FREN 1200: Elementary and Intermediate French II
Alice Yang/Makedah Hughes/Maia Hawad/Rachel Watson/ Fre./ M-F 8:20a-9:10a; 9:25-10:15a; 10:30-11:20a; 2:35-3:25p
Continuation of FREN 1100. Conducted entirely in French. To be followed by FREN 1300. Daily classroom attendance is required between Monday and Thursday. Friday asynchronous.
[Only taught in the Spring Semester]
[FREN 1100 is only taught in the Fall Semester]
FREN 1300: Intermediate and Advanced French I
Matuku Ngame/Fre./M-F 9:25-10:15a; 10:30-11:20a; 2:35-3:25p
The first half of a two-term sequence designed to develop students’ proficiency in the four language skill areas. Prepares students for further work in literary, language, and cultural studies, as well as for nonacademic use of French. Oral communication skills, writing practice, vocabulary expansion, and a comprehensive review of fundamental grammatical structures are integrated with the study of short stories, novels, and films. Admits to FREN 1400. Conducted entirely in French. Meets Monday through Thursday. Friday asynchronous.
FREN 1200, 1210, or a satisfactory placement test score.
FREN 1400: Intermediate and Advanced French II
Soumia Koundi/Fre./M-F 9:25-10:15a; 10:30-11:20a; 2:35-3:25p
The second half of a two-term sequence designed to develop students’ proficiency in the four language skill areas. Introduction of more complex grammatical structures. Films and other authentic media accompanyliterary readings from throughout the francophone world, culminating with the reading of a longer novel and in-class presentation of student research projects. Admits to FREN 1500.
Conducted entirely in French. After FREN 1300 or a satisfactory placement test score. Daily classroom attendance is required between Monday and Thursday. Friday asynchronous.
FREN 1450: Intensive Intermediate and Advanced French
Candace Skorupa/Fre./M-F 9:25am-11:20am
An accelerated course that covers in one term the material taught in FREN 1300 and 1400. Emphasis on speaking, writing, and the conversion of grammatical knowledge into reading competence. Admits to FREN 1500. For students of superior linguistic ability. Conducted entirely in French. After FREN 1200, 1210, or 1250. Instructor Permission required.
[FREN 1450 is only taught in the Spring Semester]
FREN 1500: Advanced Language Practice
Fre./Ramla Bédoui MW 11:35a-12:50p/ Rachel Watson TTH 11:35a-12:50p
An advanced language course intended to improve students’ comprehension of spoken and written French as well as their speaking and writing skills. Modern fiction and nonfiction texts familiarize students with idiomatic French. Special attention to grammar review and vocabulary acquisition.
Conducted entirely in French. After FREN 1400, 1450, or a satisfactory placement test score.
FREN 1600: Advanced Conversation Through Culture, Film, and Media
Fre./Constance Sherak MW 11:35a-12:50p
Intensive oral practice designed to further skills in listening comprehension, speaking, and reading through the use of videos, films, fiction, and articles. Emphasis on contemporary French and francophone cultures.
Conducted entirely in French. Prerequisites: FREN 1500, or a satisfactory placement test score, or with permission of the course director. May be taken concurrently with or after FREN 1700.
FREN 1700: Introduction to Literatures in French
Léo Tertrain/Fre./MW 2:35-3:50
Introduction to the analysis of literary texts in French from the 17th century to today. Close reading of novels, short stories, plays, and poems by authors such as Balzac, Césaire, Colette, Diderot, La Fontaine, Maupassant, NDiaye, and Perec. More information on the format and content of the course can be found in the syllabus. May be taken concurrently with FREN 1600.
FREN 1840: Business French: Conversation and Culture
Léo Tertrain/Fre./MW 4:00-5:15
An advanced language course designed to develop linguistic proficiency in the fields of business and economics through culture and literature. One part of the course is an introduction to historical and contemporary specificities regarding various aspects of business and economics in different Francophone countries. Discussions and oral presentations on these elements are based on documentaries, excerpts of scholarly essays, articles, and a graphic novel. The other part of the course is an exploration of the representations of business and economics in contemporary French literature. This topic is examined through several fact-based fictional narratives. More information on the format and content of the course can be found in the syllabus (available through the syllabus tab below). Conducted entirely in French.
Prerequisite: FREN 1500 or a satisfactory placement test score, or with permission of instructor.
FREN 2400: The Modern French Novel
Alice Kaplan & Maurice Samuels/Eng.+Fre./ TTh 10:30am-11:20am
A survey of major French novels, considering style and story, literary and intellectual movements, and historical contexts. Writers include Balzac, Flaubert, Proust, Camus, and Duras. Readings in translation. One section conducted in French.
FREN 3012: Literary Translation: Contemporary Workshop
Nichole Gleisner/Eng./ W 9:25-11:20a
This course will focus on translating contemporary literature by exploring concerns of writers and translators working in the French and Francophone field today. Each week, students will translate an excerpt from a wide variety of texts written in French: prose, poetry, graphic novels, YA, science fiction, long-form journalism. We will also read and craft literary criticism, paying special attention to reviews of books in translation as we seek to understand and define the role of the translator in our current day. How does literary criticism complement the work of translation? In what ways is the current mode of approaching translations in reviews lacking? How can we develop criteria to evaluate works in translation that acknowledge the role of the translator ? How do these activities – both translating and reviewing – enrich scholarly communities, webs of thought, networks of writers, students’ own ways of approaching and understanding a text? Students will translate and workshop selections each week as well as undertake the translation of a significant portion of a contemporary text of their own.
L5 level required.
FREN 3230 Moliere: French Comedy, Laughter, and Society
Pierre Saint-Amand/Fre./ TTh 11:35a-12:50p
In this course we study the major comedies written by Jean-Baptiste Poquelin, known as Molière (1622-1673), considered the greatest playwright of the French language (his plays are the most seen and read of all French writers). We analyze the plays in the context of the principal themes that have emerged out his theater and that made Molière the consecrated author he is: the critique of society, of the court, of religion; the education of women, the pervasiveness of money are other issues that will be discussed. Conducted in French.
FREN 150 or equivalent will be the prerequisite
FREN 3500: Baudelaire
Thomas C. Connolly/Eng./ M 9:25-11:20a
An undergraduate seminar on the life and work of one the greatest poets of all time, and founder of modernity, Charles Baudelaire (1821-1867). Readings include œuvre de jeunesse, his collection of poems in verse, Les fleurs du mal, his collection of poems in prose, Le spleen de Paris, as well as his writings on fashion, contemporary culture, drugs, the arts, especially painting, his translations from English and American including Edgar Allan Poe, his private journals, the infamous late writings on Belgium and the Belgians, as well as his rare attempts at theater. His afterlives in literature, painting, music, dance, film, translation, and philosophy. Secondary materials including but not limited to Benjamin, Bonnefoy, Derrida, Fondane, Sartre. Readings in French, discussions in English.
Ability to read in French is necessary.
FREN 3700: Caribbean Poetry in French
Thomas Connolly/Fre./ M 1:30pm-3:25pm
An introduction to Caribbean poetry in French from the turn of the twentieth century to the present day. Topics covered will include literary, social, and political movements including surrealism, colonization, decolonization, immigration, the relation of French to other languages of the Caribbean including Créole, Spanish, and English, and points of contact between poetry, music, theater, and the visual arts. Students will learn how to read, comment on, and write about poetry. Primary authors will include Étienne Léro, Aimé Césaire, Saint-John Perse, Magloire-Saint-Aude, Édouard Glissant, René Depestre, Davertige, Jean Métellus, Raphaël Confiant, Suzanne Dracius, and Patrick Chamoiseau. Readings, assignments, and discussions in French.
Ability to read, write, and discuss in French.
FREN 3755: Museums and Literature
Morgane Cadieu/ W 4pm-5:55pm
What type of setting is a museum? How does French literature enrich our understanding of paintings and of the places that expose them? Can a museum be apprehended as a source of inspiration and creativity, a public room of one’s own? In this seminar, we read three different forms of texts published in the twenty-first century: novels set in museums and art centers; autobiographies focused on works of art; narratives created in the context of writing residences in museums. Through a series of literary guided tours, we examine the following topics: contemplation and daydreaming; close reading and close looking; history of art and natural history; art theft and restitution; museums as storage sites of memory, History, and versions of ourselves. In addition to actual and fictional museums set in France, the assigned texts and the film also take place in museums and memorials in Belgium, Benin, Germany, and Poland.
Course entirely taught in French. Prerequisite: FREN 1700 or equivalent or higher.
FREN 3777: Fiction in the Archives
Alice Kaplan/ T 1:30pm-3:25pm
What can we learn about 20th-century French literature from literary archives? The course will investigate fiction by Céline, Genet, Camus, Sartre, Sarraute, Wittig, Memmi, and expatriate writers in Paris (Stein, Wright, and Wharton), by studying finished books in the light of manuscripts, letters, and historical sources. We explore in particular the idea of a “genesis” of a literary work. Classes take place in a classroom in the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library. A primary goal of the course is to give students practical knowledge of working in literary archives at the Beinecke Library. There are many ways to integrate literary archives into research. The seminar empowers students to experiment with archival work and to make the Beinecke collections a resource for future work, whether in a Ph.D. dissertation or a senior essay or term paper. Prerequisites:
Preference given to French graduate students; advanced undergraduates are welcome with permission. Discussion in English, advanced reading knowledge of French essential.–we will work to develop the ability to read handwritten in French and English.
FREN 3840 Representing the Holocaust
Maurice Samuels & Millicent Marcus/Engl./ TTh 2:35-3:50p
The Holocaust as it has been depicted in books and films, and as written and recorded by survivors in different languages including French and Italian. Questions of aesthetics and authority, language and its limits, ethical engagement, metaphors and memory, and narrative adequacy to record historical truth. Interactive discussions about films (Life Is Beautiful, Schindler’s List, Shoah), novels, memoirs (Primo Levi, Charlotte Delbo, Art Spiegelman), commentaries, theoretical writings, and testimonies from Yale’s Fortunoff Video Archive.
FREN 4148 Jean de Léry’s Brazil (1578): The Birth of the Ethnological Gaze in Early Modern France
Dominique Brancher/Fre./ Th 9:25am-11:20am
How can we hear the voice of others, make them heard? Is the “indigenous” the object of discourse or can it be the subject of enunciation? This course focuses on the French construction and conceptualization of the country named “Brasil” in the early 16th century. Our itinerary will begin with Jean de Léry who, at the age of 22, embarked for Brazil, where he spent almost a year among the Tupinambás. 20 years after his return to France, in 1578, he published an account of this experience of otherness, anchored in his body and senses, while seeking to bring to life in the book the community that welcomed him. A bestseller throughout Europe, the book became a classic of modern anthropology. When Claude Lévi-Strauss visited Brazil, he was haunted by nostalgic memories of Léry: “the societies we can study today are no more than debilitated bodies and mutilated forms”. We examine the genesis of modern ethnology and anthropology, and their relationship to “literature”. Through topics such as cannibalism, sensuality, gendered gazes, animality, and the construction of the “good savage,” we will reflect on the intersecting issues of identity and alterity, past and present, near and far. Readings from Thévet, Montaigne, Diderot, Bougainville, Rousseau, and De Certeau will guide us. All discussions, assignments, and readings in French.
French language skills (spoken and written) sufficient to read texts and participate in discussions, even though the aim of the course is also to enable participants to improve their communication skills.
