Lauren Ravalico, Ph.D.
Associate Dean, School of Languages, Cultures, and World Affairs| Chair of the Department of French, Francophone, and Italian Studies | Associate Professor of French | Affiliate Faculty - Women's and Gender Studies
Ravalico’s research focuses on French Romanticism and Exoticism, with current work examining feminized space, colonial ecologies, and the environmental imaginary in French culture. Her scholarship has appeared in The Comparatist, French Studies, George Sand Studies, Nineteenth-Century French Studies, Women in French, and an edited volume about Madame de Staël’s Philosophy of the Passions.
This scholarship informs her broader interest in land and food. She has long integrated food studies into her teaching through experiential learning. Her course, “The Culture of the French Table,” established partnerships with local businesses. She published an essay on these community-based teaching methods in a Routledge book on innovative pedagogy.
Her longtime commitment to institution-building through experiential learning has been supported with over $1.6 million in external grant funding from South Carolina Humanities and the Mellon Foundation.
She speaks French and Italian and has studied German, Latin, Mandarin Chinese, and Spanish. She also claims fluency in the non-verbal language of her dog.
Education
Ph.D., Harvard University
B.A., Cornell University
Honors and Awards
ExCEL Award, Outstanding Faculty Member in the School of Languages, Cultures, and World Affairs (2020)
Press and Media
The College Today: $1.5 million grant to highlight learning through food
The College Today: Mellon Foundation Award
The College Today: Beginning French Through Food
The College Today: Global Foodways Adds Cultural Perspective
Skirt! magazine: Global Foodways
Skirt! magazine: Praying for Surrender