Ordinary shameful families: Annie Ernaux’s narratives of affiliation and (mis)alliance

Day, Loraine (2007) Ordinary shameful families: Annie Ernaux’s narratives of affiliation and (mis)alliance. In, Barnet, Marie-Claire and Welch, Edward (eds.) Affaires de famille. The Family in Contemporary French Culture and Theory. (Faux Titre, 292) Amsterdam, Netherlands; New York, USA. Rodopi, pp. 121-135. (doi:10.1163/9789401204125).

Record type: Book Section

Abstract

‘Famille, je vous ai (encore et toujours à l’esprit?), je vous aime un peu, beaucoup, ou je vous hais énormément?’ What are families like in contemporary France? And what begins to emerge when we consider them from the point of view of recent theoretical perspectives: (faulty) cohesion, (fake) coherence, (carefully planned or subversive) deconstruction, loss (of love, confidence or credibility), or, even (utter) chaos and (alarming) confusion? Which media revamp old stereotypes, generate alternative reinterpretations, and imply more ambiguous answers? What images, scenes or frames stand out in contemporary representations of the family? Uneasy contradictions and ambiguities emerge in this bilingual collection of approaches and genre studies. The family plot seems to thicken as family ties appear to loosen. Has ‘the family’ been lost from sight, or is it being reinvented in our collective imaginary? This book proposes a new series of perspectives and questions on an old and ‘familiar’ topic, exploring the state and status of the family in contemporary literature, culture, critical and psychoanalytic theory and sociology.

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