Dr Ashley Harris

Ashley Harris in an ECR in French Studies with nearly five years of broad experience in HE teaching, research, public engagement and administration. She also has experience in working in diplomacy and civil service in the Foreign Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO).

Her research focuses on twentieth- and twenty-first-century French and Francophone culture, politics, and society. She is particularly interested in contemporary French cultural studies.

Her recent research has focused on the concept of the écrivain.e médiatique, using Virginie Despentes, Michel Houellebecq and Frédéric Beigbeder as case studies. Her current research looks at revisioning the banlieues through grassroots visual cultures.

Ashley holds two roles at University of Stirling:

1. Postdoctoral Research Fellow: Design, deliver and evaluate on an AHRC Impact and Engagement project on ‘Remembering Empire’.

Project Objectives: i. Transform understandings of empire among impact beneficiaries: schoolchildren, teachers, and creative practitioners through multistrand activities. ii. Support take-up of French language and culture in Scottish secondary schools.

2. University Teaching:
   • Introduction to Contemporary French and Francophone Cultures (Year 1)
   • Twentieth Century France: War, Empire and Memory (Year 2)
   • French ab initio
   • Contemporary French and Francophone Cultures (Year 2)
   • Space and Place in French (Year 1)

• French Studies, Sociology, Gender Studies, Urban Studies, Literary, Visual and Cultural Studies. • Twentieth- and twenty-first-century French and Francophone cultures, politics, and societies. • Contemporary literature and the status, role, and reception of contemporary media figures. • Sociocultural, geopolitical and intermedial critical approaches. • The depiction of the Parisian banlieues and peri-urban inhabitants; questions of identity, equality, and memory, in grassroots and mainstream representations.

Current Modules

• Introduction to Contemporary French and Francophone Cultures (Year 1)
• Twentieth Century France: War, Empire and Memory (Year 2)
• Introductory French
• Contemporary French and Francophone Cultures (Year 2)
• Space and Place in French (Year 1)

Previous Experience Overview Five years of University teaching covering: • Interdisciplinary research methodologies: post-colonialism, migrant studies, adaptation and transmediality, gender studies, geopolitical and sociocritical theories. • Nineteenth-century to contemporary French and Francophone histories, cultures, politics, and societies, including France, North Africa, Québec, francophone Asia, and the Pacific and Caribbean islands. • The study of cultural works including literature (poetry, plays, novels, and non-fiction), architecture, and visual arts (film, television, fine arts, street art). • Language teaching including ab initio, immersive teaching, and translation. • Teaching, design, and assessment including undergraduate language and research modules, interdisciplinary MRes modules and PhD progress reviews.