Professor Claire Gorrara
(she/her)

Dean for Research and Innovation for the College of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences, Professor of French Studies

: Media commentator
: Available for postgraduate supervision

I research narratives and memories of the Second World War, primarily in France. I am interested in how visual forms of representation, such as photography and comics, shape the ways in which French writers, photographers and artists transmit war stories. I have published three monographs and four edited collections of essays on French memory cultures of the Second World War.

Alongside my research on the Second World War, I lead projects that support language learning in compulsory education in the UK. I work with secondary schools, teacher-practitioners, policy-makers and third-sector organisations to increase the uptake of languages in schools in the UK through mentoring. This has led to commercialisation opportunities to develop training material and services. My language advocacy roles have led to partnership working with the Welsh and UK Governments, the British Academy, the British Council Wales, the University Council For Languages and partner organisations and universities in Spain and New Zealand.

2024

Gorrara, C. 2024. Tracing War: Transmitting stories of the Holocaust in twenty-first-century French comics for younger readers. In: Duffy, H. and Tynan, A. eds. Trauma, Ethics, Hermeneutics Essays in Honour of Colin Davis. Legenda, pp. 99-113.
Gorrara, C. 2024. Memory unboxed: Reckoning with German memories of the Second World War in Nora Krug's Heimat: A German Family Album (2018). In: Bartolini, G. and Ford, J. eds. Mediating Historical Responsibility: Memories of Difficult Pasts in European Cultures. Media and Cultural Memory Vol. 40. De Gruyter, pp. 236-254., (10.1515/9783111013299-012)

2023

Holley, T., Black, J., Gorrara, C. and Jenkins, L. 2023. Humanities and the arts: Pioneering SHAPE in Schools, a human world focus. Open Access Government 40(1), article number: 306. (10.56367/OAG-040-10990)

2022

Gorrara, C. 2022. Women's experiences of the second world war: exile, occupation and everyday life [book review]. Cultural and Social History 19/5, pp. 628-629. (10.1080/14780038.2022.2148611)
Allbeson, T. and Gorrara, C. 2022. Visual histories of postwar reconstruction: special issue introduction. Journal of War and Culture Studies 15(2), pp. 125-132. (10.1080/17526272.2022.2065121)
Allbeson, T. and Gorrara, C. 2022. Domestic archives of empire: photographing Burma and reconstructing British imperialism for the postwar moment. Journal of War and Culture Studies 15(2), pp. 233-259. (10.1080/17526272.2022.2065120)

2021

Gorrara, C. 2021. What is a language activist? Advocacy and education. In: de Medeiros, A. and Kelly, D. eds. Language Debates: Theory and Reality in Language Learning, Teaching and Research. Hodder and Stoughton, Hachette UK

2020

Beaney, R. et al. 2020. (Re)creating modern languages: conversations about the curriculum in UK higher education. Project Report. [Online]. Creative Multilingualism. Available at: https://www.creativeml.ox.ac.uk/blog/exploring-multilingualism/recreating-modern-languages-toolkit
Gorrara, C., Jenkins, L., Jepson, E. and Llewelyn Machin, T. 2020. Persbectifau amlieithog: paratoi ar gyfer dysgu ieithoedd yn y cwricwlwm newydd i Gymru. Curriculum Journal 31(2), pp. e70-e84. (10.1002/curj.46)
Gorrara, C., Jenkins, L., Jepson, E. and MacHin, T. 2020. Multilingual perspectives: preparing for language learning in the new curriculum for Wales. Curriculum Journal 31(2), pp. 244-257. (10.1002/curj.11)
Gorrara, C. 2020. Recrafting the past: Graphic novels, the Third Generation and twenty-first century representations of the Holocaust. In: Lassner, P. and Aarons, V. eds. Palgrave Handbook of Holocaust Literature and Culture. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 575-592.

2019

Gorrara, C. 2019. Legacies of war: Remembering prisoner of war experiences in French comics about the Second World War. In: Hague, I., Horton, I. and Mickwitz, I. eds. Contexts of Violence in Comics. Routledge Advances in Comics Studies London and New York: Routledge, pp. 49-63.
Gorrara, C., Jenkins, L. and Mosley, N. 2019. Modern languages and mentoring: Lessons from digital learning in Wales. Multilingualism: Empowering Individuals, Transforming Societies (MEITS). Available at: http://www.meits.org/policy-papers/paper/modern-languages-and-mentoring-lessons-from-digital-learning-in-wales
Blake, S. and Gorrara, C. 2019. Evaluating student mentoring as an intervention to support modern foreign language learning in secondary schools in Wales. Cylchgrawn Addysg Cymru / Wales Journal of Education 21(1), pp. 24-45. (10.16922/wje.21.1.3)

2018

Gorrara, C. 2018. Fashion and the femmes tondues: Lee Miller, Vogue and representing liberation France. French Cultural Studies 29(4), pp. 330-344. (10.1177/0957155818791889)
Gorrara, C. 2018. Not seeing Auschwitz: Memory, generation and representations of the Holocaust in twenty-first century French comics. In: Stańczyk, E. ed. Comic Books, Graphic Novels and the Holocaust: Beyond Maus. Abingdon and New York: Routledge, pp. 111-126.
Gorrara, C. 2018. Black October: comics, memory and cultural representations of 17 October 1961. French Politics, Culture and Society 36(1), pp. 128-147. (10.3167/fpcs.2018.360106)
Gorrara, C. 2018. Not seeing Auschwitz: memory, generation and representations of the Holocaust in twenty-first century French comics. Journal of Modern Jewish Studies 17(1), pp. 111-126. (10.1080/14725886.2017.1382107)
Gorrara, C. 2018. Speaking from Wales: building a modern languages community in an era of Brexit. In: Kelly, M. ed. Languages after Brexit How the UK Speaks to the World. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 149-158., (10.1007/978-3-319-65169-9_13)

2016

Gorrara, C. 2016. What the liberator saw: British war photography, Picture Post and the Normandy Campaign. Journal of War and Culture Studies 9(4), pp. 303-318. (10.1080/17526272.2016.1159003)

2014

Gorrara, C. J. 2014. Figuring memory as palimpsest: Rereading cultural memories of Jewish persecution in French crime fiction about the Second World War. In: Kimyongur, A. and Wigelsworth, A. eds. Rewriting Wrongs: French Crime Fiction and the Palimpsest. Cambridge Scholars Publishing, pp. 15-30.

2013

Gorrara, C. J. 2013. Le passé recomposé: memoire et postmemory dans 'Des gens très bien' d'Alexandre Jardin. In: Dambre, M. ed. Mémoires occupeés: fictions françaises et seconde guerre mondiale. Paris: Presses Sorbonne Nouvelle, pp. 63-70.

2012

Diamond, H. and Gorrara, C. J. 2012. Reframing war: histories and memories of the Second World War in the photography of Julia Pirotte. Modern and Contemporary France 20(4), pp. 453-471. (10.1080/09639489.2012.720434)
Gorrara, C. J. 2012. French crime fiction and the Second World War: past crimes, present memories. Cultural History of Modern War. Manchester: Manchester University Press.

2011

Gorrara, C. J., Feldner, H. M. and Passmore, K. 2011. Introduction. In: Feldner, H. M., Gorrara, C. J. and Passmore, K. eds. The Lost Decade? The 1950s in European History, Politics, Society and Culture. Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, pp. 1-9.
Feldner, H. M., Gorrara, C. J. and Passmore, K. eds. 2011. The lost decade? The 1950s in European history, politics, society and culture. Newcastle: Cambridge Scholar Press.
Gorrara, C. J. 2011. Conflicted masculinities: figures of resistance in French crime fiction. In: Hall, K. and Jones, K. N. eds. Constructions of Conflict: Transmitting Memories of the Past in European Historiography, Culture and Media. Cultural History and Literary Imagination Vol. 15. New York: Peter Lang, pp. 93-110.

2010

Gorrara, C. J. 2010. Forgotten crimes?: Representing Jewish experience of the Second World War in French crime fiction. South Central Review 27(1-2), pp. 3-20. (10.1353/scr.0.0078)

2009

Gorrara, C. J. 2009. Introduction. In: Gorrara, C. J. ed. French Crime Fiction. European Crime Fictions Cardiff: University of Wales Press, pp. 1-13.
Gorrara, C. J. ed. 2009. French crime fiction. European Crime Fictions. Cardiff: University of Wales Press.
Gorrara, C. J. 2009. Post-war French crime fiction: the advent of the Roman Noir. In: Gorrara, C. J. ed. French Crime Fiction. European Crime Fictions Cardiff: University of Wales Press, pp. 54-70.
Gorrara, C. J. 2009. Dramatic and traumatic: French crime fiction and the reconstruction of France. In: Hardwick, L. ed. New Approaches to Crime in French Literature, Culture and Film. Modern French Identities Vol. 85. New York: Peter Lang, pp. 121-136.
Gorrara, C. J. 2009. Through the looking glass: defeats of detection in Sebastien Japrisot's L'Été meurtrier. In: Hurcombe, M. and Kemp, S. eds. The Art of Crime. Faux Titre Vol. 329. Amsterdam: Rodopi, pp. 151-164.

2008

Gorrara, C. J. and Topping, M. E. 2008. Photography and the cultural encounter in François Maspero's and Nicolas Bouvier's Chronique japonaise. Journal of Romance Studies 8(1), pp. 61-75. (10.3828/jrs.8.1.61)
Gorrara, C. and Feldner, H. 2008. Introduction: ‘Europe in the 1950s: The “Lost” Decade?’. New Readings 9, pp. i-i. (10.18573/newreadings.59)
Feldner, H. and Gorrara, C. J. eds. 2008. Europe in the 1950s: The 'lost' decade [special issue of New Readings, vol. 9]. Cardiff: Cardiff School of Modern Languages.

2007

Gorrara, C. J. 2007. Revolt and recuperation: masculinities and the Roman noir in immediate post-war France. In: Forth, C. and Taithe, B. eds. French Masculinities: History, Culture and Politics. Palgrave Macmillan, pp. 157-171.

2005

Gorrara, C. J. 2005. Reflections on Crime and Punishment: Memories of the Holocaust in Recent French Crime Fiction. Yale French Studies 108, pp. 131-145.

2004

Diamond, H. and Gorrara, C. J. 2004. Occupation memories: French history and the Aubrac affair in the 1990s. In: Kidd, W. and Murdoch, B. O. eds. Memory and Memorials: The Commemorative Century. Ashgate, pp. 233-244.

2003

Gorrara, C. J. 2003. Cultural Intersections: the American Hard-Boiled Detective Novel and Early French Roman Noir. The Modern Language Review 98(3), pp. 590-601. (10.2307/3738287)
Gorrara, C. J. 2003. The Roman noir in post-war French culture. Oxford Studies in Modern European Culture. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Diamond, H. and Gorrara, C. 2003. Facing the past: French wartime memories at the millennium. In: Milner, S. and Parsons, N. eds. Reinventing France: State and society in the twenty-first century. French politics, society and culture UK: Palgrave Macmillian, pp. 173-185., (10.1057/9781403948182)

2000

Gorrara, C. and Motta, V. 2000. Introduction: ‘Identity, Gender, Politics’. New Readings 6, pp. 1-4. (10.18573/newreadings.42)

1998

Meyer, F. and Gorrara, C. 1998. Introduction. New Readings 4, pp. 1-5. (10.18573/newreadings.23)

1997

Burdett, C. and Gorrara, C. 1997. Introduction. New Readings 3, pp. 1-5. (10.18573/newreadings.16)

1996

Gorrara, C. and Burdett, C. 1996. Introduction. New Readings 2, pp. 1-6. (10.18573/newreadings.9)

1995

Gorrara, C. and Burdett, C. 1995. Introduction. New Readings 1, pp. 1-4. (10.18573/newreadings.4)

0

Gorrara, C. J. . Conclusion and annotated bibliography. In: Gorrara, C. J. ed. French Crime Fiction. European Crime Fictions Cardiff: University of Wales Press, pp. 125-134.

Visual Cultures of War

I am interested in the ways popular forms of representation shape how contemporary viewers and readers understand legacies of the Second World War. I am currently working on projects that focus on visual representations of war in anglophone and francophone cultures. This work interrogates the intergenerational transmission of war memory in 21st century comics, graphic novels and picture books. It asks how text-image narratives allow for the creative archiving of wartime pasts that are now moving beyond the realm of living memory as the last surviving witnesses pass away.

Language Learning and Advocacy

I am the Academic Lead for the MFL Mentoring project, a pan-Wales project that uses mentoring to enthuse secondary schools students to study modern/international languages and, thereby, to increase the take up of languages in compulsory education. The programme trains university students to be multilingual champions to school students who are disengaged from learning languages. This project is funded by the Welsh Government and is delivered in partnership with the Universities of Aberystwyth, Bangor, Cardiff Metropolitan, University of South Wales, University of Wales Trinity Saint David, Wrexham Glyndwr, Swansea, the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama in collaboration with the Welsh educational consortia. This project promotes the benefits of intercultural communication and supports aspirations towards university study for more disadvantaged groups: https://mflmentoring.co.uk/

I lead research from this project that examines why secondary school students in Wales are choosing not to study languages at school and the impact that this is having on the languages landscape and curriculum design in Wales. This research draws on large-scale data generated by the MFL Mentoring project, a programme which works with over 120 secondary schools in Wales annually.

The project was was shortlisted for the Times Higher Education Awards in 2021 in the category of Widening Participation or School Outreach project of the year.

My work on languages and mentoring has generated

public engagement pieces for The Conversation: https://theconversation.com/how-mentoring-can-improve-modern-languages-uptake-in-schools-65380;
blog posts as part of language advocacy and activism within academia: https://talkinghumanities.blogs.sas.ac.uk/2021/12/07/we-have-to-deploy-modern-languages-in-confronting-our-challenges/
opinion pieces and consultancy for language projects for the British Council Wales: https://wales.britishcouncil.org/en/blog/languages-multilingualism
consultancy work with the British Academy on SHAPE (Social Sciences, Arts and the Humanities for People and the Economy): https://www.openaccessgovernment.org/article/humanities-and-the-arts-pioneering-shape-in-school-a-human-world-focus/166477/

I regularly speak and present at briefings and policy events devoted to teaching/learning languages in Wales, the UK and globally.

My work on language learning, mentoring and education has secured large-scale funding from the Welsh Government, the Department for Education in England, UKRI (ESRC and AHRC) and the British Council Wales. It has generated international collaborations with the Castille de Leon region in Spain and, most recently the University of Waikato, New Zealand.

Research from this project is informing an educational consultancy spin-out company due to laumch in 2025: https://poblcommunications.com/

My teaching responsibilities for 2023-4 are:

_{Undergraduate}

First Year: National and Global Perspectives on France

Final Year French Dissertations: French film cultures

Postgraduate Research

I have co-supervised 11 PhDs to completion and 1 MPhil on the following topics:

'Myths and Oppression of Gendered and Racialised Subjects in the Prose Fiction of Rosario Castellanos' (passed May 2003)
'Representations of Travel and Memory in 1960s and 1970s French- and German-Language Literature' (passed April 2004), AHRC-funded studentship
'Comparative Perspective on the Poetic Course of Arthur Rimbaud, William Blake and Sohrab Sepehri' (passed 2006)
'Constructions of the Algerian War Appelés in French Cultural Memory' (passed April 2012) AHRC-funded studentship
'Cultural Representations of Italians in Wales (1920s-2010s)' (passed April 2012)
'Sapphic spectres: Interwar German women’s fiction’ (MPhil, passed April 2014)
'A Study of Scanlation and Japanese Manga' (passed March 2015)
'The Orphan Story of British Women in Occupied France: History, Memory, Legacy' (AHRC DTP-funded, passed October 2018)
'The Western in French Comics: Translation, Adaptation and Localisation' (passed May 2020)
'Translating French Memories of the Holocaust' (passed July 2020)
'Plurilingualism in the Curriculum for Wales: A Qualitative Inquiry into Secondary School International Language Teachers' Beliefs during the Preparatory Stages of the New Curriculum and Reformed GCSEs' (ESRC DTP-funded, passed November 2023)
'Promoting International Languages in Wales: A Study of the Role of Routes into Languages Cymru and its Approach to Motivating Learners' (ESRC DTP-funded, passed February 2024)

I am currently co-supervising 4 PhDs, funded by the AHRC South West and Wales Doctoral Training Partnership and the AHRC Collaborative Doctoral Awards and the Imperial War Museum.

External Examiner for PhDs

University of Kent (2010 and 2016), University of Leeds (2010), Birkbeck, University of London (2011), Université de la Bretagne Occidentale (2011), University of Auckland (2014), University of Durham (2018), University of Swansea (2023).

I am currently Dean of Research and Innovation for the College of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences at Cardiff University.

I studied for my undergraduate degree at the University of Leeds. I completed a Masters in European Literature in 1991 and a DPhil on French women's writing and the Second World War in 1994, both at Oxford University

After teaching in France, I was appointed a Lecturer in French at Cardiff University where I was made a Professor of French in 2008.

I was the founding Head of the School of Modern Languages at Cardiff University in 2014.

I was the first Dean of Research Environment and Culture at Cardiff University (2019-2021).

Honours and awards

2023: Chevalier dans l'Ordre Nationale du Merite, awarded by the French Government for services to French language and culture and the promotion of multilingualism

2021: Academic Lead of the MFL Mentoring project, shortlisted for the Times Higher Education Award for Widening Participation or School Outreach project of the year

2018 (April): Visiting Research Fellow, KU Leuven

2017: Academic Lead for the MFL Student Mentoring Project, winner of the Chartered Institute of Linguists Threlford Cup http://www.cardiff.ac.uk/news/view/997055-threlford-cup

2017 (April): Visiting Research Fellow, KU Leuven

2015: Cardiff University, Celebrating Excellence Awards: Outstanding Contribution to Leadership

2012: Elected Fellow of the Learned Society of Wales

2011: Elected Fellow of the Royal Historical Society

2011: Visiting Fellow, Centre for the Study of Cultural Memory, Institute of Germanic and Romance Studies, School of Advanced Studies, University of London

Funding

2025-6: AHRC IAA: Knowledge Exchange, Commercialisation and Translational Research Fund supporting Pobl Communications educational consultancy: £7,000

2024-5: Cardiff University/University of Waikato: £4,840: partnership funding to pilot a languages mentoring project in Hamilton, New Zealand

2023-5: Welsh Government: £789,785: Raising the Profile of Modern Foreign Languages: a Mentoring Initiative: Phase VIII and Reading Mentoring Pilot project

2023-28: ESRC IAA (Disciplinary Lead): Impact Accelerator Account (Round 3): £1.25M

2022-2023: Welsh Government: £298,000: Raising the Profile of Modern Foreign Languages: A Mentoring Initiative: Phase VII

2022: ESRC IAA (PI and institutional lead): Local Acceleration Fund (LAF): £49,984

2021-23: ESRC IAA (PI and institutional lead): Commercialising Research out of Social Sciences (CRoSS): £100,000

2021-2022: Welsh Government £230,000: Raising the Profile of Modern Foreign Languages: A Mentoring Initiative: Phase VI

2020-2023: UKRI: Future Leadership Fellows Network Training: £280,000: Cardiff Co-Investigator (Project led by the University of Edinburgh: £2.8M)

2020-21: Welsh Government £230,000: Raising the Profile of Modern Foreign Languages: A Mentoring Initiative Phase V: A Digital Programme

2019-2020: Department for Education, UK: £430,000: Digital Languages Mentoring, further roll out

2018-19: Department for Education, UK: £94,000: Pilot Digital Languages Mentoring project

2019-20: Welsh Government: £180,000: Raising the Profile of Modern Foreign Languages: A Mentoring Initiative Phase IV

2019: AHRC: £1,500: 'Rethinking the Languages Pipeline in the Era of Brexit, Language Acts and World-Making, Open World Research Initiative

2018-2020: HEFCW: Physics and Mentoring in Wales: £8,565: project consultant and advisor

2018-19: Welsh Government: £139,000: Raising the Profile of Modern Foreign Languages: A Mentoring Initiative Phase III

2018: AHRC: £1,500: 'Language Learning Opens Doors to Other Worlds: Memory Acts through Digital Technologies'. Language Acts and World-Making, Open World Research Initiative

2018: Institute of Modern Languages Research: £2,090 (with T. Allbeson): Photography and the Languages of Reconstruction, 1944-49

2018: AHRC: £2,900: 'Evaluating the effectiveness of e-mentoring and a digital languages platform for FLL in Wales', Multilingualism: Empowering Individuals, Transforming Societies (MEITS) Open World Research Initiative

2018: Welsh Government: £40,000: Turbo-Tutoring: Supporting Attainment in AS Level French: Phase II

2017-18: Welsh Government: £228,548: Raising the Profile of Modern Foreign Languages: A Mentoring Initiative Phase II

2017: Welsh Government: £40,000: Turbo-Tutoring: Supporting Attainment in AS Level Modern Foreign Languages: Phase 1

2015-16:Welsh Government: £117,305: Raising the Profile of Modern Foreign Languages: A Mentoring Initiative Phase I

2015: Welsh Government: £56,184: Raising the Profile of Modern Foreign Languages: A Mentoring Initiative Phase I

2008: Cardiff Humanities Research Institute (CHRI): £1,680: Cardiff Distinguished Visiting Fellow scheme: to fund the visit of Dr Maurizio Ascari (Bologna University) as part of the Crime Narratives in Context Research Network activities

2007: Association for the Study of Modern and Contemporary France: £350.00 Conference support: ‘The Lost Decade: the 1950s in European History, Society, Economy and Culture’, Cardiff University, 11-13 July 2007

2007: British Academy small grant fund: £2,292. Research support for the project: ‘Reconstructing France: Popular Culture, Crime Fictions and National Identity, 1946-58’

2002: Cassell Foundation funding: £700 and Association for the Study of Modern and Contemporary France funding: £200 Conference support: ‘Cultural Intersections: Noir Fiction and Film in France and Italy’ conference at the Institute of Romance Studies, London

2001-2: Leverhulme Research Fellowship: £15,646

Professional memberships

2023-26: Co-Chair, Wales Arts and Humanities Alliance: https://uniswales.ac.uk/our-work/wales-innovation-network/programmes/wales-arts-and-humanities-alliance

2020-22: Chair, Education Working Group for SHAPE campaign (Social Sciences, Humanities and Arts for the People and the Economy)

2018-2021: Chair, University Council of Modern Languages: https://university-council-modern-languages.org/

2017-18: President of the Association of University Professors and Heads of French: http://www.auphf.ac.uk/

2016-18: Executive Committee member of the Society for French Studies

2015-2017: Executive Committee member of the Association of University Professors and Heads of French

2014-2019: Academic Director of Routes into Language Cymru, pan-Wales advocacy group for modern languages: http://routesintolanguagescymru.co.uk/

2011-2014: University Council of Modern Languages representative for Wales

2007-2014: Peer Review College member of the AHRC

Academic positions

2021-2027: Dean of Research and Innovation, College of Arts, Humanities and Spcial Sciences, Cardiff University

2019-2021 University Dean of Research Environment and Culture, Cardiff University

2014-16: Founding Head of the School of Modern Languages, Cardiff University

2012-14: Acting Head, then Head of the School of European Languages, Translation and Politics, Cardiff University

2008-2012: Director of Research, School of European Languages, Translation and Politics, Cardiff University

Committees and reviewing

2020-23 and 2023-26: Council Member, Learned Society of Wales

2018-2021: Scrutiny Panel Member, Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences, Learned Society of Wales

2018-20: External Advisor, School of Languages and Applied Linguistics, Open University

2018-22: Expert Adviser to the National Assembly for Wales within the framework agreement for the provision of research and briefing services in relation to Brexit. Area of expertise: multilingualism, internationalisation and language policies

Language policy, multilingualism in Wales and globally
Memory, culture and war in France
Comics and graphic novels
Visual cultures of war

Current supervision

Martina Biavati

Research student

Nicola Keller

Research student

Contact Details

Gorrara@cardiff.ac.uk
+44 29208 74955
66a Park Place, Room 1.06, Cathays, Cardiff, CF10 3AS

Research themes

Specialisms

Culture, representation and identity
Language policy
Literature in French
Memory
Visual cultures

Mentorship scheme boosts language GCSE take up in Wales

Professor Claire Gorrara (she/her)

Overview

Publication