Morteza Malakshah

My research explores the relationships between literature, ecology, disability, and culture. As part of the Cultural Histories of Eco Ableism project, I examine how environmental ideas intersect with representations of health, disability, and human relationships with the nonhuman world. I am particularly interested in weird and speculative fiction, posthumanism, ecocriticism, colonial histories, and the ways literature can challenge dominant understandings of human and nonhuman life.

I also have a secondary research interest in the history of late antique Persia, particularly Sasanian Iran/Ērānšahr. I’m especially interested in the ecological and social dimensions of Sasanian Zoroastrianism, the relationship between religious beliefs and everyday life, the human/nonhuman dynamics of Zoroastrianism, and the ways in which Sasanian cultural and religious traditions were transformed, reinterpreted, and preserved in later Persian and Iranian traditions.