Author: njrabalais

Two French and Francophone Studies seniors recently defended their honors theses. Zarine Kharazian and Paul Naanou both conducted innovative research and received highest honors following the oral defense of their work. Financial support through the McCormack-Reboussin and the Charles Center, respectively, helped make these ground-breaking studies possible. Their work shows the interdisciplinarity and relevance to current social issues that characterize French and Francophone Studies at W&M.

Paul Naanou’s “Qui me rendra présent : Francophone Representations of Lebanese Civil War Memory”, directed by Prof. Magali Compan
Highest Honors

Being of Syrian origin, Paul Naanou had always been fascinated by Levantine history and traditions. So when he became aware of Lebanon’s rich francophone history, he just had to figure out how it fit into the region’s wider narrative. Paul recognizes the importance of memory and collective trauma in relation to the current conflict in Syria, as well.

During Paul’s sophomore year of college, he applied for a Charles Center summer grant to go and meet the Lebanese francophone poet Nada Skaff and do archival research in Paris. For Paul, meeting Nada was a highlight of his college experience because the time spent with her gave him a visceral understanding of how living in French in a Lebanese context is just as authentic as living in Arabic. Moreover, having discussions with her about her own literature gave him insight into how diverse and rich the construction of a Lebanese experience can be.

In Paul’s senior year, he decided to pursue a honors thesis with Prof. Magali Compan that not only looked at the impact of the French language on Lebanese history, but of violence (namely the Lebanese Civil War) as well. Paul says, “I feel so fortunate to have been able to bring attention to Lebanese francophone texts because the experience permitted me to share with the others the reality that all peoples make sense of suffering and violence through different ways and we need to be attuned to them because they can help us articulate our own hallowing experiences. If anything, struggle is a universal reality and rather than let us divide us, I thinking delving into art from a place as seemingly opposed to us as Lebanon enables us to bridge cultural divides and better understand ourselves.”

Zarine Kharazian’s “Yet Another French Exception: The Right To Be Forgotten”
Co-Directors: Professors Maryse Fauvel and Michael Leruth
Highest Honors

Zarine Kharazian’s research focuses on France’s seemingly unique stance on “right to be forgotten” with regard to internet search engines like Google. Her work was made possible through the generous support provided by the McCormack-Reboussin scholarship, which funded archival research in Paris over the summer of 2016. Furthermore, a research internship at Sciences-Po, Paris, through the Internships in Francophone Europe (IFE) program, facilitated access to the Cujas Law library as well as the Sciences-Po library.

In 2015, the European Court of Justice established an online “right to be forgotten” in Europe. Under this right to be forgotten, individuals may request that search engines delist links that reference their personal information from search results. Search engines need not grant these requests, but they are now obligated to review them.

While the Court’s decision to establish the right to be forgotten certainly ignited a debate among Western privacy scholars and policymakers hailing from both sides of the Atlantic, no country has participated in the debate with as much fervor as has France. Zarine’s thesis addresses the following question: What explains France’s unique sense of urgency with regard to digital right to be forgotten? She argues that French privacy jurisprudence does not sufficiently explain France’s attitude and actions in the right to be forgotten debate, as most scholars have suggested. Rather, extralegal factors – namely, long-established societal “mentalités” with regard to the modern state’s responsibility to shield individuals’ honor and reputation from excessive public scrutiny and France’s enduring antagonism towards US digital hegemony – bear most of the explanatory weight.

Thirteen W&M seniors are publishing a brief biography in French to the forthcoming open-access biographical encyclopedia on important figures of francophone Louisiana. The Class of 2017 seniors in French and Francophone Studies got a chance to engage with the authors, poets, and researchers whom they were studying, thanks to a collaboration between Prof. Nathan Rabalais and the publisher Éditions Tintamarre. Based in Centenary College in Shreveport, Louisiana, Éditions Tintamarre is the only French-language press in the U.S.

Each student in the senior seminar, FREN 450 French and Creole Louisiana, started with some online research on a prominent writer or activist. The students then completed phone or Skype interviews with their “subjects” to get extra information and fact-check.

F&FS senior Paul Naanou remarked: “I actually happened to stumble upon Amanda LaFleur, a professor who has done a lot for the preservation of Cajun French, when I was in high school just starting to learn French. It was incredible being to talk to such a wealth of knowledge and be entrusted with the responsibility of conveying her story in a succinct yet informative way.”

Katie Weed, an accounting major with a strong interest in French, interviewed renowned folklorist and poet Barry Jean Ancelet in person. Professor Emeritus at UL Lafayette where he has served as Director of the Center for Acadian and Creole Folklore and Professor of Francophone Studies and Folklore, Ancelet came to W&M’s campus in March to speak to the students in FREN 450 and to give a public talk in English on the Acadian diaspora. The event was made possible by the Dean for Educational Policy, the Department of Modern Languages and Literatures and the Reves Center for International Studies.

Ms. Weed noted: “What I enjoyed most about the biography project was how our class content tied into the people we got to interview. I think that made the class material even more relevant. For example, I interviewed Barry Ancelet about his work on Cajun and Creole folk festivals during the same week when we read about his experiences, and that interview added a lot of interesting context to our senior seminar.”

Although the open access project will include important francophone Louisiana writers from as far back as the mid-19th century, students in FREN 450 focused exclusively on contemporary figures in order to engage more directly and personally with the writers.