Addresses the theoretical and pedagogical implications of redefining French Studies as an interdisciplinary field, while providing practical examples of the kind of criticism that such a shift would entail.

French Cultural Studies for the Twenty-First Century brings together current scholarship on a diverse range of topics—from French postcards and Third Republic menus to Haitian literary magazines and representation of race in vaudeville theater—in order to provide methodological insight into the current practice of French cultural studies. The essays in the volume show how scholars of French studies can effectively analyze what we term “non-traditional sources” in their historical and geographical contexts. In doing so, the volume offers a compelling vision of the field today and maps out potential paradigms for future research. This bookbuilds upon previous scholarship that defined the stakes of using an interdisciplinary approach to analyze cultural objects from France and Francophone regions and aims to evaluate the current state of this complex and constantly evolving field and its current methodological practices.

The latest installment of Yale French Studies explores the history and development of bande dessinée, Franco-Belgian comics This special issue of Yale French Studies on bande dessinée is a multifaceted reflection on its newfound academic status. It goes beyond the question, settled long ago, of its artistic legitimacy but aims to think "outside the boxes," or cases, themselves in order to explore the mutually enriching relationship between BD and the wider francophone cultural and intellectual world. Contributions thus intersect with art history, literary theory, cinema studies, postcolonialism, semiotics, and political sociology. Articles are by mainstream interdisciplinary scholars applying themselves to BD, leading authorities on bande dessinée itself, BD artists, and key figures in contemporary French thought whose texts appear in English for the first time.

The concept of translation has become central to postcolonial theory in recent decades. This volume draws together reflections by translators, authors and academics working across Africa, the Caribbean and the Indian Ocean - areas where the linguistic legacies of French colonial operations are long-lasting and complex.

The 2007 manifesto in favour of a "Litterature-monde en francais" has generated new debates in both "francophone" and "postcolonial" studies. Praised by some for breaking down the hierarchical division between "French" and "Francophone" literatures, the manifesto has been criticized by othersfor recreating that division through an exoticizing vision that continues to privilege the publishing industry of the former colonial metropole. Does the manifesto signal the advent of a new critical paradigm destined to render obsolescent those of "francophone" and/or "postcolonial" studies? Or isit simply a passing fad, a glitzy but ephemeral publicity stunt generated and promoted by writers and publishing executives vis-a-vis whom scholars and critics should maintain a skeptical distance? Does it offer an all-embracing transnational vista leading beyond the confines of postcolonialism orreintroduce an incipient form of neocolonialism even while proclaiming the end of the centre/periphery divide? In addressing these questions, leading scholars of "French", "Francophone" and "postcolonial" studies from around the globe help to assess the wider question of the evolving status ofFrench Studies as a transnational field of study amid the challenges of globalization.

In an era of commemoration, France's Colonial Legacies contributes to the debates taking place in France about the place of empire in the contemporary life of the nation, debates that have been underway since the 1990s and that now reach across public life and society with manifestations in the French parliament, media and universities. France's empire and the gradual process of its loss is one of the defining narratives of the contemporary nation, contributing to the construction of its image both on the international stage and at home. While certain intellectuals present the imperial period as an historical irrelevance that ended in the years following the Second World War, the contested legacies of France's colonies continue to influence the development of French society in the view of scholars of the postcolonial. This volume surveys the memorial practices and discourses that are played out in a range of arenas, drawing on the expertise of researchers working in the fields of politics, media, cultural studies, literature and film to offer a wide-ranging picture of remembrance in contemporary France. Introduction: The Postcolonial Nation, Fiona Barclay Part One: Narrative Gaps 1. Amnesia about Anglophone Africa: France’s Rhodesian mind-set, its manifestations and its legacies, 1947–58, Joanna Warson 2. From ‘écrivains coloniaux’ to écrivains de ‘langue française’: strata of un/acknowledged memories, Gabrielle Parker Part Two: The Algerian War, Fifty Years On 3. Conflicting memories: modernisation, colonialism and the Algerian war appelés in Cinq colonnes à la une, Iain Mossman 4. Derrida’s virtual space of spectrality: cinematic haunting and the law in Mon Colonel (Herbiet, 2006), Fiona Barclay 5. ‘Le devoir de mémoire’: the poetics and politics of cultural memory in Assia Djebar’s Le Blanc de l’Algérie, Jennifer Mullen 6. (Un)packing the suitcases: postcolonial memory and iconography, William Kidd Part Three: The Transnational Family 7. Interrogating the transnational family: memory, identity and cultural bilingualism in Sous la clarté de la lune (Traoré, 2004), Zélie Asava 8. Continuity and discontinuity in the family: looking beyond the post-colonial in Il y a longtemps que je t’aime (Claudel, 2008), Fiona Handyside Part Four: Contemporary Commemorations 9. Anti-racism, republicanism and the Sarkozy years: SOS Racisme and the Mouvement des Indigènes de la République, Thomas Martin 10. Playing out the postcolonial: football and commemoration, Cathal Kilcline 11. Crime and penitence in slavery commemoration: from political controversy to the politics of performance, Nicola Frith