Jumoke Verissimo
Assistant Professor
Department: Department of English
Phone: 416-979-5000 x553643
Email: verissimo@torontomu.ca
Education: Education BA (Lagos State University), MA (University of Ibadan), PhD (University of Alberta)
Discipline: English
Areas of Expertise:
Afro-Canadian Literature
African Literary Criticism
Black Diasporic Studies
Cross-Genre Narrative
Fiction & Non-Fiction
Poetry
Research Interests
Memory Studies; Traumatic Affect; Digital Humanities; Postcolonialism; The Poetics of the Ellipsis; Research-Creation; Interdisciplinary Focus; Decolonializing Knowledge
Dr. Jumoke Verissimo is an Assistant Professor in the Department of English at Toronto Metropolitan University. Her research and teaching span Global, African, and Afro-Canadian Literatures, with a specific focus on the intersections of Black Diasporic studies, memory studies, and traumatic affect. As a leading scholar-practitioner, her work explores the possibilities of research-creation and decolonial methodologies in uncovering obscured histories.
Dr. Verissimo is a globally recognised author of several acclaimed works, including her most recent poetry collection, Circumtrauma (Coach House Books), which employs a research-creation methodology to explore the silences of the Nigeria-Biafra War. Her previous publications include two poetry collections, I am memory and The Birth of Illusion; the children’s book Aduke and the Moon’s Hidden Secret; and the novel A Small Silence, which was shortlisted for the RSL Ondaatje Prize and the Edinburgh Festival First Book Award, and won the Aidoo-Snyder Book Prize. She is also the co-editor of the anthology Sòròsókè, a critical record of activism against police brutality in Nigeria.
She is currently engaged in several projects that further examine the theoretical and creative dimensions of memory and ellipsis. This includes ongoing work, Home Relations (a project that examines the critical role of “archival invisibility” in the 19th-century Afro-Brazilian return movement in West Africa), a new novel, and an essay collection titled Elliptical Imaginings, in which she theorises the ellipsis as a conceptual framework for navigating the gaps and "silences" inherent in Black ancestral narratives. Her broader scholarship continues to contribute to African literary criticism and the development of restorative research practices within the humanities.
Scholarly Calling
Teaching creative writing as a Black scholar means I am always looking inwards, asking questions about what is known and what remains unsaid. I model this practice of interiority to show my students that their own histories are valid sites of knowledge, while grounding them in the rigorous writing techniques that turn memory into art. This inspires my syllabus as a tool to help students move from being historical subjects to gaining their own agency.
My commitment extends to my role as a supervisor, where I am currently supporting a Postdoctoral Fellow’s investigation into the Canadian cold produce for Black political subjects. Whether I am examining the silences of the Nigeria-Biafra war or mapping inherited gaps through my SSHRC-funded project, Ancestral Mist, my work is an ongoing effort to reclaim the archives of the self.
I am invested in helping the next generation of scholars understand that their research is an act of reclamation that ensures no story is left to the void.
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