Fourth-year PhD student Suchetana Sarkar has been awarded the first annual Benjamin Franklin V Fellowship
The University of South Carolina English Department is excited to announce that fourth-year PhD student Suchetana Sarkar has been awarded the first annual Benjamin Franklin V Fellowship, which will provide summer support for her to work on her dissertation, an examination of postcolonial African and South Asian literature. Her project, “Lands, Waters, and the Wounds of Empire” will explore literary representations of the ecological costs of the history of colonialism.
Describing the impact the fellowship will have on her scholarship, Sarkar notes that the Franklin fellowship "will allow me to devote sustained attention to my dissertation without the burden of balancing research with immediate financial pressures. I am thankful to the English department at USC for providing this much-needed support that will enable me to meet key research and writing goals and maintain momentum toward the timely completion of my degree.”
The Benjamin Franklin V Fellowship was established via the generous donation of Anne Hardin, who established an endowed fund as a way to honor Franklin for his distinguished career in the English Department. Across his broad-ranging scholarly career, Franklin has published works on American literature from the seventeenth through to the twentieth century and, most recently, has published several books on jazz. Helping beginning scholars complete their dissertations is a fitting tribute to Franklin’s legacy.
The English Department is grateful for the example of Franklin’s scholarship, the generosity of supporters like Hardin, and the tremendously importantly academic work being done by Sarkar.