Study Abroad Informed Teaching

Since I've been to France numerous times and have tons of photos of the most famous "rides" in the Disney version of the country, during my most recent trip (Jan 2018) with students I was determined to take meaningful photos. The two main criteria for being "meaningful" were 1) they captured an unusual visual detail and 2) they illustrate an important nuance of French culture.

Here are some key examples.

An ordinary bike rack at an unusual angle at the south entrance of the Jardin de Luxembourg.

A plaque commemorating a French soldier who died during WWII. He died in this spot. There are hundreds of plaques like this throughout the city and they are posted where real people died. It makes the history more meaningful when you realize someone died in the exact spot you are in.

Photos like this helped students relax a little in their foreign surroundings. We also talked a bit about the poses, the materials used, and why they were designed the way they were.

This advertisement will be perfect this fall in FREN 103. I love how the French have made "vegetable" into a verb to promote healthy eating. What does it say about French culture if huge posters like this are prominently displayed in the metro?

Louis XIV was known as the Roi Soleil and spread this imagery throughout Versailles.

The spiral staircase at the Arc de Triomphe. 

A chandelier at the Grand Trianon at Versailles.

                       

The Madeleine Church in Paris. The photo on the left shows a wedding there during the German Occupation in the 1940s. The guests are giving a Nazi salute. I took the photo on the right 74 years later.

A light fixture in Notre Dame, photo taken from below which gives it a haunted, ethereal quality.

Making faces at the Arc de Triomphe.

The steps at the Grand Trianon. 

                               

The ceiling of the Panthéon.

The floor of the Panthéon.

A wall at the Grande Mosquée de Paris. 

                                                  A door to the Grande Mosquée de Paris. 

Literary Awards

In my upper level survey of literature class this semester we studied excerpts from a wide range of French literature like lais, fables, poems, plays, short stories, and novels.

To wrap up the course the last day I asked students to think of a name for a new literary prize awarded by our class (ex: le PLUR, le Prix littéraire de l'Université de Rockford) and then sub-categories.

Here are some of the best examples the students came up with and their own nominees (without consulting their notes or books):

• Prix de la Société Malheureuse (Ourika wins for slavery, 2nd place goes to L'Amant for its depiction of statutory rape, Le Père Goriot for the arrivisme, Candide for the violence women endure)

 

• Prix de Tristesse (in the "love" category-Le Père Goriot, in the death category Huis Clos, in the happiness category [??] "Lettre à M. de Coulanges" by Madame de Sévigné)
• Prix "I" (the most improbable-Les hommes invisibles, the most innovative-L'Amant, the most immoral-Le Père Goriot)
• Prix Survie (in the impossible category-L'Amant, in the resilence category Cunégonde in Candide, in the problematic category Ourika)

We then voted and debated different nominees. It was a fun, collaborative, effective way to sum up everything we've worked on this semester.