Born of a French mother and a French Caribbean father, I was raised in France in a small town near Paris. After attending Paris 7-Denis Diderot Université and La Nouvelle Sorbonne, I earned a Ph.D. in French and Francophone Studies from the University of Michigan. In 2018, I resumed my old life in Michigan after a decade spent in Missoula, teaching at the University of Montana. I am currently Professor and Chair in the department of Afroamerican & African Studies at the University of Michigan, in Ann Arbor. My main research and teaching interests include global Blackness, Caribbean Studies, Critical Animal Studies, and Black Ecologies, particularly in a literary and cultural context. I am currently working on a book project tentatively titled The Hands that Feed: A French Black Memoir, about the politics of food and Blackness. An article based on this project appeared in Transition Magazine T130 (2020), “Neither Black nor White but Some Sort of Freegan,” and another one, entitled “Off-the-Grid,” is forthcoming in the next issue of Transition Magazine (T135 SPECIES). The memoir addresses the experience of being raised freegan and living as a French Black in America, I like to call it a 'Me-Noir.' I am also at work on a short book for the Practice Series from Duke University Press. The book looks at the everyday practice of living with dogs and is aptly titled Living With Dogs.

Email: beny@umich.edu