Kat Haklin is a scholar of nineteenth-century France working at the intersection of literature, visual studies, and the medical humanities to study representations of spatial confinement
Dr. Haklin’s book project, Writing Claustrophobia: Enclosure in Nineteenth-Century French Literature, examines the unexplored proliferation of enclosed spaces in literature just prior to the first definition of “claustrophobia” in 1879. Her latest publication, forthcoming in Écrire le huis clos au XIXe siècle (Classiques Garnier, 2024), analyzes the psychological effects of claustrophobia in Jules Verne’s Voyage au centre de la Terre
She has published articles on Baudelaire, Hugo, and Zola in Dix-Neuf, L’Esprit Créateur, and MLN, as well as in the collective volume Ephemeral Spectacles, Exhibition Spaces and Museums 1750-1918 (Amsterdam UP, 2021). She has also co-edited two special issues: “Connecting Characters in Modern and Contemporary French-language Fiction” (L’Esprit Créateur 63:3) in Fall 2023 and “The Poetry of Life, the Life of Poetry: Essays in Honor of Jacques Neefs” (MLN 136:4) in September 2021.
Professor Haklin regularly teaches courses in French language, literature, and culture at all levels. She is currently the course coordinator for French 307D (Cultural Expression) and faculty advisor to WashU’s student conversation group La Table Francophone. She has also taught upper-level courses on a wide range of topics: “The Art of Health in Nice,” “Fashioning a Revolution: Style & Social Change in France, 1700-1900,” “Feminist Filmmaking,” “From Cholera to the Coronavirus: Medicine & Confinement in Modern France,” “Not Another Fashion Victim: Shopping, Style, & Consumer Culture in Paris,” “Phobias,” and “The World Below.”
In Summer 2025, Professor Haklin will direct the WashU Healthcare in France program in Nice, which recently was awarded a $35,000 grant from study abroad provider IES Abroad.
Recent Publications:
“Character Ecologies in Zola’s Rougon-Macquart: Beyond Heredity, Beyond Metaphor.” Article in special issue of L’Esprit Créateur “Connecting Characters in Modern and Contemporary French-language Fiction” (Fall 2023) edited by Rebecca Grenouilleau-Loescher and Kathryn A. Haklin. 63:3. pp. 37–51. https://doi.org/10.1353/esp.2023.a906712
“Enclosure for Escape: Baudelaire’s Claustrophilia in ‘La chevelure.’” Article in Festschrift special issue of MLN “The Poetry of Life, the Life of Poetry: Essays in Honor of Jacques Neefs” (September 2021) edited by Kathryn A. Haklin and Abigail RayAlexander. 136:4, pp. S-69–S-89.
https://doi.org/10.1353/mln.2021.0069
“Enclosed Exhibitions: Claustrophobia, Balloons, and the Department Store in Zola’s Au Bonheur des Dames.” In Ephemeral Spectacles, Exhibition Spaces and Museums 1750-1918, edited by Dominique Bauer and Camilla Murgia, pp. 55–77. Amsterdam University Press, 2021. Book on Project MUSE: muse.jhu.edu/book/83928
“Obscure Visions: The 1867 Aquarium and Its Literary Legacy.” Invited article in special issue of Dix-Neuf: Journal of the Society of Dix-Neuviémistes on the Paris Universal Expositions (2020), edited by Anne O’Neil-Henry. 24:2–3, pp. 179–202. https://doi.org/10.1080/14787318.2020.1794446