Department of English, Goa University

The Department of English, Goa University is part of Goa's lone university and is based at its campus at Taleigao Plateau. It offers degrees at the Masters, M.Phil. and the Ph.D. levels. It was set up in 1965, as part of the Centre for Post-Graduate Instruction and Research, the predecessor of the Goa University.
History
Following the setting up of the Goa University in 1985, the Department of English was transferred from the CPIR to the GU. Its Heads of Department included:
* Prof. A. R. Kulkarni
* Prof. A. K. Joshi
* Prof. Balchandra Nemade
* Prof. Kiran Budkuley
* Prof. K. Sripad Bhat
* Prof. Nina Caldeira
* Prof. Andre Rafael Fernandes
Initially, the Department would offer admission to around 15-25 post-graduate (Masters) students each year. Subsequently, it has raised its annual admission intake to approx 50 candidates per year.
Faculty
As of November 2020, the faculty of the department comprises Andre Rafael Fernandes (Professor and Head), Nina Caldeira (professor and Dean), K. Sripad Bhat (professor), Anjali Chaubey, Poorwa Naik and Nafisa Oliveira (assistant professors)
Some of the work of the department cuts across language and other boundaries. Andre Rafael Fernandes' thesis, published as When the Curtains Rise...Understanding Goa’s Vibrant Konkani Theater focuses on the popular Konkani stage of Goa. Former head of the Konkani Department of the Goa University, late Dr Madhavi Sardessai, had been awarded her Ph.D in the Department of English of the Goa University for her thesis on 'A Comparative Linguistic and Cultural Study of the Lexical INfluences on Konkani.'
The book Goa Through the Traveller's Lens, edited by the then Head of Department, Dr Nina Caldeira, looks at perceptions of Goa by travellers who visited the land. It includes some 14 papers by "researchers who have studied travel narratives dealing with Goa from the 16th and 17th centuries to the present times."
Among the works authored by former Head of Department Dr Kiran Budkuley are Shenoy Goembab: The Man and His Work (Asmitai Pratishthan, 2003); Musings in the Meadows: Essays in Goan Literature and Culture (Sanjana Publications, 2012); Mapping the Mosaic of Culture: Essays in Language and Literature (Jaipur University Book House, 2009),
Alumni and PhD scholars
Its alumni has taught English, Literature and other subjects at the university and college levels in Goa. Among its alumni have been the editor of the Konkani literary journal Zaag late Dr Madhavi Sardessai, the former Oxford University Press (Delhi) editor and poet Brian Mendonca, and advertising professionals, journalists, teachers, critics, etc.
The Department has over 30 PhDs to its credit.
As of 2020, topics being researched on in the department included subjects such as dystopian fiction, the portrayal of Indian prostitutes in fiction, crossover fiction in children's literature, partition literature in India and Finland, post-9/11 fiction, the cultural experiences of Pearl S. Buck during the Chinese Civil War, Instapoetry, Haruki Murakami, Green cultural studies, identitarian spaces of the Goan diaspora, implementation of ICT in language and literature, college-level term paper writing in English in Bangladesh, among others.
Research scholars in the department came from countries including Finland, Bangladesh, among others.

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