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. Many of her publications center on Marcel Proust and the Polish-French writer and chansonnière Marie Krysinska, who was active during the Dreyfus affair. Her work also extends to theatrical censorship in 1890s France, as well as questions of Jewish identity and representation in the crime fiction that Belgian author Georges Simenon wrote during World War II.
After joining the faculty at App State as an assistant professor in 2014, she 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. Subsequently, as graduate program director, she mentored teaching assistants and worked extensively with active and aspiring educators. In recent years, her representative course offerings have included Masterworks of French Literature (FRE 3030), French Literature and Film (FRE 3035), Women Writers of French Expression (FRE 2055), and Spoken French (FRE 2010). 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 revision)
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 and Reviews
Review of Proust: A Jewish Way, by Antoine Compagnon. Studies in the Novel, vol. 57, no. 3, Fall 2025, pp. 345–47.
"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. 18 February 2025.
"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.
Selected Invited Talks
"Marie Krysinska." Department of French Studies. Wake Forest University. 18 Feb. 2026.
"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.
Selected Grants
"A New Academic Success Course and Speaker Series on Career Paths in the Humanities." Modern Language Association Pathways Step Grant, 2025-26.
"Béla Bartók: Father of Folk." Watauga Arts Council Grassroots Grant, 2024-25.
"Bridging the Divide between Classical Music and Folk Traditions: Béla Bartók's Legacy." North Carolina Humanities Small Project Grant, 2024-25.
National Humanities Center Summer Resident, June 2024.
"Connecting Local and Global Rural Cultures." North Carolina Humanities Large Grant, 2023-24.
"Archival Research on the Influence of American Women Regionalist Writers in France." Board of Trustees International Research Travel Grant, 2023.
Current Service to Profession
Graduate Academic Policies and Procedures Committee
DLLC Awards/Scholarships Committee
Faculty Moderator for the Pi Delta Phi National French Honor Society - Gamma Phi chapter
French Section Study Abroad Advising
French Section Placement Tests
Title: Leon Levine Distinguished Professor of Judaic, Holocaust, and Peace Studies, Affiliate Faculty: Gender, Women's and Sexuality Studies
Department: Languages, Literatures & Cultures
Email address: Email me
Phone: (828) 262-2928