Mission

The LSU Center for French and Francophone Studies (CFFS) is a member of the Centers of Excellence Network, designated by the Cultural Services of the French Embassy. The mission of the CFFS is to promote the development of French and Francophone culture and scholarship at LSU and in Louisiana more broadly.

The CFFS serves as a research and pedagogy hub bringing together members of the LSU community who share an interest in French and global Francophone studies, including the Department of French Studies which houses the CFFS and is a close collaborator in its programming. As part of its mission, the CFFS seeks to continuously engage, both in person and virtually, with scholars and students across all units at LSU to promote interdisciplinary programming around French culture. This includes collaborations with International Programs, the Office of Research and Development, the LSU Rural Life Museum, and LSU University Press.

In addition to its role within LSU, the CFFS serves the broader community, including the Friends of French at LSU, the Louisiana Museum of Art, Whitney Plantation, the Consulate General of France in New Orleans, and regional higher-ed institutions. Through public scholarship and cultural events that reinforce the continued importance of French in South Louisiana, the CFFS affirms Louisiana’s deep historical and cultural connections to the broader Francophone world. To that end, the CFFS also sponsors international exchanges with France, Canada, Francophone countries in Europe and Africa, and the French Antilles.

The CFFS will accomplish its goals by fully or partially sponsoring colloquia, lectures and workshops on arts, humanities, and social sciences in Louisiana and global French communities in support of its mission, and will seek internal and external funding to support all of its activities on a continuous basis.

People

Director: Jeffrey Leichman

Jeffrey M. Leichman (he/him) is William Boizelle and Jacques Arnaud Professor in the Department of French Studies at Louisiana State University, where he also teaches in the Program in Comparative Literature and serves as Director of the LSU Center for French and Francophone Studies. Professor Leichman’s research focuses on theatrical culture from the early modern period through the present, with three main areas of concentration: early modern European and colonial performance; digital modeling and simulation for historically-oriented humanities; and performance in cinema.

Since assuming the directorship of the LSU CFFS in 2022, Dr. Leichman has focused programming around digital humanities and Caribbean studies, providing a platform for research and cultural innovation in French, and on French-related themes, by a broad range of scholars and artists. In collaboration with the French Embassy in Washington and the Consulate of France in New Orleans, the CFFS showcases the immediate impact and long-term importance of French-language scholarship and arts at LSU and in the broader South Louisiana community.

Interim Director: Bastien Craipain

Bastien Craipain is Gabrielle Muir Assistant Professor in the Department of French Studies at Louisiana State University, where he also serves as an affiliate of the Department of African and African American Studies and the Interdisciplinary Graduate Program in Comparative Literature. His research and teaching lie at the intersection of literary studies and the social sciences in the modern and contemporary Francosphere, with specific anchoring in the fields of Caribbean studies and Black intellectual history of the long nineteenth century. His work on these topics and areas has appeared in journals and edited volumes in both English and French, and he is now working on a book manuscript tentatively titled, Patterns of Indiscipline: Race, Literature, and Science in the Haitian Atlantic.

Assistant Director: Todd Jacob

Assistant to the Chair
French Studies
Phone: (225)578-6589
E-mail: tjacob1@lsu.edu
Office: 416B Hodges

Graduate Assistant: Rachel Kirk

Rachel Kirk is a doctoral candidate in French Studies at Louisiana State University and the graduate assistant for the Center for French and Francophone Studies (CFFS) at LSU. She is also an adjunct instructor in French and Cultural Studies at Bard Early College New Orleans. She holds a BA in Political Science and French from Virginia Tech and an MA in International Education Development from Columbia University. Prior to starting her doctorate at LSU, she worked as a program manager at AC4 research center at the Columbia University Climate School. She has taught high school French in New Orleans, and was a Fulbright English Teaching Assistant in Rabat, Morocco. She has also led high school and university study abroad programs in France, Spain, Martinique, and Morocco. In her research, she is interested in how (un-)natural disasters shape cultural production in the Franco-Creole Caribbean, particularly in Martinique, Guadeloupe, and Louisiana.