FRN 375I - French Inventions of Love, 3 credit hours

Prerequisite(s): FRN 202 or equivalent recommended.
Modern western love has often been said to have been invented in France in the 12th century. This class will explore the enduring association between love and French culture. How and why has a particular conception of passionate love become strongly associated with the French? How might love be understood as a cultural construct? What are some of the narratives and social discourses about love, desire, sex, and marriage which have emerged in France and how have they influenced cultural practices?

In this class we will study innovations in the theme of love in selected French works from the twelfth century to its echoes in the present. Students will gain practice in methods of literary and cultural analysis. Emphasis on the continuity and discontinuity of such thematic content as love and death, marriage and adultery, the state vs. the individual, public vs. private, and the nature of desire and sexuality. Special attention will be given to the intersection between love and the social and the extent to which the ideal of the couple is a form of utopia. Several films will be shown throughout the semester to illuminate the issues surrounding the politics of love in contemporary culture.