Jenny Siméus

Writing Tutor
University Library , University Services
Presentation Publications

Background

I completed my undergraduate and graduate studies at Linnaeus University in Växjö, Sweden.

I earned my PhD degree in English literature in April 2018. Prior to that, I have also earned a Master of Education in the subjects of Social Science and English for lower and upper secondary school.

Research

My main research interest is South African life writing. My PhD thesis is a thesis by publication entitled "Black Lives, White Quotation Marks: Textual Constructions of Selfhood in South African Multivoiced Life Writing". The thesis examines how the self is textually constructed in South African collaborative life writing with more than one narrator present in the text. The life writing that I examined was published between 1987 and 2009 - both during and after the apartheid era.

Current research

My current research is focused on recently published South African life writing, but unlike the texts examined in my PhD thesis, these texts are not collaboratively written. I examine how the self is constructed in the texts, but also the manner in which the texts weave in and deal with history writing, oral narration and historical archives.

Teaching and tutoring

I teach literature within the teacher education programme and as standalone courses. I also supervise students who are writing bachelor theses in literature within and outside of the teacher education.

Article

Siméus, J. (2018). Narrating an Other and Each Other: Collaborative Constructions of Selfhood in There Was This Goat : Investigating the Truth Commission Testimony of Notrose Nobomvu Konile Life Writing, 15(2), 243-254. More information
Siméus, J. (2015). Collaboratively Writing a Self: Textual Strategies in Margaret McCord's The Calling of Katie Makanya: A Memoir of South Africa Research in African Literatures, 46(2), 70-84. More information
Siméus, J. (2014). Complex Collaborations: Elsa Joubert’s The Long Journey of Poppie Nongena and Zoë Wicomb’s David’s Story Ariel: A Review of International English Literature, 45(1-2), 221-245 Calgary: Johns Hopkins University Press . More information

Doctoral thesis

Siméus, J. (2018). Black Lives, White Quotation Marks: Textual Constructions of Selfhood in South African Multivoiced Life Writing (Doctoral thesis, Växjö: Linnaeus University Press). More information

Book chapter

Siméus, J. (2015). Creating a Collaborative Community<em></em>: Problems and Possibilities of Collaborative Autobiographical Writing in Jonathan Morgan's <em>Finding Mr Madini</em>. In: Henrik Eneroth, Douglas Brommesson (Ed.), Global Community? Transnational and Transdisciplinary Exchanges (pp. 79 -98). London: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers More information