Dr Armelle Blin-Rolland
Lecturer in French

Affiliations
Contact info
Email: a.blin-rolland@bangor.ac.uk
Location: room 417, 3rd floor, New Arts building
Contact Info
Email: a.blin-rolland@bangor.ac.uk
Location: room 417, 3rd floor, New Arts building
Overview
Dr Armelle Blin-Rolland joined Bangor University as Lecturer in French and Francophone Studies in 2014. Before then, she was a Teaching Fellow at the University of Bath, and a Lecturer at Sheffield Hallam University and the University of Leicester. She holds a PhD in French and Francophone Studies from Bangor University (2011), with a doctoral thesis on voice in adaptations of Céline's Voyage au bout de la nuit and Queneau's Zazie dans le métro. She also holds a BA in German from the Universite de Bretagne Occidentale (Brest), and an MA in European Cultures and Languages (Bangor University).
Dr Armelle Blin-Rolland's research specialisms include: French and Francophone ecocriticism and environmental humanities; text/image and bande dessinée studies; and adaptation and intermediality. She has published articles on these areas in journals including European Comic Art, Modern Languages Open, Modern and Contemporary France, Studies in Comics and Studies in French Cinema. She is the author of Adapted Voices: Transpositions of Céline’s ‘Voyage au bout de la nuit’ and Queneau’s ‘Zazie dans le métro’ (Oxford: Legenda, 2015). She has co-edited a special issue of European Comic Art on ‘Comics & Adaptation’ (stemming from a conference she co-organised at the University Leicester), and a special issue of Studies in Comics on ‘Comics & Nation’ (also stemming from a conference she co-organised, at Bangor University). She is review co-editor for European Comic Art.
Her current research project is entitled 'Narratives of a More-than-human France, 1945 to Today: Space, Environment, Resistance' and is funded by a British Academy/Leverhulme Small Grant. It investigates the relationship between narrative, space and the environment in France since 1945, with a focus on ‘hyper-sites’ (nuclear sites, factory farms, industrial slaughterhouses, zoos, toxic landscapes). It aims to analyse the cultural narratives and spatial dynamics that have shaped relationships to the nonhuman in contemporary France, and modes of resistance against anthropocentric, gendered, (neo-)colonial, nationalistic and capitalist divisions of space. The corpus comprises a range of media, as well as scientific writings, direct action, political discourse and material sites. The project develops a French ecocriticism that questions what ‘French’ means from multispecies, ecofeminist and eco-decolonial perspectives, in exposing and contesting environmentally unjust narratives, and promoting modes of understanding and sharing territory as more-than-human. Beyond the French context, this leads to a consideration of the role of Modern Languages in collective action towards sustainability. As part of this project, she is co-organising an International Online Conference on 'Greening Modern Languages Research and Teaching' (24th-25th March 2023; see https://www.ecomodlang.com/), and an online seminar series entitled ‘Récits des vivants / More-than-human Narratives’, which will run in 2023, and during which artists and activists will discuss ways in which their work explores environmental and animal issues. Click here for details of the first seminar.
Dr Armelle Blin-Rolland's current administrative responsibilities are: Subject Lead for French and Francophone Studies; School Internationalisation (Exchanges) and Year Abroad Officer; Year Abroad coordinator for French; School representative on Bangor University's Senate.
Teaching and Supervision
Undergraduate teaching
LXE-1700: Creating National Histories (year 1)
LXE-2025: Reading Fantastic Literatures (2nd year)
LXF-3112: Bande dessinee & adaptation (Final year)
LCF/LZF-1002: Advanced French 2 (1st year)
LCF/LZF-2020 & 2040: French language skills (2nd year)
LCF/LZF-3020, 3030 & 3040: French language skills (Final year)
LCE/LXE-3210 & 3200: Press Dossier (Final year)
Postgraduate teaching:
LXM-4035: French Film & Comic Adaptation
LXM-4001: Modes of Critical Theory (team-taught)
LXM-4002: Research Methods (team-taught)
LXM-4031: Critical Theory in Practice (team-taught)
Teaching qualification
FHEA
Research outputs (16)
- Published
Towards an Ecographics: Ecological Storylines in Bande dessinée
Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
- Published
Nuclear Islands: Toxicity, Bodies, Power
Research output: Contribution to conference › Paper
- Published
A Breton Bande dessinée? Graphic Mosaics of Brittany
Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review
Prof. activities and awards (15)
Greening Modern Languages Research and Teaching
Activity: Participating in or organising an event › Participation in workshop, seminar, course
Récits des vivants / More-than-human narratives online seminar series: talk and discussion with visual artist Alexander Lee
Activity: Participating in or organising an event › Participation in workshop, seminar, course
20th and 21st Century French and Francophone Studies International Colloquium, University of Pittsburgh, March 24-26, 2022
Activity: Participating in or organising an event › Participation in conference
Projects (2)
Conference: Comics and Nation
Project: Research