FRE 331 - Enlightenment: Eighteenth Century French Literature (1)

France’s fiercely secular understanding of citizenship can be traced back to the Enlightenment period which culminated in the violent revolution of 1789. French philosophes such as Voltaire, Rousseau, Diderot, and Montesquieu promoted an international republic of letters founded on freedom of expression and human rights. This course focuses on works by the philosophes with attention to the limits of French Enlightenment thinking with respect to differences of race and gender. Offered subject to the availability of faculty. Prerequisite: FRE 301. FRE 311 or FRE 312 is strongly recommended.
(Humanities)