Honors in Paris - Spring Term 2009

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• Download the flyer (pdf)
• Download the Advisement Form (pdf)
• Download the Scholarship Application (pdf)) - Available Soon
• Download the 2008 Program Scrapbook/Activities (pdf)

A partnership between the UF's Honors Program and the Paris Research Center offers the opportunity for high achieving students to enroll in challenging, interactive courses, enhanced by excursions, guest speakers, and tours. The curriculum is tailored for high-caliber students who are enthusiastic about living in France with Paris as their classroom. In addition to intensive studies of Modern French Culture taught by distinguished UF faculty members, students will participate in activities including a week-long trip (location TBA), lectures by esteemed guest speakers, group dinners, a wine tasting, concerts, and excursions to other areas of France. You will also be able to take advantage of an array of weekly activities designed by native Parisian students to provide an insider's view of Paris for students. Classes are held at the UF Paris Research Center, located in Columbia University's Reid Hall, an innovative center for American academic life in the heart of Paris.

This program is open to students from all majors and the courses are conducted in English; you do not have to speak French to attend. Priority will be given to students in the Honors Program, but all students with a 3.0 GPA or above are encouraged to apply.

This is a UF sponsored UFIC program so the credits you earn will satisfy major, minor and university requirements while living and studying in Paris with top UF professors. Bright Futures scholarships will cover the tuition for the courses in which you are enrolled.

For more information, please contact the John Denny, Interim Director of the Honors Program (jdenny@honors.ufl.edu), Dr. Gayle Zachmann, Director of the Paris Research Center (paris-research@clas.ufl.edu), or Dr. Martin McKellar of the UF International Center (mmckellar@ufic.ufl.edu).

Honors in Paris 2009 Program Theme:
Power and Image: Engagements with Modern France

Instructors & Courses:

• Photographing Paris: An Introduction to Photography Through History & Practice
  (ART 2930C, 3897C, 4930C, 3 credits)
  Professor Sergio Vega
• Strategic Communications in France as a Reflection of Society and Culture
  Intensive Module Course
  (PUR 4392, 3 credits)
  Professor Juan-Carlos Molleda
• Poetics, Power, and the French Avant-Gardes
  (FRT 4956, 3 credits)
  Professor Gayle Zachmann
• Beginning French
  (FRE 1182, 3 credits)
• Let Them Eat Cake? Art in the Age of Marie Antoinette
  (ARH 4930, 3 credits)
  Professor Melissa Hyde

Students may also choose to take French Language courses (FRE 1182 or higher) and Independent Studies, depending on their needs & interests.

Course descriptions 2009

Photographing Paris: An Introduction to Photography Through History & Practice

(ART 2930C, 3897C, 4930C, 3 credits)
Professor Sergio Vega

This course will examine Paris as the historical site in which modernist photography came into being. Lectures and readings will cover photography from Daguerre to Cartier-Bresson. A studio component will introduce the basics of photography in both black and white and color, which will allow students to reinterpret Paris through the eyes of the photographers that portrayed it in the past. The course will also cover the study of international contemporary photography currently produced and/or shown in Paris, and includes visits to theMaison Européene de la Photographie, the Fondation Claude Monet, and the Forum des Images, among other sites. A digital camera and a laptop with Photoshop are required for the course.

Let Them Eat Cake? Art in the Age of Marie Antoinette

(ARH 4930, 3 credits)
Professor Melissa Hyde

Marie-Antoinette was one of France's most famous, ill-fated and (during her lifetime, at least) most hated queens. This course uses "the wicked queen" as the focal point for study of French culture and art during the decades leading up to the French Revolution. Major themes include the intersections between gender, class, politics and style, the emergence of art criticism and the development of the notion of an art for the public, the problems of and for women in the public sphere. Combining class lectures and discussions of readings in art history, gender and cultural studies with excursions to such places as the chateau of Versailles and other treasures of 18th-century paintings, furniture and tapestries, this course will take full advantage of the astonishing riches Paris has to offer.

Strategic Communications in France as a Reflection of Society and Culture (Intensive Module Course)

(PUR 4392, 3 credits)
Professor Juan-Carlos Molleda

France has a long tradition of professional news media and strategic or persuasive communication industries (i.e. advertising and public relations). This module will introduce students to the historical evolution of the strategic communication industry in France, as well as the cultural dimensions that determine its practices. In addition to lectures and class exercises, the module will include presentations by experts and pioneers in the industry, as well as site visits to news media outlets, advertising agencies, and public relation firms. The module will conclude with individual analyses of an advertising or public relations campaign developed in France, in which students will scrutinize cultural dimensions and messaging systems.

Poetics, Power, and the Avant-Gardes

(FRT 4956, 3 credits)
Professor Gayle Zachmann

A historical survey of the French Literary Avant-Gardes, this course focuses on how "modern" poetic movements engage with cultural politics from one fin-de-siècle to another. The class provides an overview of the main trends in cultural production of modern Paris in the 20th century, including: the origins of the avant-gardes, the intersections of literature and politics, and the consecration of the figure of the intellectual. We will begin by exploring how historical relations between text and the construction of national identity in France pave the way for 19th-century constructions of the figure of the poet and the later interventions of the 20th-century poets, revolutionaries, and public intellectuals.

Course includes guest lectures, site visits, literary texts, manifestoes, epistolary and journalistic production, art criticism, and studies of the visual and the plastic arts. Readings will be discussed as the primary basis for understanding the constantly shifting aesthetic, social, political, and commercial contexts with which post-revolutionary artists, critics, and thinkers engage.

Students may also choose to take French Language courses (FRE 1182 or higher) and Independent Studies, depending on their needs & interests.

Previous Honors in Paris Programs

• See the Honors in Paris 2009 course listings
• See the Honors in Paris 2008 course listings
• See the Honors in Paris 2007 course listings
• See the Honors in Paris 2006 course listings

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