stipendiary lecturer in French, Oriel College
Dr Marie Kawthar Daouda teaches French language and literature at Oriel College, Oxford. Marie grew up in Morocco and studied in Paris. Marie’s research focuses on the reception of Roman antiquity in modern times, on the artistic representations of good and evil, and on 19th-21st century political crises in France.
Marie is interested in the history of ideas and their evolution, what particular cultural and political climates would cause marginal ideas to become generally accepted, and vice versa. Marie has published several academic articles dealing with he representations of femininity, with heroism and sacrifice, and with the use of Catholic dogma and aesthetics in literature. She is author of L’Anti-Salomé, représentations de la féminité bienveillante au temps de la Décadence (1850-1910).
Marie’s forthcoming book, Not Your Victim – How our obsession with race entraps and divides us, aims to challenge both the multiculturalist victimhood narrative according to which Western civilisation is the sole responsible for current inequalities and the ethno-nationalist narrative which denies non-Western people the capacity to appreciate, enjoy, and celebrate the culture, arts, and history of Europe.
Marie has contributed to UnHerd, The Telegraph, and The Critic on issues such as post-colonialism, education, Jewish-Moroccan identity, and French current affairs. Marie’s main influences are Charles Baudelaire, Joseph de Maistre, René Girard, Philippe Muray, St John Henry Newman, and St Edith Stein. She is also a fellow of Ralston College – Savannah