Recognised by UNESCO in 2010 as part of humanity's intangible cultural heritage, the French 'gastronomic meal' has been one of the gifts the French feel they have given the world. This is the first module in French Studies globally that aims to give students both a historically grounded understanding of the discourses of food in France and a critical understanding of how French cuisine functions as a national myth;

The wider context for this module's aims is the opportunity to offer our students content and teaching and learning unique in UK French Studies. The module capitalizes on the research expertise of 90% of members of staff at Liverpool;

This module aims to familiarize students with authentic documents written in French from different time periods from the Middle Ages onwards;

This module aims to encourage students to apply the theoretical concepts, historical understanding and specialist French vocabulary that they have l earnt to the understanding and analysis of real-life situations;

This module aims to encourage students to make learning and assessment choices which play to their strengths as independent learners.

(LO1) On completion of this module, students will have an understanding of the development of the significance of food for French society from the Middle Ages to the end of the twentieth century.

(LO2) On completion of this module, students will have acquired and internalized the core vocabulary in French for describing French food and its modes of presentation on the table and in a menu.

(LO3) On completion of this module, students will understand the role played by the absence and presence of food at specific moments in the history of France. 

(LO4) Students will know the names of the principal individuals who have shaped French culinary tradition and understand the importance of food in terms of the relation between Paris and the provinces of France and between France and the UK

(S1) Global citizenship - Cultural awareness

(S2) Communication (oral, written and visual) - Academic writing (inc. referencing skills)

(S3) Demonstrate a knowledge and understanding of the cultures, linguistic contexts, history, politics, geography, and social and economic structures of the societies of the country of the target language

(S4) Apply theoretical approaches or critical secondary literature to the analysis of real-world situations.

Teaching Method 1 - Seminar
Description: Seminars. These are sessions with specific learning objectives which allow students to participate in the analysis of the same type of events or documents to those that they will themselves comment on in the analysis or commentary tasks in the assessment.
Attendance Recorded: Yes
Notes: Two, one-hour blocks per week

Teaching Method 2 - Tutorial
Description: menu analysis tutorials
Attendance Recorded: No

Teaching Method 3 - Other
Description: preparation of WIKIs and module keywords on VITAL
Attendance Recorded: No
Unscheduled Directed Student Hours (time spent away from the timetabled sessions but directed by the teaching staff): 17

Topics covered during the module may include:

Dossier / VITAL site and the 1938 and 2010 editions of the Larousse Gastronomique;

Feast and fast in the Middle Ages. Le Mesnagier de Paris;

Food and excess. Feast and fast in the Middle Ages. Le Viander de Taillevent / Les Très Riches Heures du duc de Berry;

Bread and riots in the Revolutionary period. Menu for a 1788 ambassadorial visit to Versailles; selected extracts from Souvenirs d’un page de la Cour de Louis XVI, reprinted edn (1983); revolutionary pamphlets (e.g. Claude Fauchet, Journal des Amis, no. 8 for 23 February 1793);

Les plats complets de tradition, les accompagnements, les viandes et abats;

Food, wine and intoxication in nineteenth-century France. Selected poems from Baudelaire’s: Les Fleurs du mal, Le Spleen de Paris and Les Paradis artificiels;

Food in Second-World-War France (rationing, shortages and substitutes; diet, health and hunger; food propaganda; war time gastronomic vocabulary; the black market; German requisitioning; city versus countryside. Extracts from official documents, literature, film, radio and the press.