Voyage Et Litterature En France / Travel and Literature in France

Wedi cwblhau'r modiwl dylai'r myfyrwyr fedru:

1. Read and interpret travel literature, with an awareness of the generic and historical characteristics of these types of texts.
2. Conduct basic level research in the field of travel studies, locating source texts and secondary literatures; reading critically secondary literature.
3. Understand short texts of secondary literature within the field.
4. Be familiar with the changing relationship between France and the “outer world” during the 16th-20th centuries.
5. Express themselves clearly both in speaking and in writing.

This module will approach the various forms of writing a travel experience in 16th-20th century France. Travel literature was among the most important forms of reading in the early modern and modern period. During this period, most people were not in a position to travel themselves, thus their reading of travelogues was their main source of information about the world.

In the second half of the 20th century, some (like Marc Augé) suggested that with the disappearance of the ‘other’ and the rise of the ‘same’, travel and travel literature would disappear. Others criticized Augé’s ‘apocalyptic fallacy’ and pointed at the numerous forms of expression, occasionally stepping beyond the purely textual, through which travel writing was able to renew itself

The module will offer first of all a theoretical knowledge of the particularities of travel as a text in various periods; its changing relationship to notions such as “truth” and “authorship”; changing ideas about its value as a form of “polite entertainment” and/or a crucial source of information. From the 19th century, we see new directions – on the one hand, an increased level of individualism expressed through travels; on the other, travels into other lands becoming expressing ‘humanitarian/humanist’ values. Parallel to this, students will study the changing relationship between France and the various destinations studied during the mobility, through the mirror of travel, and this publicized personal experience

The aim of this module is to study the variety of possible links between forms of travel and their literary expression from the 16th to the 21st century. After a general introduction and an overview of the literature of the ‘art of travel’ (whether travel is desirable, and under what conditions), the organizing principle of the module is geography. Each destination will be studied through a selection of texts, illustrating the roles these specific travel practices, as well as the changes within the perception of a country, expressed via these texts, played in the contemporary imagination, as well as to posterity.

Module aims:
One of the main objectives of the module is to provide students both with a general knowledge about travel as social and intellectual practice and travel literature as form of writing and (possibly) a genre. The second, equally important goal is to provide an ‘introduction to research’, to raise students’ curiosity and foster independent thinking, and to equip them with a wide range of critical reading and analytical skills related to travel as a social practice and as a text.

The module will assess a variety of questions related to the field of travel literature. Questions discussed may include:

- discourses related to to specific destinations (i.e. French narratives of travel to various parts of the British Isles; Orientalism and French discourses of North Africa; France and the Americas etc.)
- gender and travel
- theories of travel and of travel writing
- travel and its impact on local communities ('travellees')
- travel and modernity
- the 'Other' and the 'Same' in travel writing

Mae'r modiwl hwn yn cydymffurfio a FfCChC Lefel 6