature and Culture, Postcolonial Theory, and intersectional approaches to gender and race. She has authored Reading on the Edge: Exiles, Modernities, and Cultural Transformation in Proust, Joyce, and Baldwin (2000) and is working on projects like Human, (Re)Imagined and Humatlantics. She frequently publishes in leading journals such as Modernism/modernity and Angelaki, addressing themes like racial silence, gender performativity, and transnational modernism.

Her teaching spans undergraduate and graduate courses, including Law and Utopia in Atlantic America and Caribbean Migrations. She has received numerous grants and fellowships, including from the Ford Foundation and NEH, and serves on advisory boards for institutions like the DuSable Black History Museum. Her community engagement includes workshops on racial discourse and public intellectualism.

Johnson-Roullier’s scholarly contributions bridge literature, history, and activism, with a focus on marginalized voices in transnational contexts. Her work interrogates race, gender, and modernity through canonical and underrepresented texts, emphasizing interdisciplinary and intersectional methodologies.