Colloquium on European Cultural History:
French Cultural History in the 18th Century
Gregory S. Brown
324 Wright Hall, x.4181, gbrown@nevada.edu
This course is intended as an overview of the literature in one of, if not the, most vibrant fields of European Cultural History: French Cultural History in the Age of Enlightenment and Revolution. The course will cover the major substantive issues in French culture during this period - including the absolutist state, commerce and civil society, scientific thought, elite and popular manners, gender relations and the body, French colonialism in the New World, national identity, and the origins and course of the French Revolution. Because of the important theoretical and methodological debates which have characterized this field, particular attention will be paid to such conceptual questions as the influence of "court society" on the broader culture; the formation of a "bourgeois public sphere;" the sociology of the "intellectual field;" the rise of print culture; rhetorical "self-fashioning;" and the particular role of Catholicism and French colonialism in the formation of national identity.
Course requirements:
In addition to regular class attendance and discussion of the readings (20%), each student will make an in-class presentation on a topic to be arranged with the instructor (30%). Students will also prepare a 15- to 20-page historiographical paper on a topic to be arranged with the instructor (50%). Students may, but need not necessarily, write their papers on the topic of their class presentations.
A. Recommended for those new to the topic (and those preparing a field in 18th-century French Cultural History):
1. Daniel Roche, France in the Enlightenment (Harvard UP, 1998)
2. Dorinda Outram, The Enlightenment
3. William Doyle, The Coming of the French Revolution (3rd edition)
B. Required
Books (available for purchase at bookstore:)
1. Roger Chartier, The Cultural Origins of the French Revolution
2. Dena Goodman, The Republic of Letters: A Cultural History of the French Enlightenment
3. Haydn Mason, ed. The Darnton Debate: Books and Revolution in the 18th Century
4. Geoffrey Sutton, Science for a Polite Society:
Gender, Culture and the Demonstration of Enlightenment
5. Arlette Farge, Fragile Lives: Violence, Power and Solidarity in Eighteenth-Century Paris
6. Jeffrey Ravel, The Contested Playhouse:
Cultural Politics in the Parisian Public Theater, 1680 - 1791
7. Lloyd Kramer, Lafayette in Two Worlds :
Public Cultures and Personal Identities in an Age of Revolutions
8. Antoine de Baecque, The Body Politic: Corporeal Metaphor in Revolutionary France
9. Lynn Hunt, The Family Romance of the French Revolution
Articles and chapters(available on reserve at Dickinson Library and the History Department office:)
1. Sonenscher, Michael "Enlightenment and Revolution." The journal of modern history.
1998 (v 70 n 2) p. 371
2. Vartanian, Aram, "The Annales School and the Enlightenment,"
Studies on Eighteenth-Century Culture 13 (1984) p. 237.
3. Sarah Maza, "Politics, Culture and the Origins of the French Revolution,"
Journal of Modern History 61 (1989) 703 - 723.
4. Colin Lucas, "Nobles, Bourgeois and the Origins of the French Revolution,"
Past & Present 60 (1973) 84 - 126.
5. . Van Kley, Dale K, "In Search of Eighteenth-Century Parisian Public Opinion. "
French historical studies. 1995 (19: 1) p. 215
6. Keith Michael Baker, "Defining the Public Sphere in Eighteenth-Century France:
Variations on a Theme by Habermas ," in Habermas and the public sphere ,
ed. Craig Calhoun (Cambridge, Mass. : MIT Press, 1992) 181 - 211.
7. Goodman, Dena "Public Sphere and Private Life:
Toward a Synthesis of Current Historiographical Approaches to the Old Regime."
History and theory. 31: 1 (1992).
8. Roger Chartier, "Social Figuration and Habitus" in Cultural History (Ithaca: 1988) 71 - 94.
9. Robert Darnton, "High Enlightenment and Low-Life of Literature"
Literary Underground of the Old Regime (Cambridge: Harvard, 1982) 1 - 40.
10. Robert Darnton, "Philosophy Under the Cloak"
Forbidden Best-Sellers of Pre-Revolutionary France (NY: Norton, 1995) 3-21.
11. Robert Darnton, "The Great Cat Massacre" The Great Cat Massacre
and Other Episodes in French Cultural History (NY: Norton,1985) 75 - 106.
12. Roger Chartier, "From Court Festivity to City Spectators,"
Forms and Meanings (Philadelphia: U. Penn Press, 1995) 43 - 83.
13. Lisa Jane Graham, "Crimes of Opinion: Policing the Public in Eighteenth-Century Paris,"
in Censer, Adams and Graham, eds., Visions and Revisions of Eighteenth-Century France (PSU Press, 1996) 79 - 103.
14. Elizabeth Colwill, "Sex, Savagery and Slavery in the Shaping of the French Body Politic," in Norberg and Mezler, eds, From the Royal to the Republican Body 198 - 223.
Additional optional readings will be indicated on the syllabus. These books have not been ordered or placed on reserve but should be available in the library. Students interested in any or all of these readings should consult the instructor if they cannot find them in the library. Finally, all the readings chosen are in English; students who read French may (although need not) see the instructor for additional bibliography in French.
Week One: Thursday September 2
Overview and Introduction:
Why French Cultural History of the Eighteenth Century?
How to study Culture? France? The Eighteenth Century?
Week Two: Thursday September 9
Culture between Ideas, Institutions and Politics:
The "Enlightenment", the "Old Regime" and the "Revolution."
This class session will discuss what might be considered the "classic" historiography of eighteenth-century France, looking at three distinct historiographical trajectories - intellectual, social and political history. 1.) The "history of ideas" of the Enlightenment comes primarily from the discipline of literature, where which a distinct approach was developed by early 20th-century French literary historians, most notably Gustave Lanson, known as "l'homme et l'oeuvre [the man and his work])." 2.) The Annales school of French social history, associated most closely with Marc Bloch and Lucien Febvre was developed in the mid-twentieth century to study social structures in France from the middle ages to the Revolution. 3.) Finally, the historiography of the Revolution, particularly the problem of its origins, came to be dominated in the first three quarters of the 10th century, by a Marxist-Jacobin paradigm associated with the Sorbonne school.
All three drawing inspiration in different ways from the sociologist Emile Durkheim, these trajectories came back together in the 1970s, 80s and 90s in "cultural history."
Readings [on reserve in the library and the History Department office]:
1. Aram Vartanian, "The Annales School and the Enlightenment"2. Colin Lucas, "Nobles, Bourgeois and the Origins of the French Revolution"
3. Sara Maza, "Politics, Culture and the Origins of the French Revolution"
4. Michael Sonenscher, "Enlightenment and Revolution"
5. Chartier, Cultural Origins 1 - 19
Optional:
Daniel Mornet, French Thought in the Eighteenth Century
Peter Burke, The French Historical Revolution
William Doyle, The Origins of the French Revolution (1 - 36)
Peter Gay, The Enlightenment (volume I: "Overture")
Alfred Cobban, In Search of Humanity: The Role of the Enlightenment in Modern History
Robert Darnton, The Kiss of Lamourette: Reflections in Cultural History (parts IV and V).
Week Three: Thursday September 16
Social Theory and Political Culture: The Problem of Civil Society
This class will introduce what has become a central topics in the field since the 1970s -- the appearance (or not) of modern civil society in eighteenth-century France, understood as a set of institutions (often referred to as a "public sphere") which linked private and domestic life to the political realm and in which individuals could articulate their values and interests. The consensus presumably built out of this articulation of private interests in the public realm (often referred to as "public opinion") came, it is argued, to confront the state, which had heretofore ruled in its own interests. Thus was constituted the origins of "modern political culture" (itself a term borrowed from political scientist Almon but adopted to a new -- and contested -- meaning by French historians.) Two key references in this line of inquiry have been Alexis de Tocqueville and Jurgen Habermas, whose ideas we will discuss insofar as they have been taken up and modified by historians.
Readings:1. Chartier, 20 - 168.
2. Goodman, "Public Sphere and Private Life"
3. Baker, "Defining the Public Sphere in Eighteenth-Century France"
4. Dale Van Kley, "In Search of Eighteenth-Century Parisian Public Opinion"
Optional:
Benjammin Nathans, "Habermas' Public Sphere in the Age of the French Revolution" French Historical Studies 16: 3 (1990) 620 - 644.
Mona Ozouf, "Public Opinion at the End of the Old Regime," Journal of Modern History 60 (Supplement: 1993) 1 - 22.
Gordon, Bell and Maza, forum on the public sphere in French Historical Studies 17:4 (1992)
Arlette Farge, Subversive Words: Public Opinion in Eighteenth-Century Paris
Week Four: Thursday September 23
Civilization and its Discontents
This class will continue our discussion of the "public sphere" by addressing the problem of "civility" and violence. Civility might be best understood as self-control in social interactions, generating a reciprocal politeness, which might presume equality of individuals in their interactions; violence as its antithesis -- aggression by one individual against another, to establish domination over that other person. Cultural historians of 18th century France have taken great interest recently in whether Enlightenment culture fostered the former, the latter or both - a debate that has also asked about the role of such factors as gender, social standing, and medium of communication in contemporary interpretations of the Enlightenment and French culture.
By discussing salons, academies and other institutions of Enlightened debate, and such varying media as oral conversation, correspondence, and print, we will see the genesis of a culture of "civility" which would appear to support Norbert Elias's of the "civilizing process" as a simultaneous diminution in aggressive action between individuals and an increase in the power of the state to inflict violence on individuals. Yet, there is a seeming paradox, because the Revolution generated a great increase in violence by individuals and the state.
Readings:1. Chartier, Cultural Origins 169 - 198
2. Chartier, "Social Figuration and Habitus" in Cultural History (Ithaca: 1988) 71 - 94.
3. Goodman, Republic of Letters (whole book)
Optional:Daniel Gordon, Citizens Without Sovereignty
Anne Goldgar, Impolite Learning
Norbert Elias, Court Society
Joachim Duindam, Myths of Power
Week Five: Thursday, September 30
The Social History of Ideas
In 1971, Robert Darnton published what may be the single most influential article in the field of eighteenth-century French cultural history, calling for a synthesis of the "history of ideas" as studied by intellectual historians with "history from below" as studied by social historians. In this and subsequent books and articles, he has drawn variously on such social theorists as Marshall McLuhan, Clifford Geertz, and Pierre Bourdieu (in fields of communication studies, cultural anthropology and sociology, respectively) to introduce questions of social status, economics, and material bibliography to the history of ideas and language. The resulting amalgm has made Darnton's work so central to this field that recently a book of essays evaluating his still-evolving career has been published. We will read three of his most important articles and some of the essays, with a response from Darnton to many of his critics. We will discuss this debate in the context of the "literary field" of eighteenth-century France.
Darnton, "High Enlightenment and Low-Life of Literature" in Literary Underground of the Old Regime ( 1 - 40)ibid., "Philosophy Under the Cloak" in Forbidden Best-Sellers of Pre-Revolutionary France (3-21)
Mason, .ed, The Darnton Debate, 83 - 128; 179 - 234; 251 - 294
Optional:Darnton, Literary Underground
ibid., Kiss of Lamourette (Part Three)
ibid., The Business of Enlightenment
ibid., Forbidden Best-Sellers of Pre-Revolutionary France (parts I and III)
Pierre Bourdieu, The Rules of Art: Genesis and Structure of the Literary Field
Roger Chartier, The Order of Books
Week Six: Thursday, October 7A Taste of the Archive: Police and the People
An important source base for cultural historians of the period has been police archives. Because the police so closely monitored the daily life of eighteenth-century Parisians of all walks of life, police archives constitute the broadest cross-section of experience. In this class, we will read the work of Arlette Farge, a social historian much influenced by Michel Foucault and Michel de Certeau, working at the conjuncture of urban history and the history of popular culture. In this class, we will discuss the experience of ordinary people -- at home, at work, and in crowds. Continuing our discussion of issues already raised in previous weeks and introducing new ones distinct to urban history and to the study of popular culture, we will consider how solidarities were forged and differences negotiated outside the genteel world of literate elites, in contact and (and increasingly confrontation with) the police authority of the monarchical state.
Farge, Fragile Lives: Violence, Power and Solidarity in Eighteenth-Century ParisGraham, "Crimes of Opinion: Policing the Public in Eighteenth-Century Paris."
Darnton, "The Great Cat Massacre" in The Great Cat Massacre and Other Episodes in French Cultural History (75 - 106)
Optional:Darnton, "A Police Inspector Sorts His Files," in Great Cat Massacre
Daniel Roche, The People of Paris
Farge, Subversive Words: Public Opinion in Eighteenth-Century France
Alan Williams, The Police of Paris
Richard Cobb, The Police and the People
Week Seven: Thursday, October 14Orality and Performance in Public
This class will continue our discussion of popular culture in an urban context, exploring the importance of oral exchange in the constitution of public opinion and political culture leading up to the Revolution. Moreover, it will introduce us to theater, which historians have only recently begun restoring to its rightful, central role in 18th century French culture, which brings together the court, the public sphere and popular entertainment.
Ravel, The Contested Parterre 1 - 98; 160 - 224Chartier, "From Court Festivity to City Spectators," in Forms and Meanings (43 - 83)
Optional:Michele Root-Bernstein, Boulevard Theatre and Revolution
Robert Isherwood, Farce and Fantasy: Popular Entertainment in Eighteenth-Century Paris
Laura Mason, Singing the French Revolution
[Note: No Class Thursday, October 21; read ahead!]
Week Eight: Thursday, October 28
The Social History of Truth: Science and Status in 18th-Century French Culture
Perhaps no area of intellectual history has seen a more thorough rethinking of approach over the past generation than the history of science, and this week we consider this rethinking in the context of eighteenth-century France. Instead of simply reporting on the discoveries of the scientists they study, historians of science have sought instead the social processes by which knowledge was produced and ascribed the status of "science." In particular, they have asked how some (wealthy and socially prominent) men -- and almost no women -- came to be thought of as natural philosophers, to the exclusion of many others who participated in experimentation and discussion. Thus, in this class we will ask about the role of academies and salons and the rules of polite conversation in fostering both scientific knowledge and - perhaps more importantly - the acceptance of knowledge as scientific by the larger society.
Geoffrey Sutton, Science for a Polite Society 1 - 18; 190 - 348.Margaret Jacob, [article] in Beyond the Cultural Turn
Optional:
Michel Foucault, Madness and Civilization: A History of Insanity in the Age of Reason
Jacques Roger, The Life Sciences in Eighteenth-Century French Thought
Week Nine: Thursday November 4From Mind to Body
Combining Elias's concern with the history of personal behavior, Foucault's critique of the importance granted reason as a source of human motivation, and feminist historians' interest in the history of ideas about gender difference, the human body has become a crucial topic in French cultural history. In this class, we consider the importance of the body as a metaphor in social and political discourse of the eighteenth century by reading of one of the most provocative and creative minds currently writing cultural history, Antoine de Baecque. These weeks will also take us into the period of the Revolution, allowing us to revisit some of the questions raised at the outset of the semester about bodily violence - metaphorical as well as phyiscal.
de Baecque, The Body Politic: Corporeal Metaphor in French Political Discourse, 1770 - 2000
Optional:Melzer and Norberg, eds., From the Royal to the Republican Body
[Note: No Class Thursday November 11 due to Veterans' Day]
Week Ten: Thursday, November 18Politics, Culture, and Gender : The Work of Lynn Hunt
Beginning her career as a political historian of the Revolution, Lynn Hunt has become perhaps the leading practitioner of gender studies working in the field of eighteenth-century France. Interested in chronicling changes in ideas of masculinity and femininity, in sexuality, in eroticism and in pornography across the eighteenth century, she has remained at the same time committed to studying the Revolution as a fundamentally democratizing and liberating event in human history. Indeed, she has sought, in sometimes astonishingly creative ways, to reconcile these two agendas, arguing against the grain of feminist scholarship (as well as revisionist histories of the Revolution) that the Enlightenment and Revolution brought positive change for women (and men) in French society. Drawing on Freudian psychology, iconography, literary theory and plain old good historical research sense to forge new paths in cultural history.
Hunt, The Family Romance of the French RevolutionColwill, "Sex, Savagery, and Slavery in the Shaping of the French Body Politic,"
in Melzer and Norberg, eds, From the Royal to the Republican Body
Optional:Hunt, "Freedom of Dress in Revolutionary France," in Melzer and Norberg, eds, From the Royal to the Republican Body
Hunt, "Pornography and the French Revolution," in Hunt., ed. The Invention of Pornography
Lucas, "A Fine Romance Without any Sisters," French Historical Studies *****
Hunt, Politics, Culture and Class in the French Revolution
[Note there is no class Thursday, November 25 for Thanksgiving.]
Week Eleven: Thursday, December 2
Personal Identity and the Self
This week we take up a new and highly promising approach to the problem of culture, by considering personal identity as the link between ideas (held and expressed by one person) and institutions (which structure how individuals behave). More specifically, we will consider the ways in which individuals represented themselves and were represented by others, asking if in the eighteenth century the act of representing an individual's identity in some way constituted rather than merely expressed that person's sense of him or herself. The concept of "self-fashioning," most closely associated with the Renaissance literary scholar Stephen Greenblatt, has been recently taken up by French cultural historians to try to resolve the false dilemma which opposes the "content" of ideas to the "form" of their expression.
Vovelle, "Introduction" to Enlightenment Portraits
Kramer, Lafayette in Two Worlds 1 - 52; 137 - 184; 175 - 280.
Optional:
Metzner, Crescendo of the Virtuosi: Skill, Spectacle and Self-Promotion in Paris in the Age of Revolution
B. Diefendorf and C. Hesse, eds., Culture and Identity in Early Modern Europe
M. Wolff, Changing Identities in Early Modern France
Week Twelve: Thursday December 9
Final discussion
Papers will be due Monday, December 13!