Francophone Oceania: Beyond the Postcard Paradise

Centuries before Europeans entered the Pacific, the sea was open to anyone who could navigate a way through. Of critical importance to Oceanian communities and scholarship today is the project of remembering the stories, knowledges, travel routes, and ecologies that have crisscrossed the aqueous landscapes of this 'other' side of the globe. This course is a survey of the literature, modern history, and aesthetics that inform the field of contemporary Francophone Oceanian Studies. Major concepts in Indigenous philosophy, European imperialism, racial politics, gender and sexuality, maritime knowledges, and nuclear colonialism will be studied. Conducted in French.