Dr Ramona Fotiade
- Reader in French (French)
telephone:
01413303548
email:
Ramona.Fotiade@glasgow.ac.uk
R311A Level 3, French, Hetherington Building, Glasgow G12 8RS
Research interests
Research interests:
Modern and Contemporary French Thought (Existentialism, Deconstruction, Postmodernism), Twentieth-Century French Avant-Garde Movements (Dada and Surrealism), French Photography and Cinema, Japanese Philosophy and Visual Studies
Dr Fotiade's research profile spans across three inter-related areas of investigation in Twentieth-Century Studies: avant-garde literary movements, philosophy and visual culture. She is the Co-Director of the Arts Lab theme Islands in the Global Age, which explores the geopoetic dimension of the landscapes we inhabit and seeks to provide creative solutions to global challenges through trans-disciplinary partnerships with archipelagic communities and researchers from Scotland, Europe and Japan. In 2019 she was the beneficiary of a JSPS Visiting Fellowship at Waseda University (Tokyo), and has since played a leading role in building strategic partnerships with Waseda and with Kyushu University. During the Japan-UK Year of Culture (2019-2020), Dr Fotiade organised several events on Franco-Japanese cultural exchanges with Scotland in partnership with the Alliance française de Glasgow.
As PI of the RSE-funded Network in Existential Philosophy and Literature Dr Fotiade organised a series of impactful KE events on geopoetics and the work of Glasgow-born philosopher and poet, Kenneth White, in partnership with the GU Special Collections, the Hunterian Art Gallery, the GalGael Trust, the Alliance française de Glasgow, the French Institute in Edinburgh, the Institut international de géopoétique and the Scottish Centre for Geopoetics.
Among her recent publications, Pictures of the Mind. Surrealist Photography and Film (Peter Lang, 2018) is the first integrated study of Surrealist photography and film from a philosophical perspective, which focuses on the relevance of post-structuralist theories (in particular, Derrida and Deleuze) for the re-assessment of the Surrealist approach to still and moving images leading to the elaboration of an ‘aesthetics of spectrality’ with lasting implications for a range of post-war trends in art-house and popular cinema. In 2010 Dr Fotiade was invited to contribute as one of only four international advisors to the major Surrealist retrospective organised at the Barbican Arts Centre in London (June-September 2010). On this occasion, she wrote five short essays on French cinema and Surrealist architecture for the exhibition catalogue (The Surreal House, Yale University Press, 2010). The exhibition attracted more than 42,500 visitors and was very favourably reviewed in The Independent, The Guardian and voted nr 1 critics’ choice in Time Out.
In 2016 she curated the exhibition, Léon Chestov - La Pensée du dehors (at the Mairie du 6e in Paris), devoted to the sesquincentenary of the existential thinker, and co-produced and scripted a short documentary film (Lev Shestov - The Thought from Outside) released during the exhibition. She edited the exhibition catalogue and has since prefaced and annotated the new, critical edition of Lev Shestov's work, Athens and Jerusalem, in English, published with Ohio University Press.
In recognition of the international reputation of the Shestov Studies Society and the scholarly publication (Les Cahiers Léon Chestov) which she directs, the Paris-based publisher Le Bruit du Temps entrusted her with the direction of the new critical edition of Lev Shestov’s complete works. The first five volumes in the series, four of which she prefaced, annotated and commented, came out in September 2010, 2011, 2012, and 2015 respectively, and were very favourably reviewed in the press.Two of the volumes in this series have since been released in paperback format with a print run of 5,000 copies: La Philosophie de la tragédie (2019) and Le Pouvoir des clés (2020), while a third one is forthcoming, Athens and Jerusalem (2023).
The prestigious French radio station, France Culture, invited Dr Fotiade on two occasions to give 34-minute interviews (with Alain Venstein) on this editorial project. The interviews were broadcast in November 2010 and October 2012. She was also asked to contribute to a programme on Benjamin Fondane’s avant-garde film, Tararira (broadcast on France Culture on 16 January 2014).
• Director of the Lev Shestov Studies Society
Check out Ramona's Open Access publications and research projects at ResearchGate
Check out Ramona's Amazon page here: http://www.amazon.fr/-/e/B0034PSSZW
or join her on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ramona-fotiade-96579234/
Publications
Selected publications
Fotiade, R. (2018) Pictures of the Mind: Surrealist Photography and Film. Series: New Studies in European Cinema, 5. Peter Lang: Oxford, UK. ISBN 9783039111299 (doi: 10.3726/b11571)
Fotiade, R. (2014) Cur Deus Homo? The irrational residue of being: reflections on Jean-Luc Marion and Shestov. In: Fotiade, R., Jasper, D. and Salazar-Ferrer, O. (eds.) Embodiment: Phenomenological, Religious and Deconstructive Views on Living and Dying. Series: Intensities: Contemporary Continental Philosophy of Religion. Ashgate: Farnham, pp. 117-130. ISBN 9781472410528
Fotiade, R. (2018) The thought from outside: memory, truth and the repetition of faith. In: Alphandary, I. and Koczanowicz, L. (eds.) Democracy, Dialogue, Memory: Expression and Affect Beyond Consensus. Series: Routledge studies in social and political thought. Routledge, pp. 110-124. ISBN 9781138564251
Fotiade, R. (Ed.) (2016) Léon Chestov (1866-1938): la pensée du dehors. Le Bruit du Temps: Paris. ISBN 9782358731003
Fotiade, R. (2018) The profane illumination of cinema: knowledge, uncertainty and belief in the age of virtual reality. Journal for the Study of Christian Culture, 40, pp. 204-230.
Fotiade, R. (2016) 'Montage, my fine care': realism, surrealism and postmodernism after Bazin. In: Aitken, I. (ed.) The Major Realist Film Theorists: A Critical Anthology. Edinburgh University Press: Edinburgh, pp. 81-93. ISBN 9781474402217
Shestov, L. (2016) Athens and Jerusalem. [Scholarly Editions]
All publications
Grants
Grants
2022 - John Robertson Bequest £370
SMLC Strategic Research Fund £533
2019 - JSPS Fellowship Award (Waseda University) £3000
2018 - IPDF & College of Arts grant £1835
IPDF & College of Arts grant £1430
2018 - GKE Fund grant £2480
2017 - RSE Research Network Award £19,402.10
2016 - GKE Fund grant £4051
2014 - Sovereign Holding Trust Research Grant €40,000
Carnegie Small Research Grant £1000
SMLC Strategic Research Fund Award £500
2014 - SMLC Strategic Research Fund Award £126
2012 – Conseil National du Livre (CNL) award of €2,000
2012 – SMLC Strategic Research Fund Award £700
2010/11 – Strategic Research Fund Award £350
2009/10 – I helped two graduates in the SMLC to develop their research projects and make successful applications for PG funding to the AHRC (one student obtained an AHRC scholarship to write a PhD in film studies under my supervision and the other successfully applied to the AHRC for a MPhil scholarship to write a dissertation on Fondane under joint supervision)
2009 – Faculty of Arts Strategic Research Fund Award for conference participation £200
2009 – SMLC Strategic Research Fund Award for participation in Salon de la revue £150
2008 – SMLC Research Support Fund Award £500
2008 – British Academy Travel Grant for conference participation £200 (Fondation des Treilles)
Faculty of Arts Strategic Research Fund Award for conference organisation £300 (Fondation des Treilles)
2007/8 – I helped a graduate student to apply successfully for a Carnegie scholarship and start writing a PhD thesis on Dostoevsky’s reception in France under my supervision
2007 – Chancellor’s Fund Award £2,200
2005/06 - AHRC Study Leave Award £14,013
1997 – The British Academy Small Research Grant £3,109
Supervision
Graduate Research Supervision
Dr Fotiade has supervised 13 PhD theses (9 of which have already been successfully defended) on topics related to philosophy, religion, cinema and literature. She has also supervised 3 MPhil dissertations on Twentieth-Century literature and ideology. She has experience supervising students from France, the UK, China, and she would welcome applications from prospective doctoral students on topics related to her research interests.
Currently supervising the following projects:
2022 -
Principal supervisor of an MRes thesis on Jean Cocteau, Maurice Blanchot and Jacques Derrida
Principal supervisor of a PhD thesis on Heidegger and Theology
2021 -
Secondary supervisor of a PhD thesis on Francophone female travel writers to East Asia and North Africa
Secondary supervisor of a PhD thesis on Georges Bataille and eco-criticism
2018 -
Principal supervisor of a PhD thesis on Georges Batailles and Buddhist philosophy
- Taylor, William
Deviant Ruins: Tracking the Decay of (Trans)humanist Futurity in Queer Bio- and Eco-Horror
2017 -
Principal supervisor of a PhD thesis on Maurice Blanchot, philosophy and literature.
2016 - 2019
Principal supervisor of a PhD thesis on Lev Shestov and continental philosophy and literature - successfully defended in February 2020.
2014 - 2018
Second supervisor of a PhD thesis on contemporary French film and philosophy - successfully defended in December 2018.
2014 - 2018
Principal supervisor of a PhD thesis on the absurd in the work of Camus, Ionesco and Pirandello - successfully defended in January 2019
2010 - 2014
Principal supervisor of a PhD thesis on French Cinema (Claire Denis & intertextuality) - successfully defended in July 2014.
2010 - 2018
Principal supervisor of a PhD thesis on the question of inadaptability
2008 - 2013
Principal supervisor of a PhD thesis on the first reception of Dostoevsky’s work in France (successfully defended in May 2013).
2010 - 2011
Second supervisor of a MPhil thesis on Benjamin Fondane’s work (successfully defended in October 2011).
2008 - 2010
Second supervisor of a PhD thesis on French and Italian feminist writers (successfully defended in October 2010).
1999 - 2005
Principal supervisor a PhD thesis on contemporary French banlieue & gay cinema (successfully defended in 2005).
1997 - 2000
Supervisor of a PhD thesis on Sartre and Ionesco’s conceptions of the theatre (successfully defended in 2000).
1996 - 1999
Supervisor of a MPhil thesis on André Breton and Paul Auster (successfully defended in 1999).
Teaching
Teaching:
Honours Options: Existentialism - Atheism, Reason and Faith (TRS/ Critical Studies), Modern French Thought, French Cinema, French Women's Writing, European and Latin-American Cinema, The Twentieth-Century French Novel, Narrating the City (Comparative Literature).
Honours: SH Language Tutor
Level 2: Surrealism lectures and seminars; Gender & Performance lectures and seminars (French)
Professional activities & recognition
Research fellowships
- 2019 - 2019: Visiting Research Scholarship - Waseda University
Editorial boards
- 1997: Lev Shestov Journal
- 1998 - 1999: Screen magazine
Professional & learned societies
- 2017: Deputy Convenor, Gifford Lectures Committee
Selected international presentations
- 2016: Rethinking Universalism (Renmin University of China)
- 2019: Centre for Applied Philosophy and Ethics - invited lecture (Kyoto University)
- 2019: SILS - invited lecture (Waseda University)
Additional information
The Shestov Journal/Cahiers Léon Chestov:
As general editor of this bi-lingual publication, Dr Fotiade has overseen the production of several themed issues, including contributions from internationally renowned scholars as well as new archival documentation and previously unpublished manuscripts relating to the life and work of the existential philospher, Lev Shestov.
The Lev Shestov Journal: ISSN 1369 9636
- no. 1, 124pp, Autumn 1997
- no. 2, 132pp, Winter 1998
- nr. 3, 120pp, Autumn 2002
- nr. 4-5 (special issue Chestov – Buber), 106pp, Spring 2005
- nr. 6, Autumn 2006, 66pp
- nr. 7, Autumn 2007, 69pp
- nr. 8 Spring 2008 (special issue Chestov – Bespaloff), 90pp
- nr. 9 Autumn 2009 (special issue Chestov – Fondane), 78pp
- nr. 10 Autumn 2010 (special issue Chestov – Cioran), 66pp
- nr. 11 Autumn 2011 (special issue Chestov - Schloezer), 76pp
- nr. 12 Autumn 2012 (special issue Chestov - Bataille), 82pp
- nr. 13-14 Autumn 2014 (special issue Chestov - Kierkegaard), 87pp
- nr. 15 Autumn 2015 (special issue Chestov - Nietzsche), 98pp
- nr. 16 Autumn 2016 (special sesquincentenary issue: Pushkin House, London), 87pp
- nr. 17 Autumn 2017 (special issue Chestov - Pascal), 122pp
- nr. 18-19 Autumn 2019 (special issue Chestov - Deleuze)
- nr. 20-21 Autumn 2021 (special issue Chestov - Dostoevsky)
For further information visit the Shestov Studies Society website
Professional Associations
since 2017 - Deputy Convener of the Gifford Lectures Committee; organiser of the Gifford Lectures in 2023 (Mark Williams), 2019 (Kevin Hart), 2018 (Judith Butler) and 2014 (Jean-Luc Marion).
since 1999 – Member of the Forum for European Philosophy (representative of the Glasgow French Section/SMLC).
Invited contribution to the “Provocations” conference series of the Forum for European Philosophy at Regent’s Park College, University of Oxford – June 2010.
Invited contributions to the Tate Modern conference series on Surrealism and Film (organised by the Forum for European Philosophy), 2001.
Co-organiser of an international conference with the Forum for European Philosophy – The Crisis of Self-Consciousness. Consciousness and Language, October 1999.