Ms Nancy Laura Morkel
Lecturer: English
Qualifications: PhD Africa Studies – South African Literature & Identity (UFS, in progress) | MA English (NMMU), cum laude | BA Hons English (UPE), cum laude | BA Media, Communication and Culture (UPE) | Postgraduate Diploma in Higher Education and Training (UFH) | Editing Methodology (SU) | Editing Practice (SU) | TEFL (TTA, in progress)
Professional Background
Nancy Laura Morkel is a Lecturer in English for Language and Social Studies Education at the Central University of Technology, Free State, Welkom Campus.
Prior to joining CUT, she served for 12 years as Lecturer: English Studies (Literature) at Nelson Mandela University. Before this, she worked at the University of Fort Hare for four years, progressing from Junior Lecturer to Lecturer in English Language and Comparative Literature.
She is currently completing a PhD thesis titled “‘Far from being ready-made’: Re-imagining ‘social identity’ and belonging in Zoë Wicomb’s fiction.” The study explores how Wicomb’s fiction opens pathways for re-imagining nation, narration, social identity and belonging for the South African subject, using a postcolonial reading of the relationship between narrative and power.
Her research interests include African literature, home, identity and belonging, race and representation, social justice in education, popular culture and narrative. She has successfully supervised more than 25 Honours treatises and six Master's dissertations.
Areas of Expertise
- • African Literature
- • South African Writing and Reception
- • Postcolonial and Decolonial Studies
- • Orality, Poetry and Black Identities
- • English Literary Studies
- • English Studies
Selected Publications
Books and Book Chapters
- • Mbinjama-Gamatham, A., Ramphobole, T. & Morkel, N.L. (2021). “‘The R. in R&B’: Rape, Race, and Representation in Surviving R. Kelly.” In M.B. Marron (Ed.), Misogyny across Global Media. Lanham: Lexington Books.
- • Morkel, N.L. (2011). “Zoë Wicomb.” In H.L. Gates Jr. & E. Akyeampong (Eds.), Dictionary of African Biography. New York: Oxford University Press.
Conference Proceedings & Presentations
- • Morkel, N.L. (2021). “‘[T]o bring down my fist on that wholeness’: Re/constructions of patterns of belonging in You Can’t Get Lost in Cape Town.” NIHSS Virtual Annual National Doctoral Conference: Building and Dynamising the Humanities and Social Sciences, 2-4 November 2021.
- • Morkel, N.L. (2019). “‘[T]o be relieved of the burden of home’: Memory and intertexts of ‘belonging’ in Zoë Wicomb’s October.” NIHSS 5th Annual National Doctoral Conference: Building and Dynamising the Humanities and Social Sciences, 28-31 October 2019.
- • Morkel, N.L. (2019). “‘Gender, Race…’ and the limits of university transformation/critical university studies.” ACUS Winter School: Advancing Critical University Studies – Emancipatory Imaginations, 15-20 August 2019.
- • Morkel, N.L. (2017). “Memory and writing South Africa.” Guest presentation to international students participating in the Nelson Mandela University Mid-Year International Short Programme, 12 July 2017.
- • Morkel, N.L. (2017). “Black South African women’s poetry and gender-based violence – The works of Gabeba Baderoon and Makhosazana Xaba.” Guest presentation to Lynchburg College exchange students at Nelson Mandela University, 8 June 2017.
