Raisa Rexer

I am a native Brooklynite who joined the department of French and Italian in the Fall of 2018. I completed my Ph.D. in French after graduate work in English and in Comparative Literature, and I take a comparative and interdisciplinary approach to my research on the literature and culture of 19^th century France. My interests focus on the intersection of the visual arts and literature, the early history of photography, and the history of pornography. In my current book project, I examine the early history of nude photography in France and its influence on contemporary cultural debates and literary representations of the body. The next one will look at photo-illustration of the novel in fin-de-siècle France. In addition to my academic work, I also contribute art reviews to the U.K.-based magazine Apollo.