Nasrin Qader

Nasrin Qader is Associate professor of French, holding a PhD from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Department of African Languages and Literatures. Trained as a comparatist, Qader consistently brings together Francophone African literature, Arabic literature of the Maghreb, Islamic mysticism and philosophy, and contemporary literary theory. Her research both investigates and performs the intersections between literature, philosophy and politics. In 2009-2010, she was awarded the Mellon New Directions Fellowship, which allowed her to study the Islamic and Hindu literary and philosophical traditions of India.

Nasrin Qader is the author of articles on French and Arabic literature of Africa, which engage with the work of Mohammad Barradah, Abdelkébir Khatibi, Abdelfattah Kilito (of Morocco) and Moussa Ouled Ebnou (of Mauritania). Her book, Narratives of Catastrophe: Boris Diop, ben Jelloun, Khatibi, published by Fordham University Press, studies the relationship between récit (narration, story) and catastrophe. Her second book tentatively titled Literary Reflections expands the corpus of texts she studies by including film. In this project, she explores the ways in which her studies of the Indian traditions can illuminate her ideas about vision, reflection and writing. Currently, she is working on a series of articles on the great Persian poet of India, Mirza Abdel Qadir ‘Bedil’ and on contemporary Afghan literature.

Nasrin Qader is an active member of the core faculty of the Program in Comparative Literary Studies and the Program of African Studies.  She serves as the co-director of the French Interdisciplinary Group (FIG) and is the Director of Graduate Studies for French. She is also a Chevalier de l’Ordre des Palmes Académiques.

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