I graduated in 2011 from the University of Birmingham with a BA Modern Languages in Spanish, French and Portuguese. Based upon my achievements in Portuguese I was soon offered Instituto Camões funding to continue studying with a MPhil (A) in Portuguese Studies at Birmingham, which I began in 2012 supervised by Dr José Lingna Nafafé (POLSIS).
Advancing from an undergraduate interest in postcolonial and gender studies, my research project examines representations and functions of gender in the post-independence fictional narrative of Guinea Bissau, one of five lusophone African countries. I examine the use of gender in reflections of the country’s past and present, and in constructing the imagined national future. I am also interested in exploring the experimentation with the boundaries of scribal and oral literature which is prevalent in the lusophone and krioulo literature of Guinea Bissau.