France

Restored Victor Hugo Statue Vandalized by French Rightists Claiming "Wokeism" Run Amok

The statue in the author's birth city of Besançon has become a lightning rod for controversy after a restoration aimed at returning to the vision of Senegalese sculptor Ousmane Sow was seen as presenting the author as Black.  

When Will the French Dam Against the Far Right Crack?

by Brian Sandberg

Macron is the latest representative of the French center to call for an electoral coalition to act as a "dam" against the far right. In another French presidential election, the dam has held, but will it endure? 

A Woman Enslaved by a Founder Sought Freedom in Paris

by Martha S. Jones

"Paris has no true monument to Abigail, no place that calls to mind an American slave who died there at the advent of American freedom."

“Some of Our Superpatriots are Simply Going Crazy”: America's Response to the Fall of France

by Michael S. Neiberg

The fall of France in 1940 disrupted Americans' understandings of their stable and secure place in the world. One response was intense nativism and paranoia about spies and subversives that resonate with today's pandemic response.

France Is Becoming More Like America. But Not How You May Think

The damaging import from the US isn't "cancel culture" but a politicized and defensively narrow nationalism. Journalist Cole Stangler says "culture wars are America’s true gift to France."

Who's Afraid of Antiracism?

by Chelsea Stieber

Recent books in different genres shed light on the limits of the French governing ideal of republican universalism for a society where racism is real and historically significant. 

France Eases Access, a Little, to Its Secrets

Historians of France's colonial war in Algeria have long been frustrated by the government's classification policies on documents related to the conflict. It is unclear how much this change will create transparency.   

French Academics Fear Becoming Scapegoats in War on Terrorism

The killing of a social studies teacher has opened French academics to accusations of supporting radical Islamists and undermining France's policy of national secularism; those who turn a critical lens to French colonialism and racism in contemporary France have received sharp criticism from nationalist and center-right politicians.

A Medieval Perspective on the Public Acceptance of Women as Leaders

by Erika Graham-Goering

Whether in medieval France or in modern democracies, women's exercise of leadership has been constrained by gendered ideas of who can lead. 

Watch This 1897 Snowball Fight for a Jolt of Pure Joy

The footage was captured in Lyon, in 1897, by the Lumière brothers, who were among the world’s first filmmakers. 

A Teacher, His Killer and the Failure of French Integration

The murder of a French social studies teacher who showed his multiethnic class images offensive to Islam illustrates the dilemma of the French policy of secularism, which is beset on one side by complaints that immigrants do not assimilate and on the other by rising xenophobia and racism.

Black Women in Nineteenth-Century France: An Interview with Historian Robin Mitchell

Robin Mitchell's book "Vénus Noire: Black Women and Colonial Fantasies in Nineteenth-Century France" examines how sexualized descriptions of Black women contributed to French racism.

A Coded Word From the Far Right Roils France’s Political Mainstream

Historians Pascal Blanchard and Pap Ndiaye say that the hot-button term "ensauvagement" reflects France's unrecognized history of colonialism and the prevalent belief that the French helped elevate the people they colonized; the present-day right wing uses the term to imply that immigrants from France's former colonies require control and repression.

The Strange Defeat of the United States

by Robert Zaretsky

Eighty years later, Bloch’s investigation casts useful light for those historians who, gripped by the white heat of their own moment, may seek to understand the once unthinkable defeat of the United States in its “war” against the new coronavirus.

The Book of Smells

Historian Robert Muchembled’s new history is full of disgusting, delicious details about early modern France.

When France Extorted Haiti – the Greatest Heist in History

by Marlene Daut

Because the indemnity Haiti paid to France is the first and only time a formerly enslaved people were forced to compensate those who had once enslaved them, Haiti should be at the center of the global movement for reparations.

Top French Historian Slams Macron's Hardline Stance on Statues

Historian Nicolas Offenstadt told French radio that Macron had a made a "hugely damaging confusion between history and memory that will not help public debate in France."

Tear Down that Statue, Mr. Macron!

by Marlene L. Daut

Four figures from French history whose statues could replace that of Jefferson in Paris.

Misremembering the Fall of France 80 Years Later (Part 2)

by Robert J. Young

The French defeat was driven by strategic error and faulty battlefield strategy, but not by a lack of will to fight. 

Misremembering the Fall of France 80 Years Later (Part 1)

by Robert J. Young

On the 80th anniversary of the Fall of France, it's time to retire the idea that the French surrendered without a fight.