Enlightenment, Gender, and Colonialism: Madame de Graffigny

Undergraduate / Graduate

Françoise de Graffigny's novel, "Letters of a Peruvian Woman" (1747-1752), was one of the greatest critical and commercial successes of the French Enlightenment. By adopting the voice of a captured Incan princess, Graffigny presents a startling critique of European colonialism, social inequalities, and gender hierarchies, while also exploring the problems of cultural appropriation, translation, and the construction of individual identity. We will study the novel in dialogue with related readings from the period, including the political philosophy of Jean-Jacques Rousseau and the feminist writings of Marie Olympe de Gouges and Mary Wollstonecraft. We will also explore Graffigny's text in relation to the evolution of the European novel and its representations of non-European societies (Montesquieu and Diderot), as well as indigenous accounts of colonialism (Garcilaso de la Vega).