Fall 2012

Fall 2012

Instructor: R. Kern

Readings:

Selected Readings.

Course Description:

This course develops students’ ability to speak and understand French in both conversational and formal contexts, enlarges vocabulary, and enhances familiarity with contemporary French culture. Activities include oral presentations, debates, collaborative projects, language journals. Class conducted entirely in French.

Prerequisites:

A passing grade in French 2 at UC Berkeley or four years of high school French. If you have questions about placement, see the Placement Guidelines.

Additional information:

Enrollment is limited to 15 students. Cannot be repeated for credit. Course not open to native or heritage French speakers. If you have questions regarding French 13 enrollment, see our FAQs (frequently asked questions).

Reading and Composition (R&C)

Upper-Division Courses 

Writing in French, 3 sections ("W")

102
Fall 2012

Readings:

Course Reader; Other readings as announced.

Course Description:

This course introduces students to different modes of proposing and furthering a point of view or argument (whether in a critical essay, through dramatic metaphor, or in plays or short stories). To this end, we read passages from a variety of works, such as critical essays, novels, and plays, in order to study their use of language, their structure, and their tactics of persuasion. Through readings on problems of language and the visual arts, we explore the ways in which words and images structure thought, communication and interactions of individuals and societies. Great attention is paid, both through the readings and through extensive written work, to questions of interpretation as well as to the logical and coherent development of reading and writing skills leading to correct and effective expression in French.

Prerequisites:

Completion of French 4 at Berkeley or the equivalent. Students who have taken the equivalent of a third-year college level French course elsewhere, or who have AP scores of 5, may also enroll in French 102; Additional placement questions may be directed to the course instructor.

Additional information:

French 102 is the sole prerequisite to all UCB French courses numbered 103 and above. Course open to non-native speakers of French only. Course conducted in French. This course is designated as “W” (writing intensive) in the French major.

Writing Love ("W")

103A : Language and Culture

Fall 2012
Instructor: S. Guerlac

Readings:

Course Reader (see description for authors)

Course Description:

Love can be intensely personal but the forms of its literary expression — and even of its experience – can be socially codified. There are ideologies of love. Love can find itself in conflict with other values. And of course love can be happy or unhappy — or both at the same time. A love story can be a pretext for saying something else altogether. Love can be idealized or demystified. We will explore these possibilities through the study of texts from various genres ( prose narrative, theatre and poetry) from the middle ages to the 20th century.

Readings will include some of the following: Yvain ou le Chevalier du lion, poetry by Louise Labé, Lamartine and Baudelaire, drama by Corneille ( Le Cid) and Racine (Phèdre), prose by Mme de Lafayette, Chateaubriand, Balzac, Duras and Proust,

Prerequisites:

Students must have either previously completed French 102 or its equivalent, or be concurrently enrolled in French 102. For additional placement information please see Placement Guidelines.

Additional information:

Satisfies L & S breadth requirement in Arts and Literature. This course is designated as “W” (writing intensive) in the French major.

Continuity and Change in Thirteenth-Century French Literature

112B : Medieval French Literature

Fall 2012
Instructor: D. Hult

Readings:
Chrétien de Troyes, Le Chevalier de la charette, Le Conte du Graal; La Quete du Saint Graal; Strubel (ed.), Guillaume de Lorris and Jean de Meun, Le roman de la rose; Kibler, Introduction to Old French; selected readings

Course Description:
This course provides an introduction to medieval French literature, starting with some of the most important courtly works of the late twelfth century and tracing their adapations in selected major works of the thirteenth century. Among the topics will be the nature and appearance of courtly poetry, the invention of romantic love, the transmission of Celtic themes in the matière de Bretagne, the legend of King Arthur and the myth of the Grail, the early comic traditions, and early theater. Some work will be done on medieval manuscripts and the transmission of these texts (including a session viewing manuscripts in the Bancroft Library). Most of the texts will be read in modern French, but instruction in the Old French language will be included and key passages will be read in their original linguistic form.

Prerequisites:
French 102 or consent of instructor.

Additional information:
Knowledge of Old French not required; readings in modern French translation. This course satisfies 1 Historical Period Requirement in French major; satisfies 1 “Literature” course or 1 “Elective” course in French major. Satisfies Letters and Science breadth requirement in Arts and Literature; Priority enrollment for declared French majors.

How To Say I Love You — The Comedies of Marivaux

118A : Eighteenth Century French Literature

Fall 2012
Instructor: N. Paige

Readings:
Le triomphe de l’amour; Le jeu de l’amour; La fausse suivante; La double inconstance; La colonie; La dispute

Course Description:
After Molière, Marivaux is France’s greatest comic playwright, and the writer who did more than any other to psychologize the genre, to make it into an exploration of the internal obstacles that keep people apart. This class provides an introduction to Marivaux’s world. The center of our interest will be a select number of his plays–their language (the playwright introduced an entire way of speaking known as marivaudage) and their form (we will learn about the comedic conventions that Marivaux appropriates and twists). We will also research the social institution of the theater in Ancien Régime France, and read some studies that connect these apparently light romantic comedies with the deep social and subjective changes that characterize modernity. Finally, because these works were made for performance, and because there is no better way into their amazing French, we will devote time to staging as scene or two. (Care will be taken to make allowances for students’ preferences; everyone will be accommodated, and no acting experience is expected.) As part of our effort to bring the texts to life, we will also be viewing some filmed adaptations, as well the award-winning hit L’esquive (Kechiche, 2003), which transposes Marivaux to a banlieue high school in Saint-Denis.

Prerequisites:
French 102 or consent of Instructor. Course conducted in French.

Additional information:
This course satisfies one “Literature” or one “Elective” in the French major; satisfies one Historical Period requirement in French major. Satisfies L & S breadth requirement in Arts and Literature. Priority enrollment for declared French majors.

Ecrire le réel, écrire l’irréel

119A : Nineteenth-Century Literature

Fall 2012
Instructor: S. Guerlac

Readings:
Readings will consist mostly of short prose works by authors such as Balzac, Zola, Maupassant, Villiers de l’Isle Adam, Gautier and Nodier, but will also include some poems by Victor Hugo, Baudelaire, and perhaps others.

Course Description:
The 19th century is famous for the realist novel. But is was also the period of the fantastic tale. A number of authors wrote in both modes. We will examine how writers try to persuade us that the fictions they present are real? How do they invite us to grant a compelling (and sometimes creepy) “reality” to what we know cannot be true?

Do these two kinds of writing require us to read in different ways? Do new technologies such as photography have an impact on one or the other – or both? Is it possible to write at the edge of this difference?

Prerequisites:
French 102 or equivalent or consent of instructor.

Additional information:
Satisfies L & S breadth requirement in Arts and Literature

An Introduction to the Films of the French New Wave

140D : French Literature in English Translation

Fall 2012
Instructor: N. Paige

Readings:

A Course Reader will include both classic essays from the period and modern historical and critical work

Films: Vadim, And God Created Woman (1956); Truffaut, The 400 Blows (1959; Godard, Breathless (1960); Chabrol, The Good Girls (1960); Resnais, Last Year at Marienbad (1961); Truffaut, Jules and Jim (1962); Godard, My Life to Live (1962); Varda, Cléo from 5 to 7 (1962); Marker, La Jetée (1963); Demy, The Umbrellas of Cherbourg (1964); Rohmer, The Collector (1967); Eustache, The Mother and the Whore (1973)

Course Description:
Though by many accounts a mere four-year phenomenon, the French New Wave is arguably the most emblematic movement in the history of modern cinema, one that continues to inspire filmmakers from Los Angeles to Teheran to Hong Kong. This class provides a comprehensive overview of the movement and its major films, with attention to the cultural and theoretical factors that help explain this extraordinary flowering of filmmaking talent in the late 1950s and early 1960s. Lectures, in English, will cover topics such as: “cinephilia” and auteur theory; technological innovations and the transformation of urban experience; post-war social upheavals and the rise of consumerism; the “ontology” of the image and film as documentary; time, narrative, and the ideology of form. Movies screened will be subtitled and will include works by Truffaut, Godard, Varda, Demy, Rohmer, Eustache, and others. Readings will include classic essays from the period as well as modern historical and critical work.

Weekly screening required: Mondays 5:30-7:30 pm

Prerequisites:
Open to all students. Course taught in English.

Additional information:
No knowledge of French is required. All lectures and discussions in English. This course satisfies 1 “Elective” course requirement in the French major if written work is done in French. If written work is done in English, this course can satisfy 1 “Outside Elective” course requirement in the French major, with prior approval of French Undergraduate Major Adviser.
Weekly screening required: Mondays 5:30-7:30 pm.

Satisfies the College of Letters & Science breadth requirement in Arts & Literature.

The Cultures of Franco-America

142AC
Fall 2012
Instructor: K. Britto

Readings:
see description

Course Description:
PLEASE NOTE: This course fulfills the Berkeley campus American Cultures (AC) requirement. The course will be taught in English, and knowledge of French is not required.

In this course, we will consider a broad range of literary and cultural texts that emerge out of the long history of the French in North America and of Americans in France. Our readings will include novels, poetry, and short stories—including the earliest known work of African American fiction, written in French and published in Paris in 1837. Alongside these literary texts produced by French writers in America and American expatriates in France, we will consider travel narratives and missionary accounts describing interactions between European and Native American populations; historical, ethnographic, and political writings; foodways and other popular cultural forms such as music, comic strips, films, and television programs. Throughout the semester, our discussions will focus on the politics of representation—which is to say that we will work to understand the processes through which categories of “race” are shaped over time through the interplay between Anglo- and Franco-American cultures and ideologies, even as these categories are challenged from the perspectives of minority populations. As we trace these processes of racialization, we will be particularly attentive to intersections between “race” and class, gender, and sexuality; at the same time, we will consider the ways in which all of these categories of identity are inflected by language, by regional and national forms of belonging and exclusion, and by the presence of “mixed-race” communities. Over the course of the semester, our readings will include selections from the following texts/authors: The Jesuit Relations, François René de Chateaubriand, Alexis de Tocqueville, Hippolyte Castra, Armand Lanusse, Victor Séjour, Kate Chopin, Louisiana Story (dir. Robert Flaherty), Jean Arceneaux, J’ai été au bal (dirs. Blank & Strachwitz), James Baldwin, Gwendolyn Bennett, Langston Hughes, Josephine Baker (cinematic performances), William Gardner Smith, M.F.K. Fisher, Samuel Chamberlain, Julia Child, Michael Pollan.

Prerequisites:
No knowledge of French is required. All lectures and discussions in English.

Additional information:
Satisfies UC Berkeley American Cultures requirement; satisfies 1 “Outside Elective” in the French major; counts for the Minor in French.

Introduction to French Linguistics

146A
Fall 2012
Instructor: R. Kern

Readings:
Léon, P., & Bhatt, P. (2009). Structure du français moderne: Introduction à l’analyse linguistique. Paris: Armand-Colin. Kerbrat-Orecchioni, Catherine. (1996). La conversation. Paris: Seuil. (Note: this book is out of print; I have permission to reproduce it.)

Course Description:
Ce cours est destiné aux étudiant(e)s qui désirent se familiariser avec les bases de la linguistique française. Aucune expérience en linguistique n’est requise, mais une bonne connaissance du français parlé et écrit s’impose. Le cours abordera les domaines principaux de la linguistique : la phonétique et la phonologie, la morphologie, la syntaxe, la sémantique, et la pragmatique, ainsi qu’une briève introduction à la sociolinguistique. Le but sera de présenter des concepts et des outils essentiels qui permettront une exploration ultérieure plus approfondie. Nous commencerons par un bref survol historique pour encadrer la discussion de notions telles que « langue », « langage », « signe », « mot », « phrase » et « grammaire ». Ensuite nous explorerons les sous-disciplines indiqués ci-dessus, avec des exercices pratiques pour concrétiser les principes présentés en classe et dans le manuel. Nous considérerons les différences (considérables !) entre le français parlé et le français écrit, nous étudierons la langue dans le contexte de son emploi dans la communication, et nous finirons par appliquer des approches linguistiques à l’analyse de la conversation.

Prerequisites:
French 102 at UCB or consent of instructor.

Additional information:
This course satisfies one “Culture” or one “Elective” requirement in the French major. Satisfies College of Letters and Science breadth in Social and Behavioral Sciences. Priority enrollment for declared French majors.

Colonial Literature and Cinema from the Thirties to the Present

175A : Literature and the Visual Arts

Fall 2012
Instructor: S. Tlatli

Readings:

Course Reader; films by Alaouache, Pontecorvo, Resnais, Vautier, Tlatli.

Course Description:
A comparison between films and narratives about the making and demise of the French empire. We will read various narratives about the imperial presence in the French colonies and compare them with a series of films from the 20th and 21st century.

Prerequisites:
French 102 or consent of instructor. Film Studies students should consult the instructor about French language preparation and prerequisites.

Additional information:
This course satisfies 1 “Culture” course or 1 “Elective” course in French major. Satisfies Letters and Science breadth requirement in Arts and Literature; Priority enrollment for declared French majors.

Histories and Memories of the Occupation in French Literature and Cinema

183A : Configurations of Crisis

Fall 2012
Instructor: D. Sanyal

Readings:
see description

Course Description:
An inquiry into the history and memory of Occupied France through a range of cultural production: novels, essays, poetry, theatre and cinema. We will focus on representations of the Occupation; the literature of Resistance; art under Nazi censorship; Vichy France and collaboration; war and the colonies; antisemitism and the Holocaust. Our explorations will seek to understand why France continues to be haunted by this “past that refuses to pass”.

Texts by Sartre, Camus, Vercors, Némirovsky, Anouilh, Delbo and others. Films by Resnais, Malle, Ophuls, Chabrol and Ousmane Sembène.

Prerequisites:
French 102 or consent of Instructor.

Additional information:
This course satisfies one “Culture” or one “Elective” requirement in the French major. Satisfies College of Letters and Science breadth in Social and Behavioral Sciences. Priority enrollment for declared French majors.

Graduate Courses

Proseminar in French

200
Fall 2012
Instructor: Dept. Chair

Course Description:
This course gives new graduate students a broad view of the French Department faculty, the courses they teach, and their fields of research. In addition, it will introduce students to some practical aspects of their graduate career, issues that pertain to specific fields of research, and questions currently being debated across the profession. All French Department graduate students are welcome to those meetings devoted to more general practical and intellectual topics. 1 unit.

Additional information:
Course enrollment limited to new graduate students in French.

Reading and Interpretation of Old French Texts

211A
Fall 2012
Instructor: D. Hult

Readings:
La Chanson de Roland, ed. I. Short; Le Roman de la Rose, ed. Strubal; Chrétien de Troyes, Romans; Tristan et Iseut, ed. P. Walter; Kibler, Introduction to Old French

Course Description:
Introduction to the study of medieval French language and literature of the 12th and 13th centuries. Through a careful analysis and critical interpretation of certain canonical works (La Chanson de Roland; Béroul and Thomas, Tristan; selected lais of Marie de France; selected romans of Chrétien de Troyes; Le Roman de la Rose) we will study Old French language and some main dialects; verse and prose composition; theories of the oral tradition; editorial problems; and the material aspects of the manuscript work (including some work on codicology and paleography). Class will be conducted in English.

Additional information:
No previous knowledge of Old French language or literature is expected. This course fulfills the Medieval Literature component of the historical coverage requirement.

The Enlightenment and its Enemies

240B : Studies in Eighteenth-Century Literature
Fall 2012
Instructor: S. Maslan

Readings:
see description

Course Description:
Immanuel Kant famously defined the enlightenment as the process and movement by which individuals and publics freed themselves from their self-imposed childish dependence on authority (monarchic, patriarchal, and religious) through the use of reason—by “daring to know.”

But others, from contemporaries to the works and events that have retrospectively come to be understood as the enlightenment to post-World War II thinkers like Adorno and Horkheimer or Isaiah Berlin, to critics writing today, have been less sanguine about reason and its uses. These criticisms have come from both the left and the right: Burke argued that enlightenment authors caused revolutionary violence (he was less impressed with the Revolution’s achievements like universal manhood suffrage); Adorno and Horkheimer claimed that reason was conceived and deployed as domination and thus led to the terror of twentieth-century fascism. Some scholars today argue that enlightenment universalism was an ingenious mask for slavery and colonialism. On the other hand, contemporary politicians regularly echo counter-enlightenment arguments in their assertion of “traditional values.”

In this seminar we will explore the contested world of enlightenment France itself by reading canonical eighteenth-century writers along with some of their now less-known enemies. We will also take on the major scholarly and critical debates about the enlightenment that have raged from Adorno and Horkheimer until today. Major topics will be secularization and toleration; slavery and colonialization; sexuality and the family. Primary readings will include works by Montesquieu, Rousseau, Diderot, Voltaire, Raynal, Mably, and their interlocutors. Critical readings will include texts by Foucault, Derrida, Darnton, Habermas, Israel, and more.

History, Literature, Culture

245A : French Society in the Old Régime (1600-1800)
Fall 2012
Instructor: D. Blocker

Readings:
See Description

Course Description:
This seminar introduces students to the historiography of early modern French society (1600-1800), by comparing modern historiographical writings on the topic to a variety of literary texts ­ plays, novels, mémoires and social satire ­ from the 17th and 18th centuries, which depict early modern French society or reflect on particular social problems. It asks not only what was French society in the Old Régime, but also how did the very notion of an “Old Régime” society come into existence and in what ways is this historiographical construct still important for us today? To answer these questions, the seminar will focus on how modern historiography works to reconstruct France’s forgone social realities and what role literary productions might have played in the process. Intersections between historiography and fiction will be stressed, as well as the fact that early modern literary representations of social issues have often shaped modern historians’ perceptions of them. The seminar will pay particular attention to how literature’s growing importance in early modern French society has impacted the way historians, to this day, continue to use such literary productions to historicize pre-Revolutionary France. Historical readings are taken from the French tradition of social history, as it developed out of and around the Annales school (Pierre Goubert, Daniel Roche, Roger Chartier, Robert Descimon, etc.) as well as from the works of their Anglo-Saxon counterparts (William Beik, Nathalie Zemon Davis, Jonathan Dewald, Peter Sahlins, etc). Literary readings include excerpts from a wide variety of early modern French works. Molière’s Georges Dandin, La Fayette’s Princesse de Clèves, Marivaux’ Le Paysan Parvenu and Diderot’s La Religieuse are read in full, along with some relevant literary and historical criticism. A number of theoretical and methodological readings are also discussed (Paul Ricoeur, Jacques Rancière, Christian Jouhaud et alt., etc).

No prior knowledge of early modern French society or literature is needed. This course is taught entirely in English, with readings available both in English and in French.

Additional information:
No prior knowledge of early modern French society or literature is needed. This course is taught entirely in English, with readings available both in English and in French. Graduate Students from all programs welcome.

Le nationalisme -- Mourir pour la patrie en Orient et dans l’Occident

251 : Francophone Literature
Fall 2012
Instructor: S. Tlatli

Readings:
Course Reader

Course Description:
Dans ce séminaire sur le nationalisme, nous analyserons un certain nombres de textes, (essais, romans et pieces de theatre) consacrés à la passion politique qui peut mener à mourir pour sa patrie. Nous commencerons donc par analyser les textes classiques de Kantorowicz (Mourir pour la patrie et The King’s Two Bodies: A Study in Mediaeval Political Theology) , puis nous explorereons certains essais et oeuvres de fiction qui posent la question du patriotisme et du nationalisme dans les pays colonisés. Nous tenterons de faire la différence entre divers aspects du nationalisme dans le monde arabe et dans l’Occident. Nous insisterons aussi sur l’aspect pyschanalytique du patriotisme et du nationalisme à travers une lecture freudienne. Nous nous interrogerons en particulier sur le phénomène des indépendances dans les pays francophones et sur la signification de l’indépendance selon les diférentes cultures antécédentes. La periode historique que nous couvrirons s’étend de 1830 a 2012.

Littérature et engagement - Autour de Sartre et Camus

260A : Studies in 20th-Century Literature
Fall 2012
Instructor: D. Sanyal

Readings:
Sartre: Qu’est-ce que la littérature, Le Mur, La Nausée, Les Mouches, Les Séquestrés d’Altona, Les Mots

Camus: L’Homme Révolté, L’Etranger, La Peste, Les Justes, La chute, l’Exil et le royaume, Le Premier homme

RECOMMENDED TEXTS: de Beauvoir: Le Sang des Autres, Olivier Todd: Camus, Bernard-Henri Levy: Le Siècle de Sartre

Course Description:

“L’écrivain engagé sait que la parole est action; il sait que dévoiler, c’est changer et qu’on ne peut dévoiler le monde qu’en projetant de le changer.” Sartre, Qu’est-ce que la littérature (1947)

“Par définition, il [l’écrivain] ne peut se mettre aujourd’hui au service de ceux qui font l’histoire : il est au service de ceux qui la subissent.” Camus, Discours de Suède (1957)

In this seminar, we will read the major literary works of Jean-Paul Sartre and Albert Camus with a view to recreating their dialogues, debates and differences on the relations between aesthetics, politics, history and ethics. Our readings will cover a sample of different genres (novels, essays, plays, autobiographical writings) that directly or indirectly address key historical junctures from the Occupation to decolonization: the épuration, the Nazi genocide, Stalinism, the Cold War, torture and terror during the Algerian war. We will also contextualize their reception and consider the relevance of their legacy for current reflections on commitment in an age of terror.

Teaching French in College: First Year

301
Fall 2012
Instructor: S. Chavdarian

Readings:

Lightbown, How Languages Are Learned

Course Description:

This course (1) provides participants with an understanding of basic principles of first- and second-language acquisition and the theoretical underpinnings of commonly used language teaching methods, and (2) offers inservice training in teaching, in creating and adapting instructional materials, and in designing tests for use in the Lower Division Program in French. The two-hour weekly meetings consist of a one hour lecture/discussion and a one hour practicum. GSIs are also required to attend a pilot class, taught by Seda Chavdarian, on select dates and as indicated on the lesson plans. Enrollment in this course is required for GSIs in their first semester of teaching in the French Department.

Additional information:

Attendance at the appropriate session (301 for French 1; 302 for French 2) is required of all instructors teaching French 1 and 2 for the first time. GSIs are also required to attend a pilot class, taught by Seda Chavdarian, on select dates and as indicated on the lesson plans.