Multiple Cultures in French - interim report
Abstract:
During the summer, Margaret videotaped interviews with three French speakers from countries other than France. She did the taping while at a Francophone Studies conference in the Ivory Coast. Topics focused mainly on issues of language, the use of French language in that country, and individuals' choices for language in different social situations. Susan traveled to Haiti and interviewed several Haitian French-speakers. Topics varied, but all the interviews included comparisons of the French language with Haitian Creole, a derivative of French.
Both Margaret and Susan have begun working with the footage to produce edited clips from the interviews. Margaret has hired a student worker at OWU to assist with the project--a student who also happens to be from a Francophone country in Africa. Susan, too, is in the process of completing the editing of the clips at Wooster.
Susan met with our Francophone colleague from Lawrence University and shared the progress on the project, the topics discussed in the taped interviews, and related topics. They agreed that November might be convenient for a meeting with Margaret and the colleague from Earlham as well. The purpose of this meeting, as originally proposed, would be to share ideas about using such video in undergraduate courses on French and Francophone culture, and possibly to create the basis for further collaborative projects.