FREN 6100a / MDVL 5615a, Old French  R Howard Bloch

An introduction to the Old French language, medieval book culture, and the prose romance via study of manuscript Yale Beinecke 229, The Death of King Arthur, along with a book of grammar and an Old French dictionary. Primary and secondary materials are available on DVD. Work consists of a weekly in-class translation and a final exam comprised of a sight translation passage, a familiar passage from Yale 229, and a take-home essay. No previous study of Old French necessary, although a knowledge of French is essential. Conducted in English.
Th 9:25am-11:15am

FREN 6700b / ITAL 6570b / LING 5640b / SPAN 5000b, Principles of Language Teaching and Learning  Staff

Introduction to the basic principles of second-language acquisition theory, focusing on current perspectives from applied linguistics, sociolinguistics, and psycholinguistics. Topics include language teaching methodology, communicative and task-based approaches, learner variables, intercultural competence, and models of assessment.
HTBA

FREN 6900a, Contemporary French Literature in the Making  Morgane Cadieu

A survey of landmark contemporary novels coupled with a workshop. On the one hand, we read important twenty-first-century novels and narratives, discuss literary movements, genres, and trends, and explore contemporary literary life (media, prizes, publishing houses, literary quarrels). On the other hand, students are in charge of selecting and giving a presentation on a novel of their choice from the fall 2025 list of new releases. This way, we practice and compare different types of literary criticism, so as to acquire the tools to examine contemporary literature in the making. Graduate seminar taught in French. Seminar taught in French open to graduate students and to undergraduate students who completed at least one course in French in the 2000-4000 range
W 3:30pm-5:20pm

FREN 7000a / FREN 700 / HIST 6312a, Readings in Modern European Cultural History  Carolyn Dean

This seminar introduces students to the various lines of inquiry informing modern cultural history in the twentieth century, with an emphasis on interdisciplinarity and method.  the course asks how historians as well as scholars in other disciplines constitute culture as an object of inquiry and addresses different approaches to historicizing culture.  Its two main aims are to explore different themes in modern European cultural history and to investigate the different ways that scholars interpret the relationship between symbolic representation and historical change.
T 1:30pm-3:20pm

FREN 7610a / AFAM 5610a / AMST 6612a / ENGL 5761a, Caribbean Literary and Cultural Studies  Marlene Daut

This course examines eighteenth- and nineteenth-century writing (in translation, where applicable) by writers from the Anglophone, Francophone, and Hispanophone islands that make up the Caribbean. Haitian independence in 1804 ushered in a vibrant and diverse print culture that included poetry, plays, newspapers, and historical writing. From the pages of La Gazette Royale d’Hayti (1811–1820), to the poems of Jean-Baptiste Romane (1807–1858), to the historical writings of Louis-Félix Boisrond-Tonnerre (1776–1806), to the operas of Juste Chanlatte (1766–1828), there arose a distinct nineteenth-century literary culture in Haiti. Beginning with national literary developments in Haiti, this course expands to consider writing from Barbados, Cuba, Trinidad, Jamaica, Antigua, and Bermuda. These writings, both fictional and non-fictional, help us to think about whether and/or how a coherent early Caribbean literary tradition developed across geographical, linguistic, national, and imperial lines.
W 9:25am-11:15am

FREN 8120b / MDVL 6112b, The Old French Fable and Fabliaux  R Howard Bloch

A study of Marie de France’s 103 animal tales and some of the anonymous “Ysopets” as well as of the 170 comic verse tales whose veins of satire, parody, comedy of language, situation, character, and farce are at the root of the European comic tradition. We read the fables and the fabliaux against the background of twelfth- and thirteenth-century social, religious, and literary culture. Fables to be read in the bilingual (Old French and English) edition of Harriet Speigel and fabliaux in the recently published bilingual edition, with translations by Ned Dubin. Conducted in English.
TTh 2:30pm-3:45pm

FREN 8190b, Montaigne Beyond Skepticism: Learning to Read the Essais  Dominique Brancher

Que sais-je? What do I know? This is Montaigne’s motto, engraved on a medal in 1576 at the writer's request. At the crossroad of disciplines, this seminar explores how Michel de Montaigne develops a philosophy of doubt by literary means. We see that he does not naively or theoretically subscribe to the skeptical tradition, but rather proposes a practical and singular use of a non-judgmental attitude in the writing of Les Essais—the early modern masterpiece of the French literature of the self. We read essays on topics such as: idleness, education, eroticism, and imagination. These texts are coupled with short, theoretical excerpts (Sextus Empiricus, Diogène Laërce, Henri Estienne). Readings and discussion in French.
T 9:25am-11:15am

FREN 8980a / CPLT 8980a, Fin-de-siècle France  Maurice Samuels

The course examines major French literary and artistic movements of the last decades of the nineteenth century (Naturalism, Decadence, Symbolism) in their cultural context. Weekly reading assignments pair literary texts with contemporary theoretical/medical/political discourse on such topics as disease, crime, sex, poverty, colonialism, nationalism, and technology. Literary authors include Barbey, Mallarmé, Maupassant, Rachilde, Villiers, and Zola. Theorists include Bergson, Freud, Krafft-Ebing, Le Bon, Nordau, Renan, and Simmel. Some attention also paid to the visual arts. Prerequisite: reading knowledge of French.
Th 1:30pm-3:20pm

FREN 9650b / AFST 9965b / CPLT 7290b, On Violence: Politics and Aesthetics across the Maghreb  Jill Jarvis

This humanities laboratory investigates North African literary texts and other aesthetic works that document, theorize, and disrupt forms of state violence. How might these works—as well as our practices as humanities scholars, critics, curators, co-creators—run counter to state-sanctioned memory projects or compel rethinking practices of testimony, archiving, and justice in the face of enduring colonial occupation, institutionalized racism, and the state-sponsored violence that continues to take place on scales or in forms that are difficult to frame or fathom? Works by Fanon, Djebar, Kateb, Mechakra, Meddeb, Rahmani, Mouride, Hawad, Binebine, and many others. The seminar is an RITM Humanities Laboratory designed to cultivate new forms of collaborative and experimental humanities scholarship. See Canvas page for a more complete description. Conducted in English. Prerequisite: reading knowledge of French.
M 1:30pm-3:20pm

FREN 9700a or b, Directed Reading  Staff

By arrangement with faculty.
HTBA

FREN 9710a or b, Independent Research  Staff

“As previously approved”
HTBA