I have my definitive schedule for the semester! I though I’d share which classes and why I’m taking each one!

Methodologies

a three week required course, it basically goes over the proper way to write a paper, give a presentation, etc in French.  This course is used to make sure we understand the French way of education is different than ours and to not make in grave mistakes.

Paris-Cinéma

This course counts as a core requirement for the French Cultural Studies major (yes I changed my major again, I decided that French cultural major is a better idea for me than French Literature).  I’m actually possibly going to count this as a LA-AS (language and arts requirement for College of Arts and Sciences at Cornell) requirement as well… I need to send the course description (which I need to translate)  to my advising Dean…. so many things on my to do list. Not to mention, this course is super interesting.  So far we’ve learned about the creation of cinéma and we are going to study films that are from Paris and/or about Paris.  This class is also reading-intensive which I hadn’t planned on.

Sociology de la culture française

Big surprise here, I loved this class!  It basically compares the french culture with itself during different time periods.  The professor is super up-beat and the class is very small.  We used different means such as psychiatry, art history, and religious architecture to compare the culture of France before and after the revolution! This class counts as an elective for the French major.  Also, it will fulfill a distribution requirement, I hope it fulfills Cultural analysis (Arts and Sciences) requirement, although I may have to settle for social bonding requirement.  I have to email for that as well.  Additionally, to apply to Osteopathic medical schools, I have to take two behavioral science classes and this will fulfill one of those requirements.

Psychanalyse: Naissance de la Psychanalyse

I can only count three classes for my major this semester so this is my freebie class.  This class will fill my social bonding arts and science requirement (we have to have a certain number of distribution requirements, do it’s okay if I have two of the same category).  Furthermore this class will count as a behavioral science class for Osteopathic medical schools.  So why psychanalyse?  Well this is the only psychology class at the intro level that fit in my schedule that I could take (their course scheduling is very different here).  This class so far has talked about Freud and the struggle for psychanalyse to be considered legitimate as well as the struggle for it to become a profession outside of medicine.

Histoire de l’Afrique Noire au 19e Siècle

History of subsaharan Africa in the 19th century.  This fulfill Historical Analysis and geographical breadth requirement for Arts and Sciences and it fulfills my francophone requirement for a French elective.  This class talks about Africa before and during colonization.  We spoke mostly about politics and religion in the last class.  Also, the professor is my absolute favorite.  In class on Thursday, she would pay attention to me because she knows I’m an international student.  Whenever she’d say a word I didn’t know, I’d keep staring at her because I wouldn’t know what to write down, and then she’d define the word.  I was shocked.  She really wanted to make sure that everyone in the class understood!  I feel really sad for this professor because she’s allergic to chalk, so she can’t ever erase the board!

Outside of my classes: 

I volunteer at Hôpital Necker- Enfants Malade (a children’s hospital)  and take dance lessons at L’école de Danse de Paris (my first one is tomorrow) … also my schedule couldn’t show all my classes and the evening due to my screen size, so you can’t see it on my schedule, but I assure you it’s there !

I also scheduled two blocks on time on Wednesday to make sure I set aside time to do MCAT verbal sections and watch the film for my film class!

Also, my classes each have a lot of reading.  I’m not used to having reading in my classes (I’ve only ever taken science classes, writing classes, or french classes at Cornell).  I’ve read more in the past week than I’ve probably read in some of my semesters (pathetic I know).  I’m hoping once I get over the first few weeks my reading speed in French will pick up and I won’t have to rely on word reference as much.  Also, most of my classes are 3 hour blocks.  That is a long time to sit still and pay attention.  I’m working up my endurance.  As of right now I’m pretty useless the last 20 minutes of class 😛

From my  schedule you can also see that I went to the Loire Valley this past weekend and I’m going to Amiens on Friday!  I will create a separate post on the Loire Valley hopefully tonight or tomorrow… I have lots of photos to upload!!