Lisa Ramapuram

Candidate statement

Lisa Ramapuram is a doctoral candidate in the English department at UC Riverside, in her fourth year of graduate study. She received her bachelor’s and master’s degrees in English from UC Riverside as well. Her research has focused on transnational feminisms in Asian American cultural productions. More specifically, she studies moments in these print and visual cultural productions at which quotidian rhythms get temporarily disrupted and give way to alternative feminist subjectivities that exceed both realist representation and the reductive logic of neoliberal ideologies. While she is very committed to her research, Lisa’s daily inspiration comes from her interactions with the students in her classroom; as a graduate student, she has had the opportunity to act as sole instructor for several composition courses for the University Writing Program.

If elected as Student Representative, Lisa hopes to invest a similar energy into fostering communication and exchange between students and faculty in the field of Asian and Asian American Studies. Lisa’s goal is to think, with both student members and the AAAS Board, about how best to demystify the processes of publishing, navigating the job market, developing professional skills, and building pedagogical training. She would also like to strategize and implement initiatives that address mental wellness. These initiatives would aim to alleviate both the personal and professional anxieties that students face in the academy.