Micaela Donabella

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About me

Micaela is a fifth-year PhD candidate at the University of Miami. Her current research explores the relationship between disability and technology as represented in twenty-first century speculative fiction. Prior to beginning her PhD, she spent three years working as a K-12 educator and received an M.A. in English from the University at Buffalo. Micaela is an AY 2025-2026 Dissertation Fellow with the Graduate School (UM). She previously served as UGrow Fellow for the Department of Writing Studies (AY 2023-2024) and Digital Humanities Graduate Fellow on “Mapping Imaginary Miami” (Summer 2023). Her work appears in Pulse: The Journal of Science and Culture.

Contact information

mxd4207@miami.edu

Education

Dissertation

Technological Optimism and Cyborg Resistance: Navigating Technofutures in Literature and Culture

Instructional Experience

Graduate Teaching Assistant, University of Miami, 08/2021 – present

High School English Teacher, Archimedean Upper Conservatory, 2019 – 2021

Course Assistant, University at Buffalo, 08/2018-12/2018

Fellowships and Awards

Dissertation Fellow, The Graduate School, AY 2025-2026

Summer Doctoral Micro-Grant, The Graduate School, Summer 2025

UGrow Fellow, Department of Writing Studies, University of Miami, 08/2023 – 05/2024

Digital Humanities Graduate Fellow, Mapping Imaginary Miami, 05/2023 – 09/2023

Graduate Activity Fee Allocation Committee (GAFAC) Travel Award, Spring 2024

Kriloff Travel Award, Spring 2023, Spring 2024

Conferences

“Sustaining Ethical Research in Times and Positions of Precarity,” Computers & Writing Conference, Charlotte, NC, June 4-7, 2026

5th Annual Digital IDEAS Summer Institute, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, June 23-27, 2025 (selected participant)

“Cyborgs, Robots, and Surplus Labor,” Northeast Modern Language Association Annual Convention, Philadelphia, PA, March 6-9, 2025

“Disability at the End of the World: Where Speculative Fiction Misses,” American Comparative Literature Association Annual Conference, Montréal, CA, March 14-17, 2024

“Cyborg Resistance to Technoableism, or Disabled Responses to Health Gimmicks,” Northeast Modern Language Association Annual Convention, Boston, MA, March 7-10, 2024

“Biohacking, Technoableism, & Disabled Futures,” The Humanities Center at Texas Tech Annual Conference 2023: “Health,” Texas Tech University, Lubbock, Texas, April 28-29, 2023

“Reading Somatic Difference in the Early Caribbean Digital Archive,” Digital Humanities Research Institute, University of Miami, Coral Gables, FL, March 30-31, 2023

“Resistance Through Poiesis: Responding to Heidegger in the State of Software Ubiquity,” Symposium for English Graduate Students (SEGUE), College at Brockport, NY, February 23, 2019

Service & Organizations (UM)

Queer Studies Interdisciplinary Research Group, Co-Convener, Fall 2025

Digital Humanities Interdisciplinary Research Group, Participating Member, Fall 2023-present

English Graduate Organization, Chair (AY 2025-2026); Co-Chair (AY 2024-2025); Secretary (AY 2023-2024)

Graduate Student Association, Senator (AY 2022-2023; 2023-2024)

Audley Webster Memorial Essay Competition, Reviewer (2021-2022; 2023-2024)