Class Schedule:

Tuesday, 10:00 am - 1:00 pm

This course offers an in-depth exploration of the French Enlightenment by taking 1685—the year of both the Code Noir and the Revocation of the Édit de Nantes—as a pivotal starting point for understanding the movement’s evolving discourses on tolerance, human rights, and emancipation. Through close readings of major thinkers including Voltaire, Marivaux, Rousseau, Olympe de Gouges, Françoise de Graffigny, Lessing, Kant, Moses Mendelssohn, and Émilie du Châtelet, students will examine how Enlightenment ideals emerged in response to systems of religious persecution, colonial violence, and racial slavery. The course pairs literary and philosophical analysis with historical inquiry, culminating in two co-curricular excursions: one to Nantes to engage with an exhibition on the transatlantic slave trade, and another to Geneva to trace the intellectual legacies of Voltaire and Rousseau in situ.

This course has previously included visits and excursions within Paris and France such as a guided tour of the King's Private Apartments at the Château de Versailles, day trip to Nantes to visit the Mémorial de l'abolition de l'esclavage and the Château des Ducs de Bretagne, research training session at the Archives nationales d'Outre-Mer in Aix-en-Provence, guided tour of the Manufacture de Sèvres, and opera performances in Paris and Versailles. Excursions for Spring 2026 will be confirmed at the beginning of the semester and are subject to availability.

The Age of Enlightenment