A French major is an incredibly flexible degree that can open up doors to a wide array of career paths all over the world. Here are the stories of some of our former majors that have gone on to do incredibly interesting, and different, things with their French major.
Spotlight on Undergraduate Alumni
Sabrina He
A double major in French and in the International Relations Honors Program, I was President of the International Relations Society at NYU. I founded the "IR INSIDER", a news site on International Affairs written by students. With over 60 writers/editors, this publication produces 3-7 articles daily with over 3000 subscribers. I interned on the editorial team of the Foreign Affairs Magazine published by the Council on Foreign Relations. I believe that French is a way of life that interacts with politics to shape our worldview. I'm currently studying at Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism.
Annie Di
As a double-major in French and politics at NYU, Annie spent a semester abroad at NYU Paris and at the prestigious L’Institut de Sciences Politiques where she focused on the politics of the European Union. After graduating with cum laude honors, Annie is now an accelerated B.A./M.A. student at NYU’s Institute of French Studies where she continues to cultivate her love of the French language and francophone cultures. Later this year, Annie will begin working as a diplomatic policy advisor for the United Nations after completing her current internship at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York. Annie believes that the experiences given to her by the NYU French Department has played a fundamental part in her formative years and has imparted the knowledge that is necessary for her career in international politics.
Aurora Bell
After studying comparative literature and French, working at the front desk in the French department, and studying abroad in Paris, my goal when I graduated from NYU in 2013 was to incorporate French into a career in book publishing. During my last year at NYU I became particularly interested in translation, studying it on a practical level in French to English translation classes and on a theoretical level for my senior thesis. Now, as an editorial project manager at Assouline, I use French most days, working with authors, freelance translators and editors, and in-house departments to coordinate the publication of large-format illustrated books, a number of which are published in both English and French.
Bryan Pirolli
Since graduating from NYU in 2008, Bryan has been living in Paris, doing more than just perfecting his language skills developed in the French department. After a short stint working at NYU’s campus in Paris as a student life administrator, Bryan decided to stay in France and develop his own projects. It’s not all macarons and baguettes, and he’s had his share of odd jobs working at a pizzeria, pulling shots as a barista, and giving guided tours. He managed to put his degree in journalism and French to use by freelancing for publications like CNN and Time Out Paris. He acknowledges the department’s courses on history and contemporary society for giving him a solid foundation to write about French culture. At the same time, he has completed both his masters and Ph.D. at the Sorbonne, writing his thesis (in French!) on evolutions in travel journalism in a digital age. He successfully defended in December 2015 and is continuing to freelance while pursuing an academic career. Never imagining he would have become a French docteur, Bryan credits his experiences at the French department for helping to make it all possible. He is currently an educator at the Sorbonne where he teaches courses on journalism to French undergraduate and graduate students.
Laura Skove
Since graduating from the French department in 2012, I have been working in international development. I spent two years as a Peace Corps volunteer in Cameroon working on food security initiatives. I am currently a master's student at the London School of Economics studying Environment and Development. I hope to return to West Africa in the future. Mastery of French is essential for working in development, particularly given my regional focus; although I also learned a local patois in Cameroon, French was my primary professional and social language. I am also grateful for the experience of writing an honors thesis under Dr. Stephane Gerson, as it prepared me well for the work I am doing now on my master's dissertation. The way of approaching and framing a topic and the research methods developed through that process have been invaluable.
Graden O'Leary
Graden currently works for a systems engineering company in San Diego, California and will be attending graduate school for international relations at Sciences Po and LSE. As an undergraduate, Graden double majored in French and Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies and completed a minor in anthropology. Completing an honors thesis with the department motivated him to pursue graduate studies and to attempt to answer the questions he initially examined in his research about Islamic dietary restrictions in contemporary France. Learning French was integral to his study, as it allowed him to engage with and across multiple cultures and diverse groups of people who would have been inaccessible without this skill. Graden coordinated his research to coincide with a semester at the NYU Paris campus to do on-the-ground interviews and research with the support of faculty both in New York and Paris.
He credits his professors in the French department with the vast improvement in his language skills, culminating with writing his thesis in French, as well as his ability to think critically in any discipline. During his time as a student Graden particularly appreciated the availability and accessibility of the French faculty, and notes that their willingness to go out of their way to facilitate understanding and engagement among their students was exceptional.
Philip Dalgarno
Philip graduated in Spring 2015 with a double major in French & Linguistics and European & Mediterranean Studies and a minor in History. He spent his last year at NYU using a DURF grant to do independent research on the nineteenth century renaissance of the Provençal language, going on to win the European Studies Prize for his honors thesis. He has interned in the past at the French-American Foundation and is currently working with New York Habitat, a real estate agency doing furnished rentals in New York, London, Paris, and the South of France. Writing about current events, history and culture for their website lets him draw on his experience studying abroad at NYU Paris and keeps him engaged with the French-speaking world.
Amanda Randone
Majoring in a modern language opened up the world to Amanda Randone since graduating from NYU. She moved to French Guiana in 2014 to work for the French Ministry of Education as a Language Assistant, a job that entailed teaching English and developing English language programs with teachers in the territory. Intrigued by the complicated sociopolitical nature of the region, where the French language was often the only commonality between Amanda and her students from neighboring Surinam, Brazil, Guyana and the Caribbean, Amanda moved to Paris upon completing her appointment to pursue a Masters degree with Middlebury College at the Sorbonne in Paris. She is writing a thesis exploring the French identity in its overseas departments as it relates specifically to education, inspired by her work in French Guiana. In addition to her research, Amanda works as a freelance journalist, publishing about topics like politics and culture for a young female audience with magazines like Teen Vogue. Her latest article was a piece about the humanitarian crisis of Syrian refugees, giving a voice to the often-overlooked population of refugees who recently arrived in her current hometown of Paris.
Raymond Wright
Raymond began his undergraduate career at NYU Paris, where he fell in love with French culture, language, and literature. After returning to Paris for his third year to study at Sciences Po, Raymond spent his final year at NYU working on his undergraduate thesis under Professor Lucien Nouis. Raymond currently attends Yale Law School, where he studies U.S. foreign policy, international human rights, and constitutional law. In his own words, Raymond considers his time spent studying French as, “an opportunity to bring to life a history and culture which before existed only in grammar exercises.” For him, “it was the study of French which exposed me to the greatest minds humanity has produced, and which refined my analytical capacities.” These capacities have served him well, as he continues working toward a career in the US Foreign Service and begins to try his hand at legal scholarship.
Elizabeth Dospěl Williams
Elizabeth (Betsy) Dospěl Williams recently finished her Ph.D. at the Institute of Fine Arts with a dissertation on Byzantine and early Islamic art, and is currently a Post-doctoral Teaching Fellow at Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection in Washington, D.C. Her double major in Romance Languages and in Fine Arts at NYU set her on the path to a career as a museum professional. French in particular has served her in innumerable ways: she reads art historical literature on medieval art in French, speaks the language during travels in Europe and the Middle East, and communicates in French with colleagues abroad. Her connections to Paris remain strong, thanks to a semester abroad under Prof. Judith Miller’s directorship. In November, she travelled there to study archival resources related to one of the earliest international loan exhibitions of Byzantine art, held at the Musée des Arts Décoratifs in 1931. Betsy is especially interested in the reception of medieval art in modernist Paris and in the exhibition organizers’ explicit positioning of the show as a testament to European political and artistic identity. She recently won a travel scholarship from the Institut national de l’histoire de l’art (INHA) for this research, and will return to Paris in summer 2016 to continue her archival work there.
Brian Phalen
Majoring in French was an education in navigating between two worlds. English and French, New York and Paris—much of my four years at NYU was about exploring the in-between, being able to think from different perspectives simultaneously, to communicate in new ways. The beauty of this degree is that you acquire not only language skills but also the ability to adapt to many different environments. This was an invaluable lesson, and ultimately a really practical one, since a French degree can be applied in so many ways. After graduation I spent a year teaching English at two elementary schools in the French Alps. And this year I finished my first book translation, Les Evaporés du Japon, an exposé from a French journalist and photographer duo on the "evaporated" people of Japan who voluntarily disappear to avoid shame and failure. At the end of the day, studying French taught me to be more adventurous, and I plan to continue exploring.