About
Vanessa Weller is a Ph.D. student and teaching assistant in French and Francophone Studies in the Department of Romance and Classical Studies at Michigan State University. She holds a B.A. in German Literature and French and Francophone Studies from Lawrence University in Appleton, WI, and an M.A. in Cultural Translation from the American University in Paris.
Vanessa has previously received research and teaching grants, including a Fulbright grant to Austria and a teaching assistantship with TAPIF (Teaching Assistant Program in France). Her research interests are 19th and 20th century Austrian and French literature, early cinema and media studies, Modernist feminist thought, translation theory, Caribbean and Maghrebi postcolonial literature, and poetry as political activism.
Her dissertation focuses on the role of mass media in the European avant-garde movements of the early 20th century and the intersections of class and gender within those movements. Education
Master of Arts, The American University in Paris, Cultural Translation, 2015
Bachelor of Arts, Lawrence University, French and Francophone Studies and German Literature, 2009 Publications
“Marguerite Porete : Between Language and Mysticism” Magistra: A Journal of Women’s Spirituality in History, Mount St. Scholastica, vol. 30, no. 1, 2024, pp. 56-79.
“Bird of Prosody: Poe’s The Raven and Baudelaire’s Le Corbeau,” Norwich Papers Vol. 22: Voices and Silence in Translation, University of East Anglia, 2014, pp. 86-103. Projects
Graduate Student Representative, MSU-RCS Policy Committee, 2023-24
GSA-TROPOS Academic Journal and Student Association, Co-chair – Journal, 2022-present
Albertine Cinémathèque Press Release, MSU French Film Festival, Spring 2023, Fall 2024
Graduate Student Representative, Cultural Translation/Comparative Literature Department, Student Senate 2013-2015 (American University of Paris) Upcoming Talks and Conferences
“The Other Side of the Moon: Alice Guy and the French Film Industry” Pacific Ancient and Modern Language Association (PAMLA), Palm Springs, CA, November 7-10, 2024
“Marguerite Porete: Between Language and Mysticism” International Conference on Medieval Studies (ICMS), Western Michigan University, May 9-11, 2024
“The Stage, the Screen, Cocteau, and Rilke: Orphée (1950) as a ‘Found’ Poem” American Comparative Literature Association (ACLA) Annual Meeting, Palais des congrès, Montreal, March 14-17, 2024
“Women’s Self-Determination in Márta Mészáros’ Adoption (1975) and Agnès Varda’s Vagabond (1985)” 20th and 21st century French and Francophone Studies International Colloquium, Villanova University, February 22-24, 2024
“The Spectacle of Modernity: Time Travel and the Carnivalesque in Fritz Lang’s Liliom (1934) and Rod Serling’s Walking Distance (1960)” Charles F. Fraker Conference, University of Michigan-Ann Arbor, October 6-7, 2023
« De la Dépêche africaine au Baobab fou : La femme noire et son identité d’intellectuelle » Associations des Professeurs de Français des Universités et Collèges du Canada (APFUCC), University of York, Toronto, May 27-31, 2023
“Austrian Identity as Cultural Translation” Kentucky Foreign Language Conference (KFLC), University of Kentucky-Lexington, April 21-22, 2023
« Hoffmann, Nerval, le double et la folie » Kentucky Foreign Language Conference (KFLC), University of Kentucky-Lexington, April 21-22, 2023
Memberships
American Association of Teachers of French (AATF), 2024-present
Phi Kappa Phi, 2024-present
American Comparative Literature Association (ACLA), 2023-present
Associations des Professeurs de Français des Universités et Collèges du Canada (APFUCC), 2023-present
DOMITOR, The International Society for Early Cinema, 2023-present
European Society of Comparative Literature, 2023-present
Michigan World Languages Association (MIWLA), 2022-present
Women in French (WiF), 2022-present
