FFS 355 - Cross Currents in French Culture

Semester Offered: Fall
1 unit(s)

Topic for 2022/23a: French and Francophone Worlds of Science Fiction. Voyage to the moon, dine on smoke, and pay your tab with poems. Take a first-class trip with engaging insect mathematicians. Dive deep with prehistoric monsters, taking refuge in the center of Earth. This course explores the world of French and Francophone science fiction from the seventeenth century to the present day. We examine how science-fiction writers imagine nearby and far-off worlds, and how their works are read and used in different cultural contexts, whether as satirical critiques of social institutions, vehicles to convey themes of tolerance or cultural relativism, or tools to advance radical political ends. We examine when, how and why science fiction may translate into utopian scenarios in some works and dystopian ones in others. Studying how, through the ages, science fiction has portrayed the future allows us to observe the different ways in which the genre engages with political, imperial, nationalistic or colonialist concerns of the day. These texts also give us insight into the debates around burning/important societal questions informed by feminism, urbanism, ecology (cli-fi) and posthumanism. Genres considered include novels, short stories, film, BDs, as well as travel documents, political discourses, AI, and architecture. Authors include: Cyrano de Bergerac, Voltaire, Jules Verne, J.-H. Rosny, Chris Marker, Luc Shuiten, Tristan Garcia, and Mathieu Bablet. Thomas Parker.

One 2-hour period.

Course Format: CLS