All News

Professor of French Joseph Mwantuali presented a keynote address at a colloquium on the Democratic Republic of the Congo held Sept. 12-14 in Logan, Australia. He spoke at the invitation of Australian Conference Rally on Kongo, Inc. (ACroK), an Australia-based advocacy group.

In a recent article, Professor of French John C. O'Neal wonders how Jean-Jacques Rousseau, a great champion of radical individualism and authenticity, would have reacted to Facebook, one of our most prevalent forums today for talking about the self.

Under the name of France’s long-standing tradition of secularism, called laïcité, French law has restricted many Islamic religious practices in the last decade. These new laws, often dubbed Islamophobic by the international community, include banning the burqa and niqab in public spaces, forbidding headscarves in public schools and restricting public prayer. Victoria Lin ’15 examined the impact of these laws on Muslim identity through her Emerson Grant.

Although France legalized gay marriage last year, LGBT individuals in the country still feel marginalized. One contributing factor to this is the portrayal of homosexuality in the media, the topic Asad Javed '15, film and French double major, is spending the summer studying. He is working on the independent Emerson project, En Rose - The Depiction and Reception of Homosexuality in French Cinema, with Professor of French Martine Guyot-Bender.

Blasé, concierge, and faux pas, among many other words, have become so integrated into the English lexicon that we often forget their French origin. The process of adopting words from other languages has been common practice for centuries, and, in fact, English has more borrowed words than any other language. This stands in stark contrast with French, which prides itself on being a “pure” language. Brendon Kaufman ‘15 was awarded an Emerson Grant to research the use of Anglicisms in everyday French in Paris this summer.

Recipients of the 2014 Emerson Summer Grants were recently announced. Created in 1997, the  program was designed to provide students with significant opportunities to work collaboratively with faculty members, researching an area of interest. The recipients, covering a range of topics, are exploring fieldwork, laboratory and library research, and the development of teaching materials. The students will make public presentations of their research throughout the academic year.

Burgess Professor of French Roberta L . Krueger and Professor Emerita Jane H.M. Taylor (Durham University) have co-translated Antoine de la Sale’s fifteenth-century Middle French romance Le Petit Jehan de Saintré, which first appeared in manuscript in 1456.

Undertaking a time-honored tradition in French bibliography known as the état présent, Professor of French John C. O'Neal reviewed the past 15 years of Rousseau scholarship at the invitation of the editors of French Studies, published by Oxford University Press.

Associate Professor of French Cheryl Morgan contributed a chapter in La Littérature en bas-bleus. Tome II - Romancières en France de 1848 à 1870 and several entries in Dictionnaire universel des femmes créatrices.

Step Up to the Plate, the final film in the Tournées Festival, will be shown on Sunday, March 2, at 4 p.m., in the Bradford Auditorium, Kirner-Johnson Building. The screening is free and open to everyone; suggested donations of $3. to the Kirkland Art Center are welcome.