Profile picture for user Kévin Drif

Kévin Drif

Graduate Student
kevindrif@berkeley.edu
CV
Available for tutoring online or in-person

Research Areas

20th and 21st century French and Francophone literature, North African diaspora, migration, film and media studies, queer studies, gender and sexuality studies, cultural studies, critical race theory.


Biography

I am a second-year graduate student in the French Ph.D. program with a designated emphasis in Film and Media. My research interests lie in French and Francophone culture, and media (film, documentaries, television, music). For my dissertation, I focus on the cultural representations of education and the school space in French cinema and television and the complicated relationship this republican institution has with children of immigrants in its mission of dissemination of a certain French identity.

Before coming to Berkeley, I earned a BA and MA in English literature from the University of Tours (France), where I wrote a thesis on The Representations of African American Masculinities in American television series from 2014 onwards. This thesis allowed me to focus on subjects that became central to my research interests namely, media studies, gender and sexuality studies, and critical race theory all through an intersectional analytical framework. A one-year student exchange in the French department at the University of Colorado Boulder helped me rediscover French literature and led me to graduate from CU Boulder with an MA in French and Francophone literature.

I taught French during the entirety of my MA at CU Boulder and cannot wait to start interacting with students further along in the Ph.D.!

My pronouns are he/him/il.


Selected Publications

Book Chapters (Editor-reviewed)

  • Drif, Kévin. “Gender Dynamics and Spatiality in Banlieue Education Films.” Gender in French Banlieue Cinema: Intersectional Perspectives, edited by Marzia Caporale, Claire Mouflard, & Habib Zanzana. (to be published in 2024 by Lexington Book Publishing)
  • Drif, Kévin and Georges-Claude Guilbert. “Ryan Murphy’s Hollywood as Queer Utopian Uchronia.” Ryan Murphy's Queer America, edited by Brenda R. Weber & David Greven, Routledge, 2022, pp. 105-118.
  • Drif, Kévin. “CŒUR DE PIRATE: A Pirate with a Heart” & “EDDY DE PRETTO: The Dawn of a New Genre.” An Anthology of French and Francophone Singers from A to Z, reedition, edited by Michaël Abecassis & Marcelline Block, Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2022, pp. 235-238 & pp. 276-279.
  • Drif, Kévin. “Titus Andromedon’s Intersectional Identity in Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt (2015-2020).” Intersectionality in Anglophone Television Series and Cinema, edited by Kévin Drif & Georges-Claude Guilbert, Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2020, pp. 36-47.

Edited Volumes

Reviews

Online articles

  • Drif, Kévin. “Les Nouvelles Aventures de Sabrina, saison 3 : Sabrina Spellman, une figure féministe ambigüe.” Le genre & l’écran, 23 Feb. 2020, https://www.genre-ecran.net/?Les-Nouvelles-Aventures-de-Sabrina-saison-3.

Podcasts

In Preparation

  • Drif, Kévin. "When the Banlieue Meets the Third Arrondissement: Education, Hip Hop, and Emancipation in Allons Enfants (2022)." Education in Contemporary French and Francophone Film, edited by Rhiannon Harries and John Marks.