FRN2706

Representing Paris: Literature and Visual Culture ( 6 points, SCA Band 1, 0.125 EFTSL)

Leader: Brian Nelson

Offered:
Not offered in 2006.

Synopsis: This interdisciplinary unit, ranging across literature, painting, photography, fashion and social history, will study symbolic representations of Paris in 19th-century writing (Baudelaire, Zola), painting (Manet, Degas), and early 20th century photography (Atget, Brassai, Cartier-Bresson); it will relate these representations to their historical contexts (the growth and metamorphosis of the city, the 'redevelopment' of Paris by Haussmann, the birth of the cultures of leisure and consumerism); it will examine the emergence of urban figures such as the flaneur, the dandy and the prostitute; and it will explore the analytical perspectives offered by the cultural theories of Walter Benjamin.

Objectives: Having completed this unit, students will: 1. Have developed a knowledge of some of the major symbolic representations of modern Paris across a range of literary and visual texts. 2. Understand broader, underlying structural changes in society that inform literary and visual representations of modern cities such as Paris. 3. Have explored the relationship between various literary and visual representations of the city and developed skills in analyzing and articulating the nature of this relationship.

Assessment: Essay (3,000 words): 60% + Test (1.5 hours, 1,500 words equivalent): 40%

Contact Hours: 1 x 1-hour lecture and 1 x 2-hour seminar per week

Prerequisites: A first year level unit in French Studies, Visual Culture, Comparative Literature and Cultural Studies, Drama and Theatre Studies, or English.

Prohibitions: FRN3706