FREN414

FREN414

The French Novel: 19th Century to Today

The Parisian Novels (The Yellow Books) by Vincent Van Gogh

The novel does not exist—or more specifically, there is no universal, applicable model. This is a bastardized literary genre that has survived many cultural, historical and political upheavals. From the French 19th century to today, the novel’s reincarnations are plentiful as they challenge aesthetic and ideological expectations. Topics covered in our advanced literature course include: engagement, narratology (realism, Nouveau Roman, autofiction, etc.), cultural critique, the collective imaginary, the seepage between life and arts, third-wave feminism, and so forth.

Required readings:

  1. Hugo. Le dernier jour d’un condamné (1829)
  2. Zola. Thérèse Raquin (1873)
  3. M Proust. Du côté de chez Swann – Combray (1913)
  4. Robbe-Grillet. La Jalousie (1957)
  5. Laurens. Celle que vous croyez (2016)

Prerequisites: One of FREN 321, FREN 328, FREN 329 and one of FREN 402, FREN 225.

Language of instruction: French

SPAN505B

Cross-listed with SPAN495B

Guess Who’s Back? Nation and Identity Building in Spanish Early Modern, Modern and Postmodern Drama

X First, Buy X, National Flag Day, patriots’ summits… Not long ago, the End of History and Globalization fostered the expectation of a post-national world, governed by supranational institutions. However, the 21st century has witnessed a resurgence of populism and nationalist movements, reaffirming national and cultural identities. In this evolving landscape—where globalization, deglobalization, and nationalism coexist and compete—it is timely to take a fresh look at the concepts of nation and national identity-building throughout history.

Using Spain as a case study, this course will explore how drama has served as a tool to promote or challenge national identity discourses—from the establishment of the so-called “national theatre” in the 16th century to the end of the transition to democracy and the present day. To do so, we will read several plays and genres (historical drama, tragedy, grotesque drama, farce, tragicomedy, political satire) in their socio-historical context. Particularly, we will discuss 1) topics such as the intersections between kingdom, nation and empire, the construction of an “essential and eternal Spain”, the evolution and re-evaluation of Spanishness, the suitability of having a National Classical Theatre Company (CNTC), the role of memory, or the inteactions between different national projects within the Iberian Peninsula; 2) processes such as the appropriation of traditional figures and values (monarchy, honor, masculinity, family, religion) by different ideologies or the development of methods to exclude others (Jews, Muslims, Indigenous peoples, Republicans, immigrants…) from the nation; and 3) rhetorical and discoursive devices such as the manipulation of History, symbolism (Numancia), allegory or synecdoche (to equate Spanish identity to a part or a group). The course will also pay attention to the discontinuities, paradoxes, contradictions and fissures (racial and gender diversity, resistance, denounce, rebellion, anxiety, schizophrenia) in the plays and their discourses to showcase the incompleteness of the task of consolidate internal unity and provide a better understanding of the Spanish identity crisis. Due to the relevance and applicability of the topic, students will be able to work on their areas of interest (i.e., Latin American contemporary drama, comparing theatre with film or other genres…) for their final research project.

Language of instruction: Spanish

Instructor: Dr. Raúl Álvarez Moreno

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Grading Breakdown

Coming soon!

Readings

Primary texts:

  • Cervantes, Miguel de. El cerco de Numancia (1585).
  • Vega, Félix Lope de. El mejor alcalde, el rey (1635).
  • García de la Huerta, Vicente. Raquel (1776) o Quintana, José Manuel. Pelayo (1805).
  • Álvarez Quintero, Serafín y Joaquín. Los chorros del oro (sainete de ambiente andaluz) (1906).
  • Valle Inclán, Ramón María. Farsa y licencia de la reina castiza (1920).
  • Torrente Ballester, Gonzalo. Lope de Aguirre: crónica dramática de la historia americana (1940).
  • Rodríguez Méndez, José María. Flor de otoño (1973) o Sanchís Sinisterra, José. ¡Ay Carmela! (1986).
  • Boadella, Albert. Ubú president o Los últimos días de Pompeya (1995).
  • Conejero, Alberto. La piedra oscura (2013).
  • Blasco, Lola. ¡Teme a tu vecino como a ti mismo! (2015)
  • Ripoll, Laila y Mariano Llorente. Rif (de piojos y gas mostaza) (2022).

Main critical sources:

  • Adorno, T. W. and Max Horkheimer. Dialectic of Enlightenment (1944).
  • Anderson, Benedicte. Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism
  •   (1991).
  • Álvarez Junco. José María. Mater Dolorosa: la idea de España en el siglo XIX  (2001)
  •    -----. Dioses inútiles. Naciones y nacionalismos (2016).
  • Balfour, Sebastian and Alejandro Quiroga. The Reinvention of Spain: Nation and Identity since Democracy (2007).
  • Certeau, Michel de. The Writing of History (1988).
  • Dangler, Jean. Making Difference in Medieval and Early Modern Iberia (2005).
  • Delgado, María and David Gies. A History of Theatre in Spain (2012).
  • Fuchs, Barbara. Exotic Nation: Maurophilia and the Construction of Early Modern Spain (2009).
  • Gellner, Ernest. Nations and Nationalism (2008).
  • González, Cinta C. Nación y constitución: de la Ilustración al Liberalismo (2006).
  • Hobsbawm, Eric. Nations and Nationalism Since 1780 (1991).
  • Kamen, Henry. Imagining Spain: Historical Myth and National Identity (2008).
  •   -----. La invención de España. Leyendas e ilusiones que han construido la realidad española (2020).
  • Maravall, José Antonio. Concepto de España en la Edad Media (1964).
  • Martín-Estudillo, Luis and Nicholas Spadaccini. Memory and Its Discontents: Spanish Culture in the Early Twenty-First Century (2012).
  • Nora, Pierre. “Between Memory and History: Les Lieux de Mémorie” (1989)
  • Rodríguez Puértolas, Julio. Historia de la literatura fascista española (2008).
  • Salgues, Marie. Teatro patriótico y nacionalismo en España: 1859-1900 (2010).
  • Sanz, Ismael. E. España contra España: los nacionalismos franquistas (2003).

FREN556A

Traductologie

Ce séminaire offre une initiation aux principales théories de la traduction. Il s’intéresse à l’étude de divers écrits théoriques historiques et contemporains, ainsi qu’à la discussion critique de ces théories et de leurs répercussions. Il trace également l’émergence de la discipline autonome de la traductologie en tenant compte de ses liens actuels avec d’autres sciences humaines et sociales telles que la sociologie, la psychologie, l’anthropologie et la linguistique. Le séminaire est l’occasion d’une remise en question des notions telles que l’œuvre originale, l’œuvre traduite, l’adaptation, la liberté, la loyauté et la neutralité en traduction. En outre, seront examinés, par exemple, le contexte socioculturel de la traduction, la traduction et le féminisme, la traduction et l’autochtonie, la traduction queer et l’évaluation de l’importance des considérations théoriques dans la pratique des traducteur.ice.s. À la fin du semestre, les étudiant.e.s devraient être capables d’identifier les tendances dans le domaine, de les associer à leurs contextes historiques et d’analyser de manière critique les différences et les similitudes repérées.

Language of instruction: French

Instructor: Dr. Irem Ayan 

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Grading Breakdown

Coming soon!

Readings

Coming soon!

FREN416

Shades of Truth and Fiction in Contemporary French Literature

René Magritte, L'Empire des lumières

One notion that has come to define our times is that of truth. We are tasked, urgently, to seize what it may be and how it can be ascertained. Paradoxically, literature may contribute some of the most crucial reflections on the boundaries of truth. Indeed, writers of fiction have an intimate grasp on all shades of the real and of its representation. This appears remarkably salient in contemporary French literature, as it plays endlessly with nuances of the self, of testimony, of objectivity. This semester, we will discover how a variety of authors interprets historical reconstitution, gaslighting, confession, verisimilitude, autofiction, and more.

Language of instruction: French

Prerequisite: Either (a) all of FREN 311, FREN 321 or (b) all of FREN 328, FREN 329 and one of FREN 225, FREN 402

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Grading Breakdown

10% Regular Participation
15% Fiches de lecture
10% Essais courts
20% Présentation littéraire
10% Création littéraire
5% Prospectus of Research Paper
30% Research paper

Readings

Patrick Modiano, Dora Bruder
Emmanuel Carrère, La moustache
Hervé Guibert, Cytomégalovirus
Annie Ernaux,  L’événement
Christine Angot, Les Petits
Gaël Faye, Petit pays

FREN419

Écrits de femmes (Studies in Women’s Writing)

Christine de Pizan, Collected Works (1407), BL, MS Harley 4431

Dans ce cours, nous examinerons un éventail de textes écrits par des femmes à travers les siècles (des récits allégoriques du Moyen Âge jusqu’au théâtre du dix-neuvième siècle) en nous penchant particulièrement sur la représentation des femmes et de l’écriture, ainsi que la réception de ces textes par le lectorat. Nous aurons lieu de nous demander s’il existe une « écriture féminine » qui se distinguerait d’une « écriture masculine », selon les genres choisis, les thèmes, les considérations stylistiques, etc.

Language of Instruction: French

Instructor: Dr. Nancy Frelick

Prerequisite: Either (a) all of FREN 311, FREN 321 or (b) all of FREN 328, FREN 329 and one of FREN 225, FREN 402.

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Grading Breakdown

Coming soon!

Readings

Ouvrages au programme :
Marie de France, « L’Aüstic »
Christine de Pizan, La Cité des Dames (extraits)
Marguerite de Navarre, L’Heptaméron (extraits)
Madame de Lafayette, La Princesse de Montpensier.
Isabelle de Charrière, Trois femmes.
George Sand, Gabriel.

Un choix de textes et d'ouvrages critiques sera affiché sur Canvas.

FREN476

French Language and Societies

This course is an introduction to sociolinguistics, with a focus on French-speaking societies. Throughout the semester, we will discuss basic concepts in sociolinguistics and address main topics in the field, including language variation, language contact and its possible outcomes, standardization, multilingualism, identity questions, and language attitudes and ideologies. This course aims to enable students to analyze, understand and discuss the links between language and society by providing students with the knowledge of sociolinguistic theory, research methods, main concepts and terminology along with developing the relevant application skills. All discussions and work submitted in this course will be in French.

Upon successful completion of this course students will be able to:

  • Recognize the challenges of linguistic and sociocultural diversity in the French-speaking world.
  • Understand the main concepts and theories in sociolinguistics and apply them to the study of French and multilingual communities.
  • Discuss and explain the link between various social factors and language use.
  • Conduct their own sociolinguistics research in a French-speaking community.

Language of Instruction: French

Instructor: Dr. Marie-Eve Bouchard

Prerequisite: One of FREN 321, FREN 328, FREN 329 and one of FREN 402, FREN 225.

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Grading Breakdown

Coming soon!

Readings

Readings will be made available through the Canvas site.

RMST301

Speculative Fiction: Afrofuturism, Gothic Horror, and the Weird

In this course, students will study major works of speculative fiction from France, Argentina, Italy, Mexico and Brazil (in English translation). The course starts with a French example of what has been dubbed “weird fiction”, namely Guy de Maupassant’s short story “The Horla” (1886) in which fact and fiction are difficult to distinguish. Students will then be introduced to Jorge Luis Borges’ reflections on infinity, non-linearity, and the labyrinth in his famous short stories “The Garden of Forking Paths” (1941) and “The Library of Babel” (1941). Turning to the fantasy novel, we will also read Italo Calvino’s The Nonexistent Knight (1959) which parodies medieval romance and chivalry. The Brazilian movie Executive Order (2020) represents a dystopian country where all African descendants are ordered to “return” to Africa. The course will end with the horror novel Mexican Gothic (2020) by Vancouver-based Mexican-Canadian writer Silvia Moreno-Garcia about a young woman who investigates the strange events at a mansion in the remote Mexican countryside. Discussion of these masterpieces of speculative fiction will be informed by readings of non-fiction that deal with intertextuality, historiographic metafiction, psychoanalysis, and biopolitics. Language of instruction is English.

Language of instruction: English

Instructor: Dr. Antje Ziethen

Prerequisites: No prerequisites

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Grading Breakdown

In-class Participation 15%
Presentation 5%
CLAS (Collective Annotation Online) 20%
2 Exams 40%
Final Paper 20%

Readings

Bookstore or E-Book:

  • Italo Calvino, The Nonexistent Knight ISBN 9780544959101 0544959108
  • Silvia Moreno-Garcia, Mexican Gothic ISBN 978-0525620785 0525620788

Canvas:

  • Guy de Maupassant “The Horla”
  • Jorge Luis Borges “The Garden of Forking Paths” and “The Library of Babel”
  • Lazaro Ramos, Executive Order (movie)
  • Non-Fictional Readings

RMST321

The Grail Quest: Myth, Mystery and Romance

Cross-listed with MDVL 301

Dante Gabriel Rossetti, The Damsel of the Sanct Grael (1874).

From Tennyson to Indiana Jones and The Da Vinci Code, much has been written and imagined about the Grail, but the earliest appearances of this mysterious artifact in medieval French literature are sometimes overlooked. This course is an opportunity to return to the great 12th and 13th century romances that first introduced the Grail and helped define it for subsequent generations.

Though the Grail is usually described today as the cup from which Christ drank at the Last Supper, early Grail romances are less clear on the matter. Chrétien de Troyes’ seminal Story of the Grail (c. 1180-1190) never quite explains the nature of the strange artifact that Perceval, a naive young man barely knighted by king Arthur, encounters during his adventures. In seeking to solve the mysteries left by Chrétien’s unfinished tale, however, his continuators and imitators built the Grail into an explicitly Christian relic, in line with the new religiosity of the early 13th century. The anonymous Quest of the Holy Grail (c. 1220) cements this interpretation and displaces Perceval in favour of a new hero, Galaad, a knight so pure and chaste as to be otherworldly: his adventures and those of his companions take place in a heavily allegorical version of the Arthurian world where every encounter has a deeper spiritual meaning.

In addition to these two romances, we will also study three short Welsh texts. Two are drawn from the Mabinogion: the romance of Peredur, which is a loose adaptation of Chrétien’s Story of the Grail, but might reflect earlier versions of the tale; and Branwen, the second branch of the Mabinogi, an early Welsh tale of war, death, rebirth and magic cauldrons, that hints at some of the earliest Celtic beliefs that may have influenced Chrétien’s work. The third, The Spoils of Annwfn, is a cryptic poem that tells of a trip by Arthur and his men to the mysterious Other World.

Throughout this course we will explore the themes of belief, valour, knowledge and fulfillment that unite the different early versions of the tale, despite their canonical divergences. The Grail quest, after all, is rarely about the Grail itself: it’s about self-discovery and finding the true nature of things beyond the veil of appearance.

Language of instruction: English

Instructor: Dr. Patrick Moran

Prerequisites: No prerequisites
Informal recommendation: As this is a 300-level course, it will entail reading, analysis, and independent research. Informal prerequisites: a sense of curiosity and an openness to wonder.

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Grading Breakdown

MDVL 301/RMST 321 is typically graded the following way:

Weekly Questions on Reading Assignment (= answer 1 out of a choice of 3 questions/week) – 15% (1.5% per week)
Short Essays – 30% (best mark of 1, 2 or 3 essays available during the term)
Outline of Final Paper – 15%
Final Paper – 40%

Readings

Chrétien de Troyes, Arthurian Romances, William W. Kibler & Carleton W. Carroll (trans.), Penguin Classics, 1991

The Quest of the Holy Grail, Pauline M. Matarasso (trans.), Penguin Classics, 1969

The Mabinogion, Sioned Davies (trans.), Oxford World’s Classics, 2008

FREN321

Critical Writing

The course topic differs each term, depending on the instructor.

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Term 1

FREN 321 provides advanced training in writing for university-level writing in French. You will be exposed to a variety of types of texts in French that requires you to think critically and creatively, support your claims, and appropriately acknowledge sources of information, which is particularly relevent in our AI-generated tools era. From analytical reading to producing argumentated writing, you will be introduced to the art of revision, focusing on the formal study of usage and grammar, the mastery of rhetorical strategies, and the careful reading of academic and non-academic texts as models. This course will give you the tools to encounter the various stages of the writing process with confidence (brainstorming, gathering evidence, considering audience, drafting, revising, editing, and proofreading).

The teaching approach is learner-centered and inclusive. A learner-centered approach means that you are a part of your learning. Therefore, you will need to develop strategies of learning in conducing both invididual and group work. It also means that I will adjust content based on your needs to the best I can to support a positive learning experience for you. An inclusive approach means that everyone matters in regards of your identity (racial, gender, sexual) and/or accessibility needs. In this class, equity matters so you are welcome to use the non-binary pronoun "iel" and further inclusive forms of writing.

Instructor: Dr. Caroline Lebrec

Grading breakdown:

In-Class Active participation 15%
Reflective Journal of your learning experience 10%
Peer Reviews on Canvas Discussions 10%
Assignments (writing tasks) 20%
Mid-term 20%
Final paper 25%

NOT 100% => 125%

Term 2

Introduction aux méthodologies de l’analyse littéraire

This is an introduction course on how to perform literary analysis, with an emphasis on French methodology for close reading and argumentative writing. Focus on four analytic tools in particular: figures du discours, résumé de texte, commentaire de texte, dissertation française. We will study diverse ranges of genre and sources: prose fiction, poetry, social sciences, and journalistic production. Elements of bibliographical research will also be included. The goal for this course is to equip students with critical terms to further their literary studies. Course materials will be provided in class: on Canvas (links included on the syllabus), or via the Koerner Library webpage.

Instructor: Dr. Farid Laroussi

Grading breakdown:

Barème
Participation (+ activités en groupes) 15%
Un examen partiel (mid-term) 20%
Deux analyses critiques (600-700 mots) : une analyse sur le résumé, l’autre sur le commentaire de texte, 30%
Un devoir final (1200-1300 mots) 35%

Language of instruction: French

Prerequisite: One of FREN 123, FREN 302.

ITST380

Italian Food Cultures

Italy is world-renowned for its food cultures and Italians put great care into food preparation, consumption, and appreciation. It’s no wonder that Italian food-related themes permeate the country’s cultural life and beyond. This course will examine representations of Italian or Italian-derived foodways and the role they play in articulating larger issues concerning contemporary Italy, including regionalism, anti-globalization, family history, gender and sexual identities, Italian American food, tourism in Italy, and immigration to Italy. Students will form a complex picture of Italy’s relationships with food cultures in a global context. Class assignments and final projects will allow students to explore their critical and/or creative views of class materials. The course assumes no prior knowledge of Italian. But it requires a passion for Italian food and culture!

Prerequisites: No prerequisites

Language of instruction: English