Literature course: Francophone women writers from the Americas (20th-21st centuries) 3304-1DZ1W-KL-41
This seminar offers a critical examination of Francophone literature from the American continent through the lens of women’s writing, conceived as an act of resistance against colonial and patriarchal structures. We will study the works of Haitian authors Yanick Lahens and Emilie Prophète, which reveal how female experience emerges amid collective memory, historical violence, and the ongoing reconstruction of identity.
The writings of Suzanne Lacascade from Martinique and Gisèle Pineau from Guadeloupe expose the lingering traces of slavery, racism, and intergenerational trauma inscribed onto women’s bodies and genealogies, while simultaneously opening spaces for emancipation and new forms of subjectivity shaped within Caribbean social and historical contexts. In North America, Anne Hébert’s work (Canada) interrogates the tensions between symbolic violence, religious authority, and women’s desires for transgression, whereas the narratives of Naomi Fontaine, an author from Indigenous communities of Québec, restore agency and voice to those systematically marginalised by colonial history.
By employing feminist, queer, and post- and decolonial approaches, the course demonstrates how writers from the Caribbean, Canada, and Indigenous nations transform literature into a laboratory for new models of womanhood - Black, racially mixed, and Indigenous - challenging gendered, racial, and cultural hierarchies. Literature thus becomes a space in which narratives of the body, memory, and belonging are renegotiated, and where decolonial modes of thought and storytelling emerge.
Mode
Course coordinators
Learning outcomes
The student possesses knowledge of the culture of France and Francophone countries (K_W12); has a structured understanding of the fundamental processes occurring in the fields of Francophone language, literature, and culture (K_W04); is able to use various traditional and modern sources and methods to search for, analyse, evaluate, select, and apply information necessary for active participation in classes (K_U01); can identify different types of cultural productions (language, literature, art) and carry out their critical analysis and interpretation using standard methodologies (K_U05); is capable of working in a group, solving problems through discussion, and proposing context-appropriate solutions (K_K02); shows an interest in contemporary processes and phenomena taking place in the cultural life and literature of Francophone countries (K_K09).
K_W10
• has knowledge of key literary and historical phenomena within the Francophone Americas;
• understands the social, cultural, and political contexts shaping these authors’ works.
K_U03, K_U04, K_U05
• can analyse and interpret literary texts using feminist, queer, postcolonial, and decolonial methodologies;
• is capable of critically engaging with theoretical and cultural sources;
• can independently formulate arguments and conclusions based on textual analysis.
K_K01, K_K02, K_K04
• demonstrates sensitivity to issues of gender, race, trauma, and marginalisation in cultural productions;
• understands literature as a space of resistance to colonial representations;
• can critically evaluate narratives of subjectivity, memory, and belonging.
Assessment criteria
Assessment methods and criteria:
- participation in discussion
- 2 tests
- oral exam
- attendance and activity in class (more than two absences will result in an additional question on the test)
Detailed conditions for passing the course will be presented at the first class.
Didactic methods:
- individual and group work
- guided discussion
- analysis and interpretation of literary texts
Bibliography
Selected literary excerpts:
- Suzanne Lacascade, "Claire-Solange, âme africaine" (1924)
- Anne Hébert, "Les fous de Bassan" (1982)
- Gisèle Pineau, "Les voyages de Merry Sisal" (2015)
- Emmelie Prophète, "Un ailleurs à soi" (2018)
- Naomi Fontaine, "Shuni" (2019)
- Yanick Lahens, "Passagères de nuit" (2025)
A detailed program and list of works to be analyzed, including theoretical sources, will be presented at the first class.
Additional information
Additional information (registration calendar, class conductors, localization and schedules of classes), might be available in the USOSweb system: