20th-Century American Literature, Environmental Humanities, Hemingway Studies, Material Ecocriticism, Poshumanism, Feminism

Presentation & Discussion, Advanced Academic English, CLIL-Based Seminar, Special Topics in American Studies, Writing Workshop

My research uncovers the ecological dimensions hidden within American literature, particularly in works that seem, on the surface, entirely human-focused. Take Hemingway—not exactly the writer you’d expect to teach us about interspecies relationships or environmental crisis, right? Yet my monograph Hemingway, Ecology and Culture: Re-reading Hemingway in the Anthropocene (Bloomsbury Publishing) reveals how his seemingly anthropocentric narratives actually pulse with “ecological forces”—connections between human and more-than-human worlds that previous scholarship has overlooked.
Beyond this ecological focus, my work spans posthumanism, transhumanism, and gender and sexuality studies, always asking: How do we expand our understanding of what it means to be human in relation to everything else? This question drives not just my research but my teaching philosophy. Through my website Issues Under Tissues, I publish both my own critical and creative work alongside inspiring pieces by my students—because the best scholarship happens when we create spaces for emerging voices to challenge established thinking.
Whether you’re interested in how literature shapes our relationship with the natural world or how we can read more critically and creatively, I invite you to explore my courses, website, and instagram (@lay.the.scholar). After all, as Aldo Leopold reminds us, we need to learn to “think like a mountain.” This kind of thinking happens best in a community—and in this context, the Sophia community!

laysionng@sophia.ac.jp

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