French 341 - Topic: The Image of France

The relationship between colonizer and colonized is two-fold: on the one hand a visible, immediate (military, economic, and political) domination, and on the other, a more subtle, less visible (ideological) domination. These will be explored trough texts (literature and films) representing both the metropolitan and the native, from the colonizer's point of view.This course will discuss first how, through its writers and filmmakers, France projected itself onto the imagination of colonized Africans and second, how, in response, Africans appropriated the pen and the camera to convey their perception of their French experiences with the metropolitan Other.

Prereq: two of the following courses: French 215, 219, 225, or 230, or permission of department chair and course instructor