Justin Omar Johnston is an Associate Professor in the English Department at Stony
Brook University. His book Posthuman Capital and Biotechnology in Contemporary Novels
(Palgrave, 2019) examines how clones, animal-human hybrids, and toxic bodies have
proliferated across a variety of internationally acclaimed literary texts during the
21st century. These bodies are entangled with the history of 20th century biopolitics,
even as they anticipate still emergent forms of subjectivity. Johnston has also published
on Richard Powers, Pat Barker, Indra Sinha, and Zadie Smith. He has two forthcoming
chapters in Medicine and Literature, “The Human Endeavor: Bioethics and Biocapitalism
in Don DeLillo’s Zero K” (Cambridge University Press), and Approaches to Teaching
the Works of Margaret Atwood, “Teaching Oryx and Crake in a Science and Literature
Course During a Pandemic” (MLA). His new book project, Helio Fictions: Imagining Solar
Power in Contemporary Literature focuses on “solarity” and plant life in a number
of recent novels. Johnston teaches a range of courses on Anglophone and Postcolonial
literature, Science and Literature, 20th Century Literature, and Critical Theory.
His work reflects his sustained passion for the fields of feminist body theory, postcolonial
criticism, animal studies, and ecocriticism.