Vinay Swamy, Interpreting the Republic: Marginalization and Belonging in Contemporary French Nove... more Vinay Swamy, Interpreting the Republic: Marginalization and Belonging in Contemporary French Novels and Films. Lanham (MD): Lexington Books, 2011. XXXiV + 171 pp. Interpreting the Republic moves deftly among interdisciplinary approaches ranging from cultural and postcolonial studies to political analysis, film criticism, and literary theory. The thread linking a seemingly disparate assortment of primary texts is the theme of belonging in the Republic. At times, this implicates the individual; at others, the notion--more problematic in the French context--of community affiliation. Swamy suggests that this tension lies at the heart of the question and that "different interpretations of the Republic(an model) are clearly dependent on an understanding of the relationship between co-called 'private' action and public consequence" (xviii). Interpreting the Republic examines the ways in which gender, sexual orientation and ethnicity intersect within these parameters. It is in this multifaceted approach that Swamy offers a fresh and important contribution to the scholarship on the identity debate, which was raging well before Sarkozy launched his short-lived official debat sur l'identite nationale in 2009. Swamy's approach breaks free of the theoretical discursive categories into which minorities are often pushed by French political and media debates as well as in Anglo-American academic discourse, whether delimited by ethnicity (Beur, Franco-Maghrebi, or simply Maghrebi), gender, sexuality, or the spatial organization of French society (the banlieue). While there are certainly a number of valuable academic contributions to the debate that are organized around such categorizations, the approach espoused by Swamy offers the promise of a fruitful and indeed essential expansion of the parameters of the debate. This approach is compelling because Individuals maneuver within society and the Republic not only, and sometimes not at all, as members of a particular ethnic group or other marginalized category. As perceptive observers such as Mireille Rosello and Patrick Weil have argued, individuals may opt to align themselves with a variety of groups, whether marginal or otherwise, and their affiliations and affinities may shift throughout the course of their lifetime. Thus, any attempt to "interpret the Republic" must take into account the complexities of belonging and exclusion at play for individuals across and beyond particular marginalized categories. Interpreting the Republic links the ethnically-focused exclusion that was brought to the forefront in the 1990s to the debate waged near the end of that decade over the Pacte civil de solidarite (PaCS), which extended some of the rights and protections afforded to homosexuals and unmarried heterosexual couples. Swamy argues that "France's thrust to maintain a robust national self-identification [...] can be found at the root of many debates about nonnormative sexual orientations" (131). Turning both to texts that explicitly invite such an approach, notably Drole de Felix (Ducastel and Martineau, 2000) and Chouchou (Merzak All-ouache, 2003)--whose titular characters conform to neither perceived ethnic nor cultural norms of the Republic--and to less obvious choices such as Francis Veber's hit comedy Le Placard (2001), Swamy foregrounds the ways in which these diverse works "appeal to tactical interpretations that allow them to define what it means to be French from their perspective" (xxv). …
SouS la direction de Vinay Swamy et louiSa mackenzie Devenir non-binaire en français contemporain... more SouS la direction de Vinay Swamy et louiSa mackenzie Devenir non-binaire en français contemporain Collection Genre(s) et création Éditions Le Manuscrit Paris vii La collection Genre(s) et création À l'heure du combat pour la reconnaissance du droit à l'autodétermination de l'identité de genre, la création, sous toutes ses formes, demeure le lieu privilégié pour la révéler et l'affirmer. Qu'elle soit littéraire, artistique ou scientifique, il s'agit de questionner, de déconstruire, de subvertir les classifications sociales et culturelles du féminin et du masculin fabriquées par le système sexe/ genre binaire et normatif. Cette collection se propose d'une part de publier en langue française des ouvrages théoriques fondamentaux pour la réflexion, d'autre part de faire connaître des travaux de recherche susceptibles d'enrichir les savoirs et de dynamiser les pratiques. ix Sommaire Avant-propos Karine Espineira xiii 1 Pour désigner un genre vécu et éprouvé en dehors du schéma masculin/féminin, il existe de nombreuses étiquettes-neutre ou neutrois, agenre, genderqueer/genderfluid (souvent en anglais-détail qui ne passera pas inaperçu dans les contributions qui suivent), androgyne, et bien d'autres. Sans vouloir niveler ces différences, nous avons privilégié « non-binaire » aussi bien comme terme générique qui englobe les mots mentionnés ci-dessus, que par souci d'économie, et par stratégie puisque c'est le terme le plus susceptible d'être reconnu par un grand public. 2 Artiste trans et bilingue d'origine québécoise, Sophie Labelle est la plus connue pour ses bandes dessinées publiées en ligne : Assignée garçon, et la version en anglais Assigned Male. 3 Sophie Labelle, Assignée garçon. Planche 118. 4 On peut reconnaître, parmi de nombreux groupes culturels traditionnellement non-binaires-ou de troisièmes genre surtout dans d'autres cultures non-européennes-les Hijras en Asie du Sud (Bangladesh, Bhutan, Inde, Népal, Pakistan, Sri Lanka), les Bissus d'Indonésie, les Fa'afa
Since Jules Ferry instituted free and mandatory education in 1882, the state school has been one ... more Since Jules Ferry instituted free and mandatory education in 1882, the state school has been one of the pillars of the French Republic. Much of the ideological work done by this institution in the construction of the nation is thus predicated on the inculcation of Republican values ...
Ci nemat i c Transposition of t he "Republic"? Fat i ma and D' une pi erre deux coups Vi nay Swam... more Ci nemat i c Transposition of t he "Republic"? Fat i ma and D' une pi erre deux coups Vi nay Swamy I. Pr el ude: T r ansposi t i on and t he Tempered Scale T r anspose: Wr i t e or pl ay (musi c) i n a different key f r om t he ori gi nal : "t he basses ar e transposed down a n octave" Oxf or d Engl i sh Dictionary T h e sensi bi l i t i es of W e s t e r n m u s i è , 1 a m t ol d, wer e di f f erent , when Johann S e b a s t i a n B à c h (16. 85:-1750) fi rst c b M p o s è d hi s *i i dw cl assi c music for T h e Wel l-T emper ed Cl at i i er (B W V ' 846-93) : At t he. cut t i ng edge of new s o u n d k a p e s i n an ot her wi se u n t e m p e r e d wbrl d òf musi c, Bach' s' work f or t he k e y b o a r d s h o w c a s e d hi s P r b W e s s i nt he h e w musi cal space, made avai l abl e si nce. t he. advent of t he concept of ' t emperi ngt h e alteration of musi cal di àt ance b e t w e e n each nser r i i t ône i n a musi cal scal e, rather t han f ol l owi ng t he st ri ct ' harmoni c pr ogr essi on t hat produces notes in a part i cul ark e y 2â l l o w e d , f or t he fi rst ti ttl e, ' ' by approximating t he sam rat i o i n t he i nt erval s b e t w e e n not es, t he possi bi l i t y of transposition' an T r ansposi t i on i s a concept t hat i s i nt i mat el y l i nked to W est er n music, given t hat musi cal not es i n t hi s s y s t e m h a v e b e e n convent i onal l y l i nked to a fi xed pitch (440 Hz i s a concer t A). As a poi nt of compar i son, i n ot her musi cal systems, suc , as i n I ndi an cl assi cal musi c, f or i nst ance, t he f undâment al not e ' (Do i n t he Western sol f ege syst em, or Sa i n m o s t I ndi an l anguages) d o e s not h a v e a f i xed pi tch: Rather, t he ent i re scal e i s d e p e n d e n t onl y on t he t oni c (Sa) c h o s e n by t he musi ci an based on
Vinay Swamy, Interpreting the Republic: Marginalization and Belonging in Contemporary French Nove... more Vinay Swamy, Interpreting the Republic: Marginalization and Belonging in Contemporary French Novels and Films. Lanham (MD): Lexington Books, 2011. XXXiV + 171 pp. Interpreting the Republic moves deftly among interdisciplinary approaches ranging from cultural and postcolonial studies to political analysis, film criticism, and literary theory. The thread linking a seemingly disparate assortment of primary texts is the theme of belonging in the Republic. At times, this implicates the individual; at others, the notion--more problematic in the French context--of community affiliation. Swamy suggests that this tension lies at the heart of the question and that "different interpretations of the Republic(an model) are clearly dependent on an understanding of the relationship between co-called 'private' action and public consequence" (xviii). Interpreting the Republic examines the ways in which gender, sexual orientation and ethnicity intersect within these parameters. It is in this multifaceted approach that Swamy offers a fresh and important contribution to the scholarship on the identity debate, which was raging well before Sarkozy launched his short-lived official debat sur l'identite nationale in 2009. Swamy's approach breaks free of the theoretical discursive categories into which minorities are often pushed by French political and media debates as well as in Anglo-American academic discourse, whether delimited by ethnicity (Beur, Franco-Maghrebi, or simply Maghrebi), gender, sexuality, or the spatial organization of French society (the banlieue). While there are certainly a number of valuable academic contributions to the debate that are organized around such categorizations, the approach espoused by Swamy offers the promise of a fruitful and indeed essential expansion of the parameters of the debate. This approach is compelling because Individuals maneuver within society and the Republic not only, and sometimes not at all, as members of a particular ethnic group or other marginalized category. As perceptive observers such as Mireille Rosello and Patrick Weil have argued, individuals may opt to align themselves with a variety of groups, whether marginal or otherwise, and their affiliations and affinities may shift throughout the course of their lifetime. Thus, any attempt to "interpret the Republic" must take into account the complexities of belonging and exclusion at play for individuals across and beyond particular marginalized categories. Interpreting the Republic links the ethnically-focused exclusion that was brought to the forefront in the 1990s to the debate waged near the end of that decade over the Pacte civil de solidarite (PaCS), which extended some of the rights and protections afforded to homosexuals and unmarried heterosexual couples. Swamy argues that "France's thrust to maintain a robust national self-identification [...] can be found at the root of many debates about nonnormative sexual orientations" (131). Turning both to texts that explicitly invite such an approach, notably Drole de Felix (Ducastel and Martineau, 2000) and Chouchou (Merzak All-ouache, 2003)--whose titular characters conform to neither perceived ethnic nor cultural norms of the Republic--and to less obvious choices such as Francis Veber's hit comedy Le Placard (2001), Swamy foregrounds the ways in which these diverse works "appeal to tactical interpretations that allow them to define what it means to be French from their perspective" (xxv). …
SouS la direction de Vinay Swamy et louiSa mackenzie Devenir non-binaire en français contemporain... more SouS la direction de Vinay Swamy et louiSa mackenzie Devenir non-binaire en français contemporain Collection Genre(s) et création Éditions Le Manuscrit Paris vii La collection Genre(s) et création À l'heure du combat pour la reconnaissance du droit à l'autodétermination de l'identité de genre, la création, sous toutes ses formes, demeure le lieu privilégié pour la révéler et l'affirmer. Qu'elle soit littéraire, artistique ou scientifique, il s'agit de questionner, de déconstruire, de subvertir les classifications sociales et culturelles du féminin et du masculin fabriquées par le système sexe/ genre binaire et normatif. Cette collection se propose d'une part de publier en langue française des ouvrages théoriques fondamentaux pour la réflexion, d'autre part de faire connaître des travaux de recherche susceptibles d'enrichir les savoirs et de dynamiser les pratiques. ix Sommaire Avant-propos Karine Espineira xiii 1 Pour désigner un genre vécu et éprouvé en dehors du schéma masculin/féminin, il existe de nombreuses étiquettes-neutre ou neutrois, agenre, genderqueer/genderfluid (souvent en anglais-détail qui ne passera pas inaperçu dans les contributions qui suivent), androgyne, et bien d'autres. Sans vouloir niveler ces différences, nous avons privilégié « non-binaire » aussi bien comme terme générique qui englobe les mots mentionnés ci-dessus, que par souci d'économie, et par stratégie puisque c'est le terme le plus susceptible d'être reconnu par un grand public. 2 Artiste trans et bilingue d'origine québécoise, Sophie Labelle est la plus connue pour ses bandes dessinées publiées en ligne : Assignée garçon, et la version en anglais Assigned Male. 3 Sophie Labelle, Assignée garçon. Planche 118. 4 On peut reconnaître, parmi de nombreux groupes culturels traditionnellement non-binaires-ou de troisièmes genre surtout dans d'autres cultures non-européennes-les Hijras en Asie du Sud (Bangladesh, Bhutan, Inde, Népal, Pakistan, Sri Lanka), les Bissus d'Indonésie, les Fa'afa
Since Jules Ferry instituted free and mandatory education in 1882, the state school has been one ... more Since Jules Ferry instituted free and mandatory education in 1882, the state school has been one of the pillars of the French Republic. Much of the ideological work done by this institution in the construction of the nation is thus predicated on the inculcation of Republican values ...
Ci nemat i c Transposition of t he "Republic"? Fat i ma and D' une pi erre deux coups Vi nay Swam... more Ci nemat i c Transposition of t he "Republic"? Fat i ma and D' une pi erre deux coups Vi nay Swamy I. Pr el ude: T r ansposi t i on and t he Tempered Scale T r anspose: Wr i t e or pl ay (musi c) i n a different key f r om t he ori gi nal : "t he basses ar e transposed down a n octave" Oxf or d Engl i sh Dictionary T h e sensi bi l i t i es of W e s t e r n m u s i è , 1 a m t ol d, wer e di f f erent , when Johann S e b a s t i a n B à c h (16. 85:-1750) fi rst c b M p o s è d hi s *i i dw cl assi c music for T h e Wel l-T emper ed Cl at i i er (B W V ' 846-93) : At t he. cut t i ng edge of new s o u n d k a p e s i n an ot her wi se u n t e m p e r e d wbrl d òf musi c, Bach' s' work f or t he k e y b o a r d s h o w c a s e d hi s P r b W e s s i nt he h e w musi cal space, made avai l abl e si nce. t he. advent of t he concept of ' t emperi ngt h e alteration of musi cal di àt ance b e t w e e n each nser r i i t ône i n a musi cal scal e, rather t han f ol l owi ng t he st ri ct ' harmoni c pr ogr essi on t hat produces notes in a part i cul ark e y 2â l l o w e d , f or t he fi rst ti ttl e, ' ' by approximating t he sam rat i o i n t he i nt erval s b e t w e e n not es, t he possi bi l i t y of transposition' an T r ansposi t i on i s a concept t hat i s i nt i mat el y l i nked to W est er n music, given t hat musi cal not es i n t hi s s y s t e m h a v e b e e n convent i onal l y l i nked to a fi xed pitch (440 Hz i s a concer t A). As a poi nt of compar i son, i n ot her musi cal systems, suc , as i n I ndi an cl assi cal musi c, f or i nst ance, t he f undâment al not e ' (Do i n t he Western sol f ege syst em, or Sa i n m o s t I ndi an l anguages) d o e s not h a v e a f i xed pi tch: Rather, t he ent i re scal e i s d e p e n d e n t onl y on t he t oni c (Sa) c h o s e n by t he musi ci an based on
Devenir non-binaire en français contemporain, 2022
Durant ces dernières années, la visibilité des personnes non-binaires qui revendiquent publiqueme... more Durant ces dernières années, la visibilité des personnes non-binaires qui revendiquent publiquement en anglais et en français leur identité au-delà du genre binaire s’est largement accrue. Alors que le singulier « they » a gagné la faveur de nombreuses personnes dans les espaces anglophones, les personnes francophones non-binaires ont dû faire face à d’autres défis concernant la langue et la syntaxe, étant donnée la nature binaire de la grammaire française elle-même. Ce volume collectif examine les tentatives récentes visant à mettre à la disposition de tout le monde une langue et des identités équitables, inclusives et expansives au sein des espaces linguistiques, culturels et pédagogiques francophones. De ce fait, Devenir non-binaire en français contemporain conteste l’idée reçue du genre non-conforme comme simple importation d’outre-Atlantique, d’un modèle identitaire à la base américaine.
The last few years have seen an increased visibility of non-binary persons who are publicly claim... more The last few years have seen an increased visibility of non-binary persons who are publicly claiming their identities and pronouns beyond the gender binary in both English and French. While the singular “they” has gained favor among many in Anglophone spaces due in part to the precedent for such a usage in English, Francophone non-binary persons have had to face further challenges regarding language and syntax given the binary nature of French grammar itself. This special issue considers recent attempts to make available gender‑equitable, ‑neutral, and ‑expansive language and identities to French speakers within linguistic, cultural, and pedagogical spaces. In offering to the readers of H-France our reflections on these developments, the contributors to this special issue expand on the fruitful exchange initiated at a symposium at Vassar College in April 2018—when earlier versions of this material were first presented—and invite dialogue with a broader public. In so doing, we hope that the questions we raise will be taken in the spirit of ongoing inquiry rather than as prescriptive positions (as indicated by the titular question mark), and that our chapters will be read as open-ended engagements with the rapidly-developing public conversations on non-binary issues beyond the academy. We also hope that the embedded hyperlinks and the appended glossary will allow our readers to engage directly, if they so wish, with the many multimedial resources cited in this issue.
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