Department Overview
The Department of French and Italian offers a major in French and Francophone studies supported by an extensive and distinctive curriculum. In addition to curricula supporting the French major, the department offers courses in beginning Italian language. We strongly encourage students to continue their language study abroad in a variety of programs suited to their interests and level.
FRENCH
Cultural ties between France and America go back to the origin of the American republic, when Thomas Jefferson, Ben Franklin, and Thomas Paine borrowed and shared concepts with French revolutionaries to frame the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. Today, French and Francophone literature, philosophy, art and cinema continue to exert a powerful influence over students and intellectuals around the world. The legacy of French thought reaches back to Descartes, Rousseau, Bergson, Sartre, Camus, and Beauvoir and continues into the present, where the concepts of Derrida, Foucault, and Deleuze are indispensable to theory in the human and social sciences and real-world struggles related to race, nation, gender, class and the environment. Writers such as Assia Djebar, Tahar Ben Jalloun, and Maryse Condé, and cinéastes such as Jean-Luc Godard, Claire Denis, and OusmaneSembène have given world literature and film new faces and voices, while Médecinssans frontières has defined the concept of humanitarian aid beyond national boundaries.
In the image of this new, engaged, global community of Francophones, the French program offers students the opportunity to integrate classroom learning with study abroad in France, Senegal, and other countries, on-campus activities at La Maison Francophone and the Table Française, and opportunities to serve the broader community. The program is built on four integrated objectives: mastery of spoken and written French; acquisition of critical appreciation ofliterature written in French, and of French-speaking cinema; the study of culture through cultural analysis; awareness of the life-changing experience sentailed in the intellectual and personal challenges of learning a different way of being. We encourage majors to live in La Maison Francophone on campus, where they have the opportunity of immersion in the target language and culture in daily contact with native speakers. A state of the art language lab and a staff of experts help students develop their language skills and connect with French speakers around the world). The French program intersects with other major programs on campus, allowing students to combine with a major or minor in French their interests in History, Art History, Comparative Literature, Cinema Studies, Middle-Eastern and North African Studies, Economics, Politics, and other subject areas. Departmental advisors are available for consultation in organizing the major program. Lectures, discussion and written work in advanced courses are normally in French.
Study Away programs in Paris, Brussels, Rennes, Aix, Marseille, and Dakar offer many possibilities for studying while engaging in community service. (See a faculty member and student testimonials for more information on these programs.) The CIEE Center for Critical Studies program in Paris is an attractive option for students interested in literature, cinema, and philosophy. Oberlin's own bilateral exchange with the Institut d'études politiques deParis ("Sciences Po") allows students majoring in History, Economics, Politics, and other subjects to study at anelite grande école in Paris. The AUCP program in Aix and Marseille is attractive to those interested in cultural exchange between France and North Africa, including research trips to Morocco and study of the Arabic language. Winter Term projects, such as "Immigration Aid in Francophone Belgium," as well as the Dakar program allow students to combine community service with studying abroad. (See a faculty member and posters and student testimonials for more information.
ITALIAN
At present, students can enroll in beginning Italian (Ital. 101, offered in the Fall, and Ital. 102, offered in the Spring) and, upon consent of the instructor, can further pursue their interest in the subject by scheduling private readings whose subject will be agreed upon with the instructor.
Courses are designed to develop the students' ability to use Italian as a means of oral and written communication and to increase their understanding of Italian culture. For this reason, class instruction is supplemented by extracurricular activities such as La tavola italiana, a weekly meeting at lunchtime where the students can talk about Italy and Italian culture and further practice their Italian, or The Italian Movie Night, a weekly showing of an Italian movie that introduces the students to the tradition of Italian classic cinema and its most recent developments.
Students are also required to spend at least one hour a week in the Language Lab, where appropriate tapes and other interactive materials on Italy aid them in improving pronunciation and comprehension.
Curriculum Overview
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