French Studies Major

This course provides an introduction to the essentials of French grammar, vocabulary, and culture. The acquisition of aural/oral skills are stressed right from the beginning, and as such, the predominant language of instruction is French. In this course, students will acquire basic knowledge of written and spoken structures so that they will be able to read and comprehend short passages in French and write simple compositions and dialogues.

This course is designed for students who have completed one semester of French Language study. This course builds on FRE 100 and provides an introduction to the essentials of French grammar, vocabulary, and culture. The acquisition of aural/oral skills are stressed, and as such, the predominant language of instruction is French. In this course, students will acquire basic knowledge of written and spoken structures so that they will be able to read and comprehend short passages in French and write simple compositions and dialogues.

This course is designed for students who have completed one year of French language study. It reviews and expands on grammar, vocabulary, and culture acquired in FRE 100 and FRE 101. The acquisition of aural/oral skills are stressed, and as such, the predominant language of instruction is French. By the end of the course, students are expected to be proficient in the written and spoken usage of intermediate linguistic structures. Further, students are introduced to short literary texts, inviting conversation and some initial literary analysis.

This course is designed for students who have completed three semesters of French language study. It reviews and expands on grammar, vocabulary, and culture acquired over the previous semesters of language study. The acquisition of aural/oral skills are stressed, and as such, the predominant language of instruction is French. By the end of the course, students are expected to be proficient in the written and spoken usage of intermediate linguistic structures. Further, students are introduced to literary texts, inviting conversation and some initial literary analysis.

For students who have completed at least two years of college-level language studies or the equivalent. This course reinforces and expands on grammar, vocabulary, and culture learnt in previous years of French language study. It introduces students to different literary and cinematic genres reflecting the contemporary scene of the Francophone world. Development of techniques of expression are accomplished through oral and written exercises.

For students who have completed at least two years of college-level language studies or the equivalent. This course reinforces and expands on grammar, vocabulary, and culture learnt in previous years of French language study. It introduces students to different literary and cinematic genres reflecting the contemporary scene of the Francophone world. Development of techniques of expression are accomplished through oral and written exercises. By the end of this course, students are expected to achieve proficiency at the B2 level of the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages.

This course uses techniques of oral expression to develop greater conversational fluency and accuracy. Conversational practice uses outstanding French films as springboards for classroom French-language discussion and instruction in the full range of language proficiencies in an array of different contexts and situations. Movies will be partially watched outside of class.

This course first aims at showing students how translation studies are very much concerned with interpretative categories such as gender, race, and class. It is then designed to reinforce student knowledge and understanding of different linguistic systems. It finally results in sharpening an awareness of the distinctive characteristics of both French and English cultures and languages through the translation of literary and non-literary texts.

This course presents a thorough introduction to the literature and culture of the city, and particularly Paris, in the nineteenth century. This class will focus on the historical and cultural factors that contributed to the rise of the city as well as on the literature that shapes our understanding of this period. Close attention will be paid to issues such as social class, gender, mobility, and space.

This course explores the genre of travel writing in France and French-speaking Switzerland in the 20th and 21st centuries. In particular, this class will propose travel writing as a useful literary trope with which to reconsider our understandings of national literatures. Special attention will be paid to the notion of the journey, both literal and figurative, and to the traveler's gaze. Students will consider the historical and social implications of gender, race, ethnicity and social class in the various texts presented.

In the mid-70s, while the literary critic Philippe Lejeune was trying to define the autobiographical genre, several writers were, through their writing practices, questioning that very same genre, offering new ways to write (about) the self. Since then, the word autobiography has been replaced by autofiction, a genre that has become so popular in France that it has lost the meaning his initiator, Serge Doubrovsky, had theorized shortly after his first autofiction was published. This course explores the evolution of the auto- biographical genre since the mid-70s and tries to answer questions such as how one writes about oneself, what it means to write about oneself, the (im)possibility to write the self through the study of writers such as Georges Perec, Serge Doubrovsky, Annie Ernaux, Camille Laurens.

This course focuses on fictional works written by authors whose identities straddle the Mediterranean. Whether they immigrated from Algeria, Tunisia or Morocco to France or were born in France to immigrant parents, these writers have found an outlet for the expression of their personal experience in writing. These fictions gives rise to a number of issues such as the important role French people of Maghreb origins have played in the cultural shaping of France since the independence of the countries mentioned above, the subsequent interior colonialism they were and are still subject to, the topographical and social divides that separate the different ethnic strata of French society, the gender issues that have developed since the ''regroupement familial'' in 1974. As a complement to the readings, students will see different documentaries and / or films that will sociologically, historically and culturally frame these issues.

In L'écriture ou la vie, Georges Semprun wondered how survivors could tell their stories, readers could imagine the Shoah, an event that 70 years after it took place constitutes an epistemological and ontological caesura in the sense that it brings forth the fundamental issue of representation and its limits, the (im)possibility of language and images to convey it, the expression of our (in)humanity. Through diverse books and films, this course examines the relation between words, images on the one hand and things / reality on the other, between text and hors texte, and explore how some writers have not so much tried to represent the Shoah as reflect on the way the Shoah can be written and filmed.

This course focuses on parts of French history, French geography, French politics and French culture in order to have students understand twentieth- and twenty-first century France.

Throughout the centuries, writers have imagined and created characters who strive to distinguish themselves. Origins, education, social milieu, gender, and ability are just some of the ways that literary characters determine how they establish, assert, and distinguish themselves from others. Starting with Molière in the 17th century and ending with Philippe Vilain in the 21st century, this course will examine how distinction is expressed and represented in different literary genres including comedy, the philosophical tale, novels, and autofiction. This course offers a critical perspective on the notion of distinction in modern French literature through the exploration of primary texts. Taught in French.

The course examines French films from Jean Vigo's Zero de conduite (1933) to Robert Bresson's Un condamne a mort s'est echappe (1956). It explores the art of cinematography while considering the aesthetics, historical, political, sociological, and psychoanalytical frames within which each movie was realized. It furthermore provides students with analytical tools to enable them to develop their own personal approach when viewing, discussing, and writing about a film.

The French New Wave was a major turning-point in the history of French Cinema. It gave birth to a new way of approaching cinematography as a whole. This course centers on New Wave film directors Chabrol, Truffaut, Resnais, Godard and Varda, and examine closely their cinematographic creed, theoretical preoccupations, similarities and differences. Movies will be partially watched outside of class.

This course is for students selected as Academic Mentors in the context of the First Year Experience. Academic Mentors are assigned to individual first-year seminars and work as a group on academic leadership and research. Using the content and classroom of the first year seminars as a context, this 300-level course provides students with the opportunity to learn and practice advanced academic leadership skills including: research, writing, teaching, and tutoring skills. Student will be expected to complete course readings over the summer, before the course begins. During the semester, students will participate actively in class and typically organize and evaluate the final public presentation. Academic Mentors will meet periodically as a group outside of their individual seminars.

Stories are everywhere. We use them, consciously or unconsciously, to make sense of identities, experiences, and desires. And, at the same time, we are shaped by the stories that we absorb and interpret. This course explores how storytelling both reflects and shapes our lives. It introduces students to keywords and terms for reading and reflecting upon stories, both in the pages of books and in everyday life. The course considers a variety of narrative forms, including short stories, novels, fairy tales, self-help manuals, comics, films, podcasts, and political discourse. The course introduces students to fundamental questions about the nature of storytelling, while developing the vocabulary and critical skills for analysing and discussing stories. This is a writing intensive course in which students read as they learn to write. Students practice applying a critical vocabulary to textual forms as well as becoming familiar with the skills of drafting and editing. The course also introduces students to some of the professional pathways open to writers and storytellers.(This writing-intensive course counts towards the Academic Writing requirements).

This course has two primary goals: to introduce students to the history and theoretical writings of various strands of cultural studies, and to acquaint them with some of the intersecting axes - race, class and gender - that energize the field. Close attention will be paid to issues such as the shaping of identity, forms of representation, the production, consumption and distribution of cultural goods, and the construction of knowledge and power in a host of cultural practices and cultural institutions.

The Senior Seminar in the French Studies major represents a culmination of the multicultural experience at Franklin University. The seminar will create a forum for the research and presentation of an original senior project in French. This capstone seminar will not only bring together work done in other courses in the French Studies major, but will offer a chance to reflect on and integrate academic travel courses and study abroad into their final product. Possible final projects include a thesis, a performance, a video essay, or a portfolio of creative work. Projects will be designed and completed in consultation with the instructor and the student's major advisor.