Marijana Mikić

Marijana Mikić is a Research Fellow affiliated with the English Department at the University of Klagenfurt. Her research focuses on intersections of race, space, and emotion in African American literature, employing frameworks from cognitive affective studies and Black geographies. She completed her PhD in 2022 with a dissertation analyzing how African American narratives interrogate emotions like fear, hope, and grief as tied to racial ideologies and spatial enforcement.

Her academic achievements include the 2023 Fulbright Prize in American Studies for her innovative dissertation, awarded by the Austrian Association for American Studies (AAAS), and a Post-DocTrack Fellowship. Her work bridges narrative theory, intersectional analysis, and spatial critique, with recent publications exploring strategic empathy in post-Morrison literature and Afrofuturist trends.

Mikić’s research contributes to broader discussions on mutual understanding between Austria and the U.S., aligning with Fulbright Program goals. She collaborates with the Narrative Encounters Project, an interdisciplinary initiative examining ethnic American literatures' narrative strategies.