Amrita Dhar

Amrita Dhar is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Literature at the University of California San Diego. She previously taught at The Ohio State University and holds affiliations with the Division of Arts and Humanities. Her research and teaching focus on early modern literature, disability studies, critical race and postcolonial studies, migration studies, environmental humanities, and mountaineering literatures. She is also the Director of the Shakespeare in the “Post”Colonies Project, an open-access digital initiative featuring interviews with global postcolonial Shakespeare scholars.

Amrita Dhar received her education from:

• Jadavpur University (India)
• University of Cambridge (UK)
• University of Michigan (USA)

Her research interests are deeply interdisciplinary, exploring themes of embodiment, difference, and language in early modern literature. She examines disability poetics, particularly through the lens of John Milton’s blindness, and its impact on poetic language. Her work also addresses critical race studies in premodern contexts, including Shakespeare adaptations and caste, migration narratives, and the intersections of colonial/postcolonial history with Renaissance literature. Additionally, she investigates mountain travel writing and the role of mountaineering literatures in understanding environmental humanities and global cultural exchanges.

Her research has been supported by grants from the following institutions:

• National Endowment for the Humanities
• Huntington Library
• School of Arts and Sciences at The Ohio State University
• Academic Senate of the University of California San Diego

She is committed to fostering her students’ intellectual growth and well-being through innovative pedagogy focused on social justice and inclusive education.

As Director of the Shakespeare in the “Post”Colonies Project, she oversees a digital platform that provides open-access interviews with leading postcolonial Shakespeare scholars worldwide, promoting global academic dialogue and accessibility in the field.