Department of French and Italian

Joint offered with CULS-C 701

In this seminar we will explore the different forms of Orality as they appear in the Francophone World since the Middle Ages. We will base our reflection on specific cases (oral tales, reading practices, music and sound recording, image and sound synchronisation, live film commentary) and theoretical readings (Mauss, McLuhan, Certeau, Zumthor, Bolter, Stiegler). We will study the ways in which we constantly interact with various forms of Orality, based on examples taken both from the everyday life or major artistic production of Francophone people in Africa, North America, and Europe. We will address three main research themes: the Performance linked with both direct and mediated Orality; the scriptural or audio-visual Mediations of Orality; the question of audio-visual Synchronisation during production and screenings process.