FRENCH LITERATURE SP

The course "Urban changes, crossing borders, identity changes" within the French Literature course is placed among the teachings characterizing the study path of LM: Philology, Linguistics and Italian Literature - European. We will consider some French novels from different historical periods, particularly representative of the themes under consideration, between the XIX and the XXI century starting from the detection of elements of the semiological phenomenon, narrative and rhetorical applied to the genre of the novel set in an urban context or involved in an identity change following the crossing of borders or urban boundaries. The point of view is that of the subject or the estrangement of the person who lives a feeling of "exile" or considered "alien", because linked to immigration or "not integrated", for ideological or social choice, compared to the French reality. The frontier is an emblematic moment of travel and therefore of narration; the sought or refused frontier, crossed by obligation or necessity, is the most important of the areas dealing with exile or alienation. It thus becomes a narrative element that plays a central role in the development of the story and in the change of subject, thanks to its symbolic value which, at the moment when it opens up to a new existential horizon, the experience of otherness and remoteness, It forces a budget and an intervention of the subject within the contingent reality. The subject will be identified in its relationship with the architectural and rhetorical place, especially in its cognitive path within the space, urban, peripheral or underground, revealing the deep relationship between literature and designed space. It will also apply the methodology of analysis of speech, according to the French school, through the analysis of discursive phenomena, highlighting the acts and social practices of subjects, in relation with the different historical realities. We will analyze the way in which "values" are transformed and embodied in actions and figures, investigating the discursive and narrative level, and in both cases, considering the syntactic and semantic dimensions.
This study will be carried out in parallel with the general vision, in a synchronous and diachronic sense, the genre in prose developed between the nineteenth and twenty-first centuries.

At the end of the course the student is able to place the authors considered within French literary history, in a synchronous and diachronic sense. Must be able to use to use the methodologies and terminology taken into consideration, being able to perform the analysis of the texts studied and be able to make connections or detect differences, according to their formal components, rhetorical, stylistic and according to the identification of the main discursive aspects. Must demonstrate knowledge of the analyzed texts, mastery of the contents, linguistic accuracy and lexical properties; possess basic knowledge on some general concepts of literature, on the enunciative relationships of the sentence, the lexicon and the discourse as a place of social articulation, on the dynamics of literary communication and the relationship between text and context, in relation to historical and urban realities specific to each novel.

Knowledge of the structure and functioning of the literary text and of the general frameworks (periodizations and literary currents) of the history of literature, in reference to foreign literary productions; general knowledge of the main problems related to the critical approach to the literary text. The prerequisites indicated here are an integral part of the path related to the master’s degree in Italian Philology and Literature.

The novels proposed, between the nineteenth and twenty-first centuries, present subjects within a "constructed" French urban reality, that is to say, a static system of "distinctions" attributable to classifications of knowledge. Crossing a border or an urban boundary will be considered. The following aspects will be analysed:
1.the poetics of the novel and the characters that place it in a genre: naturalistic novel, novel by French or Maghreb writers; novels about non-places in conflict with modern consciousness;
2.the point of view of the character who "frames" the space from a certain narrative perspective, dependent on a subjectivity linked to the positioning of a personal, social, gender point of view; the construction of qualitative differences and consequently "imperative": the subject is placed in his place, both as a user-inhabitant forced to act and move into the real, to define himself as resident or traveller, "out of place" or "out of place", as an intruder or autochthonous, as a vagabond or sedentary, as a spectator. The manifestations of the modifications are the embodiment of the impositions due to the systems of social (or technological) norms more than a stylistic order;
3.the movements and transformations within the places. Places and architectures determine a portion of space, they build a system of differences in the distributional and functional sense of the reality of the subjects. The notions of constraint and value underlie every ideological or linguistic system. The characters' accommodation (palace, marriage of neighborhoods in the French suburbs, streets, non-places) build a qualitatively "oriented" itinerary, a trajectory of ascent or personal or social decadence. In the attribution of a sense of space, the direction assumes a role of fundamental mediation, understood as a project not only motor, but also narrative. Narrative programs involve the goals and actions of the subject, a want to do, a want to be, or a knowing/having/being, set in motion a story that combines skills and performances;
4.The real as a meeting of norms, a system of hierarchical systems of values, of obligations, of constraints that define links, which involve a main body and "dependencies", inglobated spaces and inglobants. Places and architecture (cities, collective buildings, houses, neighbourhoods, streets...), as emblematic objects of the literary text of the period under consideration, have a complex semantic status: their function in the text is to be discriminatory systems (the dichotomy us/them, the status of the foreigner seeking an identity "third space", desire to de-construct polarization, linguistic dis-location), which classify, separate objects and subjects, organize naturally the strategies of the desire to be, according to the axiological modalizations put in place by the protagonists. The space is therefore oriented starting from the movements, programs and ends that the actor unfolds within it. Writing becomes central, as a moment of elaboration of the experience and construction of new references;
5.the identity crisis and the feeling of "exile" of the character, "foreign" to the environment. The sense that comes from the relationship of each subject with the world and places, starting from his body scheme, is derived from the interaction between posture and environment, often as a conflictual scenario. Starting from this localization work, the body diagram will construct the perception of space itself as a system of polarizations to which are attached forms of attribution of semantic values.

NARRATIVE TEXTS TAKEN INTO CONSIDERATION
Rachid Boudjedra, Topografia ideale per un'agressione caratterizzata, Marietti, 1991
Michel Butor, La modificazione, (any ed., in italian)
Mehdi Charef, Il tè all'harem di Archi Ahmed, (trad. and introduction by Paola Salerni), Tab edizioni, 2025
Mehdi Charef, La casa di Alexina. Storia di un bambino algerino nella Francia del 1960, (trad. P. Salerni), Ediz. Universitarie Romane, 2018
Annie Ernaux, Guarda le luci, amore mio, L'Orma, 2022
Émile Zola, La preda (any edition, in Italian)
Émile Zola, Il ventre di Parigi (any edition, in Italian)

CRITICAL ESSAYAS
Marc Augé, Non-luoghi. Introduzione a un'antropologia della surmodernità, Elèuthera, 2009
Roland Bourneuf-Réal Ouellet, L'universo del romanzo ("Piccola Biblioteca Einaudi" 1976, 2000)
COLLECTIF “QUI FAIT LA FRANCE?” (CHI FA LA FRANCIA?), Cronache di una società annunciata: racconti dalle banlieue, tr. I. Vitali, Viterbo, Stampa alternativa/Nuovi equilibri, 2008
Alice Giannitrapani, Introduzione alla semiotica dello spazio, Carocci editore, 2013
Philippe Hamon, Esposizioni. Letteratura e architettura nel XIX secolo, CLUEB, 1994
Christina Horvath, Le Roman urbain contemporain en France, Paris, Presses de la Sorbonne Nouvelle, 2008
Michela Landi (a cura di) Letteratura francese. Dall'Ottocento al XXI secolo, Le Monnier Università
Abdelmalek Sayad, La doppia assenza. Dalle illusioni dell'emigrato alle sofferenze dell'immigrato, D. Borca (Traduttore) R. Kirchmayr (Traduttore), Cortina Raffaello, 2002
Marina Sbisà (a cura di), Gli atti linguistici. Aspetti e problemi di filosofia del linguaggio, Feltrinelli, 1995 (1978)
Leila Sebbar, Paris, géographie de l’exil, Les Temps Modernes, 1980, I, 413 ; janvier 1981, II, 414
Ugo Volli, Manuale di semiotica, u.e.

Other texts will be provided by the teacher during the course

The final learning examination consists of a discussion of about 30 minutes on the topics discussed throughout the course. The student must show his knowledge of the contents and of his acquired skills; know how to use the specialized lexicon related to critical reference studies his ability to analyse the passages treated during the course by applying the methodologies studied; know how to orient themselves independently in secondary literature and know how to critically discuss it; his ability to critically organize the texts even from a linguistic expository point of view, and his historical knowledge of the urban phenomena changes; strengthen the reflective and argumentative skills of the student on the topics addressed in the course.
Objectives of training:
The French Literature exam consists of an oral exam on the topics explained during the course by the teacher, according to the knowledge of two parts:
Knowledge: the first part ascertains the knowledge of the lines of development and the peculiarities of French literature against the background of the historical-cultural context and the knowledge of some fundamental junctions of the evolution of literary prose in a synchronic and diachronic, between the nineteenth and contemporary ages.
The second will deepen, in monographic form, the works analyzed during the course.
Skills: understanding and analysis of the literary text addressed against the background of the historical-cultural context, obtained using critical literature and developing the ability to select, compare and judge independently; ability to express themselves clearly and rigorously, using the specific language diachronic, between the nineteenth and contemporary ages.
The second will deepen, in monographic form, the works analyzed during the course.
Below, the evaluation criteria and the final grade of the French Language exam, in oral, with the single coefficient referring to the 3 evaluation parameters indicated separately (linguistic correctness, knowledge of texts and topics, personal processing):
LINGUISTIC, GRAMMATICAL AND SYNTACTIC CORRECTNESS
(30 and praise) grammatically correct, appropriate language, demonstrates competence and ability to rework the topics studied with a personal linguistic contribution, is able to detect the linguistic specificities of the texts studied (6+)
(28 -30) grammatically correct, appropriate language, demonstrates competence and ability to rework the topics studied with a personal linguistic input (6)
(26-28) grammatically correct and with appropriate language (5)
(24-26) grammatically correct (4)
(22-24) predominantly corrected (3)
(20-22) quite correct (2)
(18-20) sufficiently correct, still able to communicate the contents studied (1)
(-17) very incorrect (0)
KNOWLEDGE OF TEXTS AND SUBJECTS
30 and praise Complete, with personal observations that demonstrate the ability to make connections between different disciplines, able to make methodological and stylistic comparisons (6+)
28-30 Complete, with personal observations demonstrating the ability to make connections between different disciplines (6)
26-28 complete also with personal observations (5)
24-26 very good (4)
22-24 discreet (3)
20-22 essential: the student simply reads and translates, is not able to expose independently (2)
18-20 partial (1)
15-17 insufficient (0)
PERSONAL PROCESSING
30 and praise reworks in a personal way, with references and interdisciplinary links, with the ability to make thematic links and rhetorical language found in the analyzed texts. 6
29-30 reworks in a personal way, with 29-30 reworks in a personal way, with references and with interdisciplinary links, ability to make thematic links (6)
27-28 reworks in a personal way, with references and with interdisciplinary co

oral

Assessments of the student/s of the skills demonstrated during the oral test:
29-30 and praise exposes with an appropriate vocabulary, is able to place the text within the current of criticism studied, the historical moment and literary genre and to explain its narrative aspects by making comparisons and motivating them. Reworks in a personal way, with references and interdisciplinary connections making connections and differences between the novels considered (5)
27-28 rework in a personal way with an appropriate lexicon, with references and interdisciplinary connections, placing the text within the historical moment and literary genre and explaining its narrative aspects, (4)
25-26 reworks in a personal way, but with an elementary knowledge of the texts studied (4)
23-24 has an acceptable knowledge of the contents studied (3)
21-22 knowledge of the texts analysed is limited (2)
18-20 the knowledge of the texts is sufficient, but sometimes incomplete and with a limited linguistic-expository competence(1)
(17) partial (0)

The course is composed of lectures to attend to, in which an active participation of the students is required, as well as the use of multimedia support (word and power point).
The teacher always activates the course recording in "Panopto" mode by connecting at the beginning of each lesson. Therefore, students "so-called 701", with a specific status, will have access to dedicated material that will allow them a teaching experience comparable and substitute compared to those who have the opportunity to attend.

This subject deals with topics related to the macro-area "Cities, infrastructure and social capital" and contributes to the achievement of one or more goals of U. N. Agenda for Sustainable Development