THERESE DE RAEDT

Born and educated in the Dutch speaking part of Belgium at the border with the Netherlands by parents who used the French language as their lingua franca, I have, since childhood, been very sensitive to borders, national and linguistic identity, liminality, otherness, and foreignness. 

My academic trajectory has been influenced by these factors and guided by the broadly conceived themes of “otherness” and cross-cultural relations.

Before tenure, my publications primarily focused on the representation of Africans in French literature and the visual arts. Since tenure, my research has moved from a predominantly eighteenth- and nineteenth-century French culture emphasis to a Francophone culture focus. Though I continue to be interested in issues dealing with identity, liminality, and race, I engage with them now from a more targeted Francophone perspective. I am especially concerned with African artists who reflect on their own Francophone societies and who are politically, culturally, and socially engagés.

My current research aims to elaborate various ways of understanding and assessing the place of Africa in the world today by focusing simultaneously on its cultural production (literature, film, plastic arts, etc.) and the socio-political and historical contexts—past and present—that enable this production.