Sarah Jean South

Sarah South is a PhD student in English whose research spans medieval literature, comparative literature, and critical theory. Her primary interests include Old Norse-Icelandic and early English literature, grief narratology, gender and embodiment, and the cultural regulation of mourning. Drawing particularly on Foucauldian discourse analysis, she examines how literary and cultural forms make experiences such as grief, suffering, gender, and bodily difference legible, and how older narrative structures are transformed across historical periods and cultural contexts.

Her scholarly formation is strongly transnational. She completed the graduate coursework required for master’s-level study at the University of Oslo and the University of Iceland, with sustained work in Old Norse-Icelandic language, literature, and culture. That training continues to inform her comparative approach to medieval and North Atlantic literary traditions.

Her broader interests extend into modern and contemporary literature, including writers such as Annie Ernaux and Yukio Mishima, particularly in relation to memory, grief, embodiment, identity, and cultural belonging. Her work reflects a broader commitment to comparative and transnational scholarship across languages, periods, and literary traditions.