The idea of France as a “one and indivisible” promoted through the mythologies of the monarchy and the Republic has always been challenged by the reality of a France founded upon a series of perdurable divisions. Division – often duality - is already a French characteristic in the story of France’s foundation: think of the Romans conquering the Gauls and later the Franks conquering the Gallo-Romans. These same dualities continue to shape cultural identity to this day. From the notion of the friendly Mediterranean versus the reserved Parisian to the more objective linguistic differences between the Langue d’Oïl and the Langue d’Oc, modern French culture bears the traces of these original divisions. And of course a whole new set of divisions haunt the Republic today.
In this course we will use a collection of lectures, films, video clips and short readings to trace some of the ideologies and institutions, past and present, that have served to unify and divide France and the French. Our topics will be religion and religious conflict; the rise and decline of absolute monarchy and court culture; the French Revolution; the proletariat and class division; colonialism, anti-Semitism, and secularism; the traumatic experience of war in the twentieth century, and the present-day legacies of colonialism, sexual and racial discrimination.