Dr. Darci L. Gardner

Language(s) taught

French

Teaching/Research

19th and 20th century France; literature and the visual arts; cognitive approaches to literature; aesthetics

Degrees/Certifications

PhD in French with a minor in Italian (2013), Stanford University
BA in Comparative Literature (2007), Vanderbilt University

Personal Bio

Darci Gardner specializes in French literature of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Her research and teaching explore cognitive approaches to literature and emphasize intersections between literature and other arts.

She recently authored "Cognitive Bias and Narrative Credibility in Proust" (Philosophy and Literature, vol. 45, no. 1) and "Reading, Attention, and Poetic Suggestion: 'Éventail (de Madame Mallarmé)'" (French Studies, vol. 76, no. 2), among other articles. Her previous publications include a discussion of the intertextual and interartistic dimensions of Marie Krysinska's poetry (Nineteenth-Century French Studies, vol. 46, no. 1 & 2) and a piece on how and why Proust's labyrinthine sentences change the way we read (Poetics Today, vol. 37, no. 1).

Since joining the faculty at Appalachian in 2014, she has designed a variety of new classes, including a General Education course on filmic adaptations, a short-term study abroad program in Paris, and a graduate course on instructional methods for French teachers. She offers a graduate seminar titled "Literature and Cognition" (FRE 5532) on the UNC Language Exchange and also regularly teaches Masterworks of French Literature (FRE 3030), Women Writers of French Expression (FRE 2055), and language courses at all levels.

Previously, she taught as a Lecturer at Stanford, where she completed Oral Proficiency Interview training and became an ACTFL Certified Tester in French.

Selected Publications

Book in Preparation

Leveraging Irrationality: How Storytellers Exploit Cognitive Biases (under review)

Annotated Critical Edition

Volume 2 of Marie Krysinska's Œuvres complètes, edited by Florence Goulesque and Seth Whidden. Éditions Honoré Champion, 2022. Co-authored with Laurent Robert.

Journal Articles

"Appropriation and Revision as Subversion in Intermèdes: Krysinska's Palimpsests." Dix-neuf, vol. 26, no. 3, 2022, pp. 139–154.

"Reading, Attention, and Poetic Suggestion: 'Éventail (de Madame Mallarmé).'" French Studies, vol. 76, no. 2, April 2022, pp. 193–209.

"Cognitive Bias and Narrative Credibility in Proust." Philosophy and Literature, vol. 45, no. 1, 2021, pp. 1–16.

"Simenon's Criminals and Collaborators: Anchoring and the Task of Assigning Guilt." Contemporary French and Francophone Studies, vol. 24, no. 5, 2020, pp. 592–99.

"Landscapes and Perceptual Distortions in Proust." Nineteenth-Century French Studies, vol. 48, no. 1 & 2, Fall–Winter 2019–2020, pp. 130–48.

"Krysinska's Rythmes pittoresques: Theorizing Poetry before Mallarmé's Critical Poems." Nineteenth-Century French Studies, vol. 46, no. 1 & 2, Fall–Winter 2017–2018, pp. 73–92.

"Rereading as a Mechanism of Defamiliarization in Proust." Poetics Today, vol. 37, no. 1, 2016, pp. 55–105.

"Pourquoi privilégier la poésie?: La réponse des 'récits' de Bonnefoy." Romance Notes, vol. 53, no. 1, 2013, pp. 11–20.

Encyclopedia Entries

"Charles Cros." In The Literary Encyclopaedia. Vol. 1.5.2: French Nineteenth Century, edited by Beth Gerwin and David Evans. The Literary Dictionary Company, London. 5 September 2024.

"Paul Cézanne." In The Literary Encyclopaedia. Vol. 1.5.2: French Nineteenth Century, edited by Beth Gerwin and David Evans. The Literary Dictionary Company, London. (in press)

Selected Invited Talks

"In Search of Lost Time [1913]." The Global Novel Podcast. Interview by Claire Hennessy, with François Proulx. 15 Aug. 2024.

"Drawing Invalid Moral Inferences." The Triangle French HIstory and Culture Seminar. National Humanities Center, 10 Sept. 2023.

"Literature and Cognitive Biases." The Research Workshop in Literature, Philosophy, and the Arts. Stanford University, 18 Oct. 2022.