Unit for Criticism SCT Fellow, Summer 2026
On my first day in Ithaca, hoping to get a cup of coffee, I followed the directions on Google Maps to the nearest cafe, just a short ten-minute walk away. Within five minutes, I found myself in equal parts stunned and confused, staring at a beautiful waterfall. I had, as I would discover, unknowingly entered the Cascadilla Gorge trail, one of the many trails that are around the town. Eventually, I would end up at an ice cream shop instead of a cafe. ‘A classic Ithaca adventure’, the ice cream shop attendant would laugh as they handed me a scoop of coffee ice cream, a pleasant cold treat after an unexpected hiking expedition on a warm summer day. I begin my reflection with this anecdote because it encapsulates my experience of the summer: one that takes you down unexpected paths, exceeds your expectations, and is thoroughly rewarding in many, many ways.
I attended the School of Criticism and Theory at Cornell University through the Nicholson Fellowship awarded by the Unit for Criticism and Interpretative Theory. For my major seminar, I had opted to attend ‘Orientalism/Capitalism’ taught by Prof Chi-ming Yang. It was a perfect complement to my dissertation project’s theoretical analytics and came at an apt moment – just as I was scheduled to begin my fieldwork and dissertation writing.
The seminar was intellectually invigorating and intensive, as we covered a spectacular range of theories over the course of six weeks and twelve sessions. We read works by Edward Said, Mike Davis, Patrick Wolfe, Timothy Mitchell, Karl Marx, Edward Said, Diana K. Davis, Andreas Malm, Donna Haraway, Cedric Robinson, Iyko Day, Katherine McKittrick, and Sharon Holland – to name just a few – as we discussed theories of environmental orientalism, settler colonialism, extractive capitalism, animal capital, racial capitalism, and so on. We gave the texts a close reading to attend to their language, politics, methods, and citations, while reflecting on how our own projects could gain from these readings. With participants coming from all over the world and with different disciplinary trainings, classroom discussions revealed varying perspectives and approaches to the theories, surprising me on occasion as new meanings would emerge from the texts. We also read poetry and watched films in the context of these theories, weaving them into our discussions on various contemporary forms of violence, dispossession, exploitation, and extraction, as well as notes of resistance and solidarities. Our seminar concluded the six weeks of incredibly inspiring and passionate conversations with an Afro-Asia solidarity session that brought together the entire SCT community for an afternoon of poetry, dialogue, and drinks.
Along with our selected seminar, the SCT schedule also included several public lectures by the SCT faculty, workshops, and events, including a two-day conference celebrating the program’s 50th anniversary this year. These events brought together faculty and participants to collectively contemplate the need for critical theory in the contemporary political moment.
The town of Ithaca and Cornell University provide a fitting backdrop to six weeks of deep immersion in critical theory and intellectual debates. The natural environment of Ithaca, its local history and landscape, echoed many times our conversations in the classroom, underscoring for us the urgency of the questions being raised. If the mornings were spent discussing complex theories in the warm classrooms of Goldwyn Smith Hall, the evenings took us on walks along cool waterfalls, Cornell’s botanical garden, the arboretum, and the streets of Ithaca Commons, where conversations and debates would continue to flow. On other occasions, the libraries of Cornell – including the historic A. D. White Library – provided comfortable and quiet reading nooks and a considerable set of resources to support our work.
Attending the School of Criticism and Theory is truly a worthwhile experience – one that left an indelible mark on me. SCT provided us with the space to sit with new and intellectually stimulating ideas and encouraged us to explore different methods of analysis and critical reading practices, as I found myself repeatedly appreciating over the summer. It is an invaluable opportunity as a PhD scholar to find a space to read, pause, and reflect on theory without the usual academic pressures or deadlines, to step out briefly from one’s own research. Beyond the classroom, I was able to build new friendships and gain a strong sense of academic community over many, many scoops of ice cream (and trivia) at the Cornell Dairy and at many other local ice cream shops sprinkled around town. As we explored Ithaca together, we shared resources and offered each other support, creating our small communities of care. Along with the academic gains, I came back from Ithaca at the end of the six weeks with fond memories of the camaraderie that was built and a set of amazingly supportive peers.
I am grateful to the Unit of Criticism and Interpretative Theory for providing this opportunity to attend the summer program, and I return to my dissertation research, inspired and rejuvenated.