Results of the French film essay competition 2015
Read all the latest news and upcoming events from the faculty on the main News page.
Tutors: Dr María del Pilar Blanco, Dr Ben Bollig, Dr María Donapetry, and Dr Claire Williams
Our nomination for a Teaching Excellence Award has been approved by the Humanities Division. This award is made in recognition of the high quality of our teaching and the important contribution which we make to the teaching of Latin American Studies in general and Latin American Film Studies in particular.
Film is an integral part of a number of undergraduate modern languages courses at Oxford and has also been one of the most important emerging areas in Latin American studies in recent years. We have worked together to develop a shared paper on Latin American cinema. The option proposed an innovative format that took into account the mixed level of expertise in film amongst potential students and the different areas of expertise of the teaching team.
The course thus gives students the opportunity to discover and explore major movements in the history of cinema in Latin America, from the radical experiments and manifestos of the 1950s and 60s to the slick blockbusters and internationally successful co-productions of the twenty-first century, including...
Tutors: Dr María del Pilar Blanco, Dr Ben Bollig, Dr María Donapetry, and Dr Claire Williams
Our nomination for a Teaching Excellence Award has been approved by the Humanities Division. This award is made in recognition of the high quality of our teaching and the important contribution which we make to the teaching of Latin American Studies in general and Latin American Film Studies in particular.
Film is an integral part of a number of undergraduate modern languages courses at Oxford and has also been one of the most important emerging areas in Latin American studies in recent years. We have worked together to develop a shared paper on Latin American cinema. The option proposed an innovative format that took into account the mixed level of expertise in film amongst potential students and the different areas of expertise of the teaching team.
The course thus gives students the opportunity to discover and explore major movements in the history of cinema in Latin America, from the radical experiments and manifestos of the 1950s and 60s to the slick blockbusters and internationally successful co-productions of the twenty-first century, including...
Dr Christina Roaf, former University Lecturer in Italian, has died on 18th June at the age of 96.
Dr Roaf was born on 17 November 1917 and named after Christina Rossetti, who had once lived in the house. An account of her childhood appeared in the 2003 Somerville Magazine in the "Life before Somerville" section. Much of her childhood was spent travelling around Europe in the company of her mother, Vera Waddington, an exhibition of whose work she helped put on in 2007-08.
Taught by the legendary Enid Starkie, she gained a First in Modern Languages from Somerville, thanks in part to her proficiency in spoken French and Italian. During the War, she worked for the Foreign & Commonwealth Office research department, and was later posted to the British Consulate in Milan (1945) and the British Embassy in Rome (1946).
Dr Christina Roaf, former University Lecturer in Italian, has died on 18th June at the age of 96.
Dr Roaf was born on 17 November 1917 and named after Christina Rossetti, who had once lived in the house. An account of her childhood appeared in the 2003 Somerville Magazine in the "Life before Somerville" section. Much of her childhood was spent travelling around Europe in the company of her mother, Vera Waddington, an exhibition of whose work she helped put on in 2007-08.
Taught by the legendary Enid Starkie, she gained a First in Modern Languages from Somerville, thanks in part to her proficiency in spoken French and Italian. During the War, she worked for the Foreign & Commonwealth Office research department, and was later posted to the British Consulate in Milan (1945) and the British Embassy in Rome (1946).
The multi-media edition of Rameau's Nephew, (translated by Faculty members, Kate Tunstall and Caroline Warman) has just won the 2015 British Society for Eighteenth-Century Studies Digital Prize. With over a hundred illustrations and embedded musical clips, it can be read in paper or online versions, and also be downloaded. The online version can be read for free.
Results of the French film essay competition 2015
Results from previous years
We are delighted to announce that Henrike Lähnemann, currently Chair in German Studies at the University of Newcastle, will be joining us as the Chair of Medieval German. This is one of the eight statutory chairs of the Faculty for Medieval and Modern Languages - and the first to be taken up in German by a woman in the 150 years of history of Modern Languages at Oxford. Her predecessors are Peter Ganz, the famous medievalist and editor, among other texts, of the Tristan by Gottfried of Straßburg, and Nigel F. Palmer, one of the best known academic British figures in German medieval Studies. She will start her new job on 1 January 2015.
To find out more about Henrike Lähnemann's research profile and her ambitions for German Studies in the UK, read an interview with her on Academia.net and a report on NU Connection.
The French schools liaison blog, Adventures on the Bookshelf, is celebrating its first anniversary this week, and also its quarter-of-a-millionth page-view. Over the last twelve months it's grown from a trickle of interest at first, to now welcoming up to 6000 visitors a day, and having readers in over 100 countries (including Azerbaidjan, Brunei and Tokelau). A look back at some of its greatest hits.
An Oxford DPhil student (Sarah Hickmott, Merton) has won the 2014 R. H. Gapper Postgraduate Essay Prize, accorded by the Society for French Studies, for an essay titled ‘(En) Corps Sonore’, an interdisciplinary reflection on the question of listening in the work of the philosopher Jean-Luc Nancy. The prize includes an award of £750 and expenses-paid travel to the Annual Conference of the Society.
The joint runners-up for this year’s award included another Oxford postgraduate, Emma Claussen (St John's), along with Edmund Birch (Cambridge).
In 2013 an Oxford undergraduate Dulcie fforde (SEH) won another major prize accorded by the Society for French Studies, the R.H. Gapper Undergraduate Essay Competition. The 2014 prize is yet to be accorded.
Professor Helen Watanabe-O’Kelly, FBA, learned on 3 May 2013 that her application for a collaborative research grant to HERA (Humanities in the European Research Area) was one of 18 successful projects. The 3-year grant of almost 1 million Euros will enable her to work with colleagues in Germany, Poland and Sweden on ‘Marrying Cultures: Queens Consort and European Identities 1500-1800’. The focus of the project is the foreign consort as agent of cultural transfer. Among the case studies to be investigated are the Polish princess Katarzyna Jagiellonka, Duchess of Finland and Queen of Sweden (1526-83); Hedwig Eleonora, Duchess of Schleswig-Holstein-Gottorp and Queen of Sweden (1636-1715); the Portuguese princess Catarina of Braganza, Queen of Great Britain (1638-1705); and Maria Amalia, Princess of Saxony, Queen of the Two Sicilies and Queen of Spain (1724-1760).
Professor Helen Watanabe-O’Kelly, FBA, learned on 3 May 2013 that her application for a collaborative research grant to HERA (Humanities in the European Research Area) was one of 18 successful projects. The 3-year grant of almost 1 million Euros will enable her to work with colleagues in Germany, Poland and Sweden on ‘Marrying Cultures: Queens Consort and European Identities 1500-1800’. The focus of the project is the foreign consort as agent of cultural transfer. Among the case studies to be investigated are the Polish princess Katarzyna Jagiellonka, Duchess of Finland and Queen of Sweden (1526-83); Hedwig Eleonora, Duchess of Schleswig-Holstein-Gottorp and Queen of Sweden (1636-1715); the Portuguese princess Catarina of Braganza, Queen of Great Britain (1638-1705); and Maria Amalia, Princess of Saxony, Queen of the Two Sicilies and Queen of Spain (1724-1760).
Professor Helen Watanabe-O’Kelly, FBA, learned on 3 May 2013 that her application for a collaborative research grant to HERA (Humanities in the European Research Area) was one of 18 successful projects. The 3-year grant of almost 1 million Euros will enable her to work with colleagues in Germany, Poland and Sweden on ‘Marrying Cultures: Queens Consort and European Identities 1500-1800’. The focus of the project is the foreign consort as agent of cultural transfer. Among the case studies to be investigated are the Polish princess Katarzyna Jagiellonka, Duchess of Finland and Queen of Sweden (1526-83); Hedwig Eleonora, Duchess of Schleswig-Holstein-Gottorp and Queen of Sweden (1636-1715); the Portuguese princess Catarina of Braganza, Queen of Great Britain (1638-1705); and Maria Amalia, Princess of Saxony, Queen of the Two Sicilies and Queen of Spain (1724-1760).
A feast of narrative imagination and directorial invention!
With 179 entries from across 42 schools, the University of Oxford’s second French film essay competition received over three times more entries than in 2012, and from a greater number of schools and colleges. Equal to last year, though, was the very impressive range and richness of responses to the two set films: Comme une image (Years 10-11) and Un air de famille (Years 12-13). Entrants re-wrote the closing chapter, picking up narrative threads left hanging by each film’s ambiguous ending. So rich were the responses that, in addition to the winner and runner-up in each category, a selection of further entries were offered special commendation. To read more about the re-writings of each film, click here.
On Tuesday 18 June languages teachers from across Oxfordshire joined languages lecturers from Oxford University to share their expertise in Oxford’s first ever MFL teachmeet. A teachmeet is a bit like a conference but each presentation lasts for a short period of time – usually two or five minutes. Each presenter explains an activity or technique which has worked well for them. It’s about sharing best practice, inspiring others and making connections with other educators.
The event was organised by Helen Swift, University Lecturer in Medieval French and Schools Liaison Officer for the Faculty of Medieval and Modern Languages, and the heads of languages in the OCL (Oxford City Learning) schools: Cheney, Wheatley Park, Matthew Arnold, St. Gregory The Great and Oxford Spires. These schools work together to share ideas, challenge and support each other. 35 teachers and lecturers attended the event. Most of the teachers were from OCL schools but there were also representatives from Henry Box, Bartholomew and Didcot Girls.
On Tuesday 18 June languages teachers from across Oxfordshire joined languages lecturers from Oxford University to share their expertise in Oxford’s first ever MFL teachmeet. A teachmeet is a bit like a conference but each presentation lasts for a short period of time – usually two or five minutes. Each presenter explains an activity or technique which has worked well for them. It’s about sharing best practice, inspiring others and making connections with other educators.
The event was organised by Helen Swift, University Lecturer in Medieval French and Schools Liaison Officer for the Faculty of Medieval and Modern Languages, and the heads of languages in the OCL (Oxford City Learning) schools: Cheney, Wheatley Park, Matthew Arnold, St. Gregory The Great and Oxford Spires. These schools work together to share ideas, challenge and support each other. 35 teachers and lecturers attended the event. Most of the teachers were from OCL schools but there were also representatives from Henry Box, Bartholomew and Didcot Girls.
Professor Terence Cave, Emeritus Professor of French in the Faculty of Mediæval and Modern Languages at Oxford and Emeritus Research Fellow of St John’s, is to be congratulated on being appointed CBE in the Queen’s Birthday Honours List for services to Literary Scholarship. Author of major works of criticism, including The Cornucopian Text: Problems of Writing in the French Renaissance (1979), Recognitions: a Study in Poetics (1988), Pré-Histoires (1999, 2001) and, most recently, Mignon’s Afterlives: Crossing Cultures from Goethe to the Twenty-First Century (2011), Professor Cave was recognised by the award of the International Balzan Prize (2009) “for his outstanding contributions to a new understanding of Renaissance literature and of the influence of Aristotelian poetics in modern European literature”. He used the prize to set up a research project, the Balzan Interdisciplinary Seminar, based at the St John’s College Research Centre, to address the question “What are the nature and value of literature as an object of knowledge in the interdisciplinary spectrum?” The Modern Languages Faculty is delighted at...
The impact of the introduction of the EBacc performance measure can be felt in this year's GCSE numbers, with modern foreign languages up by 15.8%.
French numbers are up from 153,436 to 177,288 (up 15.5%). German up from 57,547 to 62,932 (up 9.4%). Spanish up from 72,606 to 91,315 (up 25.8%). Other languages up from 29,843 to 31,368 (up 5.1%).
The figures show a change in market share: Spanish now represents over a quarter of GCSE entries (25.2%), taking one percentage point each from German (17.3%) and other languages (8.6%), while French retains just under half of total entries (48.9%).
Modern Languages at University
A letter to the TImes Higher Education by Jim Coleman, Chair of the University Council of Modern Languages, on degree-level language uptake.
The impact of the introduction of the EBacc performance measure can be felt in this year's GCSE numbers, with modern foreign languages up by 15.8%.
French numbers are up from 153,436 to 177,288 (up 15.5%). German up from 57,547 to 62,932 (up 9.4%). Spanish up from 72,606 to 91,315 (up 25.8%). Other languages up from 29,843 to 31,368 (up 5.1%).
The figures show a change in market share: Spanish now represents over a quarter of GCSE entries (25.2%), taking one percentage point each from German (17.3%) and other languages (8.6%), while French retains just under half of total entries (48.9%).
Modern Languages at University
A letter to the TImes Higher Education by Jim Coleman, Chair of the University Council of Modern Languages, on degree-level language uptake.
The impact of the introduction of the EBacc performance measure can be felt in this year's GCSE numbers, with modern foreign languages up by 15.8%.
French numbers are up from 153,436 to 177,288 (up 15.5%). German up from 57,547 to 62,932 (up 9.4%). Spanish up from 72,606 to 91,315 (up 25.8%). Other languages up from 29,843 to 31,368 (up 5.1%).
The figures show a change in market share: Spanish now represents over a quarter of GCSE entries (25.2%), taking one percentage point each from German (17.3%) and other languages (8.6%), while French retains just under half of total entries (48.9%).
Modern Languages at University
A letter to the TImes Higher Education by Jim Coleman, Chair of the University Council of Modern Languages, on degree-level language uptake.