Last modified 11-November-2018
Duke University
PhD, Program in Literature, 2000
Stanford University
BA with Distinction and Honors, Modern Thought and Literature, 1993
Baker-Nord Scholar in Residence, Case Western Reserve University, April 2014
Alexander von Humboldt Fellow, Humboldt University, Berlin, 2012-14
LAS Dean's Award for Faculty Research in the Humanities, 2012
Fulbright Fellow, University of São Paulo, Brazil, 2007
Faculty Fellow, Institute for the Humanities, University of Illinois at Chicago, 2002-3
James B. Duke Fellow, Duke University, 1993-2000
Foreign Language and Area Studies Fellow, Duke University, 1994
Prize for Advanced Study in the Humanities, Stanford University, 1993
Sweet Medalist, Stanford University, 1993
Autonomy: The Social Ontology of Art under Capitalism. Duke UP, forthcoming April 2019.
Editor, On the Aesthetic Education of Man, by Friedrich Schiller, trans. Matthew McLellan, with "On Schiller's Aesthetics," by György Lukács, trans. Jan Pfeiffer. Chicago and Toronto: MCM′, forthcoming 2019.
Contemporary Marxist Theory: A Reader. Edited with Imre Szeman, Andrew Pendakis, and Josh Robinson. London: Continuum, 2014. Translated into Turkish (Ankara: Dipnot, 2017), and Chinese (Beijing: China Social Sciences Press, 2018).
Marxism and the Critique of Value. Edited with Neil Larsen, Mathias Nilges, and Josh Robinson. Chicago and Alberta: MCM′, 2014.
Utopian Generations: The Political Horizon of Twentieth-Century Literature. Princeton, NJ: Princeton UP, 2005.
Yutopian geneoreishyeon: Ishipsegi munhakui jungchijeok jipyeong. Trans. Yong-Gyu Kim and Dongho Cha. Seoul: Hyeonamsa, 2018. Trans. of Utopian Generations.
Pierre Bourdieu: Fieldwork in Culture. Edited with Imre Szeman. New York: Rowman and Littlefield, 2000.
Dossier: Lukács on Schiller, Lukács on Music. Mediations 32.2 (Spring 2019).
Dossier: Wertkritik. Edited with Neil Larsen, Mathias Nilges, and Josh Robinson. Mediations 27.1-2 (Fall 2013 / Spring 2013).
Dossier: Brazil. Mediations 23.1 (Fall 2007).
An African Practice of Philosophy. (Special issue of SAPINA Journal, now called African Philosophy). Edited with V.Y. Mudimbe and Laura Kerr. SAPINA 10.2 (Fall 1997).
"Sobre a especificidade da arte" ["On the Specificity of Art."] Preface. Fabio Durão, Do texto à obra. Curitiba: Appris, forthcoming July 2019.
"Boyhood: quand l’enfance est un privilège de classe." Lava (Brussels), forthcoming. Web. 3,000 words.
"Roberto Schwarz: Mimesis Beyond Realism." The Sage Handbook of Frankfurt School Critical Theory. Ed. Beverly Best et al. London: Sage, 2018.
"Hélio Oiticica, Tropical Hyperion." nonsite #25, October 2018. Web. 11,680 words.
"Political Unconscious." Bloomsbury Handbook of Literary and Cultural Theory. London: Bloomsbury, 2018. 628-629.
"What We Worry About When We Worry About Commodification." nonsite (editorial, April 2016). Web. 7,425 words.
"The Plain Viewer Be Damned." The Contemporaneity of Modernism. New York: Routledge, 2016. 178-189.
"Everybody Needs a Union." nonsite #18 (January 2016). Web. 2,402 words.
"Art after Art after Art." nonsite #18 (January 2016). Web. 3,192 words.
"Musical Affect, Musical Citation, Music-Immanence: Kurt Weill and the White Stripes." Postmodern Culture 25.2 (January 2015).
"A obra de arte na era da sua subsunção real ao capital." Marxismo: Cultura e Educação. Ed. Fabio Akcelrud Durão, Daniela Mussi, and Andréia Maranhão. São Paulo: Nankin Editorial, 2015. 11-31.
"Brecht eu misturo com Caetano: citação, mercado e forma musical." Revista do Instituto de Estudos Brasileiros 59 (December 2014) 149-90.
"The Identity of Identity and Difference: Modernism and African Literature." Via Atlântica: Publicação da área de estudos comparados de literaturas de língua portuguesa 23 (2013) 63-74.
"Kurt Weill, Caetano Veloso, White Stripes." nonsite #10 (September 2013). Web. 20,312 words.
"Close Reading and the Market." Literary Materialisms. New York: Palgrave, 2013. 145-165.
"A lírica da bossa." João Gilberto. Ed. Walter Garcia. São Paulo: Cosac Naify, 2012. 276-282.
"The Work of Art in the Age of its Real Subsumption under Capital." nonsite (editorial, March 2012). Web. 10,002 words.
"Chinua Achebe and the Politics of Form." Research in African Literatures 42.2 (Summer 2011) 87-90.
"The Identity of Identity and Difference: Modernism and African Literature." Traversing Transnationalism: The Horizons of Literary and Cultural Studies. Ed. Pier Paolo Frassinelli, Ronit Frenkel, and David Watson. Amsterdam: Rodopi, 2011. 179-190.
"One, Two, Many Ends of Literature." Mediations 24.2 (Spring 2009) 90-101.
"It's Dialectical!" Mediations 24.2 (Spring 2009) 150-163.
"Twenty-Five Theses on Philosophy in an Age of Finance Capital." With Imre Szeman. A Leftist Ontology. Ed. Carsten Strathausen. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2009. 33-53.
"Marxist Approaches to the African Novel." Teaching the African Novel. Ed. Guarav Desai. New York: Modern Language Association, 2009. 37-52.
"African Literature, Modernism, and the Problem of Political Subjectivity." Novel 41.2/3 (Spring/Summer 2008) 264-78.
"Sufficient Involvement." Framework: The Finnish Art Review 8 (April 2008) 16-17.
"Editors' Note." Mediations 23.1 (Fall 2007) 1-5.
"Tropicália, pós-modernismo e a subsunção real do trabalho sob o capital." Roberto Schwarz: Um crítico na periferia do capitalismo. Ed. Maria Elisa Cevasco and Milton Ohata. São Paulo: Companhia das Letras, 2007. 295-309.
"Cognitive Map, Aesthetic Object, National Allegory: Carpenter's Gothic." Paper Empire: Essays on the Art of William Gaddis. Ed. Joseph Tabbi and Rone Shavers. Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 2007. 151-160.
"O que é a multidão?" Trans. Milton Ohata. Novos Estudos 75 (July 2006) 93-108. Trans. of "What Is the Multitude? Questions for Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri."
"Shenmé Shì Gún Zhòng?" Wen Yi Yan Ji [Literature and Art Studies] 7 (July 2005) 108-117. Trans. of "What Is the Multitude? Questions for Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri."
"What Is the Multitude? Questions for Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri." With Imre Szeman. Cultural Studies 19.3 (May 2005) 372-87.
"Aesthetics." Johns Hopkins Guide to Literary Theory and Criticism, 2nd ed. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins UP, 2005. 4-10.
"Ngugi wa Thiong'o." Johns Hopkins Guide to Literary Theory and Criticism, 2nd ed. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins UP, 2005. 708-710.
"{(Ø,S̷}∈{$}? Or, Alain Badiou and Slavoj Žižek, Waiting for Something to Happen." (review essay). The New Centennial Review 4.3 (Winter 2004) 289-319.
"Revolution and Recidivism: The Problem of Kenyan History in the Plays of Ngugi wa Thiong'o." African Drama and Performance. Ed. John Conteh-Morgan and Tejumola Olaniyan. Bloomington: Indiana UP, 2004. 126-143.
"bossapósbossa: Or, Postmodernism as Semi-Peripheral Symptom." The New Centennial Review 3.2 (Summer 2003) 117-159.
"What's Left of the Dialectic? A Polemic." With Imre Szeman. English Studies in Canada 29.1-2 (March/June 2003) 17-24.
"The Music of the Sphere." Content Providers of the World Unite! The Cultural Politics of Globalization. The Institute on Globalization and the Human Condition Working Papers Series 3.3 (May 2003) 23-28.
"The Global Coliseum: On Empire" (an interview with Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri). With Imre Szeman. Cultural Studies 16.2 (March 2002) 177-192.
"'Subterranean Passages of Thought': Empire's Inserts." Edited with Imre Szeman. Cultural Studies 16.2 (March 2002) 193-212.
"The Eidaesthetic Itinerary: Notes on the Geopolitical Movement of the Literary Absolute." South Atlantic Quarterly 100.3 (Summer 2001) 829-851.
"Castiglione, Our Contemporary." Explorations in Renaissance Culture 27.1 (Summer 2001) 113-128.
"Marxism and Postcolonial Studies Now" (review essay). Symploke 8.1-2 (Spring 2001) 214-221.
"Introduction: Fieldwork in Culture." With Imre Szeman. Introduction. Pierre Bourdieu: Fieldwork in Culture. New York: Rowman and Littlefield, 2000. 1-16.
"Revolution and Recidivism: The Problem of Kenyan History in the Plays of Ngugi wa Thiong'o." Research in African Literatures 30.4 (Winter 1999) 56-73.
"People's Theater in East Africa: The Lehrstücke of Ngugi wa Thiong'o." Communications from the International Brecht Society 27.1 (June 1998) 23-27.
"Introduction." An African Practice of Philosophy. SAPINA 10.2 (Fall 1997) vii-x.
"Umbuji wa Mnazi and the Poetics of Anthropology." An African Practice of Philosophy. SAPINA 10.2 (Fall 1997) 177-229.
"An Overview of the Classical Swahili Poetry of Pate Island." SAPINA 8.1-2 (Spring 1995) 43-50.
Umbuji wa Mnazi and the Poetics of Anthropology. Palo Alto: Stanford University Board of Trustees, 1995.
"Boundary Issues of Aesthetic Mimesis I: Music." Translation of Part 1 of "Grenzfragen der ästhetischen Mimesis," Chapter 14 of Georg Lukács, Die Eigenart des Ästhetischen. Translated with Jan Pfeiffer. Mediations, forthcoming 2019.
"Henry James’s Method." Translation of "Retrato de uma Senhora: o método de Henry James," by Roberto Schwarz. Mediations, forthcoming 2019.
"From a Rooseveltian Dream to the Nightmare of Parliamentary Coup." Translation of "Do sonho rooseveltiano ao pesadelo golpista: A ascensão e o declínio do lulismo," by André Singer. Translated with Emilio Sauri. nonsite #24 (Summer 2018). Web. 8857 words.
"Kafka's Family Man." Reprint of "Worries of a Family Man." Two Girls and Other Essays, by Roberto Schwarz. London: Verso, 2012. 3-9.
"Worries of a Family Man." Translation of "Tribulação de um pai de família," by Roberto Schwarz, and "Die Sorge des Hausvaters," by Franz Kafka. Mediations 23.1 (Fall 2007) 21-25.
"Our Lot." Translation of "A parte que nos coube," by Milton Ohata. With Emilio Sauri. Mediations 23.1 (Fall 2007) 177-93.
"Brazilian Civilization's Missing Link." Translation of "O elo perdido da civilização brasileira," by Milton Ohata. Mediations 23.1 (Fall 2007) 195-218.
"The Elegance of the Coconut Tree." Translation of Umbuji wa Mnazi, by Ahmed Sheikh Nabhany. In Umbuji wa Mnazi and the Poetics of Anthropology. Palo Alto: Stanford University Board of Trustees, 1995. ii-xix.
"Mangueira/Manhattan: Uneven Political Development and Aesthetic Form." Annual Distinguished Lecturer, Plenary Lecture, Cultural Production and Uneven Development, Graduate Program for Cultural Studies, University of Pittsburgh, April 19, 2018.
"What is Autonomy, and What Does it Matter?" Keynote, Presumed Autonomy: Literature and the Arts in Theory and Practice. Stockholm University, May 11, 2016.
"Actually Existing Modernism in Photography as Film and in Film as Photography." Keynote, For What It’s Worth: Nostalgia, Sustainability and the Values of the Present. Justus Liebig Universität, Giessen, April 30, 2016.
"Modernism after the Sentence." Keynote, After Postmodernism? Johannes Gutenberg Universität, Mainz, September 17, 2015.
"What's on TV?" Keynote, Engagements, Events, Energies: The Humanities Between Affirmation and Critique. Indiana University, April 19, 2014.
"What's on TV?" Baker-Nord Lecture, Case Western Reserve University, April 7, 2014.
"What's on TV?" Keynote, Art in Interesting Times. University of Florida, March 28, 2014.
"Brecht eu misturo com Caetano: Citação, mercado, forma musical." Opening Keynote, XIV Seminário de Pesquisa do Programa de Pós-Graduação em Estudos Literários. Universidade do Estado de São Paulo (UNESP-Araraquara), October 29, 2013.
"Brecht eu misturo com Caetano: Citação, mercado, forma musical." Plenary, V Colóquio Marx e os Marxismos 2013. University of São Paulo, October 25, 2013.
"Two Aesthetic Revolutions in Arrow of God." Plenary panel, Celebrating Chinua Achebe. Newhouse Center for the Humanities, Wellesley University, March 6, 2010.
"The Hermeneutics of Cultural Flows: Three Options and a Choice of Numbers." Keynote, Transcendent Ecologies, Immanent Economies? University of Washington, May 22, 2009.
"Modernism and Political Subjectivity." Plenary panel, Theories of the Novel Now. Fortieth Anniversary Conference of Novel: A Forum on Fiction. Providence, RI, November 10, 2007.
"Response to Timothy Brennan: Civic Realism Today." Department of Art and Art History, UIC, November 9, 2018.
"Hélio Oiticica, Tropical Hyperion." Rethinking Form in Latin American Literature and Visual Art, UT Dallas, January 19, 2018.
"Art as Object, Art as Commodity." Master Class, International Graduate Centre for the Study of Culture, Justus Liebig Universität, Giessen, April 28, 2017.
"Art after Art after Art." Aesthetics and Politics, UIC Department of English Public Roundtable, October 1, 2015.
"Taking Sides." Languages of Conflict. School of Languages Summer Seminar, University of Illinois at Chicago, May 14, 2015.
"What's is Art? What is a Commodity?" Art and the Commodity Form. University of Illinois at Chicago, February 3, 2015.
"The Work of Art in the Age of its Real Subsumption under Capital." Seminar, Department of Literary Theory, Instituto de Estudos da Linguagem, Universidade Estadual de Campinas (UNICAMP), October 30, 2013.
"Hegel and the World Republic of Letters." Instituting Literature: Writing between Singularity and Transnational System. Stockholm University, June 13, 2013.
"Music, Meaning, Market." Seminar, Department of English, Stockholm University, June 11, 2013.
"The Identity of Identity and Difference: Modernism and African Literature." Institut für Asien- und Afrikawissenschaften, Humboldt Universität zu Berlin, April 23, 2012.
"Der Identität der Identität und Nichtidentität: Modernism and African Literature." W.E.B. Du Bois Lecture. Humboldt Universität zu Berlin, November 13, 2012.
"The Identity of Identity and Difference: Hegel and World Literature." Spectres of World Literature. University of London, September 9, 2011.
"Where Are We? What Time Is It?" Buffett Center Graduate Colloquium, Northwestern University, May 25, 2011.
"Synthesis and Horizon in the Science of Experience." Department of English, University of Alberta, September 16, 2010.
"Reading Resistance." Postcolonial Empires: Writing Resistance? Centre for Research in the Arts, Social Sciences and Humanities, Cambridge University, July 3, 2009.
"The Hermeneutics of Cultural Flows." Department of English, Saint Francis Xavier University (Canada), April 7, 2009.
"Globalization and Culture: Three Options and a Choice of Numbers." Department of Cultural Studies, Columbia College Chicago, November 13, 2008.
"African Literature, Modernism, and the Problem of Political Subjectivity." Africa in Portuguese, the Portuguese in Africa. Hesburgh Center for International Studies, Notre Dame University, April 19, 2008.
"Globalization and Culture: Three Options and a Choice of Numbers." Department of English, Carnegie Mellon University, October 18, 2007.
"African Literature, Modernism, and the Problem of Political Subjectivity." African Novels and the Politics of Form. University of Pittsburgh, October 27, 2006.
"Empire and Culture Now: Three Options and a Choice of Numbers." Empire et culture aujourd'hui: Perspectives francophones sur la mondialisation. Humanities Institute of Ireland, University College Dublin, September 16, 2006.
"The Multitude is Not a Concept: Contemporary Evasions of Antagonism." McMaster University, Institute on Globalization and the Human Condition, October 8, 2005.
"The Real is Not a Concept: Slavoj Žižek and the Labor of the Negative." McMaster University, Institute on Globalization and the Human Condition, April 1, 2005.
"The Politics of Musical Form: Brazilian Popular Music and the Coup of 1964." Carleton College, Department of Latin American Studies, February 22, 2005.
"Teaching Chinua Achebe." Newberry Teachers' Consortium, The Newberry Library, Chicago, October 19, 2004.
"Tools for Cultural Study: Adorno, Lukács, Benjamin, and Brecht." University of São Paulo, Department of English, August 4, 2004.
"Nostalgia as Form in Ford Madox Ford's The Good Soldier." Department of English, University of California at Davis, February 1, 2002.
"bossapósbossa: or, Postmodernism as Semi-Peripheral Symptom." McMaster University, Institute on Globalization and the Human Condition, October 29, 2001.
"bossapósbossa: or, Postmodernism as Semi-Peripheral Symptom." Department of Music, Southern Illinois University at Edwardsville, May 30, 2001.
"Truth and Concretism." Association for the Study of the Arts of the Present, New Orleans, LA, October 19, 2018.
"Concretism, Literalness, and the Commodity: 1965." Association for the Study of the Arts of the Present, Oakland, CA, October 26, 2017.
"Reading Hegel Reading Diderot." Modern Language Association, Philadelphia, PA, January 6, 2017.
"Actually Existing Modernism in Film as Photography and in Photography as Film." Modernist Studies Association, Pasadena, CA, November 19, 2016.
"Modernism after the Sentence." Modernist Studies Association, Boston, MA, November 20, 2015.
"Art after Art after Art, after Labor after Labor after Labor." Association for the Study of the Arts of the Present, Greenville, SC, September 24, 2015.
"Against the Pleasure of the Postcolonial Text." Modern Language Association, Vancouver, BC, January 8, 2015.
"Althusser and the Ruse of Reason." Modern Language Association, Vancouver, BC, January 10, 2015.
"What's on TV?" Association for the Study of the Arts of the Present, Detroit, MI, October 5, 2013.
"The Novel after Postmodernism.” Modern Language Association, Seattle, WA, January 6, 2012.
"The Postcolonial and the Postmodern Revisited.” Modern Language Association, Seattle, WA, January 5, 2012.
"What Does Hegel Mean by 'Univeral,' and What Does That Mean for World Literature?" American Comparative Literature Association, Vancouver, BC, Canada, April 1, 2011.
"What Is a Frame?" Cultural Studies Association, Chicago, IL, March 26, 2011.
"A Narratology Become Postcolonial." Modern Language Association, Los Angeles, CA, January 7, 2011.
"Autonomy (in Retrospect)." Modern Language Association, Los Angeles, CA, January 7, 2011.
"Esprit de corps." Cultural Studies Association, Berkeley, CA, March 19, 2010.
"Marxist Approaches to the African Novel." Modern Language Association, Philadelphia, PA, December 29, 2009.
"modernismpostmodernism." Modernist Studies Association, Montréal, Québec, November 6, 2009.
"Waiting and the Ends of Literature." Marxist Literary Group Institute on Culture and Society, Portland State University, June 20, 2009.
"Adorno between Immanence and Transcendence." Marxist Literary Group Institute on Culture and Society, University of Wisconsin Milwaukee, June 13, 2008.
"Marxism and Disability." 2008 International Conference on Narrative, Austin, TX, May 3, 2008.
"Musical Form and the Real Subsumption of Labor under Capital." Modern Language Association, Washington, DC, December 28, 2005.
"Utopian Generations: Modernism and African Literature." African Literature Association, Boulder, CO, April 8, 2005.
"Adorno, Roberto, Caetano? Tropicália e a subsunção real do trabalho ao Capital." IX Congresso da Associação Brasileira de Literatura Comparada, Porto Alegre, Brazil, July 21, 2004.
"The Materialist Suture." Marxist Literary Group Institute on Culture and Society, University of Illinois at Chicago, June 12, 2004.
"The Historical Suture." Marxist Literary Group Institute on Culture and Society, University of California at Davis, June 19, 2003.
"Postmodernism as Semi-Peripheral Symptom." VIII Congresso da Associação Brasileira de Literatura Comparada, Belo Horizonte, Brazil, July 26, 2002.
"The Music of the Sphere: The Sound of Global Culture." Content Providers of the Word, Unite! McMaster University, Ontario, Canada, October 26, 2001.
"The Eidaesthetic Itinerary." Globalicities, Michigan State University, October 18, 2001.
"Nostalgia without Content: Ford Madox Ford's Parade's End." Modernist Studies Association, Rice University, October 15, 2001.
"Hegelianism without Eurocentrism: Or, Hegel and Haiti." Hegel and Africa, Northwestern University, March 3, 2001.
"O Frenético semba de Marx: Pepetela e o tom da Utopia." VII Congresso da Associação Brasileira de Literatura Comparada, Salvador, Brazil, July 28, 2000.
"Globalization and Aural Culture." Northeast Modern Language Association, Buffalo, New York, April 7, 2000.
"Critical Thought, Plumpes Denken: Towards a Dialectic of the Public Intellectual." Towards a Critical Public: Institutions and Critical Thought in the Twenty-First Century, Center For Cultural Studies, University of California at Santa Cruz, April 23, 1999.
"Un regain d'authenticité: Heideggerian Existentialism and Cheikh Hamidou Kane's L'aventure ambiguë." American Comparative Literature Association, University of Texas at Austin, March 27, 1998.
"Brecht in East Africa: The Lehrstücke of Ngugi wa Thiong'o." Revisualizing Brecht, University of North Carolina - Chapel Hill, February 15, 1998.
"Towards a Social Aesthetics." Pierre Bourdieu: Fieldwork in Culture, Duke University, April 21, 1995.
Co-organizer, with Henry Schwarz, of the Marxist Literary Group Institute on Culture and Society, Georgetown University, June 8-12, 2006; with Henry Schwarz and Jen Phillis, June 24-28, 2015; with Jamie Daniel, UIC, June 11-15, 2004 and June 13-20, 2001.
Co-organizer, with Silvia López, "Aesthetics and Globalization I" and "Aesthetics and Globalization II." Modern Language Association, Washington, DC, December 27-28, 2005.
Co-organizer, with Lynette Jackson, Stanley Fish, Javier Villa-Flores, Mark Liechty, and Gayatri Reddy, of the conference Religion in Our Time, University of Illinois at Chicago, April 1, 2005.
Organizer and Chair, "New Post-Marxisms." Marxist Literary Group Institute on Culture and Society, UIC, June 12, 2004.
Organizer and Chair, "Lenin and Culture." Modern Language Association, New York, December 28, 2002.
Organizer, "Ulysses: The Ethics and Aesthetics of Subjectivity." Midwest Modern Language Association, Cleveland, November 2, 2001.
Organizer and Chair, "Philosophy in the Age of Finance Capital II: Subjectivity." Marxism 2000, University of Massachusetts at Amherst, September 23, 2000.
Co-convenor, with Timothy Keeyen Choy, of the seminar Towards a Critical Public: Institutions and Critical Thought in the Twenty-First Century, Center for Cultural Studies, University of California at Santa Cruz, April 22-24, 1999.
Co-organizer, with Imre Szeman, of the conference Pierre Bourdieu: Fieldwork in Culture, Duke University, April 1995.
"Empire: A New Book Takes America by Storm." Interviewed by Fergus Nicol. The World Today, BBC World Service, 18 July 2001.
"What is to be done?" With Imre Szeman. Contribution to "What is to be Done? Questions for the 21st Century." Exhibition at Lenin Museum in Tampere, Finland, January 2003. Contribution also included in exhibitions at Krasnoyarsk Museum Biennale, Siberia (Sept 2003); "Get Rid of Yourself," ACC Gallery, Weimar/Leipzig (July-Oct 2003); and "24/7," Contemporary Art Centre, Vilnius, Lithuania (Sept-Oct 2003)
Founding Editor, MCM′ Books, 2013-
Head, Department of African American Studies, University of Illinois at Chicago, 2009-12
Chair, Editorial Board, Mediations, 2007-
President, Marxist Literary Group, 2005-2016
Editorial Board, nonsite.org (Baltimore), 2017-
Editorial Board, World Literatures in Comparison (Palgrave), 2015-
Conselho editorial, Revista de Estudos Culturais (São Paulo), 2014-
Comité de lecture, Radical (Brussels), 2013-
Executive Committee, Postcolonial Studies, MLA, 2015-18; chair 2018
Search Committee (Senior, open-rank), Department of English, University of Illinois at Chicago, 2013-14
Search Committee (Head), Department of African American Studies, UIC, 2013-14
Graduate Committee, Department of English, UIC, 2001-2, 2007-9 (ex officio), and 2013-15
Selection Committee, Modern Language Association Aldo and Jeanne Scaglione Prize for Comparative Literary Studies, 2009-2011
Programming Committee, Department of African American Studies, University of Illinois at Chicago, 2007-8, 2014-15, 2015-16
Director of Graduate Studies, Department of English, UIC, 2007-9
Search Committee (British Studies), Department of English, 2007-8
Search Committee (Cultural Studies), Department of African American Studies, 2007-8
Search Committee (British Studies), Department of English, 2006-7
Search Committee (African American Literature), Department of African American Studies, 2006-7
Delegate Assembly, MLA, 2005-07
Post-doctoral Committee, African American Studies, University of Illinois at Chicago, 2005.
Advisory Committee, African American Studies, UIC, 2004-5
Executive Committee, Sociological Approaches to Literature, MLA, 2004-7
Steering Committee, English Department, UIC, 2004-5
Graduate Curriculum Taskforce, English Department, UIC, 2001-03; Graduate Curriculum Revision Committee, English, UIC, 2003-04
Dean's Committee on the Headship of the Department of English, UIC, Fall 2001.
Search Committee (Asian American Literature), English Department, UIC, 2001-02.
Graduate Admissions Fellowship Subcommittee, English Department, UIC, Fall 2001.
Graduate Committee, English Department, UIC, 2001-2
Campus Committee on International Studies, UIC, 2000-
Advisor, International Studies, UIC, 2000-
Editorial collective, polygraph: An International Journal of Culture and Politics, 1995-99.
"Literature and the Dialectic." English 580, Fall 2016, University of Illinois at Chicago.
“The Brazilian Novel, 1850-2000.” Spanish 434 / Latin American Studies 491 / English 429, Fall 2015, UIC.
"English Literature from Stuart Restoration to Imperial Crisis" (1660-1900 lecture survey). English 242, Fall 1999, Fall 2001, Spring 2002, Spring 2004, Fall 2005, Fall 2015, UIC.
"The Contemporary Novel." English 540, Spring 2015, UIC.
"Contemporary African Literature." African American Studies 266, Spring 2015, UIC.
"Immanent Criticism: Or, How to Get an A in English." English 240, Fall 20014, Fall 2005, UIC.
"Autonomy." English 585, Spring 2014, UIC.
"Marx: Capital and Manuscripts." English 585, Fall 2011, UIC.
"Hegel: Phenomenology and Logic." English 585, Fall 2010, UIC.
"Proseminar I: Aesthetics and Politics." English 503, Fall 2009, Fall 2008, Fall 2007, UIC.
"Cultura e Ideologia na Era do Capital Multinacional." Modern Letters 5271, First Semester 2007, University of São Paulo.
"Leituras do Cânon III: The American Novel." Modern Letters 0587, First Semester 2007, University of São Paulo.
"Culture as Resource: Culture and Democracy in the Global System." With Eric Cazdyn, Maria Elisa Cevasco, Eva-Lynn Jagoe, Prem Kumar Rajaram, Will Straw, Imre Szeman, and Erna von der Walde. Central European University, Budapest, Summer 2007, Summer 2006.
"What Is World Literature?" English 537, Spring 2006, University of Illinois at Chicago.
"The Literature of South Africa." African American Studies 250, Spring 2006, UIC
"The Labor of the Negative: Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit, Logic, and Aesthetics." English 504, Spring 2005, UIC.
"The Literature of Nigeria." African American Studies 250, Fall 2004, UIC.
"A/V: Leituras da Globalização e da Cultura de Massa" [A/V: Readings in Globalization and Mass Culture]. With Eric Cazdyn, Maria Elisa Cevasco, and Imre Szeman. Modern Letters 5227, Second Semester 2004, University of São Paulo.
"African Literature and Revolution." AAST 250, Fall 2003, UIC.
"Aesthetics and Politics." English 503, Fall 2003, UIC.
"The Literary Absolute II: The Work." English 497, Spring 2002, UIC.
"The Literary Absolute I: The Idea." English 497, Fall 2001, UIC.
"Empire: The World System from Hegel to Spivak." English 458, Spring 2001, UIC.
"Ulysses." English 540, Fall 2000, UIC.
"Critical Theory: Backgrounds and Currents." English 300, Spring 2000, Fall 2001, Spring 2001, Spring 2004, UIC.
"African Literature and Theory since 1945." English 458, Spring 2000, UIC.
"The Caribbean and Africa, Africa and India: Postcolonial Novels from the Atlantic and Indian-Ocean Zones." English 358, Fall 1999, UIC.
"The Decay of Experience: Modernism between the World Wars." Spring 1997, Duke University.
"The African Novel: Mau Mau to Biafra." Spring 1996, Duke University.
Comparative modernism; African literature; twentieth-century British literature; critical theory; early German romanticism; Brazilian literature and culture; Marxism; music studies; aesthetics.
Modern Language Association, Modernist Studies Association, African Literature Association, Associação Brasileira de Literatura Comparada, American Comparative Literature Association, Marxist Literary Group.