Late 18th-century France Research Articles

Monet, Narcissus and self-reflection: the modernist myth of the self

This text provides an understanding of the life and work of Claude Monet and the myth of the modern artist. Levine analyzes the extensive critical reception of Monet and the artist's own writings in the context of the story of Narcissus, popular in late 19th-century France. Through a balance of psychoanalytical theory and historical study, he identifies narcissism and obsession as driving forces in Monet's art and demonstrates how meaning is derived from the accumulated responses to the work.

Gender and power: Images of women in late 18th-century France

(1989). Gender and power: Images of women in late 18th-century France. History of European Ideas: Vol. 10, No. 3, pp. 309-332.

Hypnosis in the courtroom.

The courts’ response to the potential contribution of hypnosis to the fact-finding process is illustrative of the consequences of a broader judicial desire for assistance from the mental health professions. Time and again, in their eagerness to facilitate the difficult process of adjudication, the courts have shown themselves susceptible to the unverified claims of some mental health practitioners that their peculiar insights or the techniques they employ can help the courts achieve greater certainty than has been possible before. When those claims turn out to be false, the judicial system is chagrined but apparently no more cautious about embracing the next mental health technique that promises to ease the adjudicative burden. Hypnosis, the case in point, is often traced back to the German physician Mesmer, whose seemingly miraculous cures in late18th-century France attracted wide attention among laymen and scientists alike (1). A refined version of hypnotic technique was later used by Charcot to treat hysterical conversion reactions, and some of Freud’s early attempts to probe the

The field of cultural production, or: The economic world reversed

To be fully understood, literary production has to be approached in relational terms, by constructing the literary field, i.e. the space of literary prises de position that are possible in a given period in a given society. Prises de position arise from the encounter between particular agents' dispositions (their habitus, shaped by their social trajectory) and their position in a field of positions which is defined by the distribution of a specific form of capital. This specific literary (or artistic, or philosophical, etc.) capital functions within an ‘economy’ whose logic is an inversion of the logic of the larger economy of the society. The ‘interest in distinterestedness’ can be understood by examining the structural relations between the field of literary production and the field of class relations. A number of effects within the literary field arise from the homologies between positions within the two fields. This model is then used to analyze the particular case of the literary field in late 19th century France.

La loi et ses monuments en 1791

Mark K. Deming and Claudine de Vaulchier : The law and its monuments in 1791. Reflecting the Enlightenment's intellectual preoccupations, architecture in late 18th-century France, was intended to exert a social and moralizing influence, especially through public buildings. Nowhere, perhaps, was such an idea more explicitly illustrated than in the Discours sur les monuments publics delivered by A.G. Kersaint in 1791, which called for the construction of several Parisien monuments embodying the new political order. Two of these were meant to strengthen the power of the law : the 'prytanée', a structure for bill-posting, originated in response to the conflict about placarding rights ; three different types, throughout the city, were to be the main source of instructions for citizens. The second, the national assembly hall, was to provide the People's delegates

Musician and Mécène: Some Observations on Patronage in Late 18th-Century France

Musician and Mécène: Some Observations on Patronage in Late 18th-Century France

Instruction or Education?

In 1938, a teachers' training college opened in Rufisque, Senegal, for young girls from all parts of French West Africa. This establishment had a twofold objective: train the first female primary school teachers and educate the future spouses of the men enrolled in higher education. The political and ideological issues underlying the creation of this institution had less to do with educating young women than with instilling in them the values and behaviors that would help France take root in the colonies. With the goal of turning out accomplished housewives and worthy mothers, the college's first principal, Germaine Le Goff, advocated, in line with official instructions, a complete moral and practical instruction in parallel to a basic education and a few lessons in the science of education itself. The principles of education applied at the college tended to be like those that prevailed in secondary schools for girls in late 19th century France. Nonetheless, creating this college marked a key phase in the professionalization of women, a process that started in French West Africa following WWI. Opening a section for midwives in the school of medicine in 1918 and institutionalizing nurses' training as of 1930 were other phases therein. The teachers' training college in Rufisque tended to represent the best of what the French administration did for educating African girls.