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Meet Dr. Gladys M. FRANCIS
Transforming Higher Education Through Innovation, Equity, and Global Engagement
About The Dean
As Dean of the College of Arts & Letters at Sacramento State University,Dr. Gladys M. Francis draws on more than a decade of transformative leadership at major institutions to expand opportunities for our students, strengthen community partnerships, and elevate our national and global profile.
Dr. Gladys M. Francis is a Distinguished Professor of Africana, French, and Francophone Studies. She is a nationally and internationally recognized leader whose career bridges scholarship, innovation, and transformative academic leadership.
Experience at a glance
- Recipient of over $10.4M in research funding
- Raised $9M+ in funding and $500K in-kind to expand global, interdisciplinary education, and student opportunities
- Raised $2.3M for curriculum‑to‑career initiatives
- Directed 500+ international collaborative projects
- Created 330+ internships, including placements in Africa and Europe
- Founded the Engaging the World program, securing $1.1M for digital pedagogy innovation
- Author of 40+ articles and 4 books, including her latest with Yale University Press
Shaping the Future of Arts & Letters
As Dean of the College of Arts & Letters at Sacramento State, I am committed to expanding opportunities for our students, strengthening our community partnerships, and elevating our national and global profile. My leadership is grounded in a proven record of transforming academic programs, securing resources, and building pathways that prepare students not just to succeed, but to lead.
A Vision for Impact
I believe higher education must be bold, relevant, and globally connected—serving as both a local anchor and a catalyst for addressing 21st‑century challenges. At Sacramento State, this means:
By fostering a vibrant academic community where a wide range of perspectives, experiences, and talents are not only welcomed but actively shape teaching, research, and innovation
We are anhored in Sacramento’s civic, cultural, and creative life while forging global partnerships.Through strategic partnerships at home and abroad, we connect campus expertise to pressing global challenges—aiming to transform the College into both a trusted community leader and a catalyst for international collaboration.
By designing forward‑thinking curricula and forging strong ties with industry leaders, ensuring students graduate with the skills, adaptability, and professional networks to thrive in a rapidly evolving job market.
By implementing initiatives with built‑in longevity—programs, policies, and partnerships designed to be adaptable, scalable, and impactful for years to come, leaving a legacy of sustained growth and opportunity for the College of Arts and Letters.
Experience That Drives Our Future
Before joining Sacramento State, I led initiatives that connected campuses to the world—creating study abroad pipelines, building 130+ global partnerships, and designing programs that foster global citizenship. These experiences now inform our College’s expanding network of international opportunities.
I have developed and launched hundreds of internships—both paid and international—that placed students in roles across Africa, Europe, and the United States, giving them real‑world experience and professional networks before graduation.
At Georgia State University, I led a comprehensive overhaul of academic programs to embed digital literacy, leadership development, and experiential learning into the core curriculum. These reforms boosted graduate and undergraduate enrollment, reduced time‑to‑degree, and secured funding to sustain internships, practicum courses, and professional development opportunities that connected students directly to industry and community partners.
At Howard University, I scaled study abroad and experiential learning opportunities to reach all 4,300 students in the College of Arts and Sciences—leveraging Washington, D.C.’s unparalleled civic, cultural, and policy resources to prepare graduates for leadership across sectors (the inaugural pipeline extended study abroad opportunities to hundreds of students who travelled to France, Italy, Ghana, Greece, Guadeloupe, Kenya, Martinique, South Africa, etc.).
At Howard University, I also founded the Ambassador Leadership Program, a $250,000‑funded initiative that expanded students’ access to high‑impact leadership training, mentorship, and global engagement experiences (e.g., England, France, Tobago). This program not only cultivated student leaders on campus but also positioned them as visible representatives of the university in national and international arenas.
I have secured over $1.1M for digital pedagogy initiatives, founded the Engaging the World program to promote technology‑enhanced learning, and directed hundreds of collaborative projects that brought together academia, industry, government, and the arts. These efforts have reached more than 24,000 participants worldwide.
As a Distinguished Professor of Africana, French, and Francophone Studies, my research explores identity, representation, and social justice across cultures and media. I have published 40+ articles, three books, and have a fourth forthcoming with Yale University Press in 2025. My work has been featured in international conferences, keynote addresses, and collaborative publications with students.
Dean Francis Education and Research
- Urban Studies
- Study Abroad
- Geohumanities
- Africana Studies
- Theory and Cultural Studies
- Women’s, Sexuality, and Gender Studies
- Literatures and Visual Arts (Caribbean, Maghreb, Sub-Saharan Africa)
- Digital Pedagogy and Instructional Technology
Purdue University, Department of Foreign Languages & Literatures - West Lafayette, IN
- Ph.D. in French and Francophone Studies
- Masters in French Studies and French Second Language Acquisition
University of the Antilles – Schoelcher Martinique, France
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Masters in Education/Second Language Acquisition Methodologies (Network Technology Integration in Education)
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Bachelors in the Humanities (Licence de Lettres Modernes)
Books, Peer-reviewed
Fabienne Kanor in Transgression. Ed. Francis, Gladys M. New Haven, CT: Yale French Studies, Yale University Press, August 26, 2025 (224 Pages, 15 b-w illus., ISBN: 978-0-300-28189-7)
Épopée créole: Histoires en transgression. Collection L’Autre Caraïbe, Paris: L’Harmattan, October 3, 2022 (264 pages, ISBN: 978-2-14-027649-1)
Francis, Gladys M. Odious Caribbean Women and the Palpable Aesthetics of Transgression. After the Empire, Series on Postcolonial Francophone Literature and Culture. Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2017 (190 pages, ISBN: 978-1-4985-4350-7)
Amour, sexe, genre et trauma dans la Caraïbe francophone. Ed. Francis, Gladys M. Collection Espaces Littéraires, Paris: L’Harmattan, 2016 (294 pages, ISBN: 978-2-343-07395-8)
Sample Journal Articles and Book Chapters, Peer-reviewed
Francis, Gladys M. “Transgressive Arts: Fabienne Kanor’s Radical Vision of Memory and Resistance.” Yale University Press Blog, July 22, 2025 (https://yalebooks.yale.edu/2025/07/22/transgressive-arts-fabienne-kanors-radical-vision-of-memory-and-resistance/)
Francis, Gladys M. “Chapé. Parting. Running Away: Introduction to Fabienne Kanor in Transgression.” Fabienne Kanor in Transgression, New Haven, CT: Yale French Studies, Yale University Press (forthcoming spring 2025)
Francis, Gladys M. “Corpomemorial Tracing, Poetics of Negation, and Aesthetics of Pain in Humus”. Fabienne Kanor in Transgression, New Haven, CT: Yale French Studies, Yale University Press (forthcoming spring 2025)
Francis, Gladys M. "Performing while Black: Disrupting Gender and Sexuality from Trinidad to Norway. The Artivism of Thomas Prestø." Diaspora: A Journal of Transnational Studies. Toronto: The University of Toronto Press, 21.2 (September, 2021): 279-296
Francis, Gladys M. "Remapping Disability through Contested Urban Landscapes and Embodied Performances." The Cambridge Journal of Postcolonial Literary Inquiry. Cambridge University Press, 8.2 (April 2021): 277-285. https://www.doi.org/10.1017/pli.2020.36
Francis, Gladys M. "Quand l’invisible s’affiche: Entretien avec Fabienne Kanor. Inscrire et réitérer des identités ouvertes, mouvantes et complexes" Francosphères. Liverpool: Liverpool University Press 8.1 (2019): 85-100
Francis, Gladys M. "Case départ: Slavery in Martinique through the Lens of Comedy." Celluloid Chains: Slavery in the Americas through Film. Eds. Alcocer, Block and Duke, Knoxville: The University of Tennessee Press, (Summer 2018, June 15, 2018): 198-221. http://utpress.org/title/celluloid-chains/
Francis, Gladys M. and Lynn E. Palermo. "Tyrannie en ‘France’: André Breton et Gerty Dambury." Entre-texte: Dialogues littéraires et culturels. Eds. Oana Panaïté and Vera Klekovkina, Routledge, 2017, pp. 277-298
Francis, Gladys M. "Fabienne Kanor « l’Ante-llaise par excellence »: sexualité, corporalité, diaspora et créolité." The French Forum peer-reviewed journal of French and Francophone literature and film, Philadelphia: The University of Pennsylvania Press 41.3 (2017): 273-288
Francis, Gladys M. and Lynn E. Palermo. "Exotisme, dialogisme et chaos en milieu antillais" in Communautés de lecture: pour une approche dialogique des œuvres classiques et contemporaines/Reading Communities: A dialogical Approach to French and Francophone Literature. Ed. O. Panaïté, Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, (2016): 48-68
Francis, Gladys M. “Introduction. Dis-positions Créoles: Corpographies du désir, du trauma et de la résistance aux Antilles.” Amour, sexe, genre et trauma dans la Caraïbe francophone, Paris: L’Harmattan, (2016): 15-25
Francis, Gladys M. “Entretien avec Simone Schwarz-Bart: ‘Vivre à la Tout-Monde.’” Amour, sexe, genre et trauma dans la Caraïbe francophone. Paris: L’Harmattan, (2016): 191-206.
Francis, Gladys M. “Résister au compromis, crever la douleur, dire le silence: entretien avec Jocelyne Béroard.” Amour, sexe, genre et trauma dans la Caraïbe francophone. Paris: L’Harmattan, (2016): 229-249
Francis, Gladys M. and Béatrice Mélina. “L’ARThralgie Créole de Béatrice Mélina: Peindre arythmies et articulations identitaires.” Amour, sexe, genre et trauma dans la Caraïbe francophone, Paris: L’Harmattan, (2016): 253-262
Francis, Gladys M. "Creolization on the Move in Francophone Caribbean Literature." The Oxford Diasporas Programme. Oxford: The University of Oxford (2015): 1-15
Francis, Gladys M. “Transgressive Embodied Writings of KAribbean Bodies in Pain.” Writing Through the Visual and Virtual: Inscribing Language, Literature, and Culture in Francophone Africa and the Caribbean. Ed. Ousseina Alidou and Renée Larrier. Lanham, MD: Lexington Books (2015): 57-76
Francis, Gladys M. "Guadeloupe’s Ka-ribbean Bodies in Conflict" Critical Perspectives on Conflict in Caribbean Societies of the Late 20th and Early 21st Centuries. Ed. R. Sobiac & P. Donatien-Yssa. Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars Press (2015): 65-82.
Francis, Gladys M. "Folies sacrificielles dans le théâtre francophone africain." Le Sacrifice dans les littératures francophones. Ed Gyssels, Stevens, and Edwards. Collection Francopolyphonies 17. NY: Rodopi (2014): 39-65
Francis, Gladys M. "Le drame de Sony Labou Tansi: faire jouer le corps souffrant et se jouer de la folie." In Corps et voix d'Afrique francophone et ses diasporas: Poétiques contemporaines et oralité. Revue d’Études Françaises. Ed. Sylvie Chalaye. Budapest: University Press of ELTE Hungary 18.1 (2013): 213-217
Francis, Gladys M. "Fonctions et enjeux de la danse et de la musique dans le texte francophone créole." Nouvelles Études Francophones. University of Nebraska Press 26.1 (2011): 179-94.
Other Peer-reviewed Publications: book reviews, prefaces, forewords, afterwords
Francis, Gladys M. Endorsement. Reimagining Resistance in Gisèle Pineau’s Works by Lisa Connell and Delphine Gras. Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, October 2022
Francis, Gladys M. Foreword. “La Techni’ka de Lénablou: Les enjeux d’une syntaxe du gwo ka et du Bigidi.” Techni’ka. Méthodologie et principes culturels caribéens pour l’enseignement du gwoka et du bigidi by Lénablou. Nouvelle Edition revue et augmentée. Pointe-à-Pitre : Éditions Jasor, November 2020
Francis, Gladys M. “Afterword.” Humus an English-language edition by Lynn E. Palermo. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, (September 2020) 191-202
Francis, Gladys M. Review of Black French Women and the Struggle for Equality, 1848-2016, by ed. Germain & Larcher. University of Nebraska Press, 2018. New West Indian Guide/Nieuwe West-Indische Gids (NWIG), MA: Brill Publishing Boston, 94.1-2 (June 3, 2020): 167-168 https://brill.com/view/journals/nwig/94/1-2/article-p167_32.xml
Francis, Gladys M. Review of Women Writers of Gabon: Literature and Herstory, by Cheryl Toman. Lexington Books, 2016. Tulsa Studies in Women's Literature, OK: University of Tulsa, 36.2 (fall 2017): 512-514
Francis, Gladys M. Review of Women Writers of Gabon: Literature and Herstory, by Cheryl Toman. Lexington Books, 2016. French Studies, Oxford UK: Oxford University Press, 71.4 (September 18, 2017): 601-602 https://doi.org/10.1093/fs/knx189
Francis, Gladys M. Foreword. Liberty Limited. By Károly Sándor Pallai. Seychelles: Arthée, 2013
Francis, Gladys M. " Body (text), Music and Dance in Guadeloupe and Martinique." International Migration Institute Working Paper Series, the Oxford Diaspora Programme. UK: Oxford University, 2013
The Pulse of The College of A&L
The true brilliance of Arts & Letters lives in its people. Our faculty—globally recognized artists, scholars, and thought leaders—bring innovation into every lecture hall and research space. Our faculty’s work transcends disciplines and borders. They bring cutting-edge research into the classroom, mentor students with compassion and rigor, and build programs that redefine what higher education can achieve.
Our staff—solutions-driven, and mission-focused—create the infrastructure of care that propels us forward. They are dedicated, visionary, and deeply student-centered. They make all of it possible. They sustain our operations, nurture our community, and ensure that every student who enters our college is met with encouragement and support.
Together, we are architects of opportunity and the reason this college thrives. Together, we create pathways for students to explore their passions, challenge convention, and find belonging.
Connect/Engage With | Follow Dean Francis
Connect with Dean Gladys M. Francis on LinkedIn to follow her leadership journey, explore initiatives in the College of Arts & Letters, and engage with her work advancing innovation, student success, and global collaboration.
