Visiting Professor

sauret@macalester.edu

Martine Sauret specializes in literatures of the fifteenth and sixteenth century as well as Art in the contemporary world. She has worked extensively on Rabelais, Montaigne, Tory, Apian and on cartography. She studies relations of space and writing in literature and cartography. Her work moves to and from early modern France and issues in theory and interpretation of visual media.  She is currently writing on L'école Cartographique de Dieppe.

The Dieppe maps explore a transitionary area of mapmaking, between medieval representations of the Oekoumene and Portulan charts. Their common features are detailed coastlines, including representations of imaginary places, travel diaries, fantastic animals and different ethnic groups. The work will explore the sense of interaction between Normand explorers and cartographers and will discuss the beginning of the autonomous geography of writing and the emergence of Renaissance values in France.

Martine Sauret enjoys teaching literature and the French language at all levels at Macalester. The communication with students is the best part of the job, she says. Seeing the “light” glowing in students’ eyes is extremely rewarding.

She is a liaison for the Alliance Française in the Twin Cities to help students discover French and Francophone cultures. She is a ''guide'' and mentor at the Walker Art Center, helping elementary and secondary teachers and their classes to understand the value of contemporary art in society. She regularly contributes articles for the journal Reflets AATTF (American Association of Teachers of French) and is the translator at the SIEFAR (Société Internationale pour l'Etude des Femmes de l'Ancien Régime). She has published in various professional journals on Renaissance Literature, early Modern France and Francophone studies.  

Dr. Sauret's publications include Les voies cartographiques.  (New York: The Edwin Mellen Press, 2004.),  L’Inconscient graphique. Essai sur l’écriture de la Renaissance. Translation into French of The Graphic Unconscious in Early Modern French Writing, by Tom Conley.  Cambridge Studies in French. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992). Translation published by Presses Universitaires de Vincennes. (2000) and "Gargantua’’ et les délits du corps. (New York: Peter Lang, 1997).     

Awards include several fellowships from the National Endowment for the Humanities and the Newberry Library. She is a member of the Modern Language Association, the International Association for the History of Cartography, the Siefar and The CEMS (Center for Early modern Studies.)

Undergraduate Degrees from the Sorbonne and The Langues Orientales, Paris France

Ph.D. University of Minnesota (1991.)