From the Union sacrée to trench warfare, these sources have been effective in introducing to one of the most formative events of twentieth-century France: World War One (or “The Great War” as it was called before there was a second).…
Delving into “les années folles” means talking about the trauma of rebuilding after the Great War, “les classes creuses” it caused and by extension, the pronatalist movement, a new silhouette for women’s fashion, Josephine Baker and the jazz clubs of Paris, surrealism… Below…
While living in France a few years ago, I found this old agenda in a pile of post-flea-market trash. Not knowing exactly what I had found, I picked it up along with some other books someone deemed no longer relevant.…
The Public Domain Review just put together this collection of images published as postcards for the 1900 World’s Fair. This would be a great source for discussing the turn of the 19th century (civilization/culture/society/technology) or for practicing the imperfect and…
Images Postcards from the Bowman Gray Collection at the University of North Carolina You can browse by country, name, or subject (includes photos and many caricatures as well, like the one on the left). Photos from the French site 1914-1918.fr. Texts…
Welcome to a new semester! I’m teaching a civilization class this spring and thought I’d share some of the ideas I’m using for course material. In this post I talked about using Gallica to find primary sources, and used the…
I was living in France in 1999-2000 when the millennium was all the rage. On the occasion of the turn of the new century (yes, a year early), I picked up a copy of a compilation CD called Les plus grandes…
Sometimes the objectives of a course require the viewing of a full-length film in class. For example, in a writing class I have used La Fille sur le pont (1999) and Vipère au poing (2004) as the basis for an…
Whether teaching a foreign language or using most students’ native tongue to discuss texts or other cultural productions, inciting discussion can be a surprisingly difficult task. Successful group discussions require both planning and flexibility to accomplish the goals you set…
Apply for an academic job and you may very likely be asked to provide a copy of your teaching portfolio. While “portfolio” suggests simply a folder of teaching-related materials, really it should be a much more connected collection of evidence…