New in Modern Languages

Cinema for French Conversation, Fifth Edition, builds upon the strengths of previous editions of this pioneering textbook by devoting six new chapters to recent award-winning French-language films including La cour de Babel, Fatima, Ce qui nous lie, La famille Bélier, Diplomatie, and Intouchables. Each of the book’s eighteen chapters features key vocabulary for viewing its corresponding film, structured post-viewing exercises aimed at facilitating in-class discussion, related readings for each film designed to provide perspective, and much more. A (forthcoming) companion website offers links to film trailers, interviews, and other online resources. A proven aid for cultivating French-language conversation skills at the upper-intermediate and advanced levels, Anne-Christine Rice’s classic book yields rich insight into elements of historic and present-day French culture while fostering appreciation for France’s renowned septième art itself.

Films and Additional Online Resources Webpage: Click here for information about how to access the films covered in the textbook and to download additional online resource PDFs for each chapter.

Course Instructor Resources: An electronic (PDF only) instructor's manual for Cinema for French Conversation, Fifth Edition is available to qualified course instructors who have adopted the text for their course. Click here to request a copy.

"Colleagues who teach courses on contemporary France in French departments will be very pleased by the much-anticipated arrival of the fourth edition of Les Français, co-authored by Jean-François Brière and Julie Fette. While the updated version reflects the profound changes that have taken place in French society since the publication of the third edition in 2001, among them the effects of the digital revolution and the increasingly visible roles of women and minorities, the book remains faithful to the spirit of the book’s original author, Laurence Wylie. Unlike other textbooks on contemporary France, Les Français does not merely catalog recent events in French history. Instead, it focuses on the ways in which the history and traditions of French society and culture have shaped current attitudes toward a variety of issues, from the debates on laïcité to the laws on parité and le mariage pour tous. This historical and comparative perspective, which gives American students the tools to understand why the French think and behave differently from Americans, constitutes the greatest strength of the book, making it the foremost French-language textbook on contemporary France." —Venita Datta, Professor of French Studies, Wellesley College

Click here to watch authors Julie Fette and Jean-François Brière's Les Français online book launch event hosted by the Institute of French Studies at NYU.

Cinema for Spanish Conversation, Fifth Edition, draws on sixteen high-interest films (and related readings) to introduce students to the authentic language and cultures of the Spanish-speaking world. Each chapter offers a wide variety of activities designed to improve students’ conversational skills as well as opportunities for reading and writing practice. New to the fifth edition are three new critically acclaimed films, including Yuli (set in Cuba), El último verano de la Boyita (Argentina), and Oscar-award-winning film Roma (Mexico), along with readings and activities related to each. Also new is a section, added to each chapter, offering new and expanded activities related to the films, updated information on each film, and its actors and directors, and a revised and updated appendix, organized by chapter, offering a list of recent films that can be compared or contrasted to the films in the book. Available for sale only in the US, Canada, and UK.

"Cinema for Spanish Conversation is already a classic pedagogical text, geared for those students seeking to improve their verbal fluency in the Spanish language while exploring complex issues relating to contemporary Spanish-speaking societies and their diaspora through the lenses of the film industry."
—Asela R. Laguna, Rutgers University, Newark

Instructor's Manual (PDF): A PDF-only instructor's manual is available. Please use this form to request the instructor's manual.

Films page: Links to purchase/rent/stream the films are available on the Cinema for Spanish Conversation films page.