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Dr. Pascale LaFountain is Associate Professor of German and French and has been at Montclair State since 2011. Her main area of research examines issues of gender, performance, and language in German, French, and Netherlandic literature of the 18th and 19th centuries.

Her recent book, Theaters of Error: Problems of Performance in German and French Enlightenment Theater (Palgrave, 2018) reveals ways in which ballet theory, acting treatises, and canonical theatrical works by Lessing, Schiller, Diderot, and Kleist negotiate the effectiveness of body language and emotional identity on stage in a period when these fields were preoccupied with contradictory investments in communication precision and sentimental subjectivity.

Dr. LaFountain’s current projects focus on affect, the senses, and verbal communication. One project examines the use of gesture and body language in early German opera before 1840. Other projects explore intersections between science and theater in the European Enlightenment, and the negotiation of bodily communication in contemporary dramas by the Nobel-prize-winning Austrian author Elfriede Jelinek. Recent publications include an article on plants, community and emotion networks in Linnaeus, Buffon, and Humboldt in the Lessing Jahrbuch, as well as German pedagogy articles in MLN, Unterrichtspraxis, and the German-based KONTEXTE.

Dr. LaFountain presents regularly at the International Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies (ISECS) German Studies Association (GSA), the American Convention of Teachers of Foreign Languages (ACTFL), Northeastern Modern Language Association (NeMLA), and other conferences.

Fluent in Dutch, French, and German, and having studied in France (Paris) and Germany (Mainz), Dr. LaFountain teaches courses at all levels in French and German. Sample courses include “The Power of the People: Democracy in Revolutionary France,” “The Senses and Performance in Enlightenment France,” “German Theater,” and “German Graphic Novels,” as well as the General Education courses “Introduction to LGBTQ Studies” and “Fairy Tales from Grimm to Disney” and communication-based language courses from the 101 level on. Other teaching includes a course on “The Art of Science Communication” for Green Teams student interns at Montclair State.

Dr. LaFountain was instrumental in Montclair State’s designation as a German Center of Excellence, obtained in November 2020.

From 2020-2024, Dr. LaFountain served as Vice President of the University Senate, where she was particularly invested in preferred name policy, the reduction of single-use plastics on campus, transparent communication, and other initiatives that facilitate Montclair State’s progress in the areas of inclusiveness and sustainability. She is currently the Chair of the Student Affairs Council of the University Senate, as well as the Secretary of the Northern New Jersey chapter of the American Association of Teachers of German (AATG).

Specialization

Gender and sexuality in German literature and performance, theories of body and mind, German literature 1700-present, 18th-century French literature and culture, theater studies, German film, Netherlandic literature, interdisciplinary communicative approaches to language pedagogy

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