معرفی
Renée Girard is an Adjunct Professor in the Department of History at Brock University. She holds a PhD from McGill University and an MA from Brock University. Her research focuses on food encounters between French and Indigenous peoples in early North America and the Atlantic World, emphasizing how food ontology influenced colonial interactions. She also explores missionaries in New France, early modern French culture, and printers during the French Revolution, with a focus on agnotology (the study of culturally induced ignorance).
Education:
- PhD in History, McGill University
- MA in History, Brock University
Research Interests:
Her work uses food as an interpretive framework to analyze colonial dynamics, particularly how French colonial writers used Greco-Roman philosophy and Christian morality to interpret Indigenous practices. Recent projects examine how food justified territorial appropriation and racial boundaries in New France. She also investigates the intersection of print culture and political change during the French Revolution through case studies of printers like Jean-Baptiste Collignon and Bordeaux’s publishing networks.
Publications & Conferences:
Recent publications include analyses of food identity in New France and collaborative works on revolutionary-era printers. She has presented at international conferences such as the Ninth International Conference on Food and Drink Studies (Tours, 2024) and the Society for French Historical Studies (Detroit, 2023), focusing on topics like environmental perceptions in colonial missions and Indigenous foodways.
Teaching:
She teaches courses like HIST4P46: Food and Drink – European-Indigenous Food Encounters in Early America, integrating primary sources and material culture into pedagogy.
