Readings/Films:

Movements, artists, writers and thinkers studied will likely include the following: Dada, the Surrealists, the Négritude movement, the radical Feminists, Créolité, Post-Exoticism, the “Comité Invisible” the “Indigènes de la République.”

Details on the availability and the purchase of the assigned texts will be communicated to students at the beginning of the semester.

Course Description:

In this course, we will explore what happens to our ideas about language and our social imaginaries when artists, writers and thinkers respond to the exigencies of their contemporary moment. We will read texts and study cultural objects that have been crafted in response to the crises, transformations, and situations of emergency that have affected France and the Francophone world from the outbreak of WW1 to the COVID-19 outbreak.

As we move through the history of the 20th and 21st centuries, we will address the following questions: what constitutes an emergency? who can declare a state of emergency? under which conditions? Which medium-specific strategies, which interdisciplinary means have writers, thinkers and artists used to retort to the events and catastrophes that have shaped their time? How have artists thought through the relationship between destruction and creation in their attempts to aesthetically impact their environment?  What can be the functions of intellectual creativity in times of crisis? In addition to writing a couple of essays during the semester, students will work on collaborative manifestos of their own.

Prerequisites:

French 102 or equivalent.

Additional Information:

Satisfies 1 “Culture” or 1 “Elective” requirement in the French major.  Satisfies one course requirement in the French minor.