2024-2025 French Courses

French 1:  1 section: Zidouh @ 9L: In this course, emphasis will be on speaking and dialogue with your peers. You will learn to introduce your family and friends, share what your daily life looks like, talk about what you do for leisure. Your final assignment will be to do an oral presentation in French describing your home town. Does not serve to satisfy Distributive or World Culture Requirements.

French 2:  2 sections: Novak @ 11 and Zidouh @ 10: In this course, you will expand your possibilities of expression by learning how to use the past and future tenses, to say where you've been and where you're going. You will share childhood memories and exchange ideas about plans for your education and career. While building your vocabulary, you will deepen your cultural knowledge with introductions to multiple francophone countries around the world. Your final assignment will be to choose a francophone country and do an oral presentation for your peers on its history, geography, architecture, art or traditions. Does not serve to satisfy Distributive or World Culture Requirements.  Prerequisites: French 1 or qualifying placement through the French Placement Exam.

French 3:  3 sections:  Novak @ 12, McConnell @ 10 and Mefoude @ 11:  In this course, you will explore several themes of contemporary life and learn to discuss travel, technology and its influence, wellness and healthcare, and social relationships. Your final assignment will be to seek out information on a current issue facing a francophone country—the environment, racism, poverty, freedom of speech, immigration, the colonial past, religious conflicts—and present it to your peers through a medium of your choice: film, interview, blog, skit, music or poster. Does not serve to satisfy Distributive or World Culture Requirements.  Prerequisite: French 2, French 11, or placement through the French Placement Exam.  

French 11:  1 section:  McConnell @ 9L:  This 1-credit course is designed for students who have studied French for one to three years in high school, or those who have been exposed to French through family ties or have spent some time in a Francophone environment. It is also suitable for students with little or no knowledge of the French language, but who have a strong background in another Romance language (i.e. Spanish, Italian, Romanian, Portuguese, Catalan, and also Latin).  French 11 is an accelerated course that combines French 1 and 2 in one term, offering an exciting and fast-paced atmosphere in which to learn French. The course will have a web-based component, which, through cultural, grammar and multimedia learning activities, will complement face-to-face work and prepare students for in-class work. Students will learn to talk about familiar events in the present and the past, as well as formulate plans for the future. Weekly cultural videos will situate in context the grammatical content of the course, making it relevant and meaningful. Students will be actively engaged in a variety of creative written and oral activities that will help them develop their language skills. Upon successful completion of this course, students will be able to sign up for French 3 or apply for our French LSAs in Lyon or Toulouse. With the goal of facilitating the acquisition of the target language, this course will be conducted entirely in French.  Prerequisite-One year or equivalent of university level instruction in a Romance Language or Latin; or three high school years of instruction in a Romance Language or Latin; or native speaking proficiency in a Romance Language; or permission of instructor.

French 8:  2 sections:  Mefoude @ 12 and Sanders @ 10:  Exploring French Culture and Language expands on the skills acquired in the French language sequence (French 1, 2, 3) as well as offering a transition to French 10 and upper-division courses that call on strong foundations of cultural knowledge. This class introduces students to contemporary and historical French and Francophone societies by focusing on topics such as evolving political and regional identities, writing and literature in the expression of identity, gender relations, the role of the media, and the culture of daily life. Students expand their active use of French, refine communicative, reading, and writing strategies, and comprehensively review grammar. Course work includes active participation in class discussions, oral presentations, and regular reading and writing assignments in the areas of narrative and poetry, cinema, music, and journalism.  Prerequisite FREN 3, or equivalent preparation. -Dist:SOC; WCult:W. NRO eligible. 

Fren 10.24: The Outsiders @ 12-Sanders:  This course, an introduction to literature of French expression, is a survey of French literature that focuses on one topic: the role of the outsider. As we read texts from each period, we will discover which identities were marginalized, often in the form of prejudice against an individual based on their religion, sexuality or geographical origin. During the term, we will investigate cross-cultural romance, cultural practices, and the uneasy position of religious beliefs within a secular society.   This course satisfies the Fr 10 requirement for FSP's. Dist: W, INT and LIT. Prerequisites:  Fr 8. NRO eligible. 

French 22: Introduction to French Literature I: the Middle Ages and the Renaissance-LaGuardia @ 12:Medieval France - its art, architecture, technology, philosophy and literature - exerted an unparalleled influence throughout Europe. Studying the first texts written in French, as well as the manuscripts in which they circulated, will shed light on the nature of French culture. We will examine defining issues of the period: the transition from oral to written expression, the invention of printing, debates concerning the status of women, Renaissance humanism, scientific inquiry, religious reform and conflict. Texts may include La Chanson de Roland, Le Roman de la rose, Tristan et Iseut, and works by Marguerite de Navarre, François Rabelais, Michel de Montaigne, and others.  Prerequisite: A course in the FREN 10 series or permission of the instructor.  Dist:LIT; WCult:W. NRO eligible.

FREN 50.07 Baudelaire/Flaubert: Reading Modernity for Filth: St. Clair @ 10a: It is by a fortuitous, if strange, twist of literary fortune that two publications from the winter of 1857—both of which would later come to be regarded as uncontested masterworks of high modernism in the French literary canon—saw their authors hauled before Second Empire courts and put on trial for obscenity: Gustave Flaubert's Madame Bovary and Charles Baudelaire's Les Fleurs du mal. This course will pursue a perhaps inadvertent insight made during the trials against these two core figures in French – and world – literature: namely, that the so-called crimes (of shocking moral corruption, of prurience and obscenity, etc.) of which Baudelaire and Flaubert were accused have much to do with the formal complexity and aporias that one finds in their works. What one finds there, in other words, is less "filthy" material per se than a stylistics that opens up space for dangerously unruly sociocritical readings; that brings into visibility and legibility desires and subjectivities typically confined in the nineteenth century to the grisaille silencieuse of "History's" margins; and that seeks to bring out into representation repressed historical and political traumas occasioned by the "shocks" of modernity (Benjamin). One finds, in other words, in Baudelaire's poetry and in Flaubert's novels a distinct literary politics; a critical use of literature against the abuses of the present order of things.  Dist:LIT; WCult:W. NRO eligible.  Prerequisites:  A course in the French 10 series or permission of the instructor. 

FREN 70.02-Francophone Lit & Culture: Elhariry @ 2: New Directions in Francophone Literature and Culture--This course will involve the study of Francophone literature and culture outside Europe. This may include the cultural production of Africa, North Africa, the Middle East, the Caribbean, Québec, and Southeast Asia. The course will introduce students to writing, cinema, and music produced by misfits, outsiders, and figures marginal to France and the French republic of letters. Readings are accompanied by class visits by the authors whenever possible. The course has three main objectives:

1. To situate modern and contemporary francophone literary and cultural production within the context of an æsthetic history: Who and what are the precedents to today's books, cinema, and music?
2. To underscore that the French language is neither French, nor belongs to France: What makes a language so capacious, plastic, and malleable?
3. To enable and empower students to think, speak, and write freely and creatively in their own idiosyncratic version/vision of French: How can a foreign language be transformed into an intimate language?

These will be the principles guiding our explorations of some of the most exciting and provocative cultural production in French today. Readings may include texts by PNL, Françoise Vergès, Kaoutar Harchi, Elsa Dorlin, Abdelkébir Khatibi, Assia Djebar, David Diop, Laure Murat, Abdellah Taïa, Georges Henein, Edmond Jabès, Joyce Mansour, Habib Tengour, Abdelwahab Meddeb, Linda Lê, Hubert Aquin, Andrée Chédid, Nadia Tuéni, Aimé Césaire, Édouard Glissant, Maryse Condé, and Évelyne Trouillot. Prerequisites: A course in the FREN 10 series or instructor permission. Non-Western Cultures. Distributives:INT, LIT. NRO eligible.

FSP Paris:  Beasley-please reach out to Professor Beasley @ Faith.E.Beasley@dartmouth.edu with any questions.  

French 1:  2 sections: Zidouh @ 9L and Oliveira @ 10:  In this course, emphasis will be on speaking and dialogue with your peers. You will learn to introduce your family and friends, share what your daily life looks like, talk about what you do for leisure. Your final assignment will be to do an oral presentation in French describing your home town. Does not serve to satisfy Distributive or World Culture Requirements.

French 2:  2 sections: McConnell @ 9L and Mefoude-Obiono @ 10: In this course, you will expand your possibilities of expression by learning how to use the past and future tenses, to say where you've been and where you're going. You will share childhood memories and exchange ideas about plans for your education and career. While building your vocabulary, you will deepen your cultural knowledge with introductions to multiple francophone countries around the world. Your final assignment will be to choose a francophone country and do an oral presentation for your peers on its history, geography, architecture, art or traditions. Does not serve to satisfy Distributive or World Culture Requirements.  Prerequisites: French 1 or qualifying placement through the French Placement Exam.

French 3:  3 sections:  Oliveira @ 9L and 11 and Zidouh @ 10:  In this course, you will explore several themes of contemporary life and learn to discuss travel, technology and its influence, wellness and healthcare, and social relationships. Your final assignment will be to seek out information on a current issue facing a francophone country—the environment, racism, poverty, freedom of speech, immigration, the colonial past, religious conflicts—and present it to your peers through a medium of your choice: film, interview, blog, skit, music or poster. Does not serve to satisfy Distributive or World Culture Requirements.  Prerequisite: French 2, French 11, or placement through the French Placement Exam.  

FR FYS 7.08 Colonial Cures: Medicine and Power in the French Empire: Mefoude @ 2:  This course explores the complex intersections of medicine, power, and colonialism within the French empire – specifically in Africa and the Caribbean.  We will examine how health and healing practices shaped—and were shaped by—colonial encounters. Our investigations will range from the microscopic world of sleeping sickness parasites to the broader landscapes of medical philanthropy.  We will use writing to investigate the role of medicine to cure, control bodies and minds, assimilate cultures, and experiment in the colonies. In this discussion seminar, we will work collaboratively to improve your writing and thinking, you will learn to examine and refine your own ideas and form strategies for making a convincing analysis.  We will examine feature films, documentaries, archives, fiction, peer-reviewed articles, and other writings by anthropologists, medical practitioners, and journalists. You will write and revise two essays and one research paper scaffolded around a conference proposal, an annotated bibliography, and a short presentation of a prospectus in class. We will also be conducting in-class writing workshops and peer review exercises so that you will receive feedback from me and your classmates.  

FR FYS 7.06:  Paris in Literature and Film: Kane @ 2a: In the Western imagination, the idea of the city of Paris is almost always linked to romance.  While couples dream of future Parisian honeymoons or vacations, in reality, living and becoming in the "city of love" are a good deal more complicated than the romanticized version with which we are so familiar.  What does it mean to live in Paris, to have a "Parisian" identity?  In what ways might history (the trauma of World War II, for example, or the French wars of decolonization) play a role in the construction of these identities?  What roles do gender, culture, immigration, and economic status play in incubating these identities in this particular, almost mythically idealized place?  Through analyses of texts by writers and directors who have lived in, loved, and sometimes even hated Paris, we will discuss the ways in which the spaces of the city participate to a certain extent in the formation of the people who exist in them, and the relationships among those people, who are shaped by memories linked to these spaces in a multiplicity of ways. How can we begin to reconceive the myth of what Paris is in our collective imagination to better understand the reality of the lived experiences of people in the city and its surrounding suburbs?  Ernest Hemingway, in A Moveable Feast, writes: "If you are lucky enough to have lived in Paris as a young man, then wherever you go for the rest of your life it stays with you, for Paris is a moveable feast."  A moveable feast, certainly; but an extremely complex one.  Works may include writings by Gary, Modiano, Colette and Baudelaire, and films directed by Varda, Doucouré and Truffaut.   

French 8:  1 section: McConnell @ 10: Exploring French Culture and Language expands on the skills acquired in the French language sequence (French 1, 2, 3) as well as offering a transition to French 10 and upper-division courses that call on strong foundations of cultural knowledge. This class introduces students to contemporary and historical French and Francophone societies by focusing on topics such as evolving political and regional identities, writing and literature in the expression of identity, gender relations, the role of the media, and the culture of daily life. Students expand their active use of French, refine communicative, reading, and writing strategies, and comprehensively review grammar. Course work includes active participation in class discussions, oral presentations, and regular reading and writing assignments in the areas of narrative and poetry, cinema, music, and journalism.   Prerequisite FREN 3, or equivalent preparation. Degree Requirement Attributes-Dist:SOC; WCult:W. NRO eligible. 

FREN 10.23: The French Atlantic: Sanders @ 12 This course, introduction to French literature, is a survey of French literature that focuses on one topic: the Atlantic world. As we read texts from each period, we will discover different versions of the Atlantic world, one that exists between many French Atlantic spaces: Caribbean, North American, African, and European. Across these representations, the Atlantic exists as a prism through which authors investigate cross-cultural romance, cultural practices, and the relative notions of beauty. The Atlantic also emerges to prominence during France's first empire. Before the eighteenth century, the Mediterranean, as an imaginary space of empire and cross-cultural contact, eclipses the Atlantic. As the first and then the second French Empire grows, the Atlantic world takes on a stronger presence in the French imaginary.    This course satisfies the Fr 10 requirement for FSP's. Dist:LIT; WCult:W.

FREN 23 The Power of the Past: France's Revolutionary Grand Siècle and Enlightenment: Beasley @ 2a: It is impossible to go anywhere in France today and not encounter evidence of France's powerful presence on the world stage in the 17^th and 18^th centuries.  Versailles, scientific advances, the Encyclopédie, the Enlightenment philosophers, Molière, Voltaire, Marie Antoinette, Louis XIV, gastronomy, and the Revolution are among the people, places, and things that have left indelible traces on French culture and continue to influence how France sees itself as well as how the world views France.  In this course we will examine this creative and turbulent period of French history and its continuing influence on French thought as well as the world's imagination, as evidenced by the many films devoted to the period.  Why do we still find this world so fascinating?  How is the memory of the past reconstructed in and for the present? No X-hour!  Dist:LIT; WCult:W.

FREN 52/XL w/AAAS 67.07:#Not So EMILY IN PARIS!/Women Stories of Migration: Larose @10a: Through a series of Francophone literary texts and films, this course examines how contemporary female writers, filmmakers and artists respond to the migration, immigration, and displacement of peoples today. From the written and the visual materials, students will consider how women such as Fatou Diome, Marie NDiaye, Kim Thúy among others address the range of critical issues and factors contributing to displacement, particularly under conditions of poverty, uneven development, competition for resources, political instability, violence, and natural disasters. The course gives participants an opportunity to participate in current immigration debates whether it is the Syrian refugee crisis, the Mexican Border crisis, Haitian TPS status, the Haitian migrants' mistreatment at the Texas border or the current Afghan relocation project. Prerequisite: A course in the FREN 10 series or permission of the instructor. This course will be taught in English with a required Xhour in French for major or minor credit. DIST: NW and INT and LIT. 

FREN 55.07 XL with HIST 47.02:  Novak @ 3a-Propaganda and Public Opinion from Napoleon to World War II-This course proposes to study the political tools used by Napoleon to control public opinion as he enacted his vision of the French nation after the Revolution. Posing as the incarnation of Enlightenment values and acknowledging public opinion as a source of his political legitimacy, Napoleon reinvented state propaganda. We will try to trace back some of his major philosophical influences, examine state-controlled newspapers and espionage.  Napoleon's failure to control German public opinion in Europe engendered the leitmotiv of German humiliation, which became a recurring basis of conflict in Europe during the 19th and 20th centuries.  W; SOC. NRO eligible. 

French 78: Senior Major Workshop: Methods in Reading, Writing and Cultural Analysis:  Sanders at 3a: As part of this culminating experience, each major will work on an independent project, either a senior thesis or expanding upon work begun in a previous course. The independent project will be developed within the framework of this course using a selection of critical texts that can be viewed as models of literary, cultural, and historical analysis. Lectures by a variety of faculty members will supplement the readings. Students will gain mastery in literary and cultural analysis, close analytical reading skills and composition in French. The course is open only to French and Italian Department senior majors or by petition, which is due by the fifth day of classes of Fall term.  Students are awarded one course credit for successful completion of this course. At the discretion of the instructor, a student may opt to do additional work over two terms. In this arrangement, students register for FREN-078 and receive a grade of "ON" (ongoing) at the end of the first term.  Students do not register for the subsequent term. A final grade will replace the "ON" at the end of the subsequent term at which time the coursework must be completed.  Dist:LIT; WCult:W

LSA+ Toulouse:  Elhariry-please reach out to Professor Elhariry with any questions-yasser.elhariry@dartmouth.edu

FSP Paris:  Tarnowski-please reach out to Professor Tarnowski with any questions-andrea.tarnowski@dartmouth.edu

French 08: Elhariry @ 11.  Practice in the active use of the language combined with an introduction to major aspects of French society. Each week students will write papers and participate in discussions based on books, articles, and films emphasizing social and historical concepts.  NRO eligible. 
Dist:SOC; WCult:W

Prerequisite: Completion of FR3 or exemption from FR3

FRIT 37.30 @ 12:-Elhariry:  FQZ Feminist Queer Zones: Provides in-depth study of the exceptional richness of feminist and queer traditions in global francophone cultures. From nineteenth-century revolutionaries to first-wave feminists; from reproductive rights and women's suffrage to the explosive intersectionality of race, capitalism, post/colonialism, and feminism; readings by Louise Michel, Simone de Beauvoir, Monique Wittig, Anne Garréta, Françoise Vergès help us understand sexuality, gender, and identity as they evolve over time and across historical, political, and sociocultural formations.  World Culture-Culture Identity. Distributives:  INT, TMV.  NRO eligible. 

French 01: 2 sections Zidouh @ 9L and Kane @ 9L-In this course, emphasis will be on speaking and dialogue with your peers. You will learn to introduce your family and friends, share what your daily life looks like, talk about what you do for leisure. Your final assignment will be to do an oral presentation in French describing your home town. Does not serve to satisfy Distributive or World Culture Requirements.

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French 02: 2 sections Mefoude @ 10 and McConnell @ 9L-In this course, you will expand your possibilities of expression by learning how to use the past and future tenses, to say where you've been and where you're going. You will share childhood memories and exchange ideas about plans for your education and career. While building your vocabulary, you will deepen your cultural knowledge with introductions to multiple francophone countries around the world. Your final assignment will be to choose a francophone country and do an oral presentation for your peers on its history, geography, architecture, art or traditions. Does not serve to satisfy Distributive or World Culture Requirements.  Prerequisites: French 1 or qualifying placement through the French Placement Exam.

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French 03: 3 sections Novak @ 11 and Oliveira @ 9L & 10-In this course, you will explore several themes of contemporary life and learn to discuss travel, technology and its influence, wellness and healthcare, and social relationships. Your final assignment will be to seek out information on a current issue facing a francophone country—the environment, racism, poverty, freedom of speech, immigration, the colonial past, religious conflicts—and present it to your peers through a medium of your choice: film, interview, blog, skit, music or poster. Does not serve to satisfy Distributive or World Culture Requirements.  Prerequisite: French 2, French 11, or placement through the French Placement Exam.  

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French 11: 1 section McConnell @ 10-This 1-credit course is designed for students who have studied French for one to three years in high school, or those who have been exposed to French through family ties or have spent some time in a Francophone environment. It is also suitable for students with little or no knowledge of the French language, but who have a strong background in another Romance language (i.e. Spanish, Italian, Romanian, Portuguese, Catalan, and also Latin).  French 11 is an accelerated course that combines French 1 and 2 in one term, offering an exciting and fast-paced atmosphere in which to learn French. 

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French 08: 2 Sections Zidouh @ 11 and Novak @ 2.  Practice in the active use of the language combined with an introduction to major aspects of French society. Each week students will write papers and participate in discussions based on books, articles, and films emphasizing social and historical concepts. 
Dist:SOC; WCult:W. Prerequisite: Completion of FR3 or exemption from FR3. NRO eligible. 

French 10.08: "Living in Paris/Habiter Paris." LaGuardia @ 12  Living in Paris has generated an enormous amount of writing since the middle ages. This course will examine diverse narrative, poetic, propagandistic, memorial, historical, and anthropological texts that describe the difficulties and the joys of living in the French capital. Works by Perec, L'Estoile, Prévost, Baudelaire, Mercier, Sue, Balzac, Augé, Modiano, Colette, Barthes, Gary, Duras, and others. Prerequisite:  French 8 or permission of instructor. Dist: LIT; WCult: W.  NRO eligible.

French 21: Introduction to Francophone Literature and Culture--Souvenirs d'enfance:  Larose @ 11: "All grown-ups were once children ... but only few of them remember it." ― Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, The Little Prince.  This seminar will center on the ways in which authors reminisce about their childhoodliving in Europe, Africa, Asia, and the Caribbean. Subjects are shaped, in part, by public policy, education, and disasters, for example, their lives sometimes impacted by war and dictatorship. We will pay particular attention to issues of language, migration, sexuality and how identities are informed by race, class, gender, and ability. This course is designed to acquaint students with literary works from authors like Georges Perec, Maryse Condé, Abdellah Taïa, Kim Thúy, Ananda Devi, Patrick Chamoiseau, Gaël Faye among others.  Prerequisites French 8; World Culture: NW; Distributives LIT. NRO eligible. 

FREN 53.07 Confrontations with Death in the French Tradition: Kritzman @ 10a:  Through readings of essays, plays, philosophical texts and fiction, we will examine the relationship of death to the history of French culture and the philosophical traditions it embodies since World War II. Issues to be discussed include separation and loss, mourning and melancholia, terrorism, the absurd and the death of God, and the difficulty of representing death. What does non-being signify and how can one describe it? Texts will be drawn from Camus, Sartre, Beauvoir, Beckett, Derrida, Malraux, Blanchot ,Kristeva, Cixous and Perec.  Prerequisite: A course in the FREN 10 series or permission of the instructor.  Dist:TMV; WCult:W.  NRO eligible.