Staff Bios
Dr. Brent Keever, Resident Director for Session I, received his B.A. in English and Literary Criticism from Princeton University and his Ph.D. in English and Modern Studies from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. He has taught and lectured all over the U.S. and throughout France on such topics as satire and humor; the literary and cinematic representations of sound, mysticism, and technology; and ethics in cartoons. His research interests include the history of critical theory and criticism, film studies, musicology, and modernist poetry and prose. An avid translator and film sub-titler, he has worked with the French children’s literature group, l’école des loisirs, as well as with French politicians. He is currently working on a project that throws into question certain theories about listening and sharing.
Dr. Hannah Taïeb, Resident Director for Session II, is the founder of the Paris summer program. She first lived in France as a teenager, taking classes at the Collège Cévenol and Aix-en-Provence, and working in Boulogne making jewelry. Her university studies, at the University of California and New York University, culminated in a Ph.D. thesis on women and identity, based on fieldwork in a rural center in Morocco. Hannah settled permanently in France in 1992, where she was the co-editor of a multilingual, multidisciplinary review, Mediterraneans. She taught intercultural and interpersonal communication at the American University of Paris for several years and has been working at the CIEE Study Center since 2001. She runs yearly seminars on religious diversity in France and teaches a class on cultural métissage, or mixing in popular culture.
Natalie Malacrida, Session I Coordinator and Summer Housing and Well-Being Coordinator, is responsible for housing, day trips and weekend excursions, and student well-being. She is a former CIEE student and has a B.A. in English and French from the University of Iowa, and an M.A. in French and Comparative Literature from Middlebury College. She prepared her thesis on study abroad.
Lucie Laureillard, Session II Coordinator and Summer French Language Coordinator, has an M.A. in French language teaching. She is currently a doctoral candidate in linguistics at the University of Paris VIII. She handles French placement and organizes the conversation exchange program.