F Is for France

F Is for France PDF Author: Piu Marie Eatwell
Publisher: Macmillan
ISBN: 1250087732
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 225

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Book Description
Exploring a culture filled with arcane laws, historical incidents, and bizarre paradoxes, Piu Eatwell's follow up to her award-winning and critically acclaimed myth-buster They Eat Horses, Don't They is a delightful exploration of France's quirky, literary, and culinary heritage. From absinthe and catacombs to former French soccer player Zinedine Zidane, Eatwell leaves no stone unturned, taking readers off the beaten path to explore the kind of information that gets missed in guidebooks and 'official' information sources. Who could imagine, for example, that there is a village in France where UFOs are banned from landing? Or that there is a verifiable population of wild kangaroos in the forests surrounding Paris? These, and many other off-beat delights, are just some of the curiosities awaiting readers in this journey through byways and hidden treasures of this endlessly fascinating and paradoxical country. Full of the richness and variety of France beyond the platitudes, including recipes and charming illustrations, F is for France is an ideal gift book and a must-read for Francophiles and anyone with an interest in French travel and culture.

F Is for France

F Is for France PDF Author: Piu Marie Eatwell
Publisher: Macmillan
ISBN: 1250087732
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 225

Get Book Here

Book Description
Exploring a culture filled with arcane laws, historical incidents, and bizarre paradoxes, Piu Eatwell's follow up to her award-winning and critically acclaimed myth-buster They Eat Horses, Don't They is a delightful exploration of France's quirky, literary, and culinary heritage. From absinthe and catacombs to former French soccer player Zinedine Zidane, Eatwell leaves no stone unturned, taking readers off the beaten path to explore the kind of information that gets missed in guidebooks and 'official' information sources. Who could imagine, for example, that there is a village in France where UFOs are banned from landing? Or that there is a verifiable population of wild kangaroos in the forests surrounding Paris? These, and many other off-beat delights, are just some of the curiosities awaiting readers in this journey through byways and hidden treasures of this endlessly fascinating and paradoxical country. Full of the richness and variety of France beyond the platitudes, including recipes and charming illustrations, F is for France is an ideal gift book and a must-read for Francophiles and anyone with an interest in French travel and culture.

The French Way

The French Way PDF Author: Richard F. Kuisel
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 0691161984
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 513

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Book Description
How the French have used American culture to define a unique modern identity There are over 1,000 McDonald's on French soil. Two Disney theme parks have opened near Paris in the last two decades. And American-inspired vocabulary such as "le weekend" has been absorbed into the French language. But as former French president Jacques Chirac put it: "The U.S. finds France unbearably pretentious. And we find the U.S. unbearably hegemonic." Are the French fascinated or threatened by America? They Americanize yet are notorious for expressions of anti-Americanism. From McDonald's and Coca-Cola to free markets and foreign policy, this book looks closely at the conflicts and contradictions of France's relationship to American politics and culture. Richard Kuisel shows how the French have used America as both yardstick and foil to measure their own distinct national identity. They ask: how can we be modern like the Americans without becoming like them? France has charted its own path: it has welcomed America's products but rejected American policies; assailed America's "jungle capitalism" while liberalizing its own economy; attacked "Reaganomics'" while defending French social security; and protected French cinema, television, food, and language even while ingesting American pop culture. Kuisel examines France's role as an independent ally of the United States—in the reunification of Germany and in military involvement in the Persian Gulf and Bosnia—but he also considers the country's failures in influencing the Reagan, Bush, and Clinton administrations. Whether investigating France's successful information technology sector or its spurning of American expertise during the AIDS epidemic, Kuisel asks if this insistence on a French way represents a growing distance between Europe and the United States or a reaction to American globalization. Exploring cultural trends, values, public opinion, and political reality, The French Way delves into the complex relationship between two modern nations.

Mission France

Mission France PDF Author: Kate Vigurs
Publisher: Yale University Press
ISBN: 0300258844
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 352

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Book Description
The full story of the thirty-nine female SOE agents who went undercover in France Formed in 1940, Special Operations Executive was to coordinate Resistance work overseas. The organization’s F section sent more than four hundred agents into France, thirty-nine of whom were women. But while some are widely known—Violette Szabo, Odette Sansom, Noor Inayat Khan—others have had their stories largely overlooked. Kate Vigurs interweaves for the first time the stories of all thirty-nine female agents. Tracing their journeys from early recruitment to work undertaken in the field, to evasion from, or capture by, the Gestapo, Vigurs shows just how greatly missions varied. Some agents were more adept at parachuting. Some agents’ missions lasted for years, others’ less than a few hours. Some survived, others were murdered. By placing the women in the context of their work with the SOE and the wider war, this history reveals the true extent of the differences in their abilities and attitudes while underlining how they nonetheless shared a common mission and, ultimately, deserve recognition.

France and Women, 1789-1914

France and Women, 1789-1914 PDF Author: James F. McMillan
Publisher: Psychology Press
ISBN: 9780415226028
Category : Women
Languages : en
Pages : 310

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Book Description
McMillan (history, U. of Edinburgh) relates how even the republican left was surprisingly conservative in its sexist ideologies for women and their roles in his exploration of French politics, culture, and society in the 19th century. He demonstrates that the ideas of progress and emancipation so prevalent at this time, and which are generally associated with the modernization of the Industrial Revolution, do not hold up to close scrutiny, particularly in relation to women's lives. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

A Brief History of France

A Brief History of France PDF Author: Paul F. State
Publisher: Checkmark Books
ISBN: 9780816081813
Category : France
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
Offers a broad overview of the country's history, from the prehistoric Neanderthals to the present nation at the heart of the European Union, while also exploring the country's geography, culture, and society. --from publisher description

The Heroines of SOE

The Heroines of SOE PDF Author: Squadron Leader Beryl E Escott
Publisher: The History Press
ISBN: 0752462458
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 236

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Book Description
Britain's war in the shadows of male spies and subterfuge in the heart of occupied France is a story well known, but what of the women who also risked their lives for Britain and the liberation of France? In 1942 a desperate need for new recruits, saw SOE turn to a previously overlooked group – women. These extraordinary women came from different backgrounds, but were joined in their idealistic love of France and a desire to play a part in its liberation. They formed SOE's F Section. From the famous White Mouse, Nancy Wake, to the courageous, Noor Inayat Khan, they all risked their lives for King, Country and the Resistance. Many of them died bravely and painfully, and often those who survived, like Eileen Nearne, never told their stories, yet their secret missions of intelligence-gathering and sabotage undoubtedly helped the Resistance to drive out their occupiers and free France. Here, for the first time is the extraordinary account of all forty SOE F women agents. It is a story that deserves to be read by everyone. 'They were the war's bravest women, devoted to defeating the Nazis yet reluctant ever to reveal their heroic pasts. Now a new book tells their intrepid tales.' Daily Express Squadron Leader BERYL E. ESCOTT served in the RAF and is one of the foremost experts on the women of SOE.

Long Ago In France

Long Ago In France PDF Author: M.F.K. Fisher
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
ISBN: 0671755145
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 182

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Book Description
Recounts the author's three year stay in Dijon before the outbreak of World War II, and details the people encountered there.

Catholic and French Forever

Catholic and French Forever PDF Author: Joseph F. Byrnes
Publisher: Sterling Publishing Company
ISBN: 9780271027043
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 318

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Book Description
In Catholic and French Forever Joseph Byrnes recounts the fights and reconciliations between French citizens who found Catholicism integral to their traditional French identity and those who found the continued presence of Catholicism an obstacle to both happiness and progress.

The Cult of the Nation in France

The Cult of the Nation in France PDF Author: David Avrom. BELL
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 0674020723
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 322

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Book Description
In a work of lucid prose and striking originality, Bell offers the first comprehensive survey of patriotism and national sentiment in early modern France, and shows how the dialectical relationship between nationalism and religion left a complex legacy that still resonates in debates over French national identity today. Table of Contents: Preface Introduction: Constructing the Nation 1. The National and the Sacred 2. The Politics of Patriotism and National Sentiment 3. English Barbarians, French Martyrs 4. National Memory and the Canon of Great Frenchmen 5. National Character and the Republican Imagination 6. National Language and the Revolutionary Crucible Conclusion: Toward the Present Day and the End of Nationalism Notes Note on Internet Appendices and Bibliography Index Reviews of this book: Bell delineates the history of nationalism in France, tracing its origins to the 17th century. He shows how in 18th-century France, political and intellectual leaders made perfect national unity a priority, allowing the construction of the nation to take precedence over other political tasks. The goal was to provide all French people with the same language, laws, customs, and values. Bell argues that while the French leaders hoped that patriotism and national sentiment would replace religion as the binding force, it was actually religion that was a major (but not exclusive) factor in helping the French see the world around them. This period of history was the beginning of the first large-scale nationalist program. Bell also shows how the relationship between nationalism and religion contributes to the French national identity debate today. Bell's comprehensive and well-documented book is written in an accessible style...Recommended for French and European history collections. --Mary Salony, Library Journal Reviews of this book: At the center of Bell's subtle and intricate argument is religion. Religion, he suggests, was changing in the 18th century. And with men less likely to see God as an interventionist presence in their daily lives and more likely to stress God's distant, inscrutable quality, space was opened up for an autonomous realm of human action, described by a series of interconnected words: society, public opinion, civilization, fatherland and nation. --Richard Vinen, New York Times Book Review Reviews of this book: David Bell has interesting things to say about the French kindred and about an important aspect of their life together. The Cult of the Nation in France is about the way a particular kind of togetherness and a novel kind of identity were implanted, grew (and may have begun to wither) in France's fertile soil. The nation, he argues, is no spontaneous growth but a political artifact: not organic like a tree but constructed like a city. --Eugen Weber, Los Angeles Times Reviews of this book: Bell argues in his excellent analysis of the 18th-century conceptual birth of French nationalism that nationalism emerged at a point when French intellectuals increasingly came to see God as distant from human affairs and sough to separate religious passions from political life...A masterful, thought-provoking [study]. --P. G. Wallace, Choice Reviews of this book: This excellent book is at once a valuable account of the development of the concept of the nation in France and an important example of the use that can be made of the culture of print...Bell argues that right-wing nationalism has belonged consistently to a minority and that there has been a basic continuity in French republican nationalism over the past two centuries, views that not all will share, but arguments that testify to the importance of this well-crafted work. --Jeremy Black, History A notable addition to the expanding literature on nationalism in general and of French nationalism in particular, The Cult of the Nation in France explores how national affiliation became part of individual identity. It demonstrates the connections between nationalism and religion, without falling into the simple trap of treating nationalism as another religion. Against the present-day challenges faced by French republican nationalism, Bell insightfully examines the paradoxical process whereby the French came to posit themselves as a union of politically and spiritually like-minded citizens. --Joan B. Landes, Pennsylvania State University A formidably intelligent and beautifully written analysis of how the French came to perceive their nation as a political construction. Its breadth, together with its highly original discussion of the role of religion, makes The Cult of the Nation in France essential reading both for students of nationalism and for anyone wanting to understand current French debates on culture, ethnicity, and identity. --Linda Colley, London School of Economics and Political Science David Bell is one of the most talented young historians working in any field. This fascinating, brilliantly argued, and beautifully written study demonstrates the multi-stranded origins of the concept of the nation in France. Bell's major contribution is to place the timing of this crucial evolution well before the Revolution of 1789. He never loses sight of the linguistic and cultural complexity of France, bringing to a conclusion the story of French nationalism in our era. --John Merriman, Yale University

Far from Home in Early Modern France

Far from Home in Early Modern France PDF Author: Marie Guyart de l'Incarnation
Publisher:
ISBN: 9781649590541
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 312

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Book Description
An engaging account of women's travels in the early modern period. This book showcases three Frenchwomen who ventured far from home at a time when such traveling was rare. In 1639, Marie de l'Incarnation embarked for New France where she founded the first Ursuline monastery in present-day Canada. In 1750, Madame du Boccage set out at the age of forty on her first "grand tour." She visited England, the Netherlands, and Italy where she experienced firsthand the intellectual liberty offered there to educated women. As the Reign of Terror gripped France, the Marquise de la Tour du Pin fled to America with her husband and their two young children, where they ran a farm from 1794 to 1796. The writings these women left behind detailing their respective journeys abroad represent significant contributions to early modern travel literature. This book makes available to anglophone readers three texts that are rich in both historical and literary terms.