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Contacts • Faculty/Staff • Undergraduate • Graduate •
Courses • Study
Abroad • Language Media Center • Newsletter • Support Us
Vanessa Borilot |
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| James Boucher M.A. student; B.A. University of Iowa (2008); Scholarly interests: Francophone literatures, Native American Representation in French and Francophone literatures. Dean's Graduate Fellowship for 2008-09. |
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| Elizabeth Carroll Elizabeth Carroll is a second-year MA student from Oak Park, IL. She completed her undergrad at Lake Forest College (Lake Forest, IL) in 2008 majoring in French and History with a minor in Educational Studies. Her scholarly interests include French history and culture, especially the French Revolution and WWII France. She is also interested in women’s history from the 18th to 20th centuries. Last year she presented a paper entitled, “Unequal Equality: the Limitations of Women’s Political Rights during the French Revolution” as the 1st Graduate Symposium in French and Francophone Studies at the University of Iowa. She also presented, “Pied-Noir Literature as Nationalistic Writing: French, Algerian or a Combination” as the Crossing Borders Conference at the University of Iowa in February 2009. Elizabeth is also the COGS steward for the Department of French, Italian and Arabic for the 2009-2010 academic year. |
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| Heidi Collins M.A. Candidate; B.A. Grand Valley State University (2007); Scholarly Interests: women writers, in particular the 18th- and 19th-century writers Marie-Jeanne Riccoboni and George Sand, gender studies, the literary relationship between mothers and daughters, and theatre. |
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| Marion Duval Arrived at the University of Iowa in 2001 as an exchange student from Amiens, France where she has received a Licence in Anglophone Literature and a Maîtrise in Literary Translation. Rediscovering her love of French literature while outside of her native country, she decided to stay at the University of Iowa and start in the Master’s Program in French Literature. She is currently working on her dissertation in which she is examining the evolution of the portrayal of Nazis and collaborators in French novels dealing with the Second World War. When she gets the chance, she enjoys having friends for dinner, watching movies and practicing yoga. |
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| Moussa Fall I am currently a PhD candidate in the Department of French and Italian. I entered the program in 2005, passed the comprehensive examination in September and defended my thesis proposal in May 2007. Currently, I am writing my dissertation and I am expecting to defend my dissertation by May 2010. My dissertation topic is “Cinema and History: the representation of history through the figure of the griot in Sembene’s films.” In this work, I focus on representation of the past, memory and history through the griot figure. Before entering the program at the University of Iowa, I received an MA in Philosophy and education at the University of Dakar (Senegal). The title of my MA thesis is “The Anthropological Dimension of Utopia.” I also received an MA from the University of Iowa in May 2002. After my MA in Iowa I worked for the New York City Board of Education where I taught French K-12. Also I taught French for the Kansas City Missouri School District K-12. My interests range from Francophone to interdisciplinary studies. (Colonial and post colonial studies with a focus on francophone literature & cinema, 20 th century literature and history, theories studies and gender studies). I presented a paper at the African literature Association in 2006 at the West Virginia University in Morgantown. - “Reinventing African Women identity in Sembene’s works.” - I also presented a paper at Western Illinois University at Macomb in 2007 -“The Contribution of Sembene’s Cinema in The Debate of French Language.” |
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| Erica Goldberg I am currently a second-year MA candidate here at the University of Iowa. I received my BA in French Business and Translation from Northern Illinois University in May 2006. After graduation, I got my first real life job at a Canadian company, where I worked with Anglophone and Francophone Canadians, and used both French and English at work on a daily basis. During the 2007-2008 school year, I was an Assistante de langue at a French high school in Chalon-sur-saône (Burgundy) through the French Government’s assistantship program. I have many scholarly interests, and coming from a Jewish family, most of them have to do with Jewishness in some way. Generally speaking, I am interested French Jewish Writers, as well the links between France & Germany, especially Alsace. However, I am most interested in World War Two in France; that is, how lives were for the Jewish people in France before, during, and after the war. I enjoy during research about the memory of the Shoah in France and how those affected by this terrible event come to terms with what happened during the war. I also have an interest in the récit de voyage during the 19th century, as well as Translation, and French philosophy. In March 2010, I will present a paper entitled "La mémoire et l'après-guerre: l'écriture de la Shoah" at the annual International Colloquium at the University of Toronto's Centre for Comparative Literature in Toronto, Canada. |
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| Jennifer Howell Ph.D. candidate; Jennifer Howell is currently working on her dissertation which examines representations of the French-Algerian War in the bande dessinée. Her scholarly interests include word and image studies, popular culture, and postcolonial studies (specifically of the Maghreb and postcolonial literatures in France). In her free time, Jennifer enjoys volunteering at the local animal shelter and at the Iowa City Public Library. |
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| Cynthia Kanko I am presently an M. A. Student and Graduate Teaching Assistant in the Department of French and Italian. I studied for the B. A. (Honors) degree in English and French at the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology in Kumasi, Ghana. I also studied for the Diplôme d’Etudes Supérieures at the Université Cheikh Anta Diop in Dakar, Sénégal. Before returning to graduate school, I was working as the Administrative/Office Manager of the Lymphatic Filariasis Support Center for Africa based at the Noguchi Memorial Institute for Medical Research, University of Ghana, Legon. After a year of teaching French Language, Literature and Culture at the Centre Régional Pour L’Enseignement du Français (CREF) in Ghana, following my B.A. degree, I worked as the Pan African Coordinator of the International Movement of Catholic Students, IMCS, more commonly known as Pax Romana, based in Nairobi, Kenya. My current teaching and research interests include Francophone African and Caribbean Literature, especially writings by and about women. Other interests include Postcolonial Theory and the evolution of French Language Teaching in Anglophone West Africa. |
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| Sonia Kpota PhD Candidate in Francophone World Studies; M.A. University of Delaware (2005); B.A in Journalism and communication at the University of Ouagadougou (2003). Scholarly Interests: Francophone literature and cinema (Sub-Saharan Africa, Maghreb and Caribbean), diaspora, colonial and postcolonial literature, 18th and 20 th century literature, comparative literature, questions of identity and language, gender studies. |
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| Rebecca Léal PhD Candidate; M.A. in French Literature (2006); B.A. in Political Science, French, International Business Certificate (2003); Scholarly Interests: Francophone Studies, French Immigration Literature and History, Arabic language studies and Colonial/Post-colonial Politics; website: http://myweb.uiowa.edu/rleal |
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| Stève Levillain M.A. candidate; maîtrise in American Civilization from the University of Caen (2001), CAPES d’anglais (2003). Scholarly interests: Literature from the Maghreb and Immigration in France. |
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| Schahrazede Longou I am a Ph.D. candidate currently writing my dissertation on Violence and Rebellion in Contemporary Algerian Women's Writing. I received a "Licence" in teaching French as a second language from the University of Soumâa, Blida, and a M.A. in French from the University of Iowa. My teaching experience in French includes language teaching at secondary and post-secondary levels, as well as specialized courses for undergraduate and graduate students. Recent courses taught: Short Fiction in France: The Nineteenth Century (in collaboration with Professor Wendelin Guentner), and French for Reading and Research, a course for graduate students in other disciplines. I am currently teaching Elementary French I, assisting Professor Ahmed Kanna, grading exams for a lecture course, The Middle East Today: A Social Inquiry. In addition to my teaching experience at the University of Iowa, I spent one year (2001-2002) as a Visiting Instructor at Illinois College. My experience as a French instructor also includes teaching students for the Upward Bound Project Summer Program (2006) as well as teaching in two elementary schools in Iowa City. My scholarly and teaching interests include the twentieth century French novel, North-African literature, postcolonial Algeria, cultural identity and diaspora, and Algerian women writers. I was awarded a Graduate Summer Fellowship and the T. Anne Cleary International Fellowship, both in 2005. I will present a paper in April 2008 at the annual conference of the African Literature Association. |
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| Jayne Machak My research interests focus on the 20th century novel and French cinema and film theory; most of my work is organized around questions of national memory/identity, the relationship between history and postwar French cinema, and gender studies. The French Ph.D program at the U of I was a logical choice for my graduate studies, because of the interdisciplinary program in Film/French that provides to its candidates a strong historical and critical background in both cinema and literature. |
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| Leah Pesola I received my BA in French from the University of Minnesota and my MA from the University of Iowa. I am now in my second year of the Ph.D. Broadly, my research interests include the novel, women’s writing, cultural production of the 17th century, and feminist theory. More specifically, I am interested in intersections between literary and architectural discourse. Recently, I have presented papers on Nicolas Delamare’s Topographical History of Paris and architecturalized subjectivity in Racine’s Britannicus and Phèdre. Currently I am working with Professor Meredith Alexander of the Theater Department to develop the script for a new adaptation of Molière’s Tartuffe that will be performed this spring. Since Fall 2006, I have volunteered at the Women’s Resource and Action Center as a group facilitator. Most recently, I co-facilitated Activate Your Political Voice, a group designed to encourage women to develop their political opinions and make their voices heard on political issues. This spring, I will co-facilitate a group to encourage discussion on the status of women in academia and university policies that effect mothers on campus. When I am not busy with academic work, I enjoy exploring Iowa City’s many parks and trails with my daughter, gardening, cooking, and sketching earthships. |
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