The French Center of Excellence and Department of History will host a conversation between Bruno Cabanes, Professor and Donald & Mary Dunn Chair in Modern Military History, and Benjamin Hoffmann, College of Arts & Sciences Designated Professor of French & Francophone Literature on Tuesday, November 18, 2025 in Thompson Library, Multipurpose Room 165 from 4:30pm-6:00pm.
Recently published by Editions du Seuil in Paris, Bruno Cabanes's monograph (Les fantômes de l'île de Peleliu. Récit ) [The Ghosts of Peleliu Island] examines the questions of memory and identity on Peleliu Island, in Micronesia. Retracing the war experience of Eugene B. Sledge, a young Marine who fought on the island in the fall of 1944, Cabanes undertook several research trips to Palau between 2017 and 2023. In his book, he engages in a temporal excavation, exploring the island’s jungle and intricate cave networks, and reflecting on the traces, vestiges and memories of a ten-week battle. The island’s history unfolds as a palimpsest, layered with voyages of exploration, ethnographic investigations, and successive waves of Spanish, German and Japanese colonizations. Combining travel impressions, American, Japanese and Palauan personal testimonies, archival materials, and field research, his book offers a vivid and poetic rendering of Peleliu and reveals the island in all its historical and emotional complexity.
This event is co-sponsored by the Department of History and French Center of Excellence, which receives funding from the French Cultural Services in the United States and the Consulate General of France in Chicago.
In December of 2020, the Cultural Services of the French Embassy in the United States selected the Department of French and Italian at The Ohio State University to join its prestigious network of Centers of Excellence. OSU’s Center of Excellence has the goal of promoting French and Francophone culture in the Midwest and beyond.
