The Algerian war was a particularly violent and ugly period in French colonial history, which was initially repressed in the French collective psyche. Due to the perceived absence of an official history, different communities involved in the conflict continue to put forward their narratives in a bid to win enduring “memory wars” on the subject. This module will examine the Algerian war from a range of different perspectives (in terms of gender, age, ethnicity, political affiliation) as expressed across different genres and media (film; fiction; memoir). It will explore questions of trauma and identity, reflect on France’s failure to acknowledge its troubled colonial past and consider how this influences its present.
The module is aimed at final year students who have chosen French as their main language.
It builds on the critical and analytical skills that students will have developed in Studies Modules in years 1 and 2.
Indicative syllabus covered in the module and / or in its discrete elements
Texts and Films covered may include:
Henri Alleg, La Question (1958)
Gillo Pontecorvo (dir.), La Bataille d’Alger (1966)
André Téchiné (dir.), Les Roseaux sauvages (1994)
Albert Camus, Le premier homme (Paris: Gallimard, 2000)
Didier Daeninckx, Meurtres pour mémoire (Paris: Folio, 2016)
Essential Reading: (author, date, title, publisher)
The chosen core texts will form the basis of essential reading for the module.
Supplementary Reading (Selected from the following list depending on individual focus of study):
Aoife Connolly, “The French of Algeria – Can the Colonisers be Colonised?”, in The Shadow of Colonialism on Europe’s Modern Past, ed. Róisín Healy and Enrico Dal Lago (Basingstoke, Hampshire: Palgrave Macmillan, 2014), 142–155.
Philip Dine, Images of the Algerian War: French Fiction and Film, 1954-1992. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1994.
Peter Dunwoodie. Writing French Algeria. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998.
Benjamin Stora, La Gangrène et l’oubli: La mémoire de la guerre d’Algérie. Paris: La Découverte, 1998.
Small group teaching in which staff input is in the form of introduction to primary materials and key concepts from the secondary reading as a means of stimulating in class discussion, group work and future reading.
E-learning
All basic course information and many of the primary materials studied will be available online, normally through Brightspace.
The module is normally delivered over one semester, two contact hours per week.
| Module Content & Assessment | |
|---|---|
| Assessment Breakdown | % |
| Formal Examination | 50 |
| Other Assessment(s) | 50 |