ABIL Officers
President - Dr. Luís Gomes (2026-2029)
Portuguese & Brazilian Studies Representative at the University Council for Modern Languages (UCFL), 2021-2025
(email: Luis.Gomes@glasgow.ac.uk)
Luís Gomes is Senior Lecturer of Portuguese Studies and Instituto Camões Lecturer at the University of Glasgow. He works on Portuguese literature of the Dual Monarchy and emblems in Portuguese. Luís has recently collaborated with Madalena Gonçalves on The Portuguese Subjunctive: a Grammar Workbook (London: Routledge, 2021), editor for Portuguese for The Year's Work in Modern Language Studies (Brill), and co-editor of the book series Glasgow Emblem Studies. Luis has taught at the University of Oxford and University of Glasgow, as well as Falkirk College of Further Education.
General Secretary - Dr. Maria Inês Castro e Silva (2025-present)
(email: m.i.castroesilva@bham.ac.uk)
Dr Maria Inês Castro e Silva is currently Teaching Fellow in Portuguese in the Department of Modern Languages at the University of Birmingham. She was awarded her PhD in Hispanic Studies in 2024 by the University of Warwick. Her research interests encompass Portuguese cinema, postcolonial studies, urban studies, and Portuguese popular culture. She has previously taught Portuguese language, culture, and film at several institutions in the United Kingdom and Ireland, including Queen’s University Belfast (2014–2017), the National University of Ireland, Maynooth (2016–2017), and the University of Warwick (2017–2020). Her research has been published in the field of Portuguese studies and Film Studies in Brazil, Portugal, the United Kingdom, and the United States. She has also presented papers at international conferences worldwide. Inês is currently working on her first book, to be published by Bloomsbury Academic in 2026.
Treasurer - Dr Jenny Nelson (2023-present)
(email: NelsonJ4@cardiff.ac.uk)
Postgraduate Officer - Jacob Dodd (2026-2029)
(email: jxd989@student.bham.ac.uk)
Social Media Officer - Dr. Fernanda Barini Camargo (2026-2029)
(email: FBariniCamargo@ucc.ie)
Dr. Fernanda Barini Camargo is a Lecturer in Lusophone Studies at University College Cork, within the Department of Spanish, Portuguese and Latin American Studies. She is a member of the Grupo de Pesquisas em Dramaturgia, Cinema, Literatura e outras Artes (GPDC-LoA | UNESP), and a team member ofthe ARTFICTIONS project (Irish Research Council). As a member of the editorial board, Fernanda contributed to the editing of Mulheres nos Cinemas e Audiovisuais: paralelos Brasil-Portugal (Renata Soares Junqueira and Paulo Cunha, Todas as Musas, 2024) and Mulheres em Cena: Ensaios sobre Literatura, Cinema e Teatro (Renata Soares Junqueira, 2023).
Early Career Officer - and Conference Secretary - Dr Peter Haysom-Rodriguez (2023-present)
(email: P.Haysom@leeds.ac.uk)
Past Conference Secretary - Dr Emanuelle Santos (2023-2025)
(email: e.santos@bham.ac.uk)
Immediate Past President - Dr Carmen Ramos Villar (2021-2024)
(email: c.ramosvillar@sheffield.ac.uk)
Dr. Ramos Villar is Senior Lecturer in Hispanic Studies at the University of Sheffield. At ABIL, she has served as treasurer, conference secretary, and president. Her research interests focus on Portuguese American life writing.
Members without portfolio
Dr. Carlos Garrido Castellano, University College Cork, (2026-2029)
(e-mail: carlos.garridocastellano@ucc.ie)
Carlos Garrido Castellano is Senior Lecturer/Associate Professor in University College Cork. He is also Senior Associate Researcher at the Visual Identities in Art and Design (VIAD), University of Johannesburg. He is Principal Investigator of the IRC Laureate Consolidator Project “Assessing the Contemporary Art Novel in Spanish and Portuguese: Cultural Labour, Personal Identification and the Materialisation of Alternative Art Worlds (ARTFICTIONS). He is the author of Beyond Representation in Contemporary Caribbean Art (Rutgers University Press, 2019), Art Activism for an Anticolonial Future (SUNY Press, 2021), Literary Fictions of the Contemporary Art System (Routledge, 2023), and Chorus: Sonic Politics of the Carnivalesque in Tragic Times (forthcoming 2026).
Dr. Fernando Beleza, University of Newcastle, 2023-present
(e-mail Fernando.Beleza@newcastle.ac.uk)
Past Officers
Presidents
Dr. Carmen Ramos Villar, University of Sheffield, 2021-2024
Professor Stephanie Dennison, University of Leeds, 2017-2021
Professor Phillip Rothwell, St Peter's College, Oxford, 2013-2017
Dr David Frier, University of Leeds, 2013-2017
General Secretary
Dr. Maria Luísa Coelho, University of Oxford, 2021-2024
Dr Catarina Fouto, King's College - London, 2013-2021
Conference Secretary
Dr. Carlos Garrido Castellano, University College of Cork, 2021-2023
Dr. Fernando Beleza, University of Newcastle, 2019-2021
Dr Raquel Ribeiro, University of Edinburgh, 2017-2019
Dr Carmen Ramos Villar, University of Sheffield, 2015-2017
Dr Ana Margarida Dias Martins, University of Exeter, 2013-2015
Treasurer
Dr Maria Tavares, Queen's University Belfast, 2017-2023
Dr Mark Sabine, University of Nottingham, 2013-2017
Portuguese & Brazilian Studies Representative at the University Council for Modern Languages (UCML)
Professor Hilary Owen, University of Oxford, 2019-2021
Postgraduate Officer
Dr. Peter Haysom-Rodriguez, University of Leeds
Dr. Gui Perdigão, University of Oxford, 2015-2017
Early Career Officer
Dr Dorothée Boulanger, Oxford, 2017-2023
Members without Portfolio
Dr Tori Holmes, Queen's University Belfast, 2013-2017
Dr Simon Park, 2017-2019