Fall 2014

Reading and Composition (R&C)

Paradise Lost or Apocalypse Now? -- French Utopian and Science Fiction
R1A (Section 1) : English Composition through French Literature in Translation

Fall 2014
A. Gabel

Readings:

Texts:

FONTENELLE Conversations on the Plurality of Worlds (1686)
VERNE The Underground City, or The Black Indies (1877)
VILLIERS de L’ISLE ADAM Future Eve (1886)
IONESCO Rhinoceros (1959)
BOULLE Planet of the Apes (1963)
WITTIG Les guérillières (1969)
VONARBURG, In the Mothers’ land/The Maerlande Chronicles (1992)

Films:

MELIES A trip to the Moon (1902), The Eclipse: Courtship of the Sun and Moon (1907)
MARKER La Jetée (1962)
GODARD Alphaville (1965)
LALOUX Fantastic planet (1973) (adaptation of WUL, Oms by the Dozen (1957))
GILLIAM Twelve Monkeys (1995)

Additional readings will be made available on bspace

Course Description:

If you ask most people to think of French science fiction, most will stop short after blurting out, “Jules Verne.” As a genre, science fiction is often at that reprehensible no man’s ground
between mainstream and minor literatures: it is an overwhelmingly pervasive force in modern cultural production, but nevertheless, a somehow underappreciated and understudied literary field. It is often produced by overlooked or unknown authors, whose mere mention provokes a sneer of disgust in academic circles. And yet, science fiction and its sister field, utopianism, often envision alternate worlds or spaces in order to critique the way things are. From restrictive socio-political groupings to man’s sheer egotism, what the French call “SF” has all kinds of targets in its sights. And while science fiction can project new social possibilities in the form of utopian communities, in Amazonian societies and the like, it can also foresee our downfall-in-the-making, in urban decay and the double-edged sword of technological development. In this course, we will look at a wide array of French texts or films fall under these umbrella labels of “science fiction” and “utopianism.” We will situate these texts within the concerns of their particular historical context(s) and look at what kind of world they offer: paradise or apocalypse?

This course is designed to fulfill the first half of the Reading and Composition requirement. The primary goal of this course is to develop students’ reading and writing skills through a series of assignments that will provide them with the opportunity to formulate observations made in class discussions into coherent argumentative essays. Emphasis will be placed on the refinement of effective sentence, paragraph, and thesis formation, keeping in mind the notion of writing as a process. Other goals in this course are a familiarization with French literature and the specific questions that are relevant to this field. In addition, students will be introduced to different methods of literary and linguistic analysis in their nonliterary readings.

Additional information:

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

Love, etc.
R1B (Section 1) : English Composition through French Literature in Translation

Fall 2014
C. Talley

Readings:

Constant, Adolphe
Proust, Swann’s Way
Breton, Nadja
Shakespeare, selected sonnets
Saint Vincent Millay, selected sonnets
Barthes, A Lover’s Discourse
Lamartine, Poetic Meditations (“Isolation”, “The Valley”, “The Lake”, “Autumn”)
Baudelaire, Flowers of Evil (“Exotic Perfume”, “Head of Hair”, “‘I love you as I love…’”, “Spleen (II)”)
Nerval, “Sylvie”
Critical articles on “Sylvie”

Course Description:

When we think of Romantic literature, we often think of a lofty ideal of love. But the fact is that here, as elsewhere, love rarely appears in an unalloyed form. As in life, perhaps, love is often accompanied and motivated by other emotional and psychological phenomena. In this course we’ll be interested in what various loves in the Romantic tradition are about, in addition to “love itself.” We’ll explore how amorous desire is influence by both memory and the imagination, and look for ways that certain states of mind like expectance and curiosity create conditions that allow love to emerge. We’ll wonder about what inspires love, what motivates it, what keeps it alive (sometimes in spite of itself), and what puts an end to it, through readings of poems by Shakespeare, Millay, Lamartine, and Baudelaire; fiction by Constant, Nerval, Proust, and Breton; and essays by Barthes.

Additional information:

French R1B satisfies the second half of the Reading and Composition Requirement. Classes are conducted in ENGLISH.

Urban Change in Modern France
R1B (Section 2) : English Composition through French Literature in Translation

Fall 2014
M. Smith

Readings:

Emile Zola The Ladies’ Paradise (tr. Brian Nelson).
T.J. Clark The Painting of Modern Life
Course Reader

Course Description:

The subject of this class is urban change. Our primary historical model will be the modernization of Paris in the 19th century. In particular, we will ask how cultural works from this period register, resist or reimagine social change. Our main focus will be on three literary and artistic genres central to the cultural landscape of this century: poetry (Baudelaire), the novel (Zola) and impressionist painting (Manet). We will also ask how the modernization of Paris relates to current issues of urban planning, gentrification and sustainability. In order to better assess the role culture plays during periods of drastic social change, we will spend the last part of the semester studying and comparing the development of other major cities in relation to a wider range cultural works (photography, film, music, performance art).

Additional information:

French R1B satisfies the second half of the Reading and Composition Requirement. Classes are conducted in ENGLISH.

Clothes Lines: Fashion, Garments and Fabrics in Paris and Beyond
R1B (Section 3) : English Composition through French Literature in Translation

Fall 2014
T. Wilds

Readings:

Honoré de Balzac, The Chouans; Course Reader

Writing Analytically, 6th ed.

Description:

“Clothes are the expression of society,” Honoré de Balzac, Treatise on Elegant Living.

In this course we will put Balzac’s maxim to the test, asking what exactly clothes tell us about the people who wear them and the places and times in which they are worn. In so doing we will join a long line of major French writers who looked at textiles as texts, interpreting fashions as cultural documents that, far from merely superficial, might disclose something essential about the times. In this spirit, we will read Balzac’s French Revolution novel The Chouans, with its intensive focus on how fashions conceal or reveal the identities of its mysterious protagonists, as well as Charles Baudelaire’s reflections on fashion and modernity in The Painter of Modern Life, and we will sharpen our own critical gaze by reading fashion criticism and looking at clothes from the nineteenth century and today. Further, we will pursue the material dimension of clothes through the increasingly far-flung networks of design, industrial production, transport and consumption that garments compress into wearable form. Engaging with the novelist Émile Zola’s Ladies’ Paradise, NPR Planet Money’s broadcasts on today’s global garment industry, and the World Trade Organization’s Agreement on Textiles and Clothing, we will tease out these networks and reflect on the dramatic consequences of their periodic reconfiguration. Along the way we will encounter an astonishing cast of dressers–the French Revolution’s incroyables and merveilleuses, nineteenth-century dandies, Coco Chanel’s austere new women, the sapeurs of the Congo–and the farmers, garment workers, shopkeepers, valets and designers who dress them.

In addition to looking at textiles as texts and reading texts on textiles, we will spend a portion of the semester examining texts as textiles. Through encounters with Stéphane Mallarmé’s poems and the artist Simon Hantaï’s folded paintings, we will consider the similarities between the page and the swatch, as well as the literary implications of pleating, wrinkling and other twists of fabric.

French R1B fulfills the second half of the Reading and Composition Requirement of the College of Letters and Science. It serves as an introduction to research in humanities disciplines and furthers R1A’s emphasis on analytic writing by highlighting the introduction of secondary source material into well-argued essays. Assignments will include one short essay and one longer essay, an annotated bibliography and a variety of writing exercises and shorter creative projects. All readings and discussions will be in English.

Additional information:

French R1B satisfies the second half of the Reading and Composition Requirement. Classes are conducted in ENGLISH.

Demand the Impossible! France in the 1960s
R1A (Sections 2 & 3) : English Composition through French Literature in Translation

Fall 2014
M. Koerner

Readings:

Franz Fanon, The Wretched of the Earth (1961)

George Perec, Things: A Story of the Sixties (1965)

Situationist International, On the Poverty of Student Life (1966)

Guy Debord, The Society of the Spectacle (1967)

Monique Wittig, Les Guérillères (1969)

Kristin Ross, May ’68 and Its Afterlives

*supplementary texts and excerpts from longer works will be provided in a Course Reader.

Films:

The Battle of Algiers (Pontecorvo, 1966)

A Grin without a Cat (Marker, 1977)

La Chinoise (Godard, 1967)

Letter to Jane (Dziga Vertov Group, 1972)

Description:

In this course we will study the tumultuous events in France of the late 1960’s that culminated in May ’68 with the student occupation of universities and the largest labor strike in French history. Situating these extraordinary events in relation to their broader, global context – from the liberation struggles in formerly colonized countries to the international protests against the Vietnam War and the emergence of young people, women, immigrants and people of color as new agents of social change – this course offers students an overview of one of the most transformative periods of the twentieth century. As this year marks the 50th anniversary of the Free Speech Movement at Berkeley, we will also explore how the “right to speak” and the desire for liberated forms of expression connected students in France to similar movements among students in the U.S. as well as those in Prague, Berlin and Mexico City. In challenging traditional social norms and existing forms of authority and representation, young people across the globe were calling the society they inherited into question. This course investigates the legacies of these movements in reimagining the terms of politics and democracy, and how they redefined the limits of the possible.

In connection with these themes, this reading and composition course focuses on the analysis of texts, images, and sounds (translations of literary works, historical documents, speeches and manifestos, as well as photographs, posters, film and music related to the period we are studying). In addition to gaining critical skills in literary and rhetorical analysis, students will strengthen their capacities to produce informed responses to materials encountered in class, to ask compelling research questions, and to build persuasive arguments. To this end, writing assignments emphasize drafting, revising and responding to peer-feedback. In addition to several in-class writing exercises, students should expect to write two short response essays (2-3 pages) as well as a final research paper (8-10 pages).

Additional Information:

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

Upper-Division Courses 

Writing in French, 3 sections ("W")

102
Fall 2014
M. McLaughlin, R. Shuh

Readings:

Course reader, available from Copy Central at 2560 Bancroft Way
A copy of Ionesco, “Rhinocéros” Folio Plus Classiques.

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 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.

Fictions of Love ("W")
103A : Language and Culture

Fall 2014
S. Guerlac

Readings:

Readings will include works by authors such as Ronsard, Louise Labé, Lamartine and Victor Hugo, Corneille, Mme de Lafayette, Colette, Balzac, Maupassant and Duras

Course Description:

Who can we love? Who can we marry? Does love drive us crazy? Does love threaten our independence? Is love an individual or a social phenomenon? Does social class matter? Where is the right place to be in love (or at least to describe it)?

We imagine love between people to be somehow universal, yet notions (and experiences) of love vary enormously not only according to circumstances – who is loving whom – but also according historical and cultural situations, as well as gender. We shall see that the way love is written, or expressed, also varies according to the conventions of different literary genres .We will examine various treatments of the theme of love from the Middle Ages to the 20th c. , reading works in various genres, including poetry, prose (realist tales and fantastic tales) and the theatre.

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 one Elective requirement. Satisfies one Historical Period requirement in the French major if student written work emphasizes pre-18C works or topics. Satisfies College of Letters and Science breadth in Arts and Literature.

This course is designated as “W” (writing intensive) in the French major course sequence. There will be specific emphasis on grammar and composition skills.

Continuity and Change in Thirteenth-Century French Literature
112B : Medieval Literature

Fall 2014
D. Hult

Readings:

Chrétien de Troyes, Le Chevalier de la Charrette and Le Conte du Graal; La Quête du Saint Graal; Guillaume de Lorris, Le Roman de la Rose; Rutebeuf, Le Miracle de Théophile; selected fabliaux, courtly lais and lyric poems.

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 French Major course requirement in the “Literature” (112-120) category or 1 French Major course requirement in the Elective category. This course also satisfies 1 Historical Period Requirement in the French major. Priority enrollment for declared French majors. Satisfies College of Letters and Science breadth in Arts and Literature.

Inventing Modern Comedy -- Molière and his Time ("W")
117A : Seventeenth-Century Literature

Fall 2014
D. Blocker

Readings:

Plays: Les Précieuses ridicules (1659), excerpts from La Critique de l’Ecole des Femmes and L’Impromptu de
Versailles (1663), Le Misanthrope (1666), L’Avare (1668), George Dandin (1668), Le Tartuffe (1669), Le Bourgeois
Gentilhomme (1670), Les Fourberies de Scapin (1671) and Le Malade Imaginaire (1673).

Films: Ariane Mnouchkine, Molière (1978) and Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme, staged by Vincent Dumestre and Le Poème Harmonique (2008).

Course Description:

Molière was France’s most prominent comical actor, playwright and stage director during the Classical Age and his plays remain central to the French imaginary to this day. This class provides an introduction to Molière’s works and times. We study a selection of his plays, ranging from his Italianate farces and the comédies-ballets (or musicals) he produced for the Court, to the high-flying social critiques he wrote and staged for his Parisian audiences. We also explore Molière’s role in the social and political institution of the theater at a time when playwriting and acting were first codified and legitimized as social practices. We give particular attention, in this respect, to Molière’s relationship to the Sun King, Louis XIV, and to the ways in which this patronage impacted his theater. We also enquire into the history of early modern performance, studying both how Molière’s texts were pronounced and acted out, and how they might have been staged, in his time. Modern filmic reconstitutions, from Ariane Mnouchkine to Vincent Dumestre, serve as a point of departure for this last investigation. Finally, we examine the canonization of Molière’s oeuvre, by studying examples of the publication of his works in modern times, as well as a selection of contemporary stagings, taken from the website of the French INA (Institut National de l’Audiovisuel).

Prerequisites:

French 102 or equivalent.

Additional information:

This course satisfies 1 French Major course requirement in the “Literature” (112-120) category or 1 French Major course requirement in the Elective category. This course also satisfies 1 Historical Period Requirement in the French major. Priority enrollment for declared French majors. Satisfies College of Letters and Science breadth in Arts and Literature.

This course is designated as “W” (writing intensive) in the French major course sequence. There will be specific emphasis on grammar and composition skills.

Wars, Revolts, Literatures. Midnight in the 20th Century
120B : Twentieth-Century Literature

Fall 2014
E. Colon

Readings:

Robert Linhart, L’établi

Vercors, Le silence de la mer

Samuel Beckett, En attendant Godot

Nathalie Sarraute, Tropismes

Jean Echenoz, 14

Marie NDiaye, Papa doit manger

Course Description:

In this course, we will explore the (plural and not always direct) relationships between literary creation and socio-political contexts as these relationships unfold in France between WWII and the contemporary era. We will do so through the lens of a publishing house, “Les Éditions de Minuit,” which was founded clandestinely during the Occupation and has since then hosted the publications of many major (as well as lesser known) writers and intellectuals. We will proceed chronologically, starting with Minuit’s tradition of “résistance littéraire” during WW2, entering the Post-War era with Samuel Beckett’s absurd/existentialist theater and leaving it with the theorization and practices of the “Nouveau Roman.” We will then move to novels, theoretical texts and documents that engage with some of the major political and social conflicts of the 1960s and 1970s in France, in particular the decolonization of Algeria, and the workers’, students’ and feminist movements. We’ll end our semester reading contemporary novels and plays written by the most recent generations of “Minuit authors” and consider what becomes of formal innovation and literary engagement when wars, revolutions and vanguard movements have seemingly disappeared altogether from the French contemporary landscape. Course taught in French. Additional texts will be made available through bCourses.

Prerequisites:

French 102 or consent of Instructor.

Additional Information:

This course satisfies 1 French Major course requirement in the “Literature” (112-120) category or 1 French Major course requirement in the Elective category. Satisfies College of Letters and Science breadth in Arts and Literature. Priority enrollment for declared French majors.

Introduction to French Linguistics
146A

Fall 2014
R. Kern

Readings:

Léon, P., & Bhatt, P. (2009). Structure du français moderne: Introduction à l’analyse linguistique.Paris: Armand-Colin. (EAN-13 : 9782200353315)

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 brève 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 indiquées ci-dessus, avec des exercices pratiques pour concrétiser les principes présentés en classe et dans le manuel. Nous considérerons les différences 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 or equivalent.

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 Science.

Histoire et mémoires de l'Occupation
162A : Perspectives on History

Fall 2014
D. Sanyal

Readings:

Némirovsky, Suite française (Isbn : 207033676x)

Camus, La Peste (folio) folio ISBN-10: 2070360423

Sartre Les Mouches (folio)

Anouilh, Antigone (folio)

Simone de Beauvoir, Le Sang des Autres ISBN-10: 2070363635,

Modiano, Dora Bruder ISBN-10: 2070315053

Course Description:

An inquiry into the history and memory of wartime 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; anti-Semitism and the Holocaust; decentering the memory of World War II. Our explorations will seek to understand why France continues to be haunted by this “past that refuses to pass.”

Texts by Sartre, Camus, Némirovsky, Anouilh, Delbo, de Beauvoir, Modiano 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. This course also satisfies College of Letters and Science breadth in Historical Studies or in Social and Behavioral Sciences. Priority enrollment for declared French majors.

Psychoanalysis and Literature
172A

Fall 2014
S. Tlatli

Readings:

A reader will be available. It will include essays by Charcot, Freud and Lacan. The literary texts we will analyze include : Le Horla, Maupassant; Les Paradis artificiels, Baudelaire; Les Manifestes du Surréalisme and Nadja , Breton.

Course Description:

Dans ce cours nous suivrons deux grandes voies, une orientation traditionnelle, soit la manière dont la théorie psychanalytique est appliquée au texte litteraire. Mais aussi, une voie historiquement et culturellement plus provoquante : comment les oeuvres littéraires et poétiques ont influencé la formation de la psychanalyse et de la psychiatrie. La période que nous couvrirons commence avec les premiers essais de Freud et Charcot sur l’hystérie et va jusqu’ au temps présent.

Prerequisites:

French 102 or consent of instructor.

Additional Information:

This course satisfies 1 “Culture” or 1 “Elective” course requirement in the French major. Satisfies College of Letters and Science breadth in Social and Behavioral Science, or in Arts and Literature.

Exploring the Banlieues ("R")
175A : Literature and the Visual Arts

Fall 2014
E. Colon

Readings:

Required texts:

Philippe Vasset, Un livre blanc

Manu Larcenet, Blast

Mohamed Razane, Dit violent

Course Description:

In this course, we will organize a dialogue (sometimes a confrontational one) between literature and the visual arts by studying these media’s respective attempts to represent a specific, marginal space—the Parisian banlieues—as well as their working class, immigrant population. We will read literary texts (prose and poetry), watch films (by Godard, Pialat, Kechiche) study photographs (by Atget, Doisneau) and street art, read graphic novels as well as texts written about photography (by Benjamin and Barthes) in order to comprehend the singular challenges with which the banlieues confront the textual and visual modes of representation. We will be investigating the following topics and questions: if the banlieues have long been a marginal, under-represented space (compared to the Parisian city-center in particular), how are we to understand its increasing centrality in contemporary culture, literature and visual arts? What kind of codes, stereotypes have unfolded in the history of the figuration of the banlieues and the banlieusards? What kind of aesthetic shifts can we observe in the transition of the banlieues from an industrial, working class site to a postindustrial, postcolonial space? Which types of texts, what kind of images are now being created from within the banlieues, in particular since the 2005 riots? And finally, how do literary and visual representation complement each other, and show each others’ limits and capacities? Course taught in French. Additional texts will be made available on bCourses. All students will be expected to undertake small research projects of their own dealing with one literary text and one visual work we will have studied.

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 College of Letters and Science breadth in Arts and Literature; Priority enrollment for declared French majors.

This course is designated as an “R” (Research-Oriented) course in the French major sequence. There will be specific emphasis on crafting research topics and acquiring bibliographical skills.

la guerre de libération en Algérie (1954-1962)
183B : Configurations of Crisis

Fall 2014
S. Tlatli

Readings :

A reader will be available. It will include essays and novels by Benjamin Stora, Assia Djebar, Mouloud feraoun, Albert Camus and Mohammed Harbi.

Course Description:

Dans ce cours nous analyserons les faits importants qui ont marqué la guerre de libération en Algérie (1954-1962). Nous discuterons de l’importance politique de cette crise unique dans l’histoire du vingtième siècle français selon une double perspective : historique et littéraire. Nous dégagerons des notions clés : l’usage de la torture par l’armée, le terrorisme des rebelles algériens, la relation entre l’immigration et la guerre, le statut des femmes pendant la guerre et enfin, la configuration politique de cette crise. En conclusion, nous nous interrogerons sur le retour de la mémoire de la guerre dans les années 2000 en France.

Prerequisites: French 102 or consent of Instructor.

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

Graduate Courses

Linguistic History of the Romance Languages
C202

Fall 2014
M. McLaughlin

Readings:

(Recommended)

Alkire, T. and C. Rosen (2010) Romance Languages: A Historical Introduction, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Campbell, L. (1999) Historical Linguistics: An Introduction, Cambridge Mass.: M.I.T. Press
Harris, M. and N. Vincent (eds) (1988) The Romance Languages, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Posner, R. (1996) The Romance Languages, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Course Description:

This course traces the development of the Romance language family from its origins in Latin through to contemporary varieties. Although the development of languages such as French, Italian, Spanish and Portuguese is a major focus, attention is also paid to lesser-known varieties including Sardinian, Occitan and the so-called Romance-based Creoles. The course aims to provide a broad understanding of the major linguistic changes that have affected the family at three levels: phonology, morphosyntax and lexis. Central questions include which factors lead to linguistic change, how we should model the relationships between the different languages in the family and how well our theories account for the vast amount of variation that exists within each language in any given period.

The course also places considerable emphasis on the external history of the languages and varieties that make up the Romance family. This means that we will adopt a socio-historical approach to the study of the history of Romance. This is a relatively new and very fruitful approach in historical linguistics. It has broadened the task of Romance historians who are beginning to look beyond the linguistic changes as structural events to get a better picture of the variation that existed in past states. Not only does this help paint a more realistic picture of the past, it also helps our understanding of language change. In this class, we will be particularly interested in topics such as multilingualism, language contact, language attitudes, standardization and genre-based variation.

Additional Information:

This course is cross-listed with Spanish C202 and Italian C201.

This course is cross-listed with French C202 and Spanish & Portuguese C202

Reading and Interpretation of Old French Texts
211A

Fall 2014
D. Hult

Readings:

La Chanson de Roland, ed. I. Short; Le Roman de la Rose, ed. Strubel; 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.

Victory Hugo, Before and After
250A : Studies in 19th-Century French Literature

Fall 2014
S. Guerlac

Readings:

Selected poems (selections from works throughout his career); Selected prefaces, including La Préface de Cromwell (1819, 1827); Le Dernier Jour d’un Condamné (1829), Claude Gueux (1834), Hernani (1830 ), Le Rhin (1842, a travelogue) L’Homme qui rit (novel, 1869), William Shakespeare (essays) and various pamphlets on the death penalty, slavery and urban planning.

Course Description:

Victor Hugo (1802 –1885) comes before and after the canonically modernist figures of the 19th Century (Baudelaire and Lautréamont, for example). Poet, novelist and dramatist, he works in all the major literary genres and transforms them. From 1851 – 1870 he writes, draws and photographs as a “living ghost” in exile.

We will consider the ways in which Victor Hugo invites us to reconsider our conceptions of romanticism and modernism through his work in various genres and media that span the century (from the Restoration to the Third Republic). We will examine the ways in which Hugo could be said to come before modernism and after it, specifically with respect to his notion of the roman poeme, of hybridity (including of grotesque and sublime) and his visionary poetics. We will also consider the specific strategies and commitments of Hugo the essayist, activist and visual artist, and their impact on his writing.

Noeuds de mémoire: Trauma and Transcultural Memory
260A : Studies in 20th-Century Literature

Fall 2014
D. Sanyal

Readings:

Camus’s La Peste ISBN-10: 2070360423

Driss Chraibi, Les Boucs 2070381609

Charlotte Delbo, La Mémoire et les jours 2917191805

Fatou Diome, Le Ventre de l’Atlantique 225310907X

Sartre, Les Séquestrés d’Altona 2070369382

Duras’s Hiroshima mon amour 2070360091

Charlotte Delbo,

Georges Perec, W ou le souvenir d’enfance 2070733165

Modiano’s Dora Bruder 2070408485

Sansal’s Le Village de l’Allemand 2070396991

François Emmanuel, La Question humaine (poche)

Course Description:

As memory studies moves towards a more transcultural orientation, national and ethno-cultural histories are currently reconceptualized through models of convergence and movement: palimpsestic layering, multidirectional and connective memory, interconnected histories, affective entanglements, but also, the dangers of such intersections. This seminar examines representations of “knots of memory “ from postwar France to contemporary French and Francophone cultural production (narrative, film and theory). We will read a selection of literary and cinematic reflections on entangled histories and legacies of trauma from the postwar context to today. We will also engage contemporary theorists who are conceptualizing the transcultural turn in memory studies, several of whom will come to Berkeley in the context of a conference on “memory without borders” in November.

A focal point in our itinerary will be the Holocaust, which has often been approached as a singular event whose magnitude defies representation and forbids comparison. Yet its memory has also been pressed in service of political, ethical and aesthetic struggles against other regimes of racialized violence since the war’s aftermath, leading to a diversification of Holocaust memories, legacies and aesthetic representations. The writers/directors we will study transform Pierre Nora’s concept of a lieu de mémoire, or singular site of memory, into noeuds de mémoire or knots of memory; they illuminate France’s ongoing entanglement with other histories and sites of displacement and loss. Pausing at junctures when distinct memorial pathways have crossed, collided and even collapsed into one another, we will pay particular attention to how the memory of the Nazi genocide, colonialism and slavery have been mobilized towards anti-imperial and post-colonial projects. We will also address the literary figures that enable such contact (allegory, analogy, palimpsest, dialectical image). Throughout, we will seek to understand the layered structure and unpredictable energy of collective memory.

Teaching French in College: First Year

301
Fall 2014
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.