Publications
2012
The Republic and the Riots: Exploring Urban Violence in French Suburbs, 2005-2007
Matthew Moran
In 2005, the deaths of two teenagers in Clichy-sous-Bois provoked three weeks of rioting in French banlieues. This book takes the reader inside the world of the banlieues and explores the nature and causes of the riots. Drawing on qualitative fieldwork conducted in Villiers-le-Bel, the author offers a unique insight into the motivating factors behind the violence. On a larger scale, the book examines the relationship between the underprivileged suburbs and the French republican model. The author explores a triad of interconnections: between republican ideals and the reality of daily life in the banlieues; between national projections of unity and localized realities of disunity; and between figures of authority and ordinary citizens.
2011
Writing Postcolonial France: Haunting, Literature, and the Maghreb
Fiona Barclay
This book examines the way in which France has failed to come to terms with the end of its empire, and is now haunted by the legacy of its colonial relationship with North Africa. It examines the form assumed by the ghosts of the past in fiction from a range of genres (travel writing, detective fiction, life writing, historical fiction, women's writing) produced within metropolitan France, and assesses whether moments of haunting may in fact open up possibilities for a renewed relational structure of cultural memory. By viewing metropolitan France through the prism of its relationship with its former colonies in North Africa, the book maps the complexities of contemporary France, demonstrating an emerging postcoloniality within France itself.
France in the Age of Organization - Factory, Home and Nation from the 1920s to Vichy
Jackie Clarke
In interwar France, there was a growing sense that 'organization' was the solution to the nation's perceived social, economic and political ills. This book examines the roots of this idea in the industrial rationalization movement and its manifestations in areas as diverse as domestic organization and economic planning. In doing so, it shows how experts in fields ranging from engineering to the biological sciences shaped visions of a rational socio-economic order from the 1920s to Vichy and beyond.
Contemporary France
Helen Drake
An accessible interdisciplinary introduction to contemporary France providing coverage of culture, society, economy, and politics set in a historical and global context. A central theme is the relationship between popular images of France and the often contradictory realities of French society as it faces up to the challenges of the 21st century.
More details
The Media in Contemporary France
Raymond Kuhn
The Media in Contemporary France analyses the role of the main news media - press, radio, television and the internet - in one of the world's major democracies. Written by a leading specialist in the field, it covers media policy, news management and image projection during the mediatized 'hyperpresidency' of Nicolas Sarkozy.
Memories of May '68
Chris Reynolds
This book sheds new light on one of the most significant periods in recent French history, the student revolts of May 1968. Focussing on the portrayal of these events during the subsequent decennial commemorations, Chris Reynolds analyzes the construction of the history of 1968. By highlighting the paradox between the plethora of existing material on 1968 and the relatively narrow frame through which the year's events are viewed, Reynolds raises complex issues concerning the gap between memory and history.
2010
Gender and Fraternal Orders in Europe, 1300-2000
Edited by Máire Fedelma Cross
What have medieval nuns, parrot shooting, Freemasonry, and Shetland revelry got in common? The essays in this volume demonstrate recent scholarship on monastic orders, guilds, men and women Freemasons and friendly societies over centuries and across frontiers in Europe. Written by scholars from interdisciplinary backgrounds, they provide new insights into their contribution to the gendering of public space and the evolution of 'separate spheres'.
French Muslims - New Voices in Contemporary France
Sharif Gemie
The debate concerning Muslims and the contemporary world has attracted the attentions of many commentators. French Muslims by Dr Sharif Gemie is an analysis of Muslim opinions and experiences in France, which has the largest Muslim population in Europe.
2009
Balzac and Violence - Representing History, Space Sexuality and Death in La Comédie humaine
Owen Heathcote
Violence is one of the main themes in the novels of Honoré de Balzac. Executions, murders, savagery and death accompany the conspiracies and the turbulence that characterise his post-Revolutionary times, from the Terror to the Napoleonic campaigns and then to the upheavals of 1830 and 1848. Despite the importance of violence in Balzac, this is the first book-length study of the topic.