Scott Carpenter, Professor of French and Francophone Studies (Ph.D., University of Wisconsin-Madison)

Scott Carpenter teaches courses on the representation of “otherness,” nineteenth and twentieth-century poetry, the aesthetics of falseness, and literary theory. He has published extensively (sometimes with students) on such authors as Charles Baudelaire, George Sand, Honoré de Balzac, and Prosper Mérimée. In addition to Acts of Fiction (1996, on political representations in nineteenth-century literature) and Reading Lessons (2000, an introduction to literary theory), he has co-edited an intermediate French reader (Vagabondages littéraires). His most recent book focuses on literary and cultural mystifications: Aesthetics of Fraudulence in Nineteenth-Century France: Frauds, Hoaxes and Counterfeits (2009).

Annick Fritz-Smead (Ph.D., University of Minnesota). A native of France, Annick Fritz-Smead teaches language courses at all levels. She has published a book on the poetry of the French poet, Francis Ponge. Her current interests include contemporary French literature, culture and cinema.

Cherif Keita, Professor of French and Francophone Studies (Ph.D., University of Georgia)

Cherif Keita teaches Francophone Literature of Africa and the Caribbean, as well as advanced languages courses. A native of Mali, he has published books and articles on both social and literary problems in contemporary Africa. His special interests include the novel and social evolution in Mali, Oral tradition, and the relationship between music, literature and culture in Africa. He is the author of Massa Makan Diabaté (L'Harmattan, 1995) and Salif Keita: L'oiseau sur le fromager (Le figuier, 2001). He has completed a documentary film entitled "Oberlin-Inanda: The Life and Times of John L. Dube" [Special Mention at 2005 FESPACO], about the life of the first President of the African National Congress of South Africa and his education in the U.S. at the end of the nineteenth century. He has a number of concurrent film projects on American missionaries and missionary education in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. The Director of French and Francophone Studies at Carleton, Professor Keïta also leads a Carleton Francophone off-campus studies program to Mali every other year.

Christine Lac, Senior Lecturer of French and Francophone Studies (Ph.D., University of Nebraska-Lincoln)

A native of France, Christine Lac teaches language courses, stylistics and culture. She coordinates the French language sequence at Carleton, managing the Tuesday - Thursday classes as well as training and supervising the Teaching Assistants. She has published articles on contemporary French women writers, nineteenth-century writers of children’s literature, and pedagogy. The Department's representative to the American Association of Teachers of French and the ACTFL, she also supervises Carleton students who are becoming licensed to teach French. She has served as the national Treasurer of Women in French as well as Program Reviewer for National Council for Accreditation of Teacher Education.

Stephanie Cox, Visiting Assistant Professor for French (Ph.D., University of Louisiana Lafayette)

Along with languages classes, Stephanie Cox will be teaching a course on Quebec literature to study one of the few socio-political contexts which places the white French speakers as the colonized people on the American continent. She will also teach a course of French Civilization focusing on the history of France's relationship with its "banlieues" and to discuss the issues and cultural products of this negociated urban space as well as its important impact on modern French culture and society. She has published an article on Mauritian writer Marie-Therese Humbert and has presented her research on Ying Chen and Linda Le at numerous conferences. She is currently working on a book on Ying Chen's works.

Dana Strand, Andrew W. Mellon Professor of French and the Humanities (Ph.D., Vanderbilt University)

Dana Strand’s teaching interests include contemporary French literature, French film, and the culture and literature of North Africa. Most recently, her research has focused on questions of national identity in French and Francophone literature and film. Dana has published a book on the short stories of the twentieth century writer, Colette, and co-edited a volume of essays entitled, “French Cultural Studies: Criticism at the Crossroads,” published by SUNY Press. She is currently working on a postcolonial study of the newly constructed Musée du quai Branly. Committed to interdisciplinary research and teaching, she has served as Director of the Women’s and Gender Studies program as well as Director of European Studies.

Cynthia specializes in French language and contemporary culture. She directs the Language Center and also teaches courses in language. She continues to bring numerous technological advances in language pedagogy to Northfield, Minnesota. She has been active in the formulation of the Mellon grant proposal to enhance language learning at Carleton through technology, and she has also participated in numerous conferences.

(Ph.D., Princeton) teaches courses on French Classicism, gender issues, marginal figures in literature, Paris in fiction, and French contemporary culture. Her field is seventeenth-century literature and her articles focus on Mme de Lafayette, Mlle de Montpensier and pedagogy. Her current main interests are women writers of the ancien régime, and in particular francophone Swiss women authors, the question of exile, and intercultural theory. Born in Venezuela of Hungarian parents and a so-called “global nomad,” she has also been active in the Cross-Cultural Studies program. She has taught about growing up cross-culturally and intercultural transitions through theory and practice.