University of Leeds student receives Fulbright for research at Cornell

Rebecca Macklin, a PhD candidate in comparative literature at the University of Leeds, has received an All Disciplines Fulbright Award to undertake research at Cornell University. Macklin will spend a year as a Visiting Student Researcher under the supervision of Eric Cheyfitz, Ernest I. White Professor of American Studies and Humane Letters in the English Department in the College of Arts and Sciences.

While at Cornell, Macklin will research postcolonial and indigenous engagements with globalization, with a specific focus on Native American and South African fiction. 
“I am very much looking forward to working with Rebecca during her Fulbright year at Cornell,” said Cheyfitz. “Our work in Indigenous and (post)colonial studies intersects in ways that will prove fruitful to both of us and the university; and Cornell with its interdisciplinary strengths and its internationally recognized American Indian and Indigenous Studies Program and English department is an ideal place for Rebecca to conduct her research. We welcome her enthusiastically and look forward to an exciting collaboration.”

The Fulbright is one of the most well-regarded scholarship programs in the world, providing the only bi-lateral, transatlantic scholarship program. Scholars are selected through a rigorous application and interview process that looks for academic excellence alongside a focused application, a range of extracurricular and community activities, and demonstrated ambassadorial skills. 

The US-UK Fulbright Commission was founded by diplomatic treaty in 1948 to foster intercultural understanding between the United States of America and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland through educational exchange. The Fulbright Commission is part of the scholarship program conceived by Senator J. William Fulbright in the aftermath of World War II to promote leadership, learning and empathy between nations through educational exchange. Prominent alumni of the US-UK Fulbright program include poet Sylvia Plath; politician Charles Kennedy; and the economist and Nobel Laureate Milton Friedman.  

“I am excited to spend a year at Cornell University working with Professor Cheyfitz and colleagues across English and the American Indian and Indigenous Studies Program - an opportunity that would not be possible without the support of the Fulbright Commission,” said Macklin. “Having studied Native American literature from afar for years, it will be invaluable for me to have access to the unparalleled resources and dynamic research culture at Cornell, which I look forward to contributing to. This is a particularly interesting time to be in the U.S., where we are seeing indigenous rights issues such as land access and sovereignty taking center stage, and my research will be vitally informed through being immersed in the landscapes and cultures that my work engages with."

An alumnus of the universities of Leeds and Lancaster, Macklin’s writing has appeared in publications including Native American and Indigenous Studies and Wasafiri. Prior to beginning her doctoral program, Rebecca worked in academic publishing as an editor of sustainable development publications, working with branches of the United Nations.