The Values of the French Republic I

Catalog description

The first course in a two-course sequence focusing on constitutional issues, national identity, and international relations of the French Republic. This course explores the history of French republican values with an emphasis on the ways in which essential concepts, such as “citoyen,” “liberté,” and “égalité,” are understood in French legal and political parlance in order to better grasp how they continue to shape life in a multicultural and multiracial nation. Current debates around French national identity will be discussed with special emphasis placed on laïcité (a cousin to the American concept of separation of church and state but which establishes a stricter barrier between the two).