The transnational and open category of Asian Francophonie can inspire students who are language learners of French to contemplate their relationship with the language. Designed for those who are new to Diaspora Studies and Asian Francophone literature, this course introduces a wide range of personal trajectories, challenging the binary division between a mother tongue and a foreign language. Through close-readings of novels, essays, haiku, and experimental literature, students will analyze the correlation between transgressing generic expectations and the desire to overcome the challenge of narrating diasporic experiences. The syllabus includes writers based in France such as Dai Sijie, François Cheng, Shan Sa, and Linda Lê, as well as those in Canada including Ying Chen, Ook Chung, Kim Thúy, and Aki Shimazaki. It concludes with Theresa Hak Kyung Cha, an Asian American multilingual writer and artist. Materials also include their feature-length films, video art, calligraphy, and installation art to explore these artists' multi-media creativity in challenging conventional historical narratives.
This course is taught entirely in French. Written assignments, class discussions, and most readings will also be in French. Any student who has completed FREN 215 (with a minimum grade of B) or has placed out of FREN 215 through the placement test may sign up for this course. It is an advanced course intended for students who have not yet studied abroad in a French-speaking country.
Students who are not admitted to the course through pre-registration are strongly encouraged to submit an enrollment request and attend the first class.
This course will count as one course toward the French studies major and minor, the Romance Studies major, the COL major. It also fulfills the language requirement for the ARHA major and GEM (Global Engagement Minor). |