I am a PhD student working on non-human species in the Anthropocene. Drawing on the contemporary critical concepts of Capitalocene (Andreas Malm) and brutalism (Achille Mbembe), I am exploring French and Francophone texts to write a dissertation that seeks to challenge traditional methods of thinking about the non-human and the role of the intellectual in the ongoing context of non-human species discrimination and climate change. Besides animal studies and environmental humanities, my interests include vegan studies, the ethics of activism, early modern French philosophy, philosophical conflicts, critical theory, and the methodology of study and interpretation.
Catherine Behm
Ph.D. Student in French
Ph.D., French, New York University, 2026 (expected)
M.A., French, University of Oregon, 2021
B.A., English Studies, University of Toulouse-Jean Jaurès, France, 2018
Animal & vegan studies; Ethics (animal, environmental, ethics of activism); Methodology and ethics of study, of interpretation; Critical theory; Early modern French philosophy and philosophical conflicts; Environmental humanities; Stylistics
2021 Henry M. MacCracken Fellowship, Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, New York
University
2019-2021 Graduate Teaching Fellowship, University of Oregon
“Penser la nouvelle normalité avec Achille Mbmembe : pour une reconquête de la respiration multi-espèce”. Roundtable panel participant “‘Le droit à la respiration’ : A view from Oregon”. Twentieth and Twenty-First-Century French and Francophone Studies International Colloquium “(Vers) une nouvelle normalité ?”, 2021.
“(Re)reading Montaigne: Towards the Deconstruction of Brutalist Speciesism”. Fall Forum 2020, Department of Romance Languages, University of Oregon, October 16, 2020.