Meagan Smith completed her PhD in Comparative and World Literature in 2022. Her dissertation, titled Science Fiction at the Border, examines representations of walled spaces in 20^th and 21^st century utopian and dystopian science fiction from Russia, Cuba, Mexico, the US and Canada. Her research draws these otherworldly fictional spaces together with investigations into the material innovations of the Industrial Revolution, critical examinations of the political and economic revolutions associated with the Cold War and the rise of neoliberalism, contemporary political debates surrounding the construction of national border walls, questions regarding the value of labor and the distribution of resources in the networks of global capitalism, and relies on theoretical foundations in biopolitics, ecocriticism and, of course, memory studies. While completing her dissertation she enjoyed teaching literature courses through CWL, writing courses through the English department and humanities courses at Illinois Wesleyan University. She also had the opportunity to work as an editorial assistant at Slavic Review and was very involved in the network of local organizations helping refugees and immigrants resettle in the Champaign-Urbana community.

Since graduating Meagan moved to Boston, MA and has pursued a career in the publishing industry, first working on a variety of short-term contracts for book projects and research projects before taking a job at Oxford University Press where she currently works on the editorial staff supporting content development for new books.