Readings and Films:

Journal du dehors, Annie Ernaux. Trans. Tanya Leslie

Lettres d’une Péruvienne, Françoise de Graffigny. Trans. David Kornacker

Ballad of the Sad Café. Carson McCullers

The Passion, Jeannette Winterson

Part 3 of Trois femmes puissantes, Marie Ndiaye. Trans. John Fletcher

“Des Boyteux” from Montaigne’s Essais. Trans. Donald Frame

Story 67 from Marguerite de Navarre’s Heptameron. Trans. P.A. Chilton

Selected poetry of Anne Sexton (Transformations) and Mary Szybist (Incarnadine)

The Piano, Jane Campion

La Cérémonie, Claude Chabrol

Description:

In this course we will read about people living on the margins of themselves and their world. If an outsider both belongs to a community and is rejected from that community, how are the lines of belonging drawn and how does this marginalized perspective work? We will consider how marginal status is constructed within a text and how a marginal point of view shapes a narrative. How do different texts form and question a person’s place in the world?

This course will focus on critical reading and the process of forming a coherent argument. Through a variety of written assignments and revisions we will work on clarifying what we are observing and thinking and how we are communicating those ideas.

Additional information:

French R1A satisfies the first half of the Reading and Composition Requirement. Classes are conducted in ENGLISH.

Section times and locations in the Schedule of Classes