French Department records

French has been taught at Mount Holyoke since the early days of the Seminary. When Mary Lyon first designed Mount Holyoke's curriculum, she included French as an extracurricular subject. In 1842, Edward Church, a native of France, taught the subject with an emphasis on speaking and understanding the spoken language as well as reading French. In 1876, Margarethe Vitzhum von Eckstadt began teaching French at the Seminary. One of her accomplishments was establishing French in the curriculum on the same basis as other subjects. Additionally, under her advising, many French plays were given and lecturers were invited from other colleges and from France to stimulate in students an interest in French literature. In 1876, Mount Holyoke became one of the first colleges in the nation to require the study of a modern foreign language in addition to a classical language. At the time of Mount Holyoke's transition from Seminary to College, French became one of the requirements for admission to the College. The department began to offer four areas of study in French: classical, seminary, literary, and scientific. The 1920s saw the beginning of the Junior Year in France program, and students began to study abroad as a part of their major in French. The goal of the department was to develop skills in the language and to provide a broad and varied acquaintance with French language and culture. From the beginning, French was the language of the classroom; all courses were taught in French. The department has undergone several name and form changes in its history. In 1934/1935, the French department became a part of the new department called Romance Languages. In the 1941/1942 academic year, the department became Romance Languages and Literature (French). Becoming independent in 1942/1943, the department was called French Language and Literature until 1959/1960. Since 1960/1961, the department has simply been called the Department of French.