Below you will find an alphabetical list of our current research postgraduates with
Dylan Sebastian Evans - MA (by Research) in French
Dissertation title: La rhétorique du viol : une recension critique du paysage discursive français
Dissertation description: The subject that I have chosen to study — rape — is an issue that, in France, remains socially taboo, having been, for far too long, shut away from prying eyes, compartmentalised, immobilised even, immured, as if it posed some present danger, a threat perhaps to current ways of thinking, a potential challenge to the received wisdom of French academe — and beyond. The body of work, or corpus, that I propose to analyse comprises representations of rape drawn from visual and literary French culture over the past thirty years. The ultimate objective of such an analysis is (a) to ‘map’ — at the level of language practised, or ‘things said’ — the ‘unstable assemblage of faults, fissures and heterogeneous layers’ from which knowledge of rape in France derives its distinctive epistemic, linguistic, and historiographic features; (b) to identify a specific area or question for further investigation; and (c) to strengthen my own understanding of the wider social, political, and historical contexts from which such representations have emerged as the necessary precursor to, and in preparation for, doctoral study.
Other research interests: discourse analysis; rhetoric; epistemology, linguistics, and historiography; queer and feminist theory; the history and politics of sexuality; and the life and works of Michel Foucault, especially his Archaeology.
Ali Hocine Dimerdji - PhD in French
Thesis title: Gilles Deleuze and Molecular Biology
Thesis description : I am interested in investigating and explaining the role and impact that molecular biology has had on the work of Gilles Deleuze, both his own and his collaborative work with Félix Guattari. Specifically, I believe that Deleuze’s work has been influenced by the development of molecular biology and its concepts. My thesis will therefore trace these concepts within his philosophy. It will highlight the ways in which the concepts of molecular biology are transformed and incorporated within Deleuze’s philosophy.
Other research interests : The philosophy of Gilles Deleuze, post-structuralism and post-modernism, science and technology, political philosophy, feminism, post-colonialism.
Catherine Gilbert - PhD in French
Thesis title: Writing Trauma: Silence in Rwandan Women’s Testimonial Literature
Thesis description: During the 1994 genocide in Rwanda, acts of unspeakable violence, including rape, were committed against women. Without any form of official documentation, how can their experiences be communicated? This thesis will analyse the responses to trauma in Rwandan women genocide survivors’ testimonial literature, focusing primarily on the works of authors Annick Kayitesi, Berthe Kayitesi and Scholastique Mukasonga. These testimonies enable us to re-examine the tragic events from a female perspective and tell us a great deal about the devastating effects of genocide and the ongoing process of surviving trauma.
Situating my research within the framework of trauma theory, I wish to show how the leitmotiv of silence has become an integral part of women’s testimonial literature, resulting in the creation of a poetics of silence. For women survivors, the act of writing is a means of breaking the ‘historic silence of women’ and also of giving form to this silence, testifying to its existence.
Other research interests:
My interest in contemporary Francophone literature ranges from Africa to Quebec and the Caribbean. My MA thesis examined the relationship between testimony and fiction in the novels of Haitian author Marie-Célie Agnant. I am also interested in questions of post-colonialism, immigration and identity, and women’s writing.
Adam Horsley - PhD in French Studies
Thesis title: Freedom and License in French Literature 1595 – 1655: ‘Libertinage ou affranchissement?’ (working title)
Thesis description: This thesis will challenge certain definitions of libertinage in early seventeenth-century French texts that have thus far been accepted by modern critics. Examining libertin source texts and contemporary critics as well as libertin works, the thesis will determine the extent to which libertin literature constitutes an escape from servitude (as the Latin root of the word - libertinus - would suggest). It will also explain the link between the libertins and atheism; re-examining the accusations of impiety made towards these writers by men of religion in order to evaluate their validity and motives.
Continuing with this distinction between libertinage and affranchissement, the thesis will also go beyond questions of religion and philosophy to consider purely literary emancipation from regulation; that is to say texts which break with convention through their form rather than their content. In these instances, it will examine works which are indeed freed from literary convention, but which were not accused of libertinage, and determine why this is the case.
Other research interests: My MA focused largely on the works of Cyrano de Bergerac, as well as the distinction between natural and blasphemous imagery in the poetry of Théophile de Viau. I have presented papers on the influences of Montaigne in the animals of Cyrano’s L’Autre Monde (Nottingham, June 2010) and the varying notions of utopia in seventeenth-century literature (Bristol, September 2010). I am also interested in the influences of the scientific revolution on seventeenth-century thought, especially its effect on the belief in the supernatural and the demonological.
John McGrath - MA in French
Dissertation Title: The ‘Fille Fragile’ in contemporary French popular music: Vanessa Paradis to Carla Bruni.
Dissertation description: My dissertation will take for its subject the numerous female singers whose hushed tones and willowy silhouettes have imposed themselves on the French cultural landscape since the 1960s; specifically those artists, very often manipulated by male songwriters, who project an image of docile seductive femininity. The dissertation will seek to investigate what this enduring Gallic phenomenon reveals about the position of women in France today.
Directed research: My first directed research piece also focused on contemporary musicians and their role in defining what it is to be French and to live in France in the 21st century. Looking at the rapper Diam's, the essay examined her conversion to Islam, the subsequent controversy around wearing the hijab during public performances and her refusal to adhere to French notions of female beauty and femininity.
While my second directed research probes Quebec Cinema since the 1995 referendum on independence; looking at the rapport between the failure of the national project and the recurrent figure of the happy loser (l’homes raté) frequently at the core of the comedy films which have succeeded at the Quebec box office over the last 15 years.
Other interests: The apparent dichotomy and widening gap between the contemporary urban France of immigration, Islam and globalisation with la France profonde, that is to say the France of provincial towns, village life and rural agriculture.
Simon R. Nicholls - PhD French and Hispanic Studies
Thesis title: Regionalism in the Western Mediterranean: a comparative study of Island Nationality in the Balearic Islands, Corsica and Sardinia, 1978-2000
Thesis description: My research will focus on the phenomena of ethno-regionalism in the Balearic Islands, Corsica and Sardinia in the late twentieth century in a comparative context. Specifically, using concepts of nationalism as a foundation, I shall be examining the degree to which each of the islands can be deemed to possess their own sense of being and whether such sentiments become more extreme when or if there is only one ‘other’ from which to distinguish themselves. In addition, I will assess whether such sentiments are linked to the relative authoritarianism or liberalism of central governments’ regional policies. This will include an analysis of each linguistic territory and the role of local institutions in disseminating regional languages and more generally in reinforcing each island’s identity. Finally, there will be an examination of regional parties and/or separatist movements’ actions in relation to regional and national governmental bodies and civilian populations.
Other research interests: Concepts of ethno-nationalism and mainstream and militant regionalist entities, Catalan identity in Languedoc-Roussillon, Sociolinguistics.
Bronwen Pugsley - PhD in French
Thesis title: The Practice of Documentary: Filmmaking by Women in Sub-Saharan Africa
T he Practice of Documentary: Filmmaking by Women in Sub-Saharan Africa
Thesis description: This thesis examines the under-explored area of documentary filmmaking by women from Sub-Saharan Francophone Africa. Significantly, while documentary films represent a considerable portion of the short and feature length films made, little research has been carried out in this field. Consequently, this thesis aims to demonstrate the overlooked diversity of documentary voices by sub-Saharan African women and to determine the personal, social and political significance of the medium. Adopting a formal approach, the thesis will examine documentary practices to determine how the films of this corpus sustain or depart from documentary filmmaking conventions.
Claire Rutherford - PhD in French
Thesis title: Narrative Representations of Child Abuse in Contemporary French Fiction for Young Adult Readers
Thesis description: My PhD is an analysis of texts depicting sexual, psychological and physical abuse towards children published between 1990 and 2010 and aimed at young adult readers aged 11 and above. My thesis will draw upon studies of structuralist narrative theory such as Propp’s Morphology of the Folktale and Genette’s Discours du récit to examine recurrent motifs, characters and temporal perspectives in the novels and to explore how adult authors construct children’s voices to express traumatic feelings and experiences. I will also consult sociological studies dealing with the reality of child abuse and trauma to contextualise my literary study and to address ethical issues relating to the depiction and marketing of sensitive material in books for young readers.
Other research interests: My main research interests lie in the field children’s literature; particularly teenage fiction and problem novels. I am also interested in twentieth and twenty-first century French women’s writing and literature dealing with trauma and abuse.
Caroline Williamson - PhD French Studies
Proposed Thesis Title: Rwandan Women’s Testimonies: using Discourse Analysis to explore women’s representations of identity
Outline of Research: The 1994 Genocide in Rwanda had major implications for women; besides the emotional and physical trauma of sexual violence and loss of loved ones, Rwandan women survived in numbers that far outweighed the male population. Left as widows, heads of households and caretakers of orphans, these women have been required to take on new roles and responsibilities in rebuilding the country.
Many discourse analysts agree that narrative, oral history and testimony enable speakers to situate their experiences and provide ideal contexts for the construction of individual representations of self and other. My thesis aims to use discourse analysis to look at how the genocide and the resulting social, political and cultural changes have affected Rwandan women by looking at how individual identity is constructed in their accounts of the Genocide and how these individual constructions of identity map on to broader historical, political and cultural explanations of Rwandan identity.
Other research interests:
African Identity and Politics; Social Psychology and Discourse Analysis