Dianne Zandstra


Dianne Zandstra

Education

  • BA (Secondary Education, French and Spanish) Calvin College
  • MA (Spanish) Michigan State University
  • PhD (Spanish Language and Literature) Michigan State University

Biography

Prof. Zandstra grew up in the United States, the Netherlands, and Argentina, which allowed her to learn Dutch, French, and Spanish.  She lived in Argentina for six years as an adult as well.  She had the privilege of launching the semester studies program in Peru and directed that program during fall 2011, 2012, and 2015.  

Research and scholarship

Professor Zandstra's academic interests are Latin American literature; the writings of Griselda Gambaro; the grotesque; and alterity and identity in cross-cultural interactions. She is currently assisting in the editing of a new Spanish/English bilingual interdenominational hymnal and is translating a book on inclusive worship.

Representative presentations include the following: 

  • “Self and Other in Vargas Llosa’s The Storyteller.”  North American Christian Foreign Language Association (NACFLA), Wheaton College, March 22, 2014.
  • “Alterity and Identity in Deep Rivers and After the Feast Day.”  NACFLA, Westmont College, March 23, 2012.
  • “Promesas y desvaríos y la evolución del protagonista grotesco [Griselda Gambaro’s Promises and Ravings and the Evolution of the Grotesque Protagonist].”  Michigan Academy, Western Michigan University, March 7, 2008.
  • “Poetry and Prejudice in Buenos Aires:  Gambaro’s Después del día de fiesta and Caetano’s Bolivia.”  NACFLA, Asbury College, March 30, 2007.
  • “Grace and the Grotesque in Flannery O’Connor and Griselda Gambaro.”  Pruit Memorial Symposium and Lilly Fellows Program National Research Conference, Baylor University, November 11, 2006. 
  • “Mujer y memoria en Pedro Páramo [Women and Memory in Juan Rulfo’s Pedro Páramo].  Michigan Academy, Oakland University, March 3, 2006.
  • “Strategies of Religious Identification in the Inca Garcilaso and in Guaman Poma de Ayala.”  NACFLA, Trinity Christian College, April 2, 2005.

Publications

  • Embodying Resistance:  Griselda Gambaro and the Grotesque.  The Bucknell Studies in Latin American Literature and Theory.  Lewisburg:  Bucknell University Press, 2007.
  • “Lenguaje y realidad en la ensayística de Borges” [Language and Reality in Borges’ Essays].  Borges:  Nuevas lecturas, ed. Juana Alcira Arancibia.  Colección Estudios Hispánicos, vol. VI.  Instituto Literario y Cultural Hispánico.  Buenos Aires:  Corregidor, 2001.
  • “God, Art, and Suffering in Dios no nos quiere contentos [Griselda Gambaro’s God Doesn’t Want Us Happy]”.  Journal of Christianity and Foreign Languages (JCFL) 6(2005):23-36.
  • “Grotesco y denuncia en Ganarse la muerte” [Social Criticism and the Grotesque in Gambaro’s  To Earn One’s Death].  Alba de América39-40(2002):207-20.
  • “La subversión del paraíso:  Ecos bíblicos en La madre naturaleza” [The Subversion of Paradise:  Echoes of the Bible in Pardo Bazán’s Mother Nature].  Letras Peninsulares2(2000):531-43.
  • “Creation and Incarnation in Borges.”  JCFL1(2000):27-38.
  • Review, Dramaturgas argentinas:  teatro, política y género [Argentine Women Playwrights:  Theater, Politics, and Gender], by Magda Castellví deMoor.  Bulletin of Hispanic Studies1(2006):136-37.
  • Review, Entre el exilio y la memoria:  Josefina Leyva y su obra (Textos críticos) [Between Exile and Memory:  Josefina Leyva and Her Oeuvre (Critical Texts)], ed. Margarita Krakusin.  Revista de Estudios Hispánicos 2(2003):167-69.
  • “Faith and Pedagogy in the Literature Classroom:  Points of Departure.”  With Cynthia Slagter.  Forum piece in JCFL 6(2005):  93-99.

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