Josh Kraut joined the Department of World Languages and Cultures faculty in 2016.  He teaches  courses in French language, literature and civilization.  He is currently at work studying and translating the contemporary French philosopher Fabrice Hadjadj.

Education 

• Ph.D., sociolinguistics, Georgetown University, 2018
• Master of Modern Letters, French literature and linguistics, Université de Provence (now Aix-Marseille Université), 2011
• M.A., teaching English as a second language, Pennsylvania State University, 2005
• B.A., French, Schreyer Honors College at Pennsylvania State University, 2005

Areas of Interest

• Laïcité
• Language learning and teaching

Honors, Grants and awards

• “The Misanthrope In Spite of Himself: Rousseau’s Interpretation of Molière’s Alceste,” (article) Nyenhuis Faculty Research Grant, Hope College, 2019
• “The Polyphonic Pastor: Two Levels of Constructed Dialogue in Argumentation,” (article) Nyenhuis Faculty Research Grant, Hope College, 2018
• “Challenging Borders,” Great Lakes Colleges Association Grand Challenge Grant, 2016

Selected Publications

• “Constructed Dialogue as Hermeneutic in Small Group Bible Study,”  Postscripts, 2022
• “Le Misanthrope Malgré Lui: Rousseau’s Vision of Alceste, ” The French Review, 2021
• “The Polyphonic Pastor: Two Levels of Constructed Dialogue in Argumentation,” Language and Dialogue, 2019
• “The Role of ‘Roles’ in Task-Design: An Exploration of ‘Framing’ as a Feature of Tasks,” in Usage-inspired L2 Instruction, John Benjamins Publishing, 2018
• “Interactional Sociolinguistics and Workplace Discourse,” with C. Gordon, in Handbook of Language in the Workplace, Routledge, 2017
• French for Children, Primer A and Primer B, Classical Academic Press, 2016

Selected Presentations

• “The Pastor in the Pew: Simulated Conversation in Contemporary American Sermons,” American Association for Applied Linguistics (AAAL) conference, 2018
• “Voices from the Past: Constructed Dialogue as a Hermeneutic Tool in Evangelical Bible Study,” AAAL conference, 2017
• “You Shall Know the Truth: Reasons and Reasonableness in Evangelical Small Group Bible Study,” American Anthropological Association (AAA) conference, 2015
• “Co-Constructing Scriptural Authority in a U.S. Quran Study Group,” with N. Harb, AAA conference, 2015

Outside the college

Dr. Kraut enjoys hanging around with his five kids, reading good books with his wife (when he can keep up), and walking under the enormous beech trees in his neighborhood.