The Department of Literary Studies at Ghent University (Belgium) is seeking well-qualified applicants for a fully-funded and full-time postdoctoral research fellowship in the European Research Council Consolidator Grant project Novel Echoes. Ancient novelistic receptions and concepts of fiction in late antique and medieval secular narrative from East to West. Its Principal Investigator is Prof Dr Koen De Temmerman, who specializes in ancient fiction and its reception. 

The successful applicant will start employment after 1 March 2021. In order to be eligible, candidates must have obtained their PhD degree at the time of application or demonstrate that they will have that degree in hand by the start of their postdoctoral fellowship. 

Within the ERC project, subprojects are assigned to individual team members. For the current vacancy, this subproject is situated in the following area: GREEK AND NEAR EASTERN STORY-TELLING: CONTACTS AND RECEPTION IN THE EASTERN MEDITERRANEAN IN LATE ANTIQUITY AND THE MIDDLE AGES. The successful candidate will work on receptions of ancient Greek fiction in Near Eastern story-telling, on the importance of rhetorical, hagiographical and/or other narrative traditions therein, and on concepts of fiction in cross-cultural narrative environments of the Eastern Mediterranean (in, for example, Christian, Islamic, Zoroastrian, Jewish, Samaritan, or Manichaean literary corpora). 

The successful candidate will spend at least 70% of their time on academic research, contribute to the strong research tradition of the Department and the University by pursuing excellence in his/her research and by publishing in journals and with publishers that are internationally accepted as being of the highest quality, publish under the parameters of the project in consultation with the Principal Investigator, live in Belgium, and play a leading role in the scholarly activities of the research group (e.g. by organizing events, co-supervizing PhD students, etc.). 

Qualifications

• Thesis-based doctorate (obtained max. 6 years ago). 
• Excellent command of (ancient or Byzantine) Greek and/or one or more Near Eastern languages (Arabic, Persian, Syriac, Coptic, Armenian, Georgian). 
• Expertise in comparative literature and/or literary theory;
• A demonstrable interest or specialization in intellectual or cultural exchange between the Greek/Byzantine world and Near Eastern cultures;
• Demonstrable research experience with cross-cultural transmissions, translations or adaptations of narrative (or, more generally, cultural) production.