Anahit Manoukian is a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Spanish and Portuguese with a Designated Emphasis in Renaissance and Early Modern Studies. Her research and teaching bridge the early modern and modern periods, with a particular emphasis on the long eighteenth century, identity and belonging, nation-building, imperial and intellectual history, transatlantic and comparative studies, and geopolitics.
Her dissertation “From Subjects to Citizens: The Construction of Civic Identity in Spain” traces the emergence of civic consciousness in Spain from its beginnings in late seventeenth-century cultural productions to its legal codification in the 1812 Constitution of Cádiz. By examining Spain’s first liberal constitution alongside literary works, Anahit's project examines how legal and literary discourses converge to imagine the boundaries of political membership, exposing the inherent contradictions within liberalism’s rhetoric of inclusion, particularly its exclusionary practices based on race and gender.
Anahit is an experienced teacher of Spanish language, as well as of a diverse range of literature and culture courses spanning from the early modern to the modern period. She is a recipient of the 2023-2024 Outstanding Graduate Student Instructor Award and the 2025 Teaching Effectiveness Award (TEA) at UC Berkeley.
Courses offered
“Modernity and Its Discontents in Spanish Literature” (Fall 2020; Spring 2021)
“Letters from the Hispanic World” (Spring 2025)
“Ghosts of Empire: Spain and Colonial Memory” (Summer 2025)