Francophone Cultures I
A.Y. 2023/2024
Learning objectives
Through a transdisciplinary approach, the course aims to give the students an extensive knowledge of the cultural practices in the main French-speaking areas. To this purpose, various media (literary texts, critical texts, images, videos) will be used to understand the cultural and transcultural dynamics set up in those areas.
Expected learning outcomes
The ability, through specific critical tools, to understand, analyse and compare different cultural phenomena, sociological dynamics of relationship, intercultural and transcultural connections. More specifically, the student should get a wider vision of the multiple diversity of contemporary society and develop possible answers to the issues that will arise during this socio-cultural research.
Lesson period: First semester
Assessment methods: Esame
Assessment result: voto verbalizzato in trentesimi
Single course
This course can be attended as a single course.
Course syllabus and organization
Single session
Responsible
Lesson period
First semester
Course syllabus
Title:
Great Voices from the South: the politics of the poetic words.
In 1959, the Second Congress of Black Writers and Artists was held in Rome, attended by the intelligentsia of the day. In 1963, Martin Luther King spoke the famous phrase "I Have a Dream" in Washington. Sixty years later, in the era of #blacklivesmatter, this course will examine what remains of the hopes of this generation of intellectuals from the French-speaking world (Black Africa, North Africa, the Indian Ocean, and the Americas). These voices of poets and scholars find common ground in their political resistance, relationship with the French language, universal questioning, and ability to break "the chains of all prejudices," be they racial, social, or economic. The study of their aesthetics and cultural and political theories will be accompanied by the reading and commentary of literary texts and by listening to recordings of French-speaking poets from the South, made in the past on the initiative of Notre Librairie and Radio France Internationale (RFI).
Part I (20 h, 3 CFU):
Great Voices from the South. The poets
Part II (20 h, 3 CFU):
Great Voices from the South. The the essayists.
Great Voices from the South: the politics of the poetic words.
In 1959, the Second Congress of Black Writers and Artists was held in Rome, attended by the intelligentsia of the day. In 1963, Martin Luther King spoke the famous phrase "I Have a Dream" in Washington. Sixty years later, in the era of #blacklivesmatter, this course will examine what remains of the hopes of this generation of intellectuals from the French-speaking world (Black Africa, North Africa, the Indian Ocean, and the Americas). These voices of poets and scholars find common ground in their political resistance, relationship with the French language, universal questioning, and ability to break "the chains of all prejudices," be they racial, social, or economic. The study of their aesthetics and cultural and political theories will be accompanied by the reading and commentary of literary texts and by listening to recordings of French-speaking poets from the South, made in the past on the initiative of Notre Librairie and Radio France Internationale (RFI).
Part I (20 h, 3 CFU):
Great Voices from the South. The poets
Part II (20 h, 3 CFU):
Great Voices from the South. The the essayists.
Prerequisites for admission
Ability to understand specific themes and motifs of Francophone literature with appropriate analytical methods and tools. Students who have never attended a Francophone literature course are advised to read the following essay: Dominique Combe, Les littératures francophones, Paris, P.U.F., 2010.
Teaching methods
A workshop approach will be favored that encourages an active learner attitude towards knowledge based on curiosity and challenge rather than a passive attitude.
Teaching Resources
Part I:
1) Poésie, grandes voix du Sud, in "Cultures Sud" n°164, January-March 2007 (extracts downloaded from Ariel).
2) "Materiali" for download (Ariel platform)
Part II
1) Eboussi Boulaga Défaites et utopies, in Politique africaine 2021/4 (no. 164), online: https://www.cairn.info/revue-politique-africaine-2021-4.htm?contenu=sommaire
2) 'Materiali' for download (Ariel platform)
Non attending students:
Students who do not attend the course in person must study the following two texts (in Italian or French) in addition to the others:
Franz Fanon, Les damnés de la terre (I dannati della terra, Torino, Einaudi, 2000).
Edouard Glissant, Introduzione a una poetica del Diverso, Roma, Meltemi.
1) Poésie, grandes voix du Sud, in "Cultures Sud" n°164, January-March 2007 (extracts downloaded from Ariel).
2) "Materiali" for download (Ariel platform)
Part II
1) Eboussi Boulaga Défaites et utopies, in Politique africaine 2021/4 (no. 164), online: https://www.cairn.info/revue-politique-africaine-2021-4.htm?contenu=sommaire
2) 'Materiali' for download (Ariel platform)
Non attending students:
Students who do not attend the course in person must study the following two texts (in Italian or French) in addition to the others:
Franz Fanon, Les damnés de la terre (I dannati della terra, Torino, Einaudi, 2000).
Edouard Glissant, Introduzione a una poetica del Diverso, Roma, Meltemi.
Assessment methods and Criteria
The oral exam (in Italian) will consist of an interview to verify the skills and knowledge acquired.
Educational website(s)
Professor(s)