SES # | TOPICS | ASSIGNMENTS |
---|---|---|
1 | Is There French Theory in This Class? |
René Margritte, "Ceci n'est pas une pipe" (1929) René Magritte, "Les deux mystères" (1966) Michel Foucault, "This is Not a Pipe" (1968) |
LEAVING REPRESSIVE SOCIETY | ||
2 | Judging the War, Rebuilding a Nation |
Albert Camus, "Reflection on the Guillotine" (1957) Alice Kaplan, The Collaborator Trial and Execution of Robert Brasillach (2000) Question: Is death penalty worse than life sentence and why? |
3 | The Genesis of May 1968 |
Jean-Paul Sartre, Existentialism is Humanism (1946) Guy Debord, Society of Spectacle (1967) Movie: Jean-Luc Godard, Pierrot le Fou (1965) Question: Is entertainment the new "opium of the people?" |
4 | Revolution and its Outsiders: Women, Migrants, Sexual Minorities |
Gilles Deleuze, Felix Guattari, Anti-Oedipus. Capitalism and Schizophrenia (1972) Michel Foucault, The Will to Knowledge (1976) Question: If you had to stage a revolution, what would you do first? |
5 | The Capitalist Machine: Society as Prison |
Michel Foucault, Discipline and Punish (1975) Movie: Jacques Audiard, Un prophète (2009) Question: Is surveillance desirable in a democracy? |
CULTURAL TASTE, NATIONAL IDENTITY | ||
6–7 | Cultural Mythologies |
Roland Barthes, Mythologies (1957) Visit: Museum of Fine Arts |
7 | The Idea of Europe |
Discussion with Professor Helen Drake, Loughborough University Robert Schuman, "Declaration May 9, 1950". |
8 | "Parlez-vous français?" The New Politics of Language |
Jacques Lacan, The Language of the Self (1968) Jean-François Lyotard, The Postmodern Condition. A Report on Knowledge (1979). Question: Do you think migrants have to speak French to become French citizens? |
9 | Social Distinction |
Pierre Bourdieu, Distinction: a Social Critique of the Judgment of Taste (1979). Movie: Agnès Jaoui. Le gout des autres (2000) Question: Do you consider yourself educated and why? |
BEYOND LIBERATION | ||
10 | Feminist and LGBT Politics: the Ethics of Ambiguities | Simone de Beauvoir, The Second Sex (1949) Didier Eribon, Insult and the Making of the Gay Self (1999) Question: Is surrogacy against women's rights? |
11 | Communities and Anticommunitarianism |
Maurice Blanchot, The Unavowable Community (1983) Jacques Derrida, Of Grammatology (1967) |
12 | Postcolonial France |
Franz Fanon, Black Skin, White Masks (1952) Movie: Abdel, Kechiche, L'Esquive (2004) |
13 | Video Project Presentations |