Faculty Bio

Dr. Matthew Risling

Assistant Professor, English

Phone: 403-531-9136
Email: matthew.risling@stmu.ca

I received my bachelor’s and my master’s degrees in English from Simon Fraser University, and I received my PhD in English from the University of Toronto. After obtaining my doctorate, I joined the Liberal Arts faculty at the University of Michigan—Jiao Tong University in Shanghai. There I taught academic writing and English literature. I returned to Canada in 2021 to join the English faculty at St. Mary’s as a contract professor, and I became tenure-track in 2023.

I specialize in long- eighteenth-century British literature with emphases on science, satire, Romanticism, and pre-colonial representations of the East. My dissertation examined the many satires of virtuosi (scientists) published throughout the Enlightenment period. My interest in satire has since expanded to the history and philosophy of humour more generally. I have taught several courses on the topic and can affirm that you don’t need to kill a joke to dissect it. My immediate research focus is on the so-called “Oriental tales” that proliferated in the British print market following the cultural sensation of the Arabian Nights Entertainments, first translated into English in 1706. Much has rightly been made of the colonial ethos—the sense of otherness—embedded in such stories, particularly those from the later eighteenth century. However, I’m equally interested in the way Oriental tales created empathic bonds with imagined communities and promoted a global consciousness.

I love engaging with students in various critical and cultural conversations. In addition to my period courses, I teach English surveys, critical theory, and research methods. I am always striving to grow as an educator and find new ways to make students as enthusiastic about literature and learning as I am.

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Specialization/Research Interest

Eighteenth-century British literature, British Romanticism, Satire and Humour, Literary theory.

Education

PhD English literature, University of Toronto
MA English literature, Simon Fraser University
BA Hons. English literature, Simon Fraser University