FREN 350 - Uncanny Modernity

In this course, we examine the various ways in which the uncanny, a lingering feeling of dread that unsettles not only our sense of self but also our understanding of the world, language, and representation, is bound up with the yearning for certainty reflected in the scientific, technological, and social advances that define modernity. Our exploration of the uncanny will entail delving into a range of literary genres and media from nineteenth-century Romanticism to Surrealism, including short stories, poetry, essays, photographs, and films as well as theoretical essays that attempt to define the uncanny and specify the uncanny nature of reproduction and representation. Authors and artists include Balzac, Gautier, E.A. Poe, Baudelaire, Villiers de l’Isle-Adam, Freud, Roger Caillois, Claude Cahun, Dora Maar, Georges Bataille, Roland Barthes, William Pietz, Hélène Cixous, Julia Kristeva, Clarice Lispector, David Lynch, and Jordan Peele. Conducted in French.

Unit(s): 1
Group Distribution Requirement(s): Distribution Group I
Prerequisite(s): FREN 212
Instructional Method: Conference
Grading Mode: Letter grading (A-F)
Not offered: 2026-27
Group Distribution Learning Outcome(s):

Understand how arguments can be made, visions presented, or feelings or ideas conveyed through language or other modes of expression (symbols, movement, images, sounds, etc.).
Analyze and interpret texts, whether literary or philosophical, in English or a foreign language, or works of the visual or performing arts.
Evaluate arguments made in or about texts (whether literary or philosophical, in English or a foreign language, or works of the visual or performing arts).