A French Major’s Research Project at a Liberal Arts University

My favorite French project was the final assignment in my Québécois Literature and Culture class during the fall semester of my senior year at the University of Mary Washington. After a semester of reading novels, watching movies, and learning about Québécois history and culture, our class’s final assignment was to write a literary analysis research paper based on one of the works we had studied.  We were asked to choose between the following books and movie – all of which Jalen and I recommend reading/watching!

Novels:
Le jour des corneilles, Jean-François Beauchemin
L’acquittement, Gaétan Soucy
Folle, Nelly Arcan
L’amant du lac, Virginia Pésémapéo Bordeleau

Movie:
La petite fille qui aimait trop les allumettes, Simon Lavoie

I chose to write my paper on L’amant du lac. This novel caught my attention in particular because of its interesting themes, including eroticism, nature, war, and the condition of First Nations peoples in Canada, as well as its unique format, which combines poetry, prose, and illustration. The plot was also captivating – in her novel, Pésémapéo Bordeleau weaves a fascinating tale about love, feminine desire, Algonquin culture, and humankind in general.

I titled my work “La décolonisation littéraire : Le cas de L’amant du lac de Virginia Pésémapéo Bordeleau” as my paper focuses on what I call a “bordeleauiste approach” –  invoking Pésémapéo Bordeleau’s use of nature, Cree language, poetry, and illustration among other strategies –  to literary decolonization.

Most of my research focused on First Nations people’s history, decolonization theory, the use of language in the context of colonization, and reappropriation strategies used in First Nations people’s literature. My paper details how these topics work together and play off of each other in Pésémapéo Bordeleau’s novel.

I enjoyed presenting my research to my classmates as well as learning about theirs – especially concerning their ideas about other novels we read and the movie we watched. Because we were given free rein for the topic of our research and paper, there were many thought-provoking and original concepts shared.

I also had the opportunity to present my paper at the annual UMW Scholarship Showcase where I talked to many interested attendees about my research and thesis. It was great to be able to represent the French major and speak about a paper that took a lot of time and effort!

I consider this my favorite French project of my college career for three reasons.

1. It was one of the few research papers I completed where I could come up with a topic and thesis that were completely unique and my own. Writing to prompts can become boring after a while, and presenting a one-of-a-kind argument is gratifying.
2. I was able to combine knowledge from multiple classes I had taken in college, like Global Issues in Literature in the English department and Geography and Development in the Geography department. Cross-curricular projects really appeal to me because synthesizing ideas discussed in other classes facilitates the creation of a dynamic thesis.
3. Finally, it was amazing to read a novel in a French class outside of the French literary canon. While I also love reading classic French authors, it was a breath of fresh air to study and write about an intriguing Québécois novel created by an author of Québécois and Cree descent.

If you have any questions about my project or have an interesting assignment of your own to share, let us know in the comments!

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