French and Francophone Studies at Vassar College

Monday, October 26 at 5:00 pm in Rockefeller Hall, Room 200, Vassar College

Since the inception of the French republic, there has been a consistent claim to universalism as a foundation of civil society. Politicians and certain intellectuals in the fifth republic have cast France's republican model as one in competition with the so-called Anglo-Saxon multiculturalist model. However, this notion of a "universalist republic, " which only recognizes the individual at the discrepancy of any community within the nation, has visibly come under attack in the last decades of the twentieth century. In this light, this lecture will consider the 2003 film Chouchou, by Merzak Allouache and Gad Elmaleh, along with Rêves en France (a 2002 telefilm by Pascal Kané) to reflect on the contemporary historical moment, in which the debates about same-sex civil unions and the possibility of "gay marriage " has put into question the traditional understanding of what constitutes the Republic.

Generously sponsored by the Office of the Dean of the Faculty. Co-sponsored by the Departments of French and Francophone Studies, and Film, and International Studies and Women's Studies Programs.