Content Courses
111. Histories of Paris
Professor Christina von Koehler
Using the buildings and space of Paris as a laboratory, this course surveys key events in the histories of Paris and France. The course will focus on the social and cultural history of the city in its material dimensions; the relation of streets and buildings to the unfolding events of French history, and the meanings of local topography within the enduring mythologies of the city. A central goal of the course is to teach students to read and write critically about the history of Paris and the cityscape around them. Includes some excursions.
5.0 UC quarter units. This course has previously transferred for these subject areas: History/Sociology/Urban Studies
115. European Integration
Professor Mariam Habibi
This course aims to provide a general introduction to the history, the structure and the current developments of the European Union with a specific focus on France. We shall look at the circumstances after the second World War that once again put the 'Idea of Europe' on the agenda and the role that France played in the rebirth of this idea. The EU will be studied from a theoretical point of view; how do we define its structure? What determines the shape and speed of the integration process? How does this institution maintain its legitimacy? We will evaluate the success of this project by looking at specific policies, such as the common agricultural policy, the economic and social policy and common foreign and security policies. Finally we will consider the role of the EU as a global actor and study the EU's link with the rest of the world.
5.0 UC quarter units. This course has previously transferred for these subject areas: European Studies/History/Political Science
117. Media, Politics & Society in France & the EU
Professor Joav Toker
This course will explore and critically analyse major institutions, actors and trends in contemporary French Media and attempt to situate them in the larger contexts of “unifying” Europe and “globalized” world-media-scene. It will examine the operational schemes, performances and internal decisional and power structures of different branches of French media: written national & regional press, specialized magazines, the publishing industry, advertising, radio, television, the internet. It will also engage in a specific analysis of ‘New Media’ and ‘Social Networks’ involvement, influence and interaction with ‘traditional’ media spheres and their political, social, and cultural impacts.
5.0 UC quarter units. This course has previously transferred for these subject areas: Communication/Film and Media Studies/Political Science
125. French Art: 1715 - 1914
Professor Christopher Boicos
This course traces the evolution of French painting from the decline of the Ancien Régime, through the upheavals of the Revolutionary age, to the birth of modern industrial and capitalist France in the 19th century. It ends with the last heroic re-definition of "modernity" in art at the opening of the 20th century.
5.0 UC quarter units. This course has previously transferred for these subject areas: Art History/European Studies/History
129. Parisian Voices in Literature
Professor Carole Viers-Andronico
In this course, students will engage in discussions prompted by a multiplicity of voices that make up what has been often referred to as the Parisian mosaic - a mosaic whose colorful tiles represent a collection of diverse and multivalent identities. Students will explore how the voices that have emerged in the past several decades bring myriad perspectives, ranging from "traditional" French culture to first and subsequent generation immigrant cultures, many of which come from former French colonies in the Francophone world, to bear on Parisian society and how these contemporary voices take a sometimes playful but often critical look at the identity of their post-war and postcolonial society. The course will, therefore, focus on examining the different social worlds that make contemporary Paris such a fascinating, diverse, and culturally important city. Through readings and class excursions to sites important to their understanding of the texts, students will trace some of the ways French alongside the more problematically termed Francophone writers and filmmakers have made their sundry voices heard over the past half a century.
5.0 UC quarter units. This course has previously transferred for these subject areas: Comparative Literature/French/History
131. Under French Eyes: America as Model and Counter-Model in France (XVIII-XXI centuries)
Professor Stephane Dufoix
It has become fashionable to speak about France and the United States as being “best enemies” or “twin enemies,” thus insisting on a strange relationship in which admiration and political friendship is combined with cultural misunderstandings and the production of numerous prejudices. Indeed, from the late eighteenth century onwards, the United States has been scrutinized by French politicians, artists, intellectuals, and journalists, among others. For more than two centuries, it has been France’s best enemy, either praised as the inspiration for French art and culture, politics, society and economy, or stigmatized as the epitome of everything that is un-French and should never be imported or implemented on French soil: capitalism, the reign of money, dangerous and soulless towns, violence, and the tyranny of ethnic, racial or cultural communities. The aim of this course is to map this complicated and paradoxical stance through the lens of history and sociology, and by examining French cultural products such as travel journals, essays, songs, essays, novels and films that place the United States under French eyes.
5.0 UC quarter units. Suggested subject areas for this course: History/Political Science/Sociology
133. Sexuality and its Subjects in French Culture
Professor Will Bishop
This course will explore what it has meant to be marked as a subject to sexuality at different eras in French culture. We will begin the course with a discussion of Manet's 1863 portrait of Olympia, pivotal for both all of modern art and for its portrayal of the sexual subject that the prostitute is when s/he finds the space to rise above his or her status as an object of (male) desire. We will then turn to two early 20th century novels by Gide and Colette which both stage a first person's confrontation with various aspects of his and her sexuality. We will conclude the first part of our course with an autobiographically-based novel from the period just after the Second World War: Genet's Thief's Journal, a text that problematizes its relation to truth and anticipates the gay liberation movement of the 1970's. The second part of our course will focus largely on several films. We will begin with Jean Eustache's 1973 New Wave classic La Maman et la Putain. We will then consider Virginie Despentes's theorization of her sexuality and film work in King-Kong Theory before turning to two contemporary films that portray lesbian sexuality from very different cultural standpoints: Colline Scianna's Naissance des Pieuvres (Water Lillies, 2007) and Abdelatif Kechiche's international and controversial hit, La Vie d'Adèle (Blue is the Warmest Color, 2013). We will end the semester with Abdellah Taïa's An Arab Melancholia and its portrayal of an openly gay man's emergence in between Morocco and Europe.
5.0 quarter credit hours. Suggested subject areas for this course: Gender Studies, Film, Comp Lit
34. French Popular Music (Lower Division)
Professor Mindy LaTour O'Brien
This course offers a survey of French popular music production and consumption from the twentieth century to the present. Beginning with mid-century icons of “la chanson” such as Edith Piaf, Georges Brassens, and Charles Trenet, we will then consider a range of popular music trends---from 1960s girl groups to Afropop and the explosion of French language rap and hip-hop. We will consider the American invasion of pop aesthetics as well as French strategies of resistance to this sonic globalization. Through this course, students will learn critical skills for analyzing popular music, from a basic technical understanding of sound production in the recording studio to fundamental elements of popular music aesthetics. The primary texts for this course will be recorded music, song lyrics, and music videos. By the end of the course, students will have constructed a critical apparatus for exploring the broader socio-cultural issues at stake in the production, performance, and consumption of popular music in France. No prior musical experience is required!
5.0 UC lower division quarter units. Suggested subject areas for this course: Music/History