Alison James

Alison James is a Professor of French Literature and Chair of the Department of French Language and Literature at the University of Chicago. Her research focuses on 20th and 21st-century French literature, with particular interest in documentary narratives, fictionality, and the representation of everyday life. She holds a PhD from Columbia University (2005).

Her scholarly works include *Constraining Chance: Georges Perec and the Oulipo* (2009) and *The Documentary Imagination in Twentieth-Century French Literature* (2020). She has co-edited volumes such as *Figures of Chance II* (2024) and *The Routledge Handbook of Fiction and Belief* (2023). Her research explores how formal constraints and documentary methods shape literary depictions of reality.

James teaches interdisciplinary courses on topics like literary avant-gardes, autobiography, and the intersection of literature with visual arts and cinema. She has held editorial roles for journals including *L’Esprit créateur* and *Revue critique de fixxion française contemporaine*.

Her current projects investigate evolving conceptions of fictionality in contemporary French literature and the role of chance in narrative forms. She is affiliated with the Center for the Study of Gender and Sexuality and the France Chicago Center.