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Nelani De Costa

Nelani De Costa

PhD Candidate
Arts, Design & Architecture
School of the Arts & Media

Email: n.de_costa@unsw.edu.au

Supervisors: Elizabeth McMahon, Brigitta Olubas

Nelani De Costa is currently a Doctoral candidate at the School of the Arts & Media, UNSW Sydney and a recipient of the University International Postgraduate Award (UIPA) at the UNSW Sydney. She has over 5 years of experience as a lecturer in English literature and literatures in English at the University of Sri Jayewardenepura and South Eastern University of Sri Lanka which are affiliated with the University Grants Commission (UGC), Sri Lanka.

She has a keen interest in the research areas of gender and sexuality in literature, Sri Lankan literature in English, Sri Lankan-Australian fiction, women writers, reception studies, literary geographies and South Asian literature. Her teaching areas of expertise include a wide array of literary subjects such as Augustan, Romantic and Victorian literature, Modern and Postmodern literature, World Literatures in English, Sri Lankan literature in English and literary studies on gender, sexuality and feminism.

She completed her Bachelor’s Degree with Honours in English from the Department of English & Linguistics, Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, University of Sri Jayewardenepura in 2016 and Masters degree in Gender & Women’s Studies at the Faculty of Graduate Studies, University of Colombo. Her MA research thesis was titled “Queer Representation in Sri Lankan English Fiction and Cinema: A Reception Study of Queer Visibility and Censorship” and involved interdisciplinary research across literary, reception and gender studies. One of the highlights of her research journey was when this dissertation was passed without corrections at the viva voce examination by the panel of examiners, which is a rare honour given at the Faculty of Graduate Studies of the University of Colombo.

Apart from her work as an academic, she has co-organized the annual literary forum "New Ink" in Sri Lanka from 2021 to 2023 along with a small group of five voluntary, non-affiliated and independent individuals. New Ink features moderated discussions, speeches and other literary performances on Sri Lankan literature written in English by award winning authors, emerging writers, academics and experts in the field.
  • Literary Geographies
  • Sexual Geographies
  • Contemporary Sri Lankan-Australian Fiction

Indexed Journal Publications

Journal Publications (Peer-Reviewed)

Essays

Full-Paper Publications

  • 2019: De Costa, M.N. Nelani. “Surveying Power in Sri Lankan English Dystopian Fiction; A Critical Analysis of Visakesa Chandrasekaram’s The King and the Assassin." Sahitya Special Volume 2019. Colombo, State Literary Advisory Board, Ministry of Higher Education and Cultural Affairs.
  • 2018: De Costa, Nelani. “The Stereotyping of Queer Identities in Sri Lankan English Fiction.” Sahitya Special Volume 2018. Colombo, State Literary Advisory Board, Ministry of Higher Education and Cultural Affairs.
  • 2017: De Costa, Nelani. “The Disciplining Mechanism of Power in Selected Literary Works by Albert Camus and Franz Kafka.” 15th Open University Research Sessions (OURS 2017), the Open University of Sri Lanka.

Poems

  • 2020: De Costa, Nelani. “Jesus on Easter” and “The Frog” from Jean’s: A Memorial Anthology, an independently published memorial tribute. Ed. Perera, V.

Abstracts

  • 2018: De Costa, M.N. “The Fashioning of Homosexuality; Queering Contemporary Sri Lankan English Fiction” (International Research Conference on Humanities and Social Sciences (IRCHSS) 2018, University of Sri Jayewardenepura). 
  • 2017: De Costa, M.N. “The Absurd Heroes of Resistance in Translated Works of Literature.” 7th Annual Research Symposium UVPA 2017, hosted by the University of the Visual & Performing Arts, Sri Lanka.
  • 2017: De Costa, M.N. The Politics of Power, Resistance and the Disciplining Gaze of Overbearing Institutions in Selected Works of Literature.” Vavuniya Campus International Research Symposium 2017, hosted by the Vavuniya Campus of the University of Jaffna.
  • 2016: De Costa, Nelani. “Striving for Freedom: Sylvia Plath’s engagement with abjection in relation to the female body and sexuality as a mode of freedom and empowerment from patriarchy and gender stereotypes.” The International Conference on Humanities and Social Sciences 2016, hosted by the University of Sri Jayewardenepura.