Kirsten Smith (she/her), PhD Candidate
Joined the program in Fall 2020.
My research broadly focuses on multilingual cinema in the 21st century. While my primary focus is the representation of allophone languages in Québec, I also research SWANA francophone film archives, French co-productions and film institutions, Franco-Hispanic films, global film festivals, and Indigenous storywork and narratives in Canada. Additionally, I am interested in video game studies (ludology and narratology in video games). I am actively working on publications discussing the cinematics of video games in the late 20th and 21st century.
I started my academic career at Wright State University, where I received a Bachelor's of Arts in Spanish with a minor in Arabic, and a Bachelor's of Arts in French in the Fall of 2017. I received my Master's in French with a focus on Franco-Arab studies from the University of Cincinnati in the Spring of 2020. At the University of Minnesota, I have a minor in MIMS (Moving Image and Media Studies), and am currently writing my dissertation on multilingual Québécois cinema in the 21st century while completing an academic exchange at l'Université Paris Cité.
“Questions of Identity and Global Visibility: French Funding in Latin American and Maghrebi Cinema” Contemporary French Civilization Vol. 49 Published 24 April 2024 https://doi.org/10.3828/cfc.2024.3
“Interview with Bachir Bensaddek, Director of Montréal la blanche (2016)” Quebec Cinema in the 21st Century: Transcending the National, edited by Michael Gott and Thibaut Schilt Published 1 April 2024 https://doi.org/10.2307/jj.6947052.16
Smith, Kirsten. “(In)visible Borders in Beans by Tracey Deer”. Québec Studies. Vol. 75, no. 1, 2023, pp. 109-130. https://doi-org.ezp3.lib.umn.edu/10.3828/qs.2023.8
“Habibi Collective and the Female ‘Political Nightmare’” Crossways 2024 Special Issue Published 22 May 2024
https://crossways.lib.uoguelph.ca/index.php/crossways/article/view/8071…
“Decolonial Motherhood in First Nations Cinema” Forthcoming Article, 2025
American Council for Québec Studies 2024, Québec City, Québec, Canada, Transnationalism in the Québec Film Industry: Roundtable for, Quebec Cinema in the 21st Century: Transcending the National, Presentation of interview contribution to the book presented at the roundtable
La nuit des idées 2024, Alliance Française - Cincinnati, Ohio, Panel: “Outside the Lines: The Politics of Language”, Invited Keynote Speaker
Le labdoc pour invitation 2023, L’Université du Québec à Montréal - Faculté de communication, Presentation: “La visibilité autochtone dans l’autofiction: Beans de Tracey Deer (2020)”, Graduate intern in the Faculté de communication’s labdoc presentation of research
“Habibi Collective and Platforming Franco-Arab Female Directors” at The 20th and 21st Century French and Francophone Colloquium, Spring 2023
"Motherhood in Crisis in Kuessipan (2019) by Myriam Verreault and Beans (2020) by Tracey Deer” at Motherhoods on Screen at Maynooth University, Ireland, Fall 2022
“The Road and the Return: Landscape and Language in Hassan Legzouli’s Ten’ja (2004) and Rachid Bouchareb’s Baton Rouge (1985)” at the Modern Languages Conference at the University of Alabama (online), Fall 2021
“Selma Baccar’s Fatma 75 (1976) and Collective Female Memory” at the World Languages and Literatures Graduate Conference at the University of Minnesota - Twin Cities (online), Spring 2021
“Narrateur ou hakawati ? La représentation de la tradition orale arabe dans la littérature Franco-Arabe du Maroc et de l’Algérie” at the Cincinnati Conference on Romance and Arabic Languages and Literatures at the University of Cincinnati, Spring 2019
College of Liberal Arts Doctoral Dissertation Fellowship, Fall 2023-2024
Linda Odegard Scholarship, Summer 2023
Harold Leonard Film Memorial Fellowship, Fall 2022-Spring 2023
Peterson Summer Graduate Fellowship, Summer 2022
Pallister Fellowship, Summer 2021
MIMS (Moving Images and Media Studies) Fellowship, Fall 2020-2021
Charles Phelps Taft Graduate Enhancement Award at the University of Cincinnati, Summer 2019
Weisgarber Scholarship at Wright State University, 2016-2017
Distinguished Senior in Arabic, Wright State University 2017
Ohio Foreign Language Association Scholarship, Wright State University, 2017
Distinguished Delegate, Palestinian Affairs, Model Arab League, Wright State University, 2015
Graduate instructor in the French and Italian Department at the university of Minnesota
Lectrice in the Département d'études anglophones at l'Université Paris Cité, Fall 2023-Spring 2024
CARLA Social Justice in Language Education Initiative, Summer 2023
Doctoral Intern at l'Université du Québec à Montréal in the Labdoc, Fall 2022-Spring 2023
Intern for Les Monteurs à l'affiche Film Festival in Montréal, Québec, Fall 2022
Graduate Teaching Assistant and French Conversation Co-Host at the University of Cincinnati, Fall 2018-Spring 2020
Co-Chair of the Cincinnati Conference for Romance and Arabic Languages and Literatures, Fall 2019-Spring 2020
Long-Term Spanish II Substitute Teacher at Clark-Shawnee Local Schools, 2018
From University of Minnesota to Université Paris Cité, 2023-2024
