116-452 Welcome Unreason: French Critical Thought and its Dissidents

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Credit Points

Coordinator

Prerequisites

A major in French (Post-VCE French stream), or equivalent.

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Subject Description

French critical theory will be examined in the context of major movements and approaches to the study of texts: Structuralism, Deconstruction, Post-Modernism, Psychoanalysis and Feminism. Authors selected to represent each approach are seen as dissidents critiquing a particular tradition, for example Luce Irigaray on feminism critiquing the Cartesian tradition. Discourse is seen as problematic and systems which impose order considered suspect; the disruption of such conventions and the ensuing challenge to the structures of power is a major focus. The course comprises analysis of the radical readings of texts proposed in a selection of critical works and practical application of theory to a corpus of French literary texts. At the end of the subject, students should be able to: apply certain methods of criticism on literary texts taken from a range of genres; elaborate their own research project, applying literary criticism to a work of their choice.

Assessment

One class paper subsequently written up (3000 words) (40%); one essay (3000 words) in French (60%).

Prescribed Texts

• Barthes, S/Z. Paris, Seuil, 1970.
• Deleuze et Guattari, L'Anti-Oedipe. 1972.
• Derrida, Positions. Minuit, 1972.
• Henri-Lévy, L'Idéologie française. Grasset, 1981.
• Luce Irigaray, Speculum de l'autre femme. Minuit, 1974.
• Lyotard, La condition post-moderne. Minuit, 1979.
• Foucault, Histoire de la folie. 2nd ed., 1972.
• Todorov, Poétique ("Qu'est-ce que le structuralisme?"). Seuil, 1973.