France

From the lenses of cultural studies and gender studies, this course examines how fiction throughout various eras has treated, whether directly or indirectly, questions of seduction, femininity, masculinity, and the meaning of virility. It explores the manner in which political and ideological disruptions have modified the figure of the seducer and vamp, and how this is presented in various cultural productions of stories, novels, poems, frescoes, paintings, opera, film, television series, and video games. 

This course focuses on the history of writing, storytelling, and books. It begins with the first signs of writing known to man, then explores the evolution of the creation of writing and what is known as a book today. The course studies the different methods used to create written works and includes guided visits to the printing museum. The first part of the course focuses on the global history of writing, and the second part of the course concentrates on the history and evolution of writing in France.  

This course focuses on Martin Heidegger’s thoughts on technology as they developed post-war and increasingly became part of the French and European landscape. It examines Heidegger’s thoughts as well as those of others that debated in the 1940s and 1950s, including Adorno, Horkheimer, Hans Jonas and Arnold Gehlen; and current thinkers like Giorgio Agamben or Harmut Rosa. The course provides a critical reflection on technology, modernism, and the notion of progress.

This course presents a general overview of drugs (illegal and legal) in today’s society. It covers both classic and contemporary work around the sociology of drugs and actors in the world of drugs. The course explores drugs in modern societies, including the history of drugs, representation, diffusion, social dynamics, and drug control policies. It also investigates the drug economy: the organization of markets, petty dealing, networks, and national and international trafficking. Additional topics include uses and experiences, motivations, experimentation; the organization of care, therapeutic models, the theory of addiction, the philosophy of risk reduction, and the medicalization of drugs; alcohol as a national and legal drug, the social construction of good drinking, and binge drinking; and “new” addictions, such as gambling, pornography, and video games.

This course sheds light on the history of Liberalism through a comparison between Britain and France. It builds a step-by-step history of liberal movements, liberal ideas, and their contradictions, both through British political history and French history, to provide a better understanding of both historical debates and today's issues regarding the notion of Liberalism in context. The course questions the view of Britain as a country of successful liberalism and France as one of failed or incomplete liberalism. It addresses Liberalism and anti-liberalism at the crossroads of political history, intellectual history, and political philosophy.