PD Dr. Aurore Peyroles

Research interests

French literature of the 20th century (esp. 30s-50s)
Literature and politics
Villes et banlieues

Current project

" Voyages au bout de la banlieue : représentations romanesques de la banlieue parisienne - 1850-1950 "

At the crossroads of the history of representations and literary studies, my current research project is part of a comparative study and proposes to explore the romantic representations of the popular banlieue between 1850 and 1950. The emergence of these singular urban spaces is a major phenomenon of this period, shaping not only the territorial organisation, but also the conception of the city and urbanity. Literature has accompanied the emergence of these areas, known as the banlieue : reflet, it has also shaped their representation and perception, creating a reservoir of stereotypes while forging new ones.

This research therefore aims not so much to uncover the potential gap between historical reality and its fictional representations as to analyse what the neighbourhood did to the romance - and conversely, what the romance did to the neighbourhood. What are the traits that make this space in the margins of representation at the heart of the novelistic texts, until it becomes "one of the principal literary landscapes of modernity" (Jean-Pierre Morel)? In turn, the banlieue poses a certain number of questions to the romance: how to take account of an espace par essence indéfini et mouvant ? What responses does the romance offer to the challenges - linguistic, stylistic, political, even metaphysical - posed by the urban margins?

since September 2020: Assistant professor at the chair of Prof. Dr. Isabella von Treskow

October 2016 - August 2020: Post-doctoral researcher at the Institut franco-allemand de sciences historiques et sociales (IFRA/SHS); editor of the journal " Revue de l'institut français d'histoire en Allemagne " https://journals.openedition.org/ifha/ (external link, opens in a new window)

September 2015 - October 2016: Assistant professor at the chair of Prof. Dr. Christine Ott at the Institute for Romance Literatures and Languages at Goethe University (Frankfurt am Main)

Doctorate:

2013: Roman et engagement : le laboratoire des années 1930 en France, en Allemagne et aux États-Unis (supervised by Prof. Dr Anne Tomichen Paris-Sorbonne)

Studies:

2003-2008: Studies at the École Normale Supérieure

2000-2003: Classes préparatoires at the Lycée Henri IV (Paris).

Conference organisation:

Villes en guerre, 1800-1914. l'urbanité moderne à l'épreuve du conflit (May 2018, Goethe University, in collaboration with Dr Frank Estelmann)