Hicham Assaoui holds an M.A. in Middle Eastern and North African Studies and a Ph.D. in Second Language Acquisition and Teaching from the University of Arizona. He is a former Fulbright Exchange scholar in Arabic at St. Edward’s University in Austin, Texas. He has taught all levels of Arabic as well as co-taught courses on language acquisition and linguistics. He is currently an Assistant Professor of Arabic at the department of Modern Languages and Cultures at Virginia Military Institute. His research interests include Arabic language and culture, Arabic dialects, linguistics, pedagogy, second language acquisition, and sociolinguistics.

Camille Bouillon is a French instructor at Virginia Military Institute (VMI) where she teaches intermediate French courses.

After receiving a B.A. in French and Comparative Literature at Université Paris-Sorbonne (IV), Ms. Bouillon spent an academic year as a Language Teaching Assistant at Washington and Lee University (2016-2017); she then returned to France to complete a Master’s degree in teaching French as a foreign language at the Sorbonne and she is now back in the United States pursuing a Ph.D. in French and Francophone Studies at the University of Pennsylvania (UPenn), where she's taught elementary, intermediate and advanced French courses.

Her academic research focuses on sensory studies - more specifically on sound, hearing and sound reproduction technologies - in late 19th-century French literature, including works by Villiers de l’Isle-Adam.

Col. Kathleen Bulger-Barnett earned a Ph.D. in Spanish from the University of Kentucky with a specialization in Spanish Golden Age literature.   Since 1989 she has taught courses on  Spanish language, literature, and culture. Research interests include Spanish Golden Age literature (both drama and prose) and also Cuban writers and Caribbean literature.  

Professor
Modern Languages and Cultures

A native of Virginia, Col. Abbey Carrico has been at VMI since 2013. Professor of French, she is the head of the Department of Modern Languages and Cultures where she teaches all levels of French and holds the Lieutenant General John W. Knapp ’54 Chair of Academic Excellence. In 2019, she was awarded the Thomas Jefferson Teaching Award, presented to a VMI faculty member “who is deemed especially talented at inspiring students in the development of their intellect and character.” Since her time at VMI, Col. Carrico has created a teaching forum, “Pedagogy 400,” co-directed the summer study abroad program in Paris, and served as an Assistant Inspector General/Title IX Coordinator. Her scholarly research centers on representations of the environment in 19^th-century French literature and has been published by top journals and presses including Revue Flaubert, Dix-Neuf, Classiques Garnier, Les Cahiers naturalistes, Cambridge Scholars Publishing, and the Modern Language Association. She is active in the Foreign Language Association of Virginia and has presented her teaching strategies at the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages Convention. Col. Carrico received her BA in French and concentration in Education from the University of Richmond, her MA in History (European Area Studies) from Virginia Tech, and her Ph.D. in French Literature from Emory University. 

Select publication and presentation links:

Foreign Language Teaching and the Environment: Theory, Curricula, Institutional Structures (Modern Language Association)

Flaubert voyageur Classiques Garnier)

Water Imagery in George Sand’s Work (Cambridge Scholars Publishing)

Dictionnaire Gustave Flaubert  (Classiques Garnier)

“Progressive Waters: Memory, Narrative and Localism in Émile Zola’s L’inondation” (Dix-Neuf)

“The Meaning of Water” (NPR’s With Good Reason) 

Professor
Modern Languages and Cultures

Dr. Bárbara Xavier França is an Assistant Professor of Spanish at Virginia Military Institute. She holds a Master of Arts and a Ph.D. in Spanish and Portuguese Languages and Literatures from Tulane University, New Orleans, LA. Her research discusses the role of chemically induced altered states of consciousness in Latin American fiction and reflects on the tensions between pharmacology and coloniality displayed in contemporary literature. She also earned a Master of Arts degree in Social Communication, specializing in Image Pragmatics (Film Studies), from the Federal University of Minas Gerais (UFMG) in Belo Horizonte, Brazil, and a Bachelor of Arts degree in Social Communication/Journalism from the same institution. 

Dr. Xavier França has taught Spanish language and literature at Tulane University and Washington and Lee University. She has also taught courses on the introduction to academic research and narratives in UFMG’s Department of Social Communication, as well as in the Faculty of Languages, Literature, and Linguistics, and has served as a news reporter for Sempre Editora (O Tempo and Pampulha newspapers) in the state of Minas Gerais, Brazil. 

She has published academic works on contemporary Argentinean, Chilean, and Colombian novels, Peruvian and Paraguayan films, and Brazilian documentaries, prose, and poetry. Moreover, Dr. Xavier França has conducted fieldwork in Spain, Mexico, Colombia, the Dominican Republic, and Cuba, and has presented papers at comparative literature, cultural studies, and modern languages conferences in Brazil, the United States, Spain, Canada, Colombia, and Greece. 

Dr. Steve Gerome has been teaching Spanish at the university level since 2006. He holds a B.A. in International Relations and Modern Foreign Languages at James Madison University (1998), and he is currently completing his dissertation in translation and intercultural mediation at the University of Salamanca, Spain. He completed his M.A. in Spanish Translation and Interpreting in 2018 from the University of Texas at Rio Grande Valley.  He has also taken classes in legal writing, civil law/torts, contracts, and criminal law.

He has provided language instruction to state and local agencies including police officers from the Virginia State Police and local agencies. From 1999 to 2004, he served as a legal interpreter and translator as well as language consultant to multiple agencies such as the Drug Enforcement Administration, The Office of the U.S. Attorney, R.U.S.H. drug task force, and the United States District Court for the Western District of Virginia.

He also provided translation and interpretation services in Spanish/English in cases and numerous judicial proceedings involving criminal and civil litigation, workers’ compensation, criminal prosecutions, and in federal and state criminal investigations.

He previously worked fifteen years in commercial business where he used Spanish translating and interpreting skills frequently in Human Resource and Environmental Health and Safety Management while interacting with colleagues and customers conducting business in Mexico, South America, and in Europe.

Education

Ph. D. Universidad de Salamanca, Spain (expected 2022)
Dissertation: “The lexicalization of metaphors in interlinguistic and intercultural communications in the field of public safety relating to the prevention and persecution of money laundering”.

Ph. D. 2008 - Capella University, Minneapolis, MN
Organization and Management
Dissertation: “An Examination of Relationships between Transformational Leadership and Interactive Justice Perceptions Among Membership of a Local Chapter of Human Resource Professionals”.

M. A. 2018 - University of Texas Rio Grande Valley, Brownsville, TX
Master of Arts in Spanish Translation and Interpreting
Capstone project: “La traducción de la metáfora en una traducción parcial de Countering International Money Laundering, “Total Failure is Only a Decimal Point Away.” (in English: The translation of metaphor in a partial translation of Countering International Money Laundering. 

Ms. Ed. 2004 - Master of Science in Education, Adult Human Resource Development/Management

B.A.  1998 - Bachelor of Arts, International Affairs/Spanish, December 1998

Recent publications

Gerome, Stephen. “La autotraducción: la teoría y los retos del género” (in English; Self Translation; theory and challenges in the genre), edited by : Alex Martín Escribà and Javier Sánchez Zapatero, Clásicos y contemporáneos en el género negro, Andavira, 2018, pp.247-254.

Gerome, Stephen, “Lingüística forense, casos penales y la entrevista policial.” (in English; Forensic linguistics, criminal cases and the police interview), edited by Alex Martín Escribá and Javier Sánchez Zapatero, La (re) invención del género negro. Andavira, 2014, pp.241-246.

Recent Presentations

“Lingüística forense y examinación del uso del lenguaje policial” (in English; Forensic linguistics, criminal cases and the police interview),  XIX Congreso de Novela y Cine Negro de la Universidad de Salamanca, April, 2013

“La autotraducción: la teoría y los retos del género” (in English; Self Translation; theory and challenges in the genre). at the XI Congreso de Novela y Cine Negro de la Universidad de Salamanca, April, 2015.

Dr. Sabrina S. Laroussi is an associate professor of Spanish at Virginia Military Institute where she teaches courses on Spanish and Latin American literature, cultures and film, in addition to Spanish language courses. Before coming to VMI, she was a visiting assistant professor at the College of Charleston and received her degrees at the Université d’Alger in Algeria (BA), Universidad de Alcalá in Madrid (MA) and Texas Tech University (MA and Ph.D.). 

At VMI, she co-directs La mesa de español with Col. Bulger-Barnett and the summer study abroad program in Alcalá de Henares (Madrid). She also serves as the chapter adviser for the National Collegiate Hispanic Honor Society, Sigma Delta Pi, and co-adviser for VMI Building Bridges Club. 

Academic Research and Teaching Interests

• 20^th – 21^st Century Peninsular and Latin American Literature and Culture
• Contemporary Spanish-Language Film
• Literary Theories of the Grotesque
• Cultural Ramifications of Drug Trafficking in Colombia, Mexico, and Galicia
• Metafiction and Intertextuality in Literature and Film
• Representation of Death and Violence in Contemporary Hispanic Narrative

Courses Taught at VMI

• SP101: Elementary Spanish I
• SP102: Elementary Spanish II
• SP201: Intermediate Spanish I
• SP202: Intermediate Spanish II    
• SP303WX: Spanish Composition and Conversation (content developed)
• SP305: Survey of Spanish Literature I
• ML311: Internship in Spanish
• SP312: Culture and Civilization of Spain
• SP313: Advanced Spanish Grammar
• SP322: Hispanic Cinema (content developed)
• SP426: Contemporary Spanish Literature I
• SP424: Narcos, Hitmen and Religion. Drug Trafficking Culture in Colombian Literature and Media (course developed)
• SP450: Modern Language Capstone Course 
• “The Narco as Neo-cultural and Transatlantic Model. Literary, Audiovisual and Artistic Critical Approaches” (2020, content developed)
• “Self-Reflection in Contemporary Hispanic Fiction and Film” (2022, content developed)
• SP481: Survey of Spanish Culture and Society (course developed, taught in Spain)
• ML498 & ML499: Reading and Writing for the Honors Thesis in Modern Languages and Cultures
• Cadet Steven Foster Jr., “Narcos, Sicarios and Narcocorridos: The (De)humanization of Mexican Drug Trafficking Figureheads in Media,” 2017- 2018
• Cadet Christopher Soo, “Narco Souvenirs for Sale: The Fight Against the Touristification of Colombia’s Narco Heritage,” 2021- 2022

Publications:

Co-Edited Volumes

• With Yasmina Romero Morales (Universidad de La Laguna) and Luca Cerullo (Università degli Studi di Palermo). Reescrituras del paradigma. Alteridad y género en el mundo literario hispánico. SÍLEX Ediciones, fall 2022. Reviewed in Impossibilia. Revista Internacional de Estudios Literarios
• With Iana Konstantonova (Southern Virginia University). Crear entre mundos: nuevas tendencias en la metaficción española. Colección Diálogos peninsulares, Albatros Ediciones, fall 2021. Reviewed in Bulletin of Hispanic Studies, Hispania, Hispanófila, Symposium: A Quarterly Journal in Modern Literatures, Romance Quarterly

Book Chapters

• “Cuando Almodóvar desnuda a Pedro y viceversa: la meta(auto)ficción en Dolor y gloria.” Crear entre mundos: nuevas tendencias en la metaficción española. Edited by Iana Konstantinova and Sabrina S. Laroussi. Diálogos peninsulares, Albatros Ediciones, 2021, pp. 38-50. 
• “Violencia y blasfemia: lo grotesco en La Virgen de los sicarios y Rosario Tijeras.” Perspectivas sobre el género negro hispano. Edited by Jorge Zamora and Rodrigo Pereyra. Editorial Libros Medio Siglo, 2017, pp. 119-35.

Articles

• “¿Víctima o heroína? El modus vivendi y operandi de Rosario Tijeras.” The SCOLAS Journal, Southwest Council of Latin American Studies, vol. 4, 2022, pp. 79-90. (published in 2023)
• “Entre lo católico y lo narco: una lectura grotesca de María, llena eres de gracia.” Bulletin of Hispanic Studies, vol. 98, no. 10, 2021, pp. 1031-40.
• “Contigo en la distancia: Colombia, Galicia y el negocio narco entre la realidad y la ficción, entre el humor y el dramatismo.” Studies in Latin American Popular Culture, vol. 39, 2021, pp. 120-33. 
• “Nacho Carretero y Fariña. La historia de un periodismo de investigación que tumbó el tabú del narco en Galicia.” Letras Hispanas, vol. 16, 2020, pp. 92-101.
• “Dicotomía grotesca de la mujer en la narconovela colombiana: ¿virgen o puta?” Forum, vol. XXII, 2015, pp. 65-84.
• “Destino fatídico y tremendismo gore: la monstruosidad de Pascual en La familia de Pascual Duarte.” Hispanet Journal, vol. 5, April 2012, pp. 1-20.

Book Reviews

• James H. Creechan. Drug Wars and Covert Netherworlds, Journal of Strategic Security, vol. 15, no. 2, 2022, pp. 89-93.
• Aldona Bialowas Pobutsky. Pablo Escobar and Colombian Narcoculture. Hispanófila, vol. 191, 2021, pp. 217-18. 
• Nilda Garcia. Mexico’s Drug War and Criminal Networks. Journal of Strategic Security, vol. 13, no. 3, 2020, pp. 157-59. 
• Kristine Vanden Berghe. Narcos y sicarios en la ciudad letrada. Letras Hispanas, vol. 15, 2019, pp. 151-52.
• Oswaldo Zavala. Los cárteles no existen. Narcotráfico y cultura en México. Dura. Revista de literatura criminal hispana, no. 1, 2019, pp. 178-81. 
• Guadalupe Pérez-Anzaldo. El espectáculo de la violencia en el cine mexicano del siglo XXI. Middle Atlantic Review of Latin American Studies, vol. 2, no. 1, 2018, pp. 164-65.
• Andrea F. Castro, Alejandro Herrero-Olaizola, and Chloe Rutter-Jensen, eds. Territories of Conflict. Studies in Latin American Popular Culture, vol. 36, 2018, pp. 190-92.

Dr. Lu is an Assistant Professor of Chinese at Virginia Military Institute. She earned her Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in Chinese Linguistics. Her research interests include teaching Chinese as a second language, prosody, interface between language and music, and second language acquisition. Before joining VMI, Dr. Lu taught at Wake Forest University, College of William and Mary, University of Iowa, and Luther College. At VMI, she teaches all levels of Chinese language classes and culture classes.

Dr. Schroepfer earned his B.A. in Near Eastern Languages and Literatures from the University of California at Berkeley and his Ph.D. in Middle Eastern Languages and Cultures from the University of Texas at Austin. He has taught all levels of Arabic courses offered at VMI. His research revolves around Arabic dialectology and sociolinguistics in Arabic-speaking communities, with a particular interest in Egypt. He is an author of the book A Grammar of Arabic (Routledge). His articles have been published in University of Pennsylvania Working Papers in Linguistics, International Journal of Arabic Linguistics, Die Wiener Zeitschrift für die Kunde des Morganlandes, The Semitic Languages (Routledge), and Arabic Dialectology: Methodology and Field Work (Harrassowitz).

Mohammed Shihab obtained his M.A. from the University of Virginia (Middle Eastern Studies and Arabic Language and Culture) and his B.A. in English Language and Linguists from the University of Baghdad. He also holds an associate degree in Civil Engineering from Institute of Technology in Baghdad.

Before coming to VMI in fall 2015, Mr. Shihab taught Arabic language and culture at UVA, where he developed a course entitled “The Art of Arabic Calligraphy” based on his specialty as an Arabic calligrapher. He has taught a variety of topics, including the Arabic language (all levels), Arabic media, and Arabic societies. Moreover, he is a native Arabic speaker and is able to communicate in more than six dialects (Iraqi, Egyptian, Syrian, Lebanese, most dialects of Arab Gulf countries as well as Modern Standard Arabic). He has experience tutoring and working with upper-level college and post-graduate students from the Defense Language Institute (DLI) and the Department of State.

Mr. Shihab has more than five years of experience in both written and oral, written translation (documents, literary works, conferences, etc.), and has many research interests, including Middle East Affairs, troubled societies in the Middle East and related problems, and Arabic language and poetry.

Instructor
Modern Languages and Cultures

Prof. Sunnen received his Ph.D. in Germanic Languages & Literatures from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 1990.  Although a medievalist by virtue of his interest in Arthurian tales and their Germanic versions, he has concentrated his research and teaching on 20th-century Germany in recent years.  His main interests at present revolve around the Resistance (both military and civilian) in Germany against the Nazi regime and the efforts to save refugees from war-torn Europe.  He is also the faculty liaison for VMI’s exchange with Helmut-Schmidt-Universität (also known as the Universität der Bundeswehr, Hamburg).

Professor