Course Offerings by term

Examines how experiences of Paris have been committed to the page from the first century to the present. Considers the uses and effects of overviews, street-level accounts, and underground approaches to describing the city and its inhabitants. Includes visits to the sewers and museums, revolutionary sites and archives, with multiple members of the comparative literature faculty speaking on their areas of expertise.

This course aims to introduce students to the different arrondissements of the city of Paris and its immediate suburbs, their most unusual and secret aspects but also the most mundane by immersing them in the worlds of Doisneau, Cartier-Bresson, Atget, Kertész, Miller, Weiss, Lartigue, Newton, Klein, and other photographers. Tender and nostalgic icons of the popular Paris of Doisneau, darker and ambiguous visions of the nocturnal Paris of Brassaï and Kertész, historical representations of major events such as the Second World War or May 68, ideological images linked to the French colonial Empire and to decolonial movements, more modern images of Paris and its diverse and multicultural suburbs, images of photojournalism from the 2015 attacks...: these multiple and contradictory facets will encourage students to explore the city, to immerse themselves in its history and diverse culture. Through the photographs of these artists as well as literary or critical texts, students will discover the intimate faces of Parisians, their gestures, their habits, their values, their dreams, their disappointments, their fears. Students will measure the impact of the major historical events of the 20th century on their lives and will analyze urban transformations from the end of the 19th century to the present day.

This course reviews basic and complex sentence patterns in greater depth through discussions on students experience in Paris. Cultural and historical aspects of the French life are introduced. Students will learn additional vocabulary to express opinions, beliefs, doubts and emotions, and are shown various language registers (formal/informal vocabulary and structures) and intonations. Examples are taken from real life situations, film, television, newspaper articles, etc.The four language skills (listening, reading, speaking, writing) will be reinforced.

This high intermediate course will allow students to reach the B1+ CEFR (DELF) competencies by reinforcing and expanding their ability to express themselves, defend an opinion, and debate with others. Special attention is paid to increasing students' ability to form complex sentences to express attitudes, wishes, necessity, doubt, emotions, to link ideas and to speculate. A B1.1 level in French or a passing grade in a French and Culture IV class (FR 2100) is required.

Spontaneously and through active workshops and discussion, they will react and express their point of view on contemporary subjects and questions, such as access to knowledge (university or other) for all, the gaze on information at a time of “fake news” and the over-multiplication of distribution channels (Internet, social networks, etc.), the representation of so-called “visible” minorities in the media sphere, or the consequences of global warming on countries and their inhabitants...

Through learning that is both individual and collective, debates on ideas based on their past and current experiences in and out of class, but also a constant questioning of their representations, students will thus be encouraged to develop, in addition to their linguistic and cultural skills, their critical thinking and to better understand contemporary issues.