FREN 442 - France from the Renaissance to the 17th Century

What were the important facts happening during this period in France? What are the movements in art, history, philosophy and literature that influenced the everyday life of women, children, and men during this time? What pleased the people, the court, the king? More than understanding events as explanatory reports attached to an historical timeline, we will analyze supporting media that configure the events and view the formalized representations that they induced. The facts themselves sometimes are less important than the system of textual representation which recorded the phenomenon. We will adopt complementary perspectives; taking into account the events and its media representation on one hand and review the forms of writing claiming historical testimony on the other hand. How can we deduce the evolution or non-evolution of the role of the women during these periods? What is the conception of raising kids, or a king? What are the different representations of the economy or the war during these periods? What is the concept of the ”other” in those centuries? How do the explorations influence the court, the socio and economic system? How is the daily life conducted? How is the concept of ”human” taken into account? How will it affect the centuries after? We will center our attention in questioning these facts relative to the affirmation of monarchical power (acts of wars, Newspapers, compte-rendus, philosophical treaties, diaries of kings or writers, maps, invasions, explorations, plays, diagrams, etc.) discuss their impact on the economic, sociological issues and intellectual trends of the period. We will also study the complex problem of the construction of the political, intellectual and sociological events and examine their interpretations through the study of texts, archives, films, chronicles, travel logs, exemplary stories, critics of the times, archived commentaries, debates, class discussions an d 3 visits outside Macalester (visits to MIA and visits to James Ford Library Special Collections). Taught in French. Prerequisite(s): FREN 306 . Offered occasionally. (4 Credits)