BA French and Japanese / Course details

This unit examines how contemporary French artists, playwrights and authors have experimented with various media (radio, tape recorders, films, the Internet and YouTube) and platforms (festivals, museums, conferences, happenings), to invent new and sometimes destabilizing and daring art forms, art objects and creative practices. For instance, we will study how texts incorporate filmic or pictorial fragments. We will see how digital platforms invite artists and authors to reconsider the nature of writing. More importantly, we will ask ourselves how we respond to new forms of artistic expressions. Introductory lectures and seminars will examine key concepts such as ‘media’, ‘digital practice’, ‘artistic consumption’ and ‘performance’.  In the course of the semester, we will watch and analyze short video clips, theatrical performances and digital art.

All Ba (Hons) programmes with French 

• To familiarise students with key developments in French culture from a formal, social and political perspective. 
• To introduce students to the study of Media in order to enable the analysis of literary, visual and audio-visual artwork from modernity to the present day. 
• To provide an overview of the different issues of cultural representation;  
• To encourage and enable students to verbalise and intellectualise their emotional response to a wide range of practices. 

Week 1: Introduction to the study of Media

Weeks 2-3-4: New creative practices

Weeks 5-7-8: Contemporary theatre and performance

Weeks 9-10-11: New digital cultures

Week 12: revision sessions in preparation for exam

3 introductory lectures on media and performance analysis

3 x 1-hour lectures and 3 x 2-hour seminars on contemporary creative practices

3 x 1-hour lectures and 3 x 2-hour seminars on contemporary performance

3 x 1-hour lectures and 3 x 2-hour seminars on digital cultures

3 x 1-hour methodology workshops, one for each block

• Demonstrate knowledge and understanding of some of the major aspects of Contemporary related to media 

• Understanding digital culture in France today 

• Understanding the differences between genres and medias 

• Contextualise, analyze and discuss literary, visual and audio-visual material in a structured fashion.
• Apply critically terminology and conceptual frameworks derived from media studies.

• Demonstrate the ability to carry out individual research for coursework essays, and express ideas and arguments coherently and convincingly in time-limited constraints.
• Using an appropriate level of academic writing and exemplification.

• Demonstrate powers of analysis;
• manage word-count effectively when writing coursework;
• manage time effectively when writing in exam conditions; participate in seminars;
• work as part of a group;
• assess the relevance of existing literature through independent research;
• seek advice and feedback and develop confidence.

Resit Assessment:

Essay

Set texts

A selection of short texts

One play by either Jan Fabre or Romeo Castellucci

A selection of digital art pieces  

  
Secondary Readings:

Debray, Régis, Cours de médiologie générale (Paris : Gallimard, 1991).

Grafton, Anthony, La Page de l’Antiquité à l’ère Numérique (Paris : Hazan, 2015).

Lebel, Jean-Jacques, Poésie directe des Happenings à Polyphonix. Entretiens avec Arnaud Labelle-Rojoux et quelques documents (Paris Opus International, 1994)  

Bolter, Jay David and Richard Grusin, Remediation: Understanding the New Media (London, MIT Press, 2000)

Ruffel, Lionel and Olivia Rosenthal (eds), La littérature exposée. Les écritures contemporaines hors du livre, in Littérature, 2010, 4 (160).

Ruffel, Lionel and Olivia Rosenthal (eds), La littérature exposée 2, La littérature exposée 2, in Littérature, 2018, 4 (192).

Lehmann, Hans-Thies, Le théâtre postdramatique (Paris : L’Arche, 2002)