Laura Gomez '19

Laura Gomez is an alumna of the Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences, where she double majored in English Literature and French. Throughout her time at Northwestern, she has been particularly influenced and inspired by experiences like studying post-colonial Senegalese literature and volunteering with a refugee resettlement organization, which have caused her to examine her own experience as a first-generation student growing up with immigrant parents. Laura’s research interests include the mental, emotional, and cultural impact of assimilation through immigration and/or asylum seeking as it is portrayed in literature. Through Mellon Mays, she completed her honors thesis on the role of national borders and postcolonial migrant trauma in the global magical realist novel. During her time at Northwestern, Laura was selected to participate in the University of Chicago Summer Training and Research Program. She was also the recipient of a 2019 Fulbright to France and an Erasmus Mundus Scholarship, and was inducted into the Phi Beta Kappa honor society. Outside of Mellon Mays, Laura was President and Co-Founder of the Northwestern Undergraduate English Association, an Undergraduate Research Assistant with the French Department, and a writing consultant at the Writing Place. Next year, Laura will be pursuing a Master’s degree in comparative literature at the University of Strasbourg and the University of Bologna with her Erasmus Mundus scholarship before going on to pursue a PhD in English Literature.