{"title":"A moment of luxury in eighteenth-century France: On Jean-Honoré Fragonard's the Swing","authors":"John Armitage","doi":"10.1177/09571558261417900","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/09571558261417900","url":null,"abstract":"The first section of this article offers a conceptual and historical narrative of luxury in eighteenth-century France, moving to an introduction to the main thrust of the eighteenth-century French philosophers of luxury Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Jean-François de Saint-Lambert's endeavor to enhance the understanding of luxury. However, in the second section, attention is paid to the central theme of what I call “a moment of luxury” in eighteenth-century France, the import of the German philosopher Martin Heidegger's work on the concept of a “moment of vision,” and, in particular, my own original recasting of this experience of insight into people's situation as a “moment of luxurious vision.” In the third and final substantial section, as the article's title suggests, the concept of luxury is paramount in my specific contribution, which is less a historical than a philosophical interpretation of Jean-Honoré Fragonard's 1767–1768 famous painting, <jats:italic toggle=\"yes\">The Swing</jats:italic> , with an emphasis on the artwork as a representation of a moment of luxurious vision. A conclusion is reserved for an evaluation of this philosophical work and my own assessment of its potential impact.","PeriodicalId":12398,"journal":{"name":"French Cultural Studies","volume":"54 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2026-02-09","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"146146001","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"In flesh and metal: Automachinic femininity in Titane","authors":"Melissa Barchi Panek","doi":"10.1177/09571558261418002","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/09571558261418002","url":null,"abstract":"This article examines how Julia Ducournau's <jats:italic toggle=\"yes\">Titane</jats:italic> (2021) reconfigures the cultural coding of the automobile in French cinema by merging it with female corporeality to construct what I term <jats:italic toggle=\"yes\">automachinic femininity</jats:italic> . Challenging the long-standing masculinized framing of both cars and women as objects of spectacle, the article argues that <jats:italic toggle=\"yes\">Titane</jats:italic> fuses flesh and metal through a grotesque yet generative aesthetic. Through textual and semiotic analysis, the study situates the film within a lineage of French cinema while emphasizing its radical transgression. Central to this analysis is the figure of the Metallic Madonna, a mythic cyborg hybrid that reworks Marian iconography through machinic pregnancy and birth. By destabilizing binaries such as masculine/feminine and organic/mechanical, <jats:italic toggle=\"yes\">Titane</jats:italic> positions the female body as a site of posthuman transformation rather than passive display. The article concludes that Ducournau's film offers a feminist posthuman framework for rethinking gender, technology, and embodiment in contemporary cinema today globally.","PeriodicalId":12398,"journal":{"name":"French Cultural Studies","volume":"31 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2026-02-09","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"146146002","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Challenging the enduring epistemic injustice of eating disorders: Critically re-reading Occupation food insecurity in the Trente Glorieuses with Elsa Triolet and the 1944–1945 ‘Minnesota Starvation Experiment’","authors":"Ruth Cruickshank","doi":"10.1177/09571558251406518","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/09571558251406518","url":null,"abstract":"The intersection of food insecurity in occupied France with other risk factors and comorbidities thought to lead to eating disorders has been obscured. So have the profound emotional and functional impacts which occur right across the spectrum of these extremely serious psychiatric conditions, including the most prevalent, yet little-known diagnosis: other specific feeding or eating disorder (OSFED). This article challenges this nexus of neglect. It reveals how historians occlude key psychological impacts of semi-starvation in Vichy France and into the <jats:italic toggle=\"yes\">Trente Glorieuses</jats:italic> . In the 1944–1945 ‘Minnesota Starvation Experiment’ and recent scientific research, it identifies epistemic injustice whereby testimony of lived experiences, the potential for making sense of them and access to knowledge are prejudicially undermined. Re-reading scientific literature fills some hermeneutic gaps, but Elsa Triolet's literary fiction provides a compelling representation of OSFED and powerfully communicates the impacts of the clinically significant distress or impairment experienced in all eating disorders. Entangling these critical re-readings demonstrates the Humanities’ potential for setting new agendas and for challenging narratives undermining understanding of all eating disorders.","PeriodicalId":12398,"journal":{"name":"French Cultural Studies","volume":"6 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2025-12-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145893708","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The ABCs of early French computational literature: APL, Paul Braffort, and constrained writing in Oulipo","authors":"Bruno Galmar","doi":"10.1177/09571558251406513","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/09571558251406513","url":null,"abstract":"This article explores how Iverson's APL (A Programming Language), a distinctive programming language, was integrated into Oulipo's <jats:italic toggle=\"yes\">Atlas de littérature potentielle</jats:italic> by Paul Braffort (1923–2018), the group's AI and programming expert. For Braffort, APL was more than an efficient tool for algorithmic text processing and text generation; it served as a pedagogical “tool of thought” that enabled creative writers to abstract and formalize their ideas about constrained writing. We examine Braffort's technical and aesthetic rationale for adopting APL over more common programming languages. By uniting science (computer science in a broad sense) and humanities (literature) cultures, Braffort embodied a new figure in French experimental literature of the 1970s–1980s: the <jats:italic toggle=\"yes\">writer–mathematician–programmer,</jats:italic> updating the previous figure in the Oulipo of the <jats:italic toggle=\"yes\">writer–mathematician</jats:italic> epitomized by Queneau. In today's era of generative AI with natural-language interfaces, his forward-looking vision of modeling literary ideas in APL as a formal language remains both relevant and original. At present, with free access to modern APL tooling and abundant resources, creative writers can more readily than in 1981 experience APL as a powerful “intellectual tool”, a tool that has empowered creative artists beyond the field of literature. Braffort's work with APL in the <jats:italic toggle=\"yes\">Atlas</jats:italic> stands as a milestone in French computational literature, characterized by the crossing of constrained writing, programming, and the formalizing spirit of early AI.","PeriodicalId":12398,"journal":{"name":"French Cultural Studies","volume":"1 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2025-12-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145893709","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Casting out: The racial division of acting labor in French film and television","authors":"Maxime Cervulle, Sarah Lécossais","doi":"10.1177/09571558251406520","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/09571558251406520","url":null,"abstract":"This article examines how racial categories shape casting practices in the French film and television industry. Drawing on interviews with 24 casting directors and 51 actors and actresses perceived as non-white, it reveals a highly stratified employment landscape, where ethnoracial stereotypes severely restrict access to significant roles. Although explicit racial categorization is generally prohibited in France, the entertainment industry benefits from specific exemptions that allow casting professionals to openly rely on ethnoracial criteria. Non-white performers describe casting as a degrading, exclusionary process, as they are frequently compelled to embody caricatured roles, adopt fake accents or subjected to demeaning comments about their appearance. Despite formal training and proven talent, they are often confined to minor parts, due to a racialized structure of artistic labor.","PeriodicalId":12398,"journal":{"name":"French Cultural Studies","volume":"29 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2025-12-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145808072","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Occupation and resistance: In honour of Margaret Atack","authors":"Diana Holmes, Max Silverman","doi":"10.1177/09571558251406515","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/09571558251406515","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":12398,"journal":{"name":"French Cultural Studies","volume":"3 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2025-12-19","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145801131","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Voices of French women in wartime London: ‘Books that record great events do not explain how ordinary people of a great city live during momentous days’","authors":"Debra Kelly","doi":"10.1177/09571558251406505","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/09571558251406505","url":null,"abstract":"The primary aim of this contribution is to seek the traces of those not foremost in the plethora of texts published during and after the Second World War concerning key figures and political and military events of the period. Its focus is a range of French women living in wartime London. It takes in, therefore, the experiences and writings of female citizens of London's well-established ‘French Colony’, alongside those of some of the women belonging to the Free French Corps des Volontaires Françaises who joined de Gaulle in the city in 1940 and shortly afterwards. By working and thinking beyond established historical subjects and sources the aim is also, following Margaret Atack's own commitments and approaches, to construct other archives and different historical knowledge structures.","PeriodicalId":12398,"journal":{"name":"French Cultural Studies","volume":"22 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2025-12-19","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145801033","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Storying the archive of war","authors":"Hilary Footitt","doi":"10.1177/09571558251406517","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/09571558251406517","url":null,"abstract":"This article situates Margaret's early doctoral research, resulting in the seminal study ‘Literature and the French Resistance: Cultural Politics and narrative forms, 1940–1950’, within the 1970s/1980s context of Resistance historical scholarship in which she was working, a scholarship dominated by the Comité d’Histoire de la Deuxième Guerre Mondiale (the predecessor, 1951–1979, of the Institut d’Histoire du Temps Présent). The conception, methodology and gendered ownership of the Resistance historiography established by the Comité are reviewed in order to indicate ways in which Margaret's work represented a forceful critique of their notions of Resistance history and historical truth. In doing this, the article reflects on the nature of archives – the first archives on the French Resistance collected immediately after the war when there was little or no official material to hand; oppositional archives like Margaret's developed to contest contemporary historiography, and finally some of the implications of the digitised turn in archives for our understanding of ourselves as researchers.","PeriodicalId":12398,"journal":{"name":"French Cultural Studies","volume":"56 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2025-12-16","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145765150","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Unity and ambiguity in French culture of the 1940s","authors":"Michael Kelly","doi":"10.1177/09571558251406746","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/09571558251406746","url":null,"abstract":"Margaret Atack's work offers a clear insight into the enduring paradoxes of the Occupation and its aftermath. She suggests that novels of Unity written during the Occupation were followed by novels of Ambiguity which reflected the social and moral confusions that haunted France through the post-war period. This is confirmed by the main cultural movements of the 1940s, which struggled to articulate a national spirit that could manage the polarisations of the Occupation. The complex legacy of ambiguities is exemplified by the Catholic personalist movement around Emmanuel Mounier and the review <jats:italic toggle=\"yes\">Esprit</jats:italic> , whose itinerary is examined from its foundation in 1932. The period of publication under the Vichy Regime in particular posed painful dilemmas which left a legacy of ambiguities when <jats:italic toggle=\"yes\">Esprit</jats:italic> emerged as a leading literary and philosophical review in the post-war period. The review's trajectory suggests that ambiguity may be the price to be paid for national unity and that unity is always provisional.","PeriodicalId":12398,"journal":{"name":"French Cultural Studies","volume":"30 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.4,"publicationDate":"2025-12-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"145759703","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}