Specialised in 19th–20th century French Literature, with a thesis on the theatre of Mallarmé and Maeterlinck (2005), published by Brill, Maria de Jesus Cabral is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Languages and Cultures at the University of Aveiro.
Her research follows the continuity of Symbolist and Modernist poetics from a comparative and cross-border perspective, exploring the relationship between theatre and literary reading, as well as its extension to contemporary practices and current poetic thought.
She coordinates the LEA ! – Lire en Europe Aujourd’hui network and launched the European Erasmus+ project Reading Communities Shaping Identities in 2023, leading a consortium of ten European universities. A strong advocate for scientific Francophonie in Portugal, she co-founded the APEF – Portuguese Association for French Studies in 2003 and is currently its Honorary President.
Since 2012, her research and teaching bridges literature and medicine. She has coordinated and takes part in various research programmes, training initiatives, and fieldwork in Narrative Medicine and Medical Humanities, in Portugal and abroad, with a particular focus on France, Canada, and Brazil. She explores the applications of theatre and literary reading in medical education, promoting them as spaces for reflection and care, understood in its ethical and relational dimension.