Verita Sriratana

Verita Sriratana is Associate Professor of Literary Studies at the Department of English, Faculty of Arts, Chulalongkorn University. She is a former recipient of the Slovak National Scholarship (April-July 2023) based at the University of Prešov, Slovakia, and a former Visiting Research Fellow in Human Rights (Regional Asia Pacific Programme) at the Raoul Wallenberg Institute of Human Rights and Humanitarian Law (RWI) in Lund, Sweden.

Verita earned her BA (1st class honours, with gold medal award for highest academic achievement) in English from Chulalongkorn University, her MA (Distinction) in Colonial and Postcolonial Literature in English from the University of Warwick and her PhD in English from the University of St Andrews. The title of her MA Dissertation is Historical Fiction and Postcolonialism: Analysis of Amitav Ghosh’s In an Antique Land and David Dabydeen’s The Counting House and the title of her PhD thesis is “Making Room” for One’s Own: Virginia Woolf and Technology of Place. The title of her first book is Particular Modernity/Modernism: Locating Modernist Moments in Czech and Slovak Literature (2015).

Verita worked as a postdoctoral researcher at the Department of English Language and Literature, Faculty of Education, Comenius University in Bratislava, Slovak Republic, as a recipient of the Slovak National Scholarship in 2013-2014. She is a recipient of the 2019 Gratias Agit Award presented by the Czech Minister of Foreign Affairs for her contribution in promoting Czech culture, films and literary works in Thailand.

Verita researches in Gender, Necropolitics, Epistemic Violence, Postcolonial Studies and Modernist Studies. She was a guest lecturer on the topic of “Decoloniality and Epistemic Violence in Thailand's Current Pro-Democracy Movement: An Activist Academic’s Experience and Advocacy for Feminism and Marriage Equality” at the Global Gender Matters International Workshop, Department of Gender Studies, Lund University, and on the topic of “Gender and Decoloniality in IR & Diplomacy” for the “Women in Foreign Service” course at the School of International Relations and Diplomacy, Anglo-American University in Prague (Summer School). She was invited as guest speaker for “Thai Totalitarians? Why the Love of Authoritarian Symbols?: A Discussion with Verita Sriratana” broadcast as part of the Nordic Asia Podcast series and as guest speaker on the topic of “Gender-Based Violence in Thailand’s Pro-Democracy Movement” held as part of the Thailand Social Science Seminar Series – TS4 and sponsored by the Sydney Southeast Asia Centre (SSEAC), the Nordic Institute of Asian Studies (NIAS) and the New York Southeast Asia Network (NYSEAN) (https://youtu.be/c4PVsQXAtuo).

Verita presented an academic paper on the topic of “'Laughter, No Laughing Matter': Affect as Epistemic Resistance against Necropower in Poland’s Orange Alternative and Thailand’s Youth-led Pro-democracy Movement" at the British Association for Slavonic and East European Studies Annual Conference held at the University of Glasgow in 2023. Her recent publications include "I Burn (Marx’s) Paris: 'Capital' Cities, Alienation & Deconstruction in the Works of Bruno Jasieński", a research article published in the Temporalities of Modernism Center of European Modernist Studies Volume as part of the CEMS series by La Casa editrice universitaria Ledizioni (https://www.ledizioni.it/prodotto/temporalities-of-modernism/), “The Straight and Strong Man’s Burden”: An Analysis of Benevolent Sexism as Misogyny in International Women’s Day Speeches from Leaders of Belarus, Russia and Thailand”, a research article published in Stance: The Thai Feminist Review. 10: 1 (January-June 2023) (https://wsc.soc.cmu.ac.th/journal/issue_upload/0.93658600-1688125463.pdf), and “The Land of Smiles, Nazi Chic and Communist Cool: Personality Cult and ‘Democide & Holocaust Indifference’ in Thailand”, a research article published as part of Proceedings of the First International Symposium, Identifying and Countering Holocaust Distortion: Lessons For and From Southeast Asia. Ed. Never Again Association. Warsaw: Never Again Association, 2022 (https://online.fliphtml5.com/zfgnm/rbue/#p=84). Verita's forthcoming works include the Thai translation of Susan Sellers's novel entitled Vanessa and Virginia (2008).

Verita's interview on feminism in Thailand bears the title of “Debunking Misconceptions: Feminism Explained”, published by Prachatai English (https://prachatai.com/english/node/8699). She organised and acted as moderator for “The Pandemic, (Necro)Politics and Literature”, an Online Discussion with Arundhati Roy (https://fb.watch/4s3slR90Ce/), and also acted as moderator for "Critical Discourse Analysis Approach to Study Anti-Minority Discourses, Racism, and Genocide Denial" public lecture given by Professor Teun A. van Dijk, held as part of “Identifying and Countering Holocaust Distortion: Lessons for and from Southeast Asia” symposium (https://youtu.be/qOxrR6lUzBU).