All work conducted in French. In this course, we will consider important literary representations of those who were conceived of as marginal, as outsiders, as unwanted, or even as unrepresentable. We will read texts that represent enslaved Persians, Peruvian princesses, Tahitians, extra-terrestrials, and those very familiar outsiders, that is women and children. We will think about the unexpected centrality of such figures to the enlightenment, to the ways in which writers and philosophers sought to analyze and critique their own society and even to the ways they sought to understand what humanity was. Working with these texts will allow us to ask primordial questions about what is natural and what is social, what is just and what is unjust, how and why social, political, and economic inequality characterize the worlds we inhabit, how Europe engaged with, imagined, and sometimes oppressed the non-European world and how such engagement shaped French identity.

All Work for This Class Conducted in French; Completion of FR102, Placement Exam, or Native Language Fluency Required for Enrollment. MUST HAVE TAKEN FRENCH 4 AT UC BERKELEY OR A FRENCH DEPARTMENT PLACEMENT TEST - For placement testing, please contact vrodic@berkeley.edu(opens in a new tab).