CES Blog

My last semester in Paris taught me that the worst thing I can do is take myself too seriously as a researcher. I showed up in Paris, ready to write a Social Studies junior paper about race in France (something, anything within that giant area of study), armed with contacts I had made while at Harvard. I met with a number of professors, took sociology classes at French universities, then I angsted for a month. Then another month. I was stuck: Where was my magical, fascinating research topic? What was my contribution to the not-yet-existent field that was race in France?

Turns out, said field was already budding, and that’s what I ended up studying. I looked at books with the word “race” in the title since the 1990’s to study trends in its usage. (Side note: race is a very taboo word in France, except in relation to the US e.g. “They are so obsessed with race,” or colonialism, so it is a bold move for a French author to frame it as a pertinent contemporary issue.) Not a groundbreaking study, per se. 20 pages really isn’t that grand of a paper. But I finally realized I was not writing a book, and chose an interesting and remotely feasible topic.

So this time, even with a more serious intellectual endeavor—a senior thesis—I have to remember that, at the end of the day, I am still a student. Though I may find interesting results, they will be humble, and Paris is also a great place to just enjoy life. If you let go of expectations, something serendipitous might just fall into your lap. Then, maybe I’ll finally know what I’m writing about!

A few Sundays ago, I went to a “barbecue” at the home of a Parisian family.  It was given by Elsa’s best friend from high school, and her younger brother.  (Elsa Paparemborde ‘10 is graciously hosting me this summer in her Paris residence.)  Elsa asked her friend if she could bring me and Becky Cooper ‘10 along, and so we were invited.

After two years studying at Harvard, I think Elsa may very well have adopted the American model of the summer BBQ – or at least she was picturing it when she thought about including us, the visiting Americans.  As it turned out, what this family had referred to as a barbecue was in fact just a French dinner party, moved outside into the garden.  It’s important to point out that in Paris, having a garden is a rare luxury.  Statistically, only 3000 of the over 1 million apartments in Paris boasts a private garden.  So, if you’re fortunate enough to be among the privileged 3000, I suppose you can’t just have any ordinary barbecue.

This particular luncheon, as it should be called, involved a select group of invitees, all very close friends of the brother and sister who hosted it.  It was clear right away that Becky and I were new to the group, but the family welcomed us warmly nonetheless.  As this party had been carefully planned in advance, it lacked much of the casual-ness of its would-be American equivalent.  In place of beer and soda, they had champagne apéritifs.  Where one might have found pretzels, there were mini-quiches.  Instead of lawn chairs, the family had moved an indoor table and chairs out into the garden for the afternoon.  Real glasses replaced solo cups, and the table was laid with a clean white cloth.  Most of all, there were no hamburgers or hot dogs in sight.  The grilling fell to the brother, who had just graduated from high school.  We all gathered around eagerly and watched – for over an hour – as he placed sausage, then lamb, then full-size steaks onto the ironically miniature (but appropriately small, as all European appliances are in comparison to our own gargantuan counterparts) old-fashioned charcoal grill.

Once the grilling ceremony was complete, the mother and father guided us to the fancy, pre-set table, and ad-libbed a wedding-esque seating arrangement: alternating boys and girls, and separating those who knew each other well.  I must say that the conversation was very interesting, as this was a very accomplished group of French high-school students.  Like Elsa, they had all attended the competitive Lycée Bilingue, and therefore not only spoke French and English fluently, but had a wide and informed sense of the world.  I was especially impressed with the maturity of these “mere” eighteen-year-olds and the level of conversation they could carry.  Perhaps it was the experience of a series of such sit-down meals that had taught them these skills; all in all, they seemed far more advanced – culturally, intellectually, and socially – than Americans their age (of whom I know many, thanks to my nineteen-year-old sister).

Over the “course” (no pun intended) of the requisite four courses of the [normally indoor] French meal – meat, salad, dessert, coffee, and wine all throughout – I got into a fairly serious discussion, or debate rather, with the young host himself.  Well-traveled and well-spoken, Pablo (who also speaks Spanish fluently because of his Mexican mother) confidently pontificated on the finer points of French culture, the legacy of the colonial world, and, most memorably, why he would never live in the United States.

His main point was that in the U.S., everything centers on production (he came very close to describing Weber’s Protestant ethic, but I didn’t think I had the ability to explain that properly to him).  Whereas Americans place value only on the products of work, the French appreciate leisure and the value of not working, on simply “existing.”  (Again, I was not brave enough to try to go into existentialism – with a French education, Pablo could have probably bested me in “philo,” anyway.)  The examples of capitalist industry are obvious, but the example we dwelt on most was that of academics.  I say “academics,” and not university professors, or researchers, because in France, there are men and women who simply think.  That is, the socialist state supports them, as members of the Académie Française for instance, to just ponder.

I insisted that there were, at least, some ridiculous elements to this system, because these academics were under no expectation or obligation to write books, or publish research data.  In effect, their thinking benefited no one, while they consumed state funding.  Pablo jumped on this comment with a victorious reminder to me of just how American my confusion was.  When I added that intellectuals should, in my opinion, be part of university communities, he argued that universities would put too much pressure on these thinkers to “produce” books or attract students.  Private universities, he claimed, made a product out of learning.  In France, on the other hand, most higher education is public (I went to the Sorbonne for a semester in the fall for less than $400).

There were several points of irony in Pablo’s argument, though he was right about my mentality being distinctly American.  First, and most simply, Pablo attended an elite private high school, thereby rejecting what the state offered in terms of education.  Second, the French higher education system does not use a liberal-arts curriculum.  Rather, one pursues a college-equivalent degree in the professional field one wishes to enter.  Law, for example, is an undergraduate field.  Therefore, all opportunity to “learn for the sake of learning” is more or less unavailable to the majority of French youth.  If you were to take up a subject in the humanities, you would be expected to teach in that subject, plain and simple.  The lucky few who make it to the higher ranks of the French intelligentsia have succeeded on test after test to finally be accepted to the most prestigious of academic institutions, the École Normale Supérieure (ENS).  What continues to baffle me is what is expected of ENS graduates once they receive their diplomas.  That the people and the government expect nothing (even if they do welcome a good book), is, according to Pablo, the beauty of French cultural-intellectual life.

This conversation, mutually futile as it was, confirmed to me how important it is to understand the differences in educational philosophy around the world, and how much education informs culture (and vice versa).  At Harvard, it is easy to consider that we have the best of the best in education, and efficiency, and diversity, and a public-private balance.  At the end of the day – at the end of my semester abroad – I still prefer the American system.  And now, I am willing to admit that the United States and an American education have inculcated in me a value for production, for proving one’s ability to the world, for working for one’s own benefit and hopefully also for that of others.

There are surely many downsides to this culture of production, many of which I’m sure my classmates are realizing in their summer banking and consulting internships.  The leisure-work balance is delicate in the U.S., and perhaps our society could appreciate a little more free time: for contemplation, for vacation, for long conversations, and for sit-down “barbecues.”  After all, had we been in the States, we would have finished our buffet-served hot dogs hours ago.

When I started thinking about my thesis topic, I knew I wanted it to involve the United States and France.  With the encouragement of professors to pursue “transnational” history – so trendy right now – I was sure there must be a great topic out there, somewhere.  But after six months studying abroad in Paris, I was ashamed to say that I hadn’t quite found it.  The consensus among the professors seemed to lead me toward late 19th-century Paris: the world of writers like Henry James and Edith Wharton, painters like Thomas Eakins and Mary Cassatt, and the captains of the newly formed American bourgeoisie who tried (mostly unsuccessfully) to infiltrate the circles of their Parisian counterparts.  The evidence was certainly there.  In Belle-Époque Paris, there did indeed exist an American “colony” (as French and American newspapers alike called it), and the dynamic between these Francophilic Yankees and the city – its residents sometimes included – seemed promising.

Sitting reluctantly in the Widener reading room in early June, though, I still wasn’t sure where to start.  The expansiveness of the topic overwhelmed me.  “Cultural interchange” could mean so many things – art, literature, science, even business – and it was up to me to create that meaning.  I had one week left before I had to get on a plane for France, and I was in desperate need of direction.  That week, researching on campus, I learned to love the HOLLIS catalog.  One rainy day, I came across an entry for “Radcliffe in France,” a manuscript collection in the Schlesinger Library.  There was hardly any description online, so I went over to the Radcliffe Yard and asked to see it.  The massive box that came out of the reserves turned out to be the keystone of my thesis.  Inside, I found the scrapbooks, letters, diaries, and news clippings of a group of six young Radcliffe alumnae who traveled to France after World War I to help in the relief efforts.  Bluestockings or not, these girls were fastidious letter-writers (almost daily), and record-keepers.  They say Harvard men used to make fun of Radcliffe women for taking notes like “little scribes;” but in this case, I have to thank these Cliffies for producing a painstakingly accurate account of the work they did and the experiences they had in 1920 France.  In addition to this treasure trove of archival material, I discovered several related manuscript collections in both the Harvard Archives and the Houghton Library.  Apparently, relief work in France was pretty popular among the educated elite of the Progressive era – more so, I have realized here in France, than I ever predicted.

Twenty email chains and three days later, I had my entire research trip planned.  I would do half my research in Paris, and the other half in the local archives and museums of Picardie, the French département most devastated by the Great War.  I had people to see and places to go, and I felt much better about the whole thing.  The topic couldn’t be better for me.  I had clinched the transnational component (more like “transatlantic,” which is how the French often speak of Franco-American relations), and I had even incorporated a bit of Harvard-Radcliffe history – a sentimental attachment of mine, especially after Rev. Gomes’s delightful course last spring.  I would get to go back to France – my “third” home, so to speak – and at the same time I would see the country through the eyes of my collegiate predecessors.

While at the Sorbonne, I took a class on World War I, which I have decided now must have somehow nudged me toward this topic.  Plus, it emerges fittingly out of the original idea I proposed.  The Great War brought the Belle Époque to a startling and definitive halt, but the attitudes and connections it had formed manifested themselves throughout the harsher, less-belle years.  It was the Americans who had grown to love Paris, and France at large, who led the first relief efforts as soon as the war broke out – before the United States even entered on the Allies’ side.  Edith Wharton agitated fervently for the end of American isolationist neutrality, and Anne Morgan, daughter of J.P., launched the largest foreign relief organization out of a ruined château near the Somme river.

This past week, I visited that château, and a bunch of other fascinating spots in rural Picardie.  In fact, I’ve been in France for almost four weeks already.  It’s strange to be starting a blog at the end of a trip (I go back to Boston on Thursday), but it should give me some perspective, and allow for a more organized version for you readers.  I’ll try my best to keep up the suspense and sense of adventure, and hopefully the more distance I have, the more the witty analysis will flow – hopefully.  My experience here has been richer and denser than I could have imagined.  So much has happened in such a short time, both in terms of research and in terms of, well, fun.  I’m so thrilled to have received a CES grant for the summer.  It’s given me the chance to prepare well for my thesis – in the future – and also to fill in all the gaps in my past Parisian experience.  Meanwhile, the present – sitting on a café terrasse in the quiet Batignolles square – isn’t so bad, either.

Coming up next: Forays in the card catalog, obscure Paris libraries, factory-esque French universities, and…a masquerade ball in England.

The first time I heard the word “sexy” used in relation to academics, it made me giggle. A lot. But apparently it is not uncommon to describe topics that are especially popular to study as sexy. So here I am, with one of the sexiest research topics in Europe: race-related policies in France.

Everybody has an opinion. American media are quite fascinated with the topic: the New York Times has covered Obama’s importance for Black youth in France, the now-infamous Parisian suburbs, France and Algeria, the also-infamous headscarf ban in schools, newly appointed Muslim officials, etc. etc. Not my exact topic, affirmative action in French higher education, which also isn’t a race-based policy per se, but it undoubtedly gets its sexiness from these more high-profile issues.

While a sexy thesis has its advantages, the same sexiness also makes it more challenging me to study. It is all too easy for an American who has grown up with the US Census, a history of Black slavery (and subsequent White guilt), segregation laws, and constant discussions about race relations, to enter France with a number of assumptions. Especially when such assumptions are all over the news. (more…)