MARIA "CRISTI" BERDICHEVSKY

BERDICHEVSKY MARIA CRISTINA BERDICHEVSKY "Cristi" Maria Cristina Beatriz Charles de Berdichevsky, 62, beloved spouse of Daniel Benjamin Berdichevsky y Berdichevsky, and a Professor of French and Spanish at Gallaudet University, passed away on Thursday, September 4, 2014, at Washington Hospital Center after a three year battle with cancer. Mrs. Berdichevsky, or Cristi, as she was known to all, was born in Buenos Aires, Argentina, to the late Dr. Eduardo Gabriel Berlioz y Charles and the late Concepcion Matilde del Campo de Charles.?? Cristi Berdichevsky held a Bachelor's in Comparative Literature from the Universidad del Salvador, a Masters Degree in French from McMaster University, and a PhD in French Literature from Rutgers University. Cristi Berdichevsky taught at Gallaudet for more than 20 years and was a strong advocate for the rights of deaf peoples in the Americas and in Africa. While at Gallaudet, she helped found International Deaf Partnerships (IDP), an organization that recruits volunteers to work with and on behalf of deaf schools and summer camps in various deaf communities, such as Haiti, Guatemala, and Cameroun. A multiple time president of Gallaudet's AAUP chapter, Cristi Berdichevsky's academic interests revolved around feminist interpretations of social violence experienced by 18thCentury French women writers. Cristi Berdichevsky lived in Argentina, Germany, and Canada, among other places, before settling in College Park, Maryland in 1989. A lover of coffee, art, and conversation, she is survived by her husband of 38 years; by her siblings, Matilde Charles de Fontana and Miguel del Campo y Charles; her five children, Ezequiel Berdichevsky, David Berdichevsky, Santiago Berdichevsky, Miriam Berdichevsky, and Laura Snitkovskiy; as well as two grandchildren. She also leaves Zinc, her black Labrador Retriever. A celebration of Cristi Berdichevsky's life will take place at the Gallaudet University Peikoff Alumni House on September 22, 2014 at 4 p.m. For more details on the place and time please contact Barbara White at barbara.white@gallaudet.edu or Ezequiel Berdichevsky at eberdich@gmail.com. The family requests that in lieu of flowers donations be made to IDP at: http://idpcamp.weebly.com/donate.html.http">idpcamp.weebly.com/donate.html.http://idpcamp.weebly.com/donate.html.