æryka jourdaine hollis o’neil

æryka jourdaine hollis o’neil, PhD, MFA is an interdisciplinary scholar, writer, and artist whose research spans the fields of Black queer and trans studies, Black feminist theory, political ontology, visual culture, performance studies, and film theory and practice. hollis o’neil is currently Assistant Professor of Trans Cinema and Media at the University of Toronto, jointly appointed in the Cinema Studies Institute and Bonham Centre for Sexual Diversity Studies. Prior to beginning this appointment, hollis o’neil concurrently completed her PhD in Black Studies and MFA in Documentary Media at Northwestern University with graduate certificates in Gender and Sexuality Studies and Critical Theory. In addition, hollis o’neil also holds a Master of Arts in American Studies and a graduate certificate in Documentary Filmmaking from George Washington University in Washington, DC. Her writing can be found in the journals Feminist Theory, TSQ: Transgender Studies Quarterly, and is forthcoming in a special issue of Women & Performance: a journal of feminist theory.

Apart from her written scholarship, æryka maintains a creative research and artistic practice, having screened her work at Harvard University, Prismatic Ground, Onion City Experimental Film Festival, San Francisco Documentary Festival, Milwaukee Underground Film Festival, and Prism: Austin’s 37th Annual LGBTQ+ Film Festival, with her film in the interval receiving a Special Jury Recognition of “Best Media Archaeology Meditation” and “Queer Black Voices” Award at the latter two. Utilizing an assemblage of narrative, documentary, experimental, personal and performative modes of address, hollis o’neil produces work that convenes and questions related themes of racialized gender, sexuality, desire, kinship, embodied capital, personhood, violence and belonging.