University of Nebraska at Omaha
Inside this content area:
Relevant unomaha.edu links:
Faculty
The Faculty in the Department of Foreign Languages is extremely committed to student learning, having earned collectively 16 teaching and service awards in recent years. Our diverse faculty possess far reaching areas of expertise including literature, film and cultural studies, linguistics, second language acquisition and pedagogy.
Arabic
Chinese
French
Gascoigne, Carolyn
Professor of French, Graduate Faculty Fellow
MALT Graduate Program Chair
Ph.d., Florida State University, 1997
ASH 301A
402.554.2862
cgascoigne@mail.unomaha.edu
PhD Florida State University
Dr. Gasoigne’s teaching interests include topics and courses such as French grammar and composition, composition and stylistics, structure of French, and second language acquisition research. Her recent research interests include various aspects of second language acquisition such as studies of focus on form techniques, hybrid instruction, and the role of classroom climate in the language learning process.
Awards and Honors
Kiewit Professorship, The Edouard Morot-Sir Pedagogical Prize (American Association of Teachers of French); UNO Excellence in Teaching Award; Alumni Outstanding Teaching Award (College of Arts & Sciences); NAATF Teacher of the Year (Nebraska Association of Teachers of French); STAR Foreign Language Teaching Award (Nebraska Department of Education).
Part-time Instructor
ASH 307D
554-4872
Associate Professor of French
ASH 301S
402.554.3029
jparnell-smith@unomaha.edu
Director, UNO Summer abroad program in Besançon, France
President of Nebraska Chapter of the American Association of Teachers of French (2001-2004, 2008)
PhD University of California Los Angeles
Dr. Parnell’s teaching interests include business French, contemporary France (politics and culture), French cinema, French theater (17th-19th centuries) and stylistics. Dr. Parnell also serves as the French Study Abroad Director. Her research interests include 19th century French feminist authors, 19th century French culture and fine arts, and pedagogy and technology (teaching online and hybrid French classes).
Awards and Honors
Alumni Outstanding Teaching Award, STAR award, Foreign Language Teaching Award from Nebraska in 2006 and 2007,
Professor of French
Peter Kiewit Professor of French
ASH 301Q
402.554.4839
pproulx@mail.unomaha.edu
Graduate Faculty Fellow; Member of Women's & Gender Studies faculty & International Studies faculty; Courtesy Professor Appointment in the Department of English; Director of the UNO Summer Study Abroad Program in Quebec City, Canada; Editorial Board Member: Women in French Studies and Québec Studies; Book Review Editor, Québec Studies; French advisor.
PhD Cornell University
Dr. Proulx’s research and teaching interests include 20th and 21st century French and francophone literature, cultural studies, and francophone film. She is especially interested in exploring literary themes related to history, memory, and the transmission of stories. She teaches such seminars as “Exiles, Madwomen, and Witches in Contemporary French Literature” and “Francophone Film and Literature: Africa, the Caribbean, and Quebec.” In addition she serves an editor of The Feminist Encyclopedia of French Literature and co-edited Immigrant Narratives in Contemporary France and Textualizing the Immigrant Experience in Contemporary Quebec.
Awards and Honors: Peter Kiewit Professorship; Mary Ann Lamanna Award for Excellence in Women’s and Gender Studies; UNO Excellence in Teaching Award (university-wide); Alumni Outstanding Teaching Award (College of Arts & Sciences); the STAR Foreign Language Teaching Award (Nebraska Department of Education and the Nebraska International Language Association); served on U.S. Student Fulbright National Screening Committee; Canadian Studies Faculty Enrichment Grant; Quebec Studies Program Grant for Professors and Researchers.
Selected Publications:
Books:
Textualizing the Immigrant Experience in Contemporary Quebec. Ed. Patrice J. Proulx
and Susan Ireland. Westport, CT: Praeger Press, 2004.
Immigrant Narratives in Contemporary France. Ed. Patrice J. Proulx and Susan Ireland. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 2001.
Articles:
“Literary Border Crossings: Reconceptualizing Montesquieu’s Lettres persanes in Lise Gauvin’s Lettres d’une autre and Chahdortt Djavann’s Comment peut-on être français?” In Transatlantic Passages: Literary and Cultural Relations between Quebec and Francophone Europe. Ed. Paula Ruth Gilbert and Miléna Santoro. Montreal: McGill-Queen’s UP, 2010. 122-135.
"Witnessing Creation in Nancy Huston's Une adoration." The French Review 83.1 (October 2009): 90-101.
"Breaking the Silence: An Interview with Marie-Célie Agnant." Québec Studies Vol. 41 (Spring/Summer 2006): 45-61.
"Narratives of Exile and Identity in the Works of Gisèle Pineau and Neil Bissoondath." Minorités ethniques anglophones et francophones: études culturelles comparatives. Ed. Alec G. Hargreaves. Paris: Editions l'Harmattan, 2004. 31-49.
German
Assistant Professor of German
ASH 301U
402.554.3820
gcliver@unomaha.edu
PhD Washington University in St. Louis
Dr. Cliver has also taught at Guilford College in North Carolina and Ball State University. Her research has studied the integration of mathematics and mathematical philosophy in the writings of Robert Musil and Hermann Broch and the modernist interest in infinity. Currently, she is exploring the changing urban landscapes of intentionally planned cities of the former GDR. Dr. Cliver enjoys teaching basic language structures as well as German history, culture, literature, and art.
Japanese
Russian
Professor of Russian
ASH 301O
402.554.4840
tnovikov@mail.unomaha.edu
Ralph Wardle Diamond Alumni Professor in Arts and Sciences. Member of Women's Studies Faculty
PhD Florida State University
Tatyana Novikov is Professor of Russian and a Graduate Faculty Fellow. Her research interests include Russian cultural history, foreign language pedagogy, and contemporary Russian literature, in particular, Russian Symbolist poetry, Russian women’s fiction, Russian émigré literature and the utopian/dystopian literary tradition.
Awards and Honors
2004 UNO Alumni Outstanding Teaching Award, The STAR Foreign Language Teaching Award (Nebraska Department of Education and the Nebraska Foreign Language Association).
Spanish
Associate Professor of Spanish
Ph.D., University of Texas at Austin, 2004
ASH 301B
402.554.4989
melaniebloom@mail.unomaha.edu
Department Chair
PhD University of Texas at Austin
Dr. Bloom’s teaching interests include Spanish conversation and pronunciation and advanced composition as well as courses in the basic language sequence. Dr. Bloom also enjoys teaching the core classes in the MALT program. Recent research interests include the relationships between study abroad and intercultural sensitivity and language proficiency, and innovations in second language instruction.
Specialty Areas
Teaching methodology, assessment, teacher-research, and second language acquisition.
Awards and Honors
STAR Foreign Language Teaching Award (Nebraska Department of Education).
Assistant Professor of Spanish
Ph.D., University of Missouri-Columbia, 2004
ASH 301N
402.554.4838
acarballal@mail.unomaha.ed
PhD University of Missouri-Columbia
Dr. Carballal’s areas of expertise include Spanish Literature, Galician Studies, Spanish Regional and Ethnic Studies, Immigration and Exile, Afro- Hispanic Literature, Post-Colonial Studies, Service Learning, Teaching and Learning in Foreign Languages, Women and Religious Studies. She has received numerous honors and awards including: the Donald K. Anderson Award for Excellence in Teaching, Nebraska Association of Teachers of Spanish and Portuguese Outstanding Teacher Award, the Who’s Who among America’s Teachers Award, the STAR Award for Excellence in Teaching, International Studies Office Recognition for Outstanding Graduate Work, and the Graduate Teaching Scholars Award.
Specialty Areas
Modern Spanish literature, literature of the Spanish Civil War, Galician Studies, Afro-Hispanic literature, Post-Colonial Studies
Assistant Professor
Office: ASH 301B
Phone:
edistefano@unomaha.edu
PhD University of Illinois at Chicago
Dr. Di Stefano joined the faculty of the University of Nebraska at Omaha in August of 2012 as an Assistant Professor of Spanish. His research is concerned with literary and visual cultures and their intersection with politics. More specifically, his work examines representations of torture, violence and pain in contemporary literature and film in countries such as Chile, Mexico and Uruguay. He has also worked extensively on representations of disability in fiction as well as the emergence of human rights as a political discourse in Latin America. His most recent article “From Revolution to Human Rights in Mario Benedetti's Pedro y el Capitán”appears in the Journal of Latin American Cultural Studies. Before coming to the University of Nebraska at Omaha, he was an Assistant Professor at the University of West Georgia.
Assistant Professor of Spanish.
Ph.D., University of Florida, 2007.
ASH 301R
402.554.4837
csgarcia@unomaha.edu
PhD University of Florida
Dr. García’s teaching interests include Latin American literature, with emphasis in Central American, Guatemalan, and indigenous literatures; Latin American cultures; critical thinking; reading comprehension; creative and academic writing; service and community engagement learning projects. Her research focuses on Contemporary Central American and Guatemalan literatures; Latin American Indigenous literatures; and, Guatemalan women novelists (1940-1970).
Specialty Areas
American Literature, Guatemalan narrative, cultural studies.
Instructor of Spanish
ASH 301G
402.554.3604
dmalhiwsky@unomaha.edu
PhD University of Nebraska-Lincoln
Dr. Jurisevic’s teaching interests include topics and courses such as Spanish grammar and composition, foreign language methods, the basic language series, and second language acquisition research. Recent research interests include various aspects of second language acquisition using Web 2.0 technologies, hybrid instruction, and the role of grammar tools in the writing process.
Assistant Professor of Spanish
Ph.D., University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 2008
ASH 301C
402.554.3298
anitasaalfeld@unomaha.edu
PhD University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Dr. Saalfeld enjoys teaching Spanish classes at all levels, and is particularly interested in teaching Spanish linguistics courses and first-year Spanish courses. Her primary research interest is the acquisition of second language sound systems, but she has also done research in the field of technology-enhanced language learning and second language writing. Dr. Saalfeld's website, http://www.anitasaalfeld.com, contains a detailed summary of her work, as well as a repository of materials that she's created that are freely available for use by other language instructors.
Specialty Areas
Hispanic Linguistics, Spanish Phonetics & Phonology, Second Language Acquisition, Acquisition of Phonology, Technology in the Language Classroom
Assistant Professor of Spanish
Ph.D., University of Nebraska-Lincoln, 2006
ASH 301D
402.554.3749
sltorres@unomaha.edu
PhD University of Nebraska-Lincoln
Dr. Torres’ teaching interests include Spanish literature, film, history, contemporary society and conversation. His research interests include modern Spanish and Latin American literature, cultural studies, film, metacultural discourse, sociology of literature and the Spanish Civil War in literature and film.
Specialty Areas
Modern Spanish literature, cultural studies and metacultural discourse, sociology of literature, Spanish film
Associate Professor of Spanish
Ph.D., University of Colorado at Boulder, 1997
ASH 301H
402.554.4844
mvillamil@mail.unomaha.edu
Graduate Faculty Member, Spanish Adviser.
Faculty of the UNO CLS Program (Chicano/Latino Studies, Office of Latino/Latin American Studies of the Great Plains).
Research Areas
20th and 21st century Spanish-American narrative, Mexican and Colombian narrative, Mexico–US border issues.
Teaching areas
Latin American literature, (Surveys, 16th through 21st centuries), Latin American short story, Introduction to literary theory.
Honors and Awards"Who's Who Among America's Teachers" (2005-2006). "The STAR Foreign Language Teaching Award" (Nebraska Department of Education and the Nebraska Foreign Language Association, 2002).
Emeritus
Emeritus Professor of German
Ph.D., University of Illinois, 1972
ASH 301I
ajung@unomaha.edu
PhD University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Dr. Jung’s teaching and research interests include 17th and 18th century German literature, German cultural history & Landeskunde, and study abroad programing. During his career at UNO he received numerous honors and awards includingthe UNO Excellence in Teaching Award; Outstanding Teacher Award (Nebraska Chapter of the American Association of Teachers of German-Goethe Haus New York); the Second Annual
Specialty Areas
17th & 18th century German literature, German cultural history & Landeskunde, advising, Graduate Faculty, German Honor Society Adviser, Study Abroad Programs in Braunschweig, Germany, and Vienna, Austria
Awards and Honors
UNO Excellence in Teaching Award; Outstanding Teacher Award (Nebraska Chapter of the American Association of Teachers of German-Goethe Haus New York); The Second Annual Anderson-Gouttierre Award 2001,; AATG Outstanding Educator Award 2001; Checkpoint Charlie Foundation Scholarship 2001.
Lafontant, Julien J.
Emeritus Professor of French
Ph.D., SUNY, Binghamton, 1976
ASH 301E
402.554.4835
jlafontant@mail.unomaha.edu
Specialty Areas
18th century French literature, black literature, Graduate Faculty member, Graduate Faculty Fellow.
Awards and Honors
UNO Excellence in Teaching Award,
Who is Who Among America's Teachers.
Emeritus Professor of Spanish
Ph.D., Michigan State University, 1978
ASH 301I
avalle@unomaha.edu
PhD Michigan State University
Dr. Valle’s teaching and research interests include contemporary Latin American literature, Latin American civilization, and women in Latin American literature. During her career at UNO she received numerous honors and awards including the Excellence in Teaching Award (Nebraska Association of Teachers of Spanish and Portuguese); Certificate of Merit Awarded by the UNO International Student Services; and a Certificate of Appreciation for contributions to International Trade awarded by the Nebraska Department of Economic Development.
Specialty Areas
Contemporary Latin American literature, Latin American civilization, women in Latin American literature, Spanish honor society advisor, Graduate Faculty member.
Awards and Honors
Excellence in Teaching Award (Nebraska Association of Teachers of Spanish and Portuguese); Certificate of Merit Awarded by the UNO International Student Services; Certificate of Appreciation for contributions to International Trade awarded by the Nebraska Department of Economic Development.