This course features intensive work on French grammar, with emphasis on the acquisition of basic active skills (speaking, reading, writing and vocabulary building). We will be using a new multimedia program, Totem, which employs only authentic French, allowing students to use the language colloquially and creatively in a short amount of time. Three hours a week for explanation and demonstration, plus small sections with French assistants. This course prepares students for FREN 103. For students without previous training in French.

This course features intensive work on French grammar, with emphasis on the acquisition of basic active skills (speaking, reading, writing and vocabulary building). We will be using a new multimedia program, Totem, which employs only authentic French, allowing students to use the language colloquially and creatively in a short amount of time. Three hours a week for explanation and demonstration, plus small sections with French assistants. This course prepares students for FREN 103. For students without previous training in French.

Independent Reading Courses.

Fall and spring semester.  The Department.

(Offered as ENGL 481, FAMS 481, and ARHA 481.)  This seminar explores different ways of entering into conversations with experimental filmmakers.  Through weekly screenings, in-class visits by contemporary artists, and rigorous examinations of artists’ writings, interviews, and related theoretical texts, we will seek to develop critical and creative vocabularies through which to interact with an array of experimental films and videos.  We will ask:  What sorts of aesthetic, conceptual, and political keywords do contemporary filmmakers draw on to frame their artisti

(Offered as ENGL 478 and FAMS 478.)  Documentary’s difference from fiction is frequently understood in terms of its emphasis on the spoken word.  In documentary studies, voice, rather than point of view, is the standard parlance for describing the unique social perspective of a documentary film.  Voice is also the metaphor of documentary’s social mission:  some of the most influential histories of documentary are narrated as a history of giving--and having, or appropriating--the right to speak.