Alina Cherry

Alina Cherry

Alina Cherry is associate professor of French in the department of Classical and Modern Languages, Literatures, and Cultures. Her teaching and scholarship focus on contemporary French and Francophone literatures and cultures. Her first book, Claude Simon: Fashioning the Past by Writing the Present, considers how key stylistic innovations developed by Claude Simon (Nobel Prize in Literature, 1985) open new ways of understanding the impact of some of the most traumatic historical events of the 20th century, the two World Wars and the Spanish Civil War. Her current book project examines literary works produced in the aftermath of the devastating earthquake that occurred on January 12, 2010 in Haiti.

Research interest(s)/area of expertise

• Contemporary French and Francophone Literatures
• Claude Simon Studies
• Narrative and Temporality
• Space and Place
• Mobilities Studies
• Catastrophe Studies
• Intersections of visual and narrative representation
• Sound Studies
• Ecocritical Humanities

Education

• Ph.D. with honors, French, New York University
• M.A., French, New York University
• B.A. summa cum laude, French, Georgia State University

Awards and grants

• Humanities Center Faculty Fellowship, “Transition,” Wayne State University, 2021
• Career Development Chair, Wayne State University, 2019-2020
• Graduate Research Assistant Award, Wayne State University, 2018-2019
• Humanities Center Faculty Fellowship, “Mobilities,” Wayne State University, 2016
• College of Liberal Arts and Sciences Teaching Award, Wayne State University, 2016
• Humanities Center Faculty Fellowship, “Borders and Intersections,” Wayne State University, 2012
• University Research Grant, Wayne State University, 2011
• Andrew Dulau Dissertation Fellowship, New York University, 2008
• Dean’s Outstanding Graduate Student Teaching Award in the Humanities, New York University, 2004

Selected publications

• Claude Simon: Fashioning the Past by Writing the Present. Madison, New Jersey: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 2016.

Articles (peer-reviewed)

• "Drame du lieu ou lieu du drame? Réflexions sur le lieu et les fonctions du paysage dans Les Petits chevaux de Tarquinia." Forthcoming in Cahiers Marguerite Duras 4.
• "Le potentiel de la marge: Fonctions du terrain vague chez Jean-Philippe Toussaint." The French Review 97.4 (May 2024): 37-52.
• "Catastrophe Televised: Accelerated Time, Telescoped Events, Distorted Perceptions." Contemporary French and Francophone Studies 27.4 (2023): 570-578. 
• “Painterly Letters: On the Possibilities of the Textual Reterritorialization of Painting.” Symposium 70.2 (Summer 2016): 53-65.
• “Miroitements pronominaux: vers la construction d’un agencement textuel dans Les Géorgiques de Claude Simon.” Nouvelles Francographies 4.2 (Fall 2013): 17-25.
• Dictionnaire Claude Simon. Ed. Michel Bertrand. 2 vols. Paris: Honoré Champion, 2013. “Tom Bishop” 1:121-122, “Chronologie” 1:191-197.
• "Personnages et lieux ou le vide de l'appropriation dans Le Vice-consul de Marguerite Duras." Modern Language Notes 127.4 (Sept. 2012): 865-888.
• “Espaces: transports, croisements, traversées dans Fuir de Jean-Philippe Toussaint.”  French Forum 37.3 (Fall 2012): 143-162.

 Translations

• Gilles Deleuze, Painting and the Question of Concepts, Seminar 2 (19,980 words). deleuze.cla.purdue.edu/

Courses taught by Alina Cherry

Winter Term 2025 (current)

• FRE2110 - French through Film II
• FRE8610 - Seminar in Modernity, Postmodernity, and Extreme Contemporain

Winter Term 2024

• FRE2110 - French through Film II
• FRE4620 - Topics in Sociocultural Analysis
• FRE6620 - Topics in Sociocultural Analysis

Fall Term 2023

• FRE5415 - Topics in French and Francophone Literature
• FRE6300 - Modernity, Postmodernity, and Extreme Contemporain
• FRE8415 - Topics in French and Francophone Literature

Winter Term 2023

• FRE2110 - French through Film II
• FRE4620 - Topics in Sociocultural Analysis
• FRE6620 - Topics in Sociocultural Analysis