Our English majors pursue numerous paths of scholarly study and creative practice
while at MCLA. We have publishing poets and novelists, experimental filmakers and
podcasters, editors and literary scholars. Here are just a few of our current students:
Matt is the co-founder and president of the MCLA Poetry Collective, a close-knit group of poets who meet weekly to share their passion for creative writing and expression. A trained associate in MCLA’s Writing Studio, he enjoys helping students with their writing projects and assignments across disciplines. Outside the classroom, Matt is at work on a novel titled North Watcher, along with a collection of short stories and poems he hopes to share with the world soon.
His poem “Meditations” was published in the 2024 edition of Spires, the campus literary journal. Matt has also presented at MCLA’s Undergraduate Research Conference, including a collaborative session on the philosophy of Martin Heidegger and performances of his poetry during the Creative Writing Special Session.
A science fiction and fantasy writer, Guhan publishes under the pen name G.R. Nanda at grnanda.com. His creative writing has been presented at a COPLAC (Council of Public Liberal Arts Colleges) conference and MCLA’s Undergraduate Research Conference, and he was selected for the MOSAIC Artists’ Residency Internship.
On campus, Guhan is the founder and president of The Fellowship of the Pen, a club dedicated to science fiction, fantasy, and horror writing. .
Quinn’s independent research and writing projects focus on feminist, auto-theoretical
artmaking practices that combine the personal/embodied with the theoretical/conceptual.
She writes hybrid nonfiction essays exploring the politics of illness experiences
and abnormalities historically associated with women, including anorexia nervosa,
scoliosis, and hysteria. In recognition of this work, Quinn has received awards from
the English Department, the Feigenbaum Institute, and the 2025 MOSAIC Arts Immersion
Residency, where she worked on Autorexy, a project dedicated to expanding cultural interpretations of eating disorders while
bridging the gap between theory and personal experience in eating disorder literature.
Quinn is currently serving as curatorial intern for Ecologies of the In\between at MCLA’s Gallery 51, administrative publishing intern at Tupelo Press, and teaching
assistant for Intro to Visual Culture.
Aja has a passion for learning about discourse communities and their ties to different backgrounds and experiences. As a freshman, she gave a presentation entitled “A Comparison of Themes between Nella Larsen and Maya Angelou” at MCLA’s Undergraduate Research Conference, and at the department’s end-of-year ceremony, she was recognized for “Excellence in Literary Criticism” for her work on James Joyce’s A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man in her “Interpretations and Methods” course. Aja's poem "Half Boys" was published in this year's edition of Spires.
You can often find her working as a Writing Associate in the Writing Studio alongside her peers and Dr. Amber Engelson.
