The stated aim of Virginie Despentes is to give voice to the voicelessness: the outsiders and freaks – people of both sexes that nobody wants (Despentes 2006). Against this background, her controversial debut novel Baise-moi [Rape me] (1997) may be interpreted as a study of the losers of the neoliberal economy who vegetate in the outlying districts of the French metropolises ignored by the public eye. In fact the novel has been read in terms of a sociological study that documents the everyday of the lower classes, especially their media consumption and its various implications. But in this regard the charm of the novel – the fact that its female protagonists reverse the gender roles in a joyful enclave situation, consuming ‘male’ media (porn-movies and magazines, thrash metal, punk, hip-hop, B-movies, firstperson shooters etc.) that inspire their wild escape across the French backwaters – is ignored.

As the course will show, the numerous excesses of the two protagonists stand in the tradition of carnival culture (as it is rooted in Venice) and literature Bakhtin, 1965) that finds its paradigm in Rabelais’ Gargantua and Pantagruel (1532-1564). Thus, Baise-moi already shows the main features of Despentes’ radical gender-poetics that gets articulated in various interviews as well as in her well-known autobiographical essay collection King Kong Theory (2006) that was written simultaneously to Paul B. Preciado’s 'autopornographic' essai Testo Junkie (2008).

In the light of the performativity of gender categories (Butler 1990) Preciado develops the idea of subversive gender performances, such as gender hacking and draking. But whereas Preciado consumes high doses of the male sex hormone testosterone, Despentes’ protagonists don’t go this far in their role-plays. What is more, they are conscious about the limitations of their festive enclaves, which gives a rather depressive keynote to Despentes’ later works, such as Bye Bye Blondie (2006), which deals once more with the miserable female existence at the margins of a patriarchal, neo-liberal society. If it shows the vibrant punk-rock subculture as an alternative way of life (where love is possible), it offers nothing but a temporarily limited escape from the persistent norms.

The course will discuss Virginie Despentes as an author of violent accusation who is not able to free herself, nor her protagonists, from the norms that are making her suffer. The students will be familiarized with the works of one of the leading French writers, learn about the interplay of popular culture and literature and be introduced to two of the most uncompromising contemporary gender-theories (Despentes/Preciado). To deepen the discussions the cinema adaptions of Baise-moi and Bye Bye Blondie – directed by the author herself – will be shown as well.

Learning outcomes of the course
By the end of this course, students will:
- Deconstruct the idea of a static order of sexes
- Put into question the narratives of gender in popular mainstream media
- Know how to apply Bakhtin’s concept of carnival to contemporary literature
- Demonstrate their arguments through careful exposition in the essay form
- Appraise literary beauty in the selection of works

Teaching methods
Moderated discussions, oral presentations, directed study (groups)

Evaluation methods
a) Course participation: Active and informed discussion of materials in class, that
showcases both familiarity and reflection with the matters analyzed (10%)
b) Oral presentation of a research subject: the student will lead the first half of the
discussion of one of the materials to be studied, following close guidance from the
instructor (20%)
c) A 5 page midterm paper that analyzes and compares two of the course materials
(25%)
d) A 10-12 page research paper that analyzes one of the books in question (45%)

Bibliography

a) Required materials
Virginie Despentes:
Baise-moi (Rape me) [1997] (2002)
King Kong Theory [2006] (2009)
Bye Bye Blondie [2006] (2009)
Paul B. Preciado:
Testo Junkie [2008] (2013)

b) Recommended reading
Mikhail Bakhtin: Rabelais and his World, Cambridge, Mass: MIT Press 1968.
Judith Butler: Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity, New York:
Rouledge 1990.
Nicole Fayard: "The Rebellious Body as Parody: Baise-moi by Virginie Despentes", in: French Studies: A Quarterly Review, 2006, Vol.60 (1), pp.63-77.
Jacinda Read: The new avengers feminism, femininity and the rape-revenge cycle, Manchester: Manchester Univ. Press 2000.
Lisa Downing: "French cinema's new 'sexual revolution': Postmodern porn and troubled genre", in: French Cultural Studies, Oct, 2004, Vol.15(3), pp.265-280.
Shirley Ann Jordan: Contemporary French women's writing women's visions, women's voices, women's lives, Oxford [u.a.]: Lang 2004.
Amaleena Damlé / Gill Rye: Women's writing in twenty-first-century France: Life as literature, Cardiff: Univ. of Wales Press 2013.
Anna Rocca / Kenneth Reeds: Women taking risks in contemporary autobiographical narratives, Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars 2013.