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COURSE MATERIALS

• Colin Jones, Paris: Biography of a City. (London: Penguin, 2004)
• Course reader
• Three English-language booklets from the Itinéraires series published by the Editions
  du patrimoine: The Pantheon; The Arch of Triumph; The Palais Garnier.
  

FORMAL REQUIREMENTS

• Class participation and Reaction papers (40%)
  Students are expected to have done the reading for each class and to participate in discussions both in class and at the weekly site visits. These visits are what make the class unique: you may not ever again have the opportunity to actually take what you read about Paris to the streets. The meeting points for the walks are indicated below, please be on time. The visits are not optional, as they form the core of the class. Therefore you must be prepared to do a lot of walking, no matter what weather conditions are. (It can get very cold and windy. Pack sneakers and warm socks as well as a decent coat). Reaction papers – 2/3 typed pages – respond to site visits and the related readings. These papers allow you to synthesize your impressions of the places we visit, to reflect upon them in terms of the issues discussed in class, and to raise questions for further debate. Each student must hand in a total of 6 reaction papers (ie. you may chose not to write a paper for some of the site visits). The reaction papers are due – in double-spaced print-outs – at the next class after the related visit. Those sent via e-mail will not be accepted. If Accent organizes a trip to Versailles, you may write about it instead of a Paris visit.
• One 3 page personal reaction paper. (10%)
  Here you choose your own site, and highlight its relevance to the class. This paper is due, at the latest, by Week 10.
• Midterm (25%)
• Final (25%)

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COURSE SCHEDULE

Week 1 . Sept 7 & 9
The Unplanned City:  Whose Paris?

Readings:

• Jones, Ch. 4 and begin Ch. 5.
• David P. Jordan, Transforming Paris, (New York:  The Free Press, 1995),  selection from Chapter 1 “Paris before Haussmann,” pp. 18-36.
• Orest Ranum, Paris in the Age of Absolutism, (Penn State U Press, 2002), pp. 87-106.

Week 2. Sept 14 
Expressing Power:  the Means and Ends of Louis XIV

Readings:

• Jones,  finish Ch. 5
• Louis XIV, manuscript page from 1714.
• Jean de La Fontaine, “The Frogs Who Asked for a King,” in Selected Fables (James Mitchie, trans. London: Penguin Books, 1979/1982, pp. 37-38).
• Nathan Whitman, “Myth and Politics: Versailles and the Fountain of Latona,” in John C. Rule, ed.  Louis XIV and the Craft of Kingship, (Ohio State University Press, 1969), pp. 286-301.

Sept 16
Site visit:  From the Louvre to the Place des Victoires
(Read the section “The Philip Augustus Wall” in Jones, Ch. 2, and bring the maps from the reader)

Meeting point: 
GROUP 1:  outside the Metro stop Palais Royal/Musée du Louvre
(Metros: #1 or #7)  Take the exit marked “Place du Palais Royal,” you will find yourself on a big noisy square facing the Louvre with a lot of rollerbladers practicing around you.  If you’ve taken the #7 and come outside from under a jeweled awning, you are in the wrong place!  Head southeast and look for the Art Nouveau metro entrance.
GROUP 2:  outside the Metro stop Louvre/Rivoli  (Line #1)

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Week 3 . Sept 21
Erase, Deface, Replace:  Revolutionary Paris

Readings:  

• Jones, Ch. 6 and half of Ch. 7
• Richard D. E. Burton , Blood in the City, (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2001), Chapter 2 “Violent Origins, The Taking of the Bastille,” pp. 26-40.
• James Leith, “Ephemera: Civic Education Through Images,” from Peter Jones, ed., The French Revolution in Social and Political Perspective  (London: Arnold Press, 1996), pp. 188-202.
• Itineraire reader:  The Pantheon

Sept 23 
Site visit:  The Panthéon

Meeting point:
in front of the Pantheon. (RER B Luxembourg)  If you are coming from the Saint Michel direction, be at the back of the train and head for the nearest exit. Find rue Soufflot.  If it is raining, inside.

Thursday Sept 24 
Site visit: the Gardens of the Palais de Versailles

This excursion out of Paris will count as the make-up class for the NOV 11 session.

Meeting point:

for BOTH GROUPS: in front of the Accent Center at 2:30 sharp.  We will probably only return to Paris by 7:00 p.m. –  make no travel plans for this evening.

Week 4. Sept 28
Glory in Stone: Napoleon I’s Paris

Readings:

• Jones, finish Ch. 7
• Johannes Willms, Paris, Capital of Europe, (New York:  Holmes & Meier, 1997), “Napoleon as Architect,” pp. 124-135.
• Jordan, Transforming Paris.  End of Chapter 1, pp. 36-40.

Sept 30 
Site visit: L’Arc de triomphe 

Meeting point:
GROUP 1:  on the corner (pairs) of the Ave. des Champs Elysées, outside the Metro – facing the arch, you are on the right hand side of the avenue. First, we will be walking around the base, then walking up.  Metros: #1, 2, 6, and RER A Charles de Gaulle/EtoileGROUP 2:  on top of the Arch.  Take the #1,2,6 or RER A to Charles de Gaulle/Etoile, use the exit clearly marked for the Arch, find and take the underpass out to the monument. At a booth to your left as you are about to emerge from the tunnel, use your Accent card to get a free ticket and climb the 200 or so steps to the top.  I will be waiting up there, outside.

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Week 5. Oct 5
1815 to 1851: The Struggle for Paris Past and Future

Readings:

• Jones, Ch. 8.
• Burton , Blood in the City,  Chapter 4,  “Vendôme/Invalides, Paris of the Bonapartes 1802-1871,” pp. 72-89.

Oct 7 
Site visit: Les Invalides.

Meeting point:
this is complicated. Verify this on your map.  The south,  back,  part on the Avenue de Tourville is where one finds the entrance to the church.  The closest Metro stops are not close, and the area is disorienting :  « Ecole Militaire » (Metro 8), « Varenne » (Metro 13).  The “Invalides” stop is quite far away and places you in front of the wrong side of the building.  Give yourself extra time to get here !  

Week 6. Oct 12
Three Wishes:  Haussmann, genie of the Second Empire

Readings:

• Jones, begin Ch. 9
• Jordan, Transforming Paris,  Ch. 8 “The Implacable Axis of a Straight Line,” pp. 185-210.
• Paul Goldberger, “Toddlin’ Town,”  from The New Yorker, March 9, 2009, pp. 80-81.
• Paul Goldberger, “Eminent Dominion, Rethinking the Legacy of  Robert Moses,” from The New Yorker, Feb 2, 2007, pp. 83-85.
• Itineraire reader:  The Palais Garnier

Oct 14 
Site visit: Le Quartier de l’Opéra.

Meeting point:
GROUP 1:  At the ticket purchase entrance of the Opéra Garnier just where the rue Scribe and rue Auber cross. (Metro stops: Opera (#3, 7, or 8) or Chausee d’Antin/Lafayette (# 3 or #9).
GROUP 2: inside the church of St. Augustin (Metro stop: St. Augustin on the #9 or # 14)

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Week 7 
Oct 19:  Catch-up
Oct 21: In-class MIDTERM

MID-SEMESTER BREAK  (Oct. 26- Nov. 1)

Week 8. Nov 2 
Blood and Iron:  Constructing the Third Republic

Readings:

• Jones, finish Ch. 9 
• David Harvey,  Paris, Capital of Modernity (New York: Routledge, 2003). Ch. 13:  “The Building of the Basilica of Sacre Coeur,” pp. 311-340.

Nov 4 
Site visit:  Sacré-Coeur (with a view of the Eiffel Tower)

Meeting point:

GROUP 1: outside the metro station Anvers in front of the gates to the park on the Place d’Anvers. (Metro # 2). 
GROUP 2: on the front steps of the basilica.  From Anvers walk north up the rue de Steinkerque.  When you reach the Place Suzanne Valadon, take the funicular up to the church (Navigo or regular metro ticket works) and  find us there.  (you can also walk east from Metro Abbesses (#12) along rues Y Le Tac/Tardieu to reach the funicular

Week 9. Nov 9
Temporary Monuments/Permanent Ambitions:  The Universal Expos.

Readings:

• Jones, Ch. 10
• E.J. Hobsbawm, “Mass-Producing Traditions:  Europe 1870-1914,” in Hobsbawm, E.J.  and Terrence Ranger, eds., The Invention of Tradition.  (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983), excerpts: pp. 263-273 and 303-307.
• Henri Loyrette, “ The Eiffel Tower,” in Pierre Nora, et al.  Realms of Memory:  Rethinking the French Past.  Arthur Goldhammer, trans.  (New York:  Columbia University Press, 1996), vol. III, pp. 349-374.
• Itineraire reader:  The Eiffel Tower.
• Images from the Universal Expos of 1900 and 1937

Nov 11
NO CLASS

Week 10. Nov 16
Assimilation or exclusion:  what is forgotten, what is remembered, being Jewish in Paris

Readings: 

• Jones, Ch. 11
• Nancy Green,  The Pletzl of Paris, Jewish Immigrant Workers in the Belle Epoque, (New York, Holmes & Meier, 1986), “Emmigration and Immigration,” pp 29-32,  “Arrival and Reception,” 50-53, “Setttling in,” pp. 68-78.
• Robert O. Paxton, “Inside the Panic,” in The New York Review of Books, Nov. 22, 2007, pp. 49-50.
• Tony Judt, “The Problem of Evil,” in NYRB, Feb. 14, 2008, pp. 33-35.

Nov 18 
Site visit:  Le Musée de l’art et de l’histoire du judaïsme

Meeting point: 
In front of the museum at 71, rue du Temple (4ème).  Closest metro:  Rambuteau (#11)

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Week 11. Nov 23
The Identity Crisis of Postwar Paris: why do Les Halles matter?

Readings: 

• Jones, Ch. 12 and “Conclusion” 
• Jason Epstein, “New York: The Prophet,” in NYRB, Aug. 13, 2009, pp. 33-35.
• Images of the destruction of Les Halles.
• Richard Cobb, “The Assassination of Paris,” in his People and Places (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1985), pp. 187-199.
• Christopher Caldwell, “Revolting High Rises,” the New York Times Magazine, Nov. 27, 2005.
• Nicolai Ourousoff, “A New Paris, as Dreamed by Planners,”  The New York Times, March 7, 2009.

Nov 25 
Site visit:  Looking for Les Halles

Meeting point:
GROUP 1:  in front of The Centre Pompidou by the flowerpot(4^th arr.)  Closest Metro:  “Hotel de Ville” (Metro #1) or “Rambutteau” (#11)
GROUP 2:  inside the Church of Saint Eustache  Closest metros: “Etienne Marcel” (#4); or “Les Halles” using the exit for rue Rambutteau. 

Week 12. Nov 30
Culture as a monument to itself:  the “grands projets” of the Mitterand years

Readings:  

• Herbert Muschamp, “Growing Accustomed to Paris’s New Face,” from The New York Times, June 18, 1995, pp. 1 and 33.
• Richard Bernstein, “The Death and life of a Great Chinese City,” in NYRB, March 26, 2009, pp. 40-42.
• Tony Judt, “A La Recherche du Temps Perdu,” in NYRB, Dec 3, 1998, pp. 51-58.

Dec 3 
Site visit: The Ile de la Cité

Meeting point:
GROUP 1:  in front of the Statue of Henri IV in the middle of the Pont Neuf.  The closest metro stop is Pont Neuf, line #7, but you can also take the #1 from Bastille to “Louvre/Rivoli” and walk over.
GROUP 2:  outside the Memorial des Déportés in the Square de l’Ile de France at the easternmost tip of the Ile de la Cité.  Note: this is not the park with roses just behind Notre Dame, hard to find, use your map!  Nearest Metro:  Pont Marie (#7)

Week 13.
Dec 7:  Review session
Dec 9:  In-class FINAL

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