*Literature 91r. Supervised Reading and Research
Catalog Number: 1074
Sandra Naddaff and members of the Committee and Tutorial Board
Half course (fall term; repeated spring term). Hours to be arranged.
A graded, supervised course of reading and research to be conducted by a person approved by the Committee.
Note: Permission of Director of Studies required.
*Literature 97. Tutorial — Sophomore Year
Catalog Number: 4595
Sandra Naddaff and members of the Committee and Tutorial Board
Half course (spring term). Hours to be arranged.
Note: Successful completion of Literature 97 is required of all concentrators in their sophomore year.
*Literature 98a. Tutorial — Junior Year
Catalog Number: 3119
Sandra Naddaff and members of the Committee and Tutorial Board
Half course (fall term). Hours to be arranged.
Note: Successful completion of one term of Literature 98a is required of all concentrators in their junior year.
*Literature 98b. Tutorial — Junior Year
Catalog Number: 1528
Sandra Naddaff and members of the Committee and Tutorial Board
Half course (spring term). Hours to be arranged.
Note: Successful completion of one term of Literature 98b is required of all concentrators in their junior year.
*Literature 99a. Tutorial — Senior Year
Catalog Number: 4857
Sandra Naddaff and members of the Committee and Tutorial Board
Half course (fall term). Hours to be arranged.
Note: Successful completion of one term of Literature 99a is required of all concentrators in their senior year.
*Literature 99b. Tutorial — Senior Year
Catalog Number: 1290
Sandra Naddaff and members of the Committee and Tutorial Board
Half course (spring term). Hours to be arranged.
Note: Successful completion of one term of Literature 99b is required of all concentrators in their senior year.
*Literature 104. On Theory
Catalog Number: 8760 Enrollment: Limited to 20.
Verena A. Conley
Half course (fall term). W., 1–3.
What is theory? What is the difference between literary, critical and cultural theory? What is the relation between theory and reading? This course introduces students to various concepts of theory (Derrida, Deleuze, Foucault, Balibar, Adorno, Benjamin, Freud, Saussure, Cixous, Kristeva, Butler and others). Focuses on theoretical texts and will bring in literary texts where necessary.
[*Literature 106. On Lyric]
Catalog Number: 6351 Enrollment: Limited to 20.
Christopher D. Johnson
Half course (spring term). Hours to be arranged.
Explores the history of Western lyric poetry and how lyric has given voice to the recurrent themes of love, death, and subjectivity. Poetic techniques and forms will be examined, as will the roles that lyric has played as a vehicle for intellectual and cultural values. Poets to be read include Sappho, Catullus, Ovid, Bertran de Born, Dante, Petrarch, Donne, Quevedo, Sponde, Goethe, Labé, Blake, Dickinson, Baudelaire, Hölderlin, Rimbaud, Celan, Pound, Akhmatova, and Carson.
Note: Expected to be given in 2010–11.
Literature 108. On the Essay - (New Course)
Catalog Number: 28173
Christopher D. Johnson
Half course (spring term). W., 1–3.
This course examines the aesthetics, motives, and history of the literary essay. Attention will be given to the essay’s forms (and formlessness), styles, subjectivities, receptions, and some of its characteristic content. Exemplary essayists to be studied include: Montaigne, Bacon, Johnson, Voltaire, the Schlegels, De Quincy, Beaudelaire, Woolf, Turgenev, Lu Hsun, Emerson, Thoreau, Benjamin, Borges, Mencken, Baldwin, Davenport, Sontag, Suleri, Berry, Eco, Dillard, and Foster Wallace.
[*Literature 109. On Translation]
Catalog Number: 0594 Enrollment: Limited to 20.
Sandra Naddaff
Half course (fall term). Hours to be arranged.
Examines theories of translation from various periods (Dryden, Schopenhauer, Schleiermacher, Benjamin, de Man, among others). Also looks closely at specific translated texts (e.g., various English translations of The Thousand and One Nights), and considers such topics as the notion of “unequal languages,” the problem of cultural translation, translation post-9/11, and the possibility of untranslatability. Final project involves an original translation and commentary.
Note: Expected to be given in 2010–11. Preference given to Literature concentrators.
Prerequisite: Reading knowledge of one foreign language.
[Literature 113 (formerly Humanities 16). Existential Fictions: From Saint Augustine to Jean-Paul Sartre and Beyond]
Catalog Number: 3016
Verena A. Conley
Half course (spring term). Hours to be arranged.
This course examines problems of existence in relation to self and other in the world from the early Christian era to our days. It shows how existence preoccupies major writers who have approached its implications (and the dilemmas it inspires) in different ways. At stake are the redemptive powers of religion, thoughts about the death of God, the limits of atheism, and philosophies of becoming.
Note: Expected to be given in 2010–11. This course, when taken for a letter grade, meets the Core area requirement for Literature and Arts A.
[Literature 115. Literature and the Environment]
Catalog Number: 3677
Karen Thornber
Half course (fall term). Hours to be arranged.
Examines how literature from Africa, the Americas, Asia, and Europe has addressed environmental concerns and crises. Focuses on literary works that explore the uneasy relationship between human desire and the survival of the non-human world. Introduces concepts of ecocriticism, ecofeminism, ecology, environmental criticism and environmental justice. Critical readings by Adamson, Bhabha, Buell, Conley, Dimock, Foucault, Glotfelty, Said, Stein, Snyder, Williams, and others.
Note: Expected to be given in 2011–12.
[*Literature 116. Literature and Science]
Catalog Number: 6289 Enrollment: Limited to 20.
Christopher D. Johnson
Half course (fall term). Hours to be arranged.
Explores how literature in different historical periods represents and reshapes the ideas, methods, and language of science. Compares the ways reason and the imagination function in literature and science. Considers how literature rethinks the cultural and historical significance of the scientific enterprise. Primary texts include Lucretius, Donne, Copernicus, Kepler, Cavendish, Fontenelle, Shelley, Goethe, Darwin, Calvino and Gibson.
Note: Expected to be given in 2010–11.
[Literature 117. Literature, Gender, and Revolution]
Catalog Number: 3626
Karen Thornber
Half course (spring term). Hours to be arranged.
Explores relationships among literature, gender, and revolution in China, Cuba, Iran, Japan, Korea, and Russia from the late 19th century to the present. Readings by Butler, Chukovskaya, Danishvar, de Beauvoir, Foucault, Mikiso Hane, Kim Ilyop, Loynaz, Marruz, Pleck, Qiu Jin, Scott, Tamura Toshiko among others.
Note: Expected to be given in 2011–12.
*Literature 119. On Comparative Arts
Catalog Number: 0078 Enrollment: Limited to 18.
Marc Shell and Daniel Albright
Half course (fall term). M., 2–4.
Is there one Art, or are there many arts? We will consider affinity and difference among literature, painting, music, and other arts. Student projects will investigate works of art that submit to or reject a particular material medium. Theory from Plato (Ion), Aristotle, Lessing, Burke, Diderot, Rousseau, Hegel, Pater, Greenberg, Heidegger; examples from Homer, Leonardo, Turner, Monet, Rossetti, Wagner, Richard Strauss, Apollinaire, Schoenberg--and others.
*Literature 121. 1001 Nights: Adaptations, Transformations and Translations
Catalog Number: 5879 Enrollment: Limited to 15.
Sandra Naddaff
Half course (fall term). Tu., 1–3.
Examines how the 1001 Nights is transformed and adapted for different media and genres. Focuses on a variety of films, (e.g., The Thief of Baghdad, Chu Chin Chow, Aladdin), illustrations/images (eg., Doré, Chagall, Matisse), musical and balletic renditions (e.g., Rimsky-Korsakov, Fokine), translations (e.g., Galland, Lane, Burton, Haddawy), and re-tellings of stories (e.g., Poe, Barth, Mahfouz, Sebbar, Zimmerman). Also considers the role of the 1001 Nights in contemporary popular culture.
[Literature 125. The Desire for Narrative: Across Cultures, Forms and Media] - (New Course)
Catalog Number: 70867
Biodun Jeyifo
Half course (fall term). Hours to be arranged.
An exploration of the cultural roots of the powerful human desire both to tell and be told stories, in full and not in fragments. We will range across diverse societies and cultural forms and media like fiction, drama, film, television and oral performances.
Note: Expected to be given in 2010–11.
Literature 127. Futurisms - (New Course)
Catalog Number: 39657
Jeffrey Schnapp
Half course (fall term). M., 4–6.
From its foundation in 1909 through WWII, futurism developed into the first international cultural-political avant garde. Its aim was the revolutionary transformation of all spheres of life, and its influence extended from Europe to the Americas to Asia. Topics include machines and culture; poetics and war; futurism’s ties to bolshevism and fascism. Media: poetry, performance, music, painting, photography, radio, and film. Writers: Marinetti and Mayakovsky. Visual artists: Boccioni, Bragaglia, Russolo, Malevich, and El Lissitzky.
[Literature 129. Reading the 18th Century Through 21st-Century Eyes]
Catalog Number: 8742
Christie McDonald
Half course (fall term). Hours to be arranged.
Why read texts from the French Enlightenment today and how? Analysis of works from the 18th century juxtaposed with novels, plays, media events, and films of the 20th-21st centuries that explore debates in literature and philosophy about cultural differences, universality, and the search for belief and confidence in a society undergoing dramatic change. Readings include Beaumarchais, Beauvoir, Derrida, Diderot, Foucault, Franklin, Graffigny, Kant, Kundera, Laclos, Lyotard, Rousseau, Obama, Potocki, Voltaire.
Note: Expected to be given in 2011–12.
Literature 137. Postcolonial Bildungsroman - (New Course)
Catalog Number: 90847
Nirvana Tanoukhi
Half course (spring term). Tu., 1–3. EXAM GROUP: 15, 16
Coming-of-age narratives from the non-Western world are analyzed to understand how postcolonial writers and heroes conceived the tension between modernity and tradition, freedom and responsibility, conformity and adventure. The literary genre of the bildungsroman, which centers on the young hero’s early development, is explored through the lens of postcolonialism. Salient themes of postcolonial literature are introduced including: cultural imperialism, economic development, religious and Western pedagogy, cultural conflict, identity crisis.
Literature 143. The Novel of the Periphery - (New Course)
Catalog Number: 13271
Frode Saugestad
Half course (spring term). W., 4–6.
This seminar examines the role of "the literary periphery" in world literature. The selected novels represent a wide geographical, aesthetic, cultural and ideological span, and the common denominator is that all the novels are from and about the literary periphery of the world. Reading these novels will not only help us understand local cultures and societies, but also highlight similarities across national, regional and global cultures and languages, thereby underlining the universal language of the novel.
[*Literature 146 (formerly *Literature 124). Space and Place in Postmodern Culture]
Catalog Number: 8228 Enrollment: Limited to 20.
Verena A. Conley
Half course (spring term). Hours to be arranged.
Focuses on renewed awareness of space in contemporary theory, literature and film. Examines notions of space and place under the impact of consumerism and electronic technologies in a global world. Texts and films include Lefebvre, Godard, de Certeau, Wenders, Baudrillard, Perec, Tati, Augé, Deleuze and Guattari, Virilio and Verhoeven.
Note: Expected to be given in 2010–11.
Literature 150. Colonial and Post-Colonial Spaces: France-North Africa
Catalog Number: 89597
Verena A. Conley
Half course (spring term). Th., 1–3.
Focuses on transformations of colonial and postcolonial spaces in North Africa that include Morocco, Tunisia, and especially, Algeria by way of literature, film and theory. Readings include Albert Memmi, Kateb Yacine, Mohammed Dib, Driss Chraibi, Albert Camus, Frantz Fanon, Assia Djebar, Malika Mokkedem, Amara Lakhour, Amin Maalouf, Helene Cixous, Nina Bouraoui. Further readings by Deleuze and Guattari, Jacques Derrida, Edward Said and others. Special attention is given to problems of language, subjectivity, identity and citizenship, nation and community.
Literature 153 (formerly Comparative Literature 153). Saul Bellow and the New York Intellectuals
Catalog Number: 2506
Ruth R. Wisse
Half course (fall term). Th., 1–3, and a weekly section to be arranged.
Studies Bellow’s major works in the context of the intellectual and literary community that constituted America’s first European style "intelligentsia." Considers work of Isaac Rosenfeld, Delmore Schwartz, Lionel Trilling, Irving Howe, writers of Partisan Review and Commentary.
Note: Class is conducted in a modified seminar format.
Literature 154. Music, Literature, and the Voice - (New Course)
Catalog Number: 65838
John T. Hamilton
Half course (fall term). W., 3–5.
A comparative examination of select works of French and German literature that deal with music and the problem of the voice. Topics: verbal and musical form; musical meaning; reading and listening; music and psychoanalysis; evanescence and silence. Readings in : Diderot, Kleist, Hoffmann, Eichendorff, Balzac, Mallarmé, Thomas Mann, Bernhard, Lacan, and Quignard.
Note: Texts may be read in English translation.
[Literature 157 (formerly Comparative Literature 111). From Type to Self in the Middle Ages]
Catalog Number: 9245
Luis M. Girón Negrón
Half course (fall term). Hours to be arranged.
It has been argued that the poetic "I" in premodern literatures is not a vehicle for self-representation, but an archetype of the human. The course will examine this thesis against the rise of autobiographical writing in medieval and early modern Europe. Readings include spiritual autobiographies (Augustine, Kempe, Teresa of Ávila), letter collections, maqama literature, troubadour lyric, Hispano-Jewish poetry, pilgrimage narratives, medieval allegories, Dante and the picaresque novel. Theoretical perspectives by Spitzer, Lejeune, Zumthor and DeCerteau.
Note: Expected to be given in 2010–11. All readings in English translation. This course, when taken for a letter grade, meets the Core requirement for Literature and Arts C.
Literature 160 (formerly Comparative Literature 160). Literary Forgeries and Mystifications
Catalog Number: 3614
George G. Grabowicz
Half course (spring term). M., 2–4.
Examines literary forgeries and mystifications from the late 18th century to the present, focusing on their poetics, their ideological motivation and their role in modern political mythmaking (some texts considered: Ossian, The Igor Tale, the Czech manuscripts, the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, Ern Malley). Also considers the psychology and esthetics of simulation and mystification as reflected in the works of Gide, Borges, Nabokov, Pavic, Eco, and Calvino.
Note: All readings in English.
[Literature 162 (formerly *Comparative Literature 207). Theory and Methods in Comparative Oral Traditions: Seminar]
Catalog Number: 7426
Gregory Nagy
Half course (fall term). Hours to be arranged.
Genres, forms, and themes of oral traditions in poetry and prose. Theories of performance and composition. Comparative metrical and formulaic analysis.
Note: Expected to be given in 2010–11. Knowledge of Greek not required.
Literature 163. Jewish Languages and Literature
Catalog Number: 8627
Marc Shell and Members of the Faculty
Half course (spring term). Tu., 1–3, plus an additional hour to be arranged.
What is a Jewish language? What is Jewish literature? General topics are alphabetization, translation, oral tradition and diaspora. Languages worldwide include Hebrew as well as Judeo-Spanish, -Aramaic, -Arabic, -French, -Greek, -Italian, -Persian, -Spanish, -Malayalam, Yiddish, and other secular Jewish languages. Readings usually include love stories, medical and philosophic texts, and writings on science, travel, and music. Guest scholars visit most weeks. No language requirement.
Note: Language credit can be arranged.
[Literature 164. The 20th-Century Post-Realist Novel in Eastern Europe: Conference Course]
Catalog Number: 7762
George G. Grabowicz
Half course (spring term). Hours to be arranged.
Psychological, mythic, “catastrophist,” and comic tendencies in the Eastern and Central European novel between the two World Wars (1918–1939). Focus on Kafka, Capek, Bulgakov, Schulz, Witkiewicz, Gombrowicz, and Nabokov.
Note: Expected to be given in 2010–11. All texts can be read in English translation.
[Literature 166 (formerly Comparative Literature 166). The Comic Tradition in Jewish Culture]
Catalog Number: 3418
Ruth R. Wisse
Half course (fall term). Hours to be arranged.
Jews are probably best known in America today for their roles in the Holocaust and in Humor. What, if anything, is the relation between these spheres? Does Jewish humor make fun of the Jews, or does it make fun of those who make fun of the Jews? Studies some of the theories and uses of Jewish humor, some of its leading practitioners and outstanding works. Invites comparison with other comic traditions and investigation of "national" humor.
Note: Expected to be given in 2010–11. Readers of Yiddish may take this course as Yiddish 200. This course, when taken for a letter grade, meets the Core area requirement for Literature and Arts A.
[Literature 167 (formerly Comparative Literature 167). Contemporary Fiction: The Novel After Theory]
Catalog Number: 1808
Judith Ryan
Half course (spring term). Hours to be arranged.
Examines a series of novels from 1980 to the present that build consciously on recent literary and cultural theory. Also explores the relation of fictional narrative to history, social problems, and ideology. Authors treated include: Don DeLillo, Marguerite Duras, John Irving, David Malouf, Christoph Ransmayr, Patrick Süsskind, Graham Swift, and Christa Wolf. Theorists include: Barthes, Bhabha, Baudrillard, Derrida, Hassan, Lacan, and White.
Note: Expected to be given in 2010–11.
Literature 174. Realism, Fantasy, and the Grotesque: Hoffmann and Balzac - (New Course)
Catalog Number: 14316
John T. Hamilton
Half course (spring term). W., 3–5.
A close reading of select works by E.T.A. Hoffmann and his reception in the work of Balzac focuses on Realism’s indebtedness to the imaginative realms of the fantastic and the grotesque. Topics: music and inspiration; societal decadence and caricature; magic and the uncanny; experience, observation and expression.
Note: Texts may be read in English translation.
[Literature 178 (formerly Slavic 178). Trauma: Representation, Theory, Experience: Conference Course]
Catalog Number: 9125
Joanna Nizynska
Half course (spring term). Hours to be arranged.
How do literature and film convey traumatic experiences and how does trauma challenge representation? What constitutes post-traumatic syndrome in the life of the individual and society? How does it affect the formation of personal and collective memory? Using texts and films by Agamben, Borowski, Caruth, Freud, LaCapra, Polanski and Kieslowski, we will consider historical traumas (e.g., the Holocaust) and individual trauma, the transposition of traumatic memory/experiences into narratives, and the trans-generational transmission of the traumatic.
Note: Expected to be given in 2010–11. All readings in English translation. All films subtitled.
Literature 184. Imagining the City: Literature, Film, and the Arts
Catalog Number: 2332
Giuliana Bruno and Svetlana Boym
Half course (fall term). Th., 11:30–1, and a weekly film screening W., 7-9pm, and weekly sections to be arranged. EXAM GROUP: 13, 14
How do visual representation and narrative figuration contribute to construct urban identity? Explores the urban imagination in different artforms: architecture, cinema, literature, photography, and painting. Topics to be mapped out include: cities and modernity, metrophilia and metrophobia, the museum and cultural archaeology, the ruin and the construction site, interior space and public sphere, technology and virtual cities. We will focus on the European city, as we travel through Paris, Berlin, St. Petersburg, Moscow, Naples, and Rome
Note: Cannot be taken for credit if VES 184 had been taken. Cannot be taken concurrently with VES 184. Offered jointly with the Graduate School of Design as 4353. This course, when taken for a letter grade, meets the Core area requirement for Literature and Arts B.
*Literature 187r (formerly *Literature 187). Selected Topics in Poetics and Rhetoric: Seminar
Catalog Number: 7999
Gregory Nagy
Half course (spring term). M., 1–3.
Points of departure: Aristotle’s Poetics and Rhetoric.
Note: Knowledge of Greek not required.
[*Comparative Literature 211. Mysticism and Literature: Seminar]
Catalog Number: 3867
Luis M. Girón Negrón
Half course (spring term). W., 1–3. EXAM GROUP: 6, 7
Trends and debates in the comparative study of mystical literature. Primary works by Jewish, Christian, and Muslim authors from the Middle Ages through the 16th century. Also modern authors (Borges, Eliot, Goytisolo) and literary theorists (DeCerteau).
Note: Expected to be given in 2010–11. Students admitted by permission of course head. Offered jointly with the Divinty School as 3802.
[Comparative Literature 230. The Poetics of Empire: Colonization, Translation, and Literary Rewriting]
Catalog Number: 0694
Karen Thornber
Half course (fall term). Hours to be arranged.
Explores how colonial, semicolonial, and postcolonial writers from Africa, the Caribbean, Central and Eastern Europe, East Asia, India, the Middle East, and Southeast Asia have reconfigured literature from American, European, and Japanese (former) metropoles via translations and intertextual recreations. Also addresses metropolitan engagement with literature from (former) colonies/semicolonies. Aims to rethink the phenomenon of world literature and theories of cultural negotiation.
Note: Expected to be given in 2010–11.
[Comparative Literature 241. Reading Spinoza and Leibniz with Gilles Deleuze]
Catalog Number: 1652
Christopher D. Johnson
Half course (fall term). M., 3–5. EXAM GROUP: 8, 9
“In the history of philosophy,” Deleuze writes, “a commentary should act as a veritable double and bear the maximal modification appropriate to a double.” Examines the thoughts of Spinoza (The Ethics) and Leibniz (The Monadology, Discourse on Metaphysics) in the context of Deleuze’s commentaries.
Note: Expected to be given in 2010–11.
Comparative Literature 245. Intertextuality - (New Course)
Catalog Number: 19804
Judith Ryan
Half course (spring term). Th., 1–3. EXAM GROUP: 15, 16
Explores theories of intertextuality developed by Kristeva, Jauss, Bloom, Gilbert and Gubar, Genette, and others, and asks why the debates they have provoked have had such resonance in contemporary literary studies. A series of literary texts ranging from classical antiquity to the present will provide test cases for the various theories. Attention to such questions as influence, imitation, allusion, quotation, and plagiarism.
[Comparative Literature 246. The Critic in Culture]
Catalog Number: 3141
David Damrosch
Half course (spring term). Tu., 1–3. EXAM GROUP: 15, 16
This class will examine the interplay of scholarly analysis and cultural critique in a range of major modern critics and theorists, exploring their stylistic and essayistic strategies as they seek to find - or create - an audience for their ideas. Readings in Nietzsche, Foucault, Benjamin, Kobayashi, Woolf, Adorno, Barthes, Cixous, Said, Miyoshi, Minh-ha, Anzaldúa, Penley, Gramsci, and Agamben.
Note: Expected to be given in 2010–11.
Comparative Literature 247. Baroque and Neo-Baroque Literature - (New Course)
Catalog Number: 84314
Christopher D. Johnson
Half course (spring term). W., 3–5. EXAM GROUP: 8, 9
Examines the Baroque as a literary style, hystorical period, and mode of thought. Focuses on 17th century European, Colonial American, and contemporary "Neo-Baroque" texts. Analogies between the literary, visual, and musical arts are explored.
Note: Note: All readings available in translation, but students are encouraged to work in the original language.
Comparative Literature 248. American Multilingual Literature in a Transnational Context - (New Course)
Catalog Number: 32792
Werner Sollors
Half course (spring term). M., 3–5.
This Longfellow Institute seminar works with original source materials in several different languages. Special focus is on the historiographic and critical treatment of non-Anglophone texts, on general and theoretical problems of an ongoing multilingual American tradition, on the recuperation and editing of texts, and on issues of translation.
Comparative Literature 250. Theories of Security - (New Course)
Catalog Number: 80818
John T. Hamilton
Half course (fall term). Th., 3–5. EXAM GROUP: 17, 18
Investigates the broader significance of the term "security" that has coursed through philosophical, literary and artistic productions across various historical and cultural traditions. Discussions address that which remains implicit, latent, or unthought in current political and governmental issues of security and biopolitics. Readings include: Sophocles, Plato, Seneca, Machiavelli, Hobbes, Leibniz, Nietzsche, Freud, Kafka, Heidegger, Schmitt, Arendt, Foucault, Agamben, and Virilio.
[Comparative Literature 251. Literary Criticism and Theory: Antiquity to the Renaissance] - (New Course)
Catalog Number: 29296
John T. Hamilton
Half course (spring term). Hours to be arranged.
An historical and critical examination of key issues and debates in poetic theory, rhetoric, and literary interpretation. Topics include mimesis, catharsis, expression, performance, allegoresis, typology, semiotics, hermeneutics, verisimilitude, genre, decorum, and the sublime.
Note: Expected to be given in 2010–11.
Comparative Literature 252. The Literatures of Medieval Iberia: Approaches and Debates in their Comparative Study - (New Course)
Catalog Number: 38202
Luis M. Girón Negrón
Half course (fall term). W., 4–6. EXAM GROUP: 9
The cultural interactions in premodern Spain between Muslims, Christians and Jews shaped the literary history of Arabic, Hebrew and the Ibero-Romance vernaculars. Our seminar examines selected scholarly debates on the comparative study of these literatures.
Comparative Literature 254. Modernist Polemics - (New Course)
Catalog Number: 89724
Daniel Albright
Half course (spring term). M., 2–4. EXAM GROUP: 7, 8
Modernism’s theories of itself - manifestoes, polemics, strident declarations, urbane repudiations of the old-fashioned-tested against Modernist practice, in literature, music, and painting. I welcome students from disparate graduate programs in the university.
Comparative Literature 256. Archeology of Modernity and Visual Culture - (New Course)
Catalog Number: 74617 Enrollment: Limited to 15. The course will include a creative experiments in photography, writing and digital media as well as analytic assignments. VES and GSD students welcome.
Svetlana Boym
Half course (spring term). Th., 2–4. EXAM GROUP: 16, 17
Explores contradictions of the modern experience in literature, philosophy, arts and architecture.
Topics for 2010: nostalgia and modernization, public freedom and cross-cultural memory, archeology and the creative mapping of the urban space, culture and politics. Special attention to the relationship between critical theory and creative practice. Reading from Benjamin, Simmel, Shklovsky, Nabokov, Kafka, Arendt, Certeau, Lyotard, Derrida.
[*Comparative Literature 257. Trauma, Memory, and Creativity]
Catalog Number: 7853
Susan R. Suleiman
Half course (spring term). Hours to be arranged.
We will examine classic and contemporary theories of psychic trauma in individual and collective contexts and explore the relations between trauma, resilience, play, and artistic innovation with special attention to modern literary autobiography; fiction; some attention to film and visual narrative.
Note: Expected to be given in 2010–11. Open to qualified juniors and seniors with approval of the instructor.
Prerequisite: Good reading knowledge of at least one non-English language.
Comparative Literature 261. Fragments of a Material History of Literature
Catalog Number: 6923
Jeffrey Schnapp
Half course (spring term). W., 1–3. EXAM GROUP: 6, 7
Literary studies studied from the perspective of the practices that have shaped ideas concerning literature, writing, speech, and communication: from scrolls and codices to the rise of printing and typewriting to digital writing.
[*Comparative Literature 262. Aesthetics and Freedom]
Catalog Number: 5308
Svetlana Boym
Half course (spring term). Hours to be arranged.
Examines philosophical, political, and aesthetic conceptions of freedom from French and American revolutions to postcommunism. Topics: aesthetic education and the space of freedom, the myth of America from a cross-cultural perspective, love, and modern ethics.
Note: Expected to be given in 2010–11. Open to graduate students and qualified undergraduates. The discussions in class are based mostly on the English translations. However, the use of the texts in the original languages (Russian, French, and German) is encouraged for the final paper.
[Comparative Literature 263. Journey, Exile, and Displacement in Modern Arabic Literature]
Catalog Number: 3125
William E. Granara
Half course (spring term). Th., 4–6. EXAM GROUP: 18
The course examines narratives of journey, exile, and displacement in modern Arabic literature that trespass geographical, political and linguistic boundaries, and create new literary spaces that define and reshape modern Arab identities. Theoretical readings will include Prattt, Said, Rushdie and Kaplan.
Note: Expected to be given in 2010–11. Arabic helpful but not required. Undergraduates welcome.
[Comparative Literature 264. Thinking and Writing Transculturally]
Catalog Number: 6133
Karen Thornber
Half course (spring term). Hours to be arranged.
Explores approaches to transculturation in the production and evaluation of literature in light of new understandings of human and textual border-crossings. Topics include the ethics of dividing cultural products along ethnic, linguistic, and national lines on the one hand and classifying phenomena as global on the other, and the ramifications of cross-cultural comparison. We also examine the relationship between creative production and such topics as empire, travel/diaspora, translingualism, and literary reconfiguration.
Note: Expected to be given in 2010–11.
[Comparative Literature 266. Irony]
Catalog Number: 9984
Panagiotis Roilos
Half course (spring term). Hours to be arranged.
Explores major philosophical and aesthetic discourses on irony as well as literary manipulations of the trope in western European tradition. Topics discussed include irony and rhetoric, parody, laughter, irony, and the post-modern.
Note: Expected to be given in 2010–11.
[Comparative Literature 273. Approaches to Modernity: The Metropolis]
Catalog Number: 2521
Svetlana Boym
Half course (fall term). W., 2–4; W., at 4. EXAM GROUP: 7, 8
Examines the relationship between urban experience and debates on modernity/postmodernity in art, architecture and social theory. Topics: nostalgia and modernization, cultural archeology and architecture of transition, memorial, museum and public art, national identity and cosmopolitan imagination, metropolis and megapolis.
Note: Expected to be given in 2010–11. Students in this class will be encouraged to attend lectures and screenings for VES 184 and develop individual research and/or creative projects.
[Comparative Literature 275. Theory of Narrative: Conference Course ]
Catalog Number: 3105 Enrollment: Limited to 15.
William Mills Todd III
Half course (fall term). Hours to be arranged.
Studies of selected narratives (fictional, psychoanalytic, historical, sacred) as semiotic structures, representations, rhetorical gambits, and cultural phenomena. Readings by Jakobson, Barthes, Bakhtin, Iser, Lukács, Foucault and others.
Note: Expected to be given in 2010–11. Open to advanced undergraduates and graduates. Recommended for potential teaching fellows.
[Comparative Literature 276. Renaissance Poetics and Rhetoric]
Catalog Number: 2534
Christopher D. Johnson
Half course (spring term). W., 3–5. EXAM GROUP: 8, 9
Examines Renaissance literary criticism and theory in the context of the arts of poetry and rhetoric. Topics include imitation, genre, decorum, and the conceit. Readings from Petrarch to Gracián and Boileau.
Note: Expected to be given in 2010–11.
[Comparative Literature 277. Literature and Diaspora]
Catalog Number: 6042
Karen Thornber
Half course (spring term). W., 1–3. EXAM GROUP: 6, 7
Examines creative and critical discourse from and about the African, Chinese, Indian, Japanese, Jewish, and Korean diasporas. Explores the relationship between diaspora and constructions of artistic and cultural identities, transculturation, translation, and multilingualism.
Note: Expected to be given in 2010–11.
Comparative Literature 278. Failure and Change (Graduate Seminar in General Education) - (New Course)
Catalog Number: 41112
Christie McDonald
Half course (fall term). Tu., 1–3. EXAM GROUP: 15, 16
Analysis of the failure of models and testing of limits in reflection about change, as well as the dialogue among literary, theological, socio-political, artistic, and philosophical discourses. Topics include authority, freedom, equality, sentiment, reason, fanaticism, tolerance. Readings include works from St. Augustine, Rousseau, Diderot, Kant, Proust, Koselleck, Rorty, Beauvoir, Sartre, Kofman, Beckett.
The seminar will design and develop a General Education course on these themes for undergraduates; it will also contain an arts component.
[Comparative Literature 283. Language Differences]
Catalog Number: 7468
Marc Shell
Half course (fall term). Hours to be arranged.
Considers language difference both as a literary theme and as a potent cause of war in the political arena. Historical foci include Europe, the Middle East, North America, and Africa. Literary issues include translation, heteroglossia, cinematography, and multilingualism. Works of literature include Sophocles, Shakespeare, Goethe, and Dove.
Note: Expected to be given in 2010–11.
[Comparative Literature 286 (formerly Literature 148). Metaphor]
Catalog Number: 6074
Christopher D. Johnson
Half course (fall term). M., 3–5. EXAM GROUP: 8, 9
Explores the theory and practice of metaphor in literature, philosophy, and science. Topics include: the aesthetic, heuristic, and epistemological functions of metaphor; metaphor’s relation to allegory, irony, and other “major tropes”; metaphor in lyric poetry. Readings include Aristotle, Gracián, Jakobson, Freud, Ricoeur, Blumenberg, Kofman,Derrida, de Man, and Kuhn.
Note: Expected to be given in 2010–11. All readings will be available in translation, but students are encouraged to work in the original languages.
Comparative Literature 288. Antiquity and Beyond: Modern Critical Theory and the Classics
Catalog Number: 7557
Panagiotis Roilos
Half course (fall term). Tu., 1–3. EXAM GROUP: 15, 16
Explores the impact of classical literature and culture on the formation of modern critical theory. Topics include: construction of power; trafficability of art; ritual theory; sexuality; gender studies; irony; orality and literacy.
*Comparative Literature 299ar. Theory and Comparative Literature: Proseminar
Catalog Number: 2431
David Damrosch
Half course (fall term). W., 1–3. EXAM GROUP: 6
An investigation into current trends in comparative literature, with an emphasis on methodologies, resources, and theory.
Note: Required of first-year graduate students in Comparative Literature; others may be admitted by permission of the instructor.
*Comparative Literature 397. Direction of Doctoral Dissertations
Catalog Number: 0320
Daniel Albright 4615, Svetlana Boym 1926, Joaquim-Francisco Coelho 7715, Verena A. Conley 2250, David Damrosch 5998, James Engell 8076, Luis M. Girón Negrón 3060, William E. Granara 1054 (on leave spring term), John T. Hamilton 3977, Christopher D. Johnson 4301 (on leave fall term), Christie McDonald 1160, Sandra Naddaff 7779, Gregory Nagy 1423, Stephen Owen 7418, Julie Peters 6250, Panagiotis Roilos 1982, Judith Ryan 1135 (on leave fall term), Marc Shell 3176, Werner Sollors 7424, Diana Sorensen 4214, Susan R. Suleiman 7234 (on leave 2009-10), Karen Thornber 5764 (on leave 2009-10), William Mills Todd III 1634 (on leave 2009-10), and Ruth R. Wisse 3177
*Comparative Literature 399. Reading and Research
Catalog Number: 2893
Daniel Albright 4615, Svetlana Boym 1926, Joaquim-Francisco Coelho 7715, Verena A. Conley 2250, David Damrosch 5998, James Engell 8076, Luis M. Girón Negrón 3060, John T. Hamilton 3977, Christopher D. Johnson 4301 (on leave fall term), Christie McDonald 1160, Sandra Naddaff 7779, Gregory Nagy 1423, Stephen Owen 7418, Julie Peters 6250, Panagiotis Roilos 1982, Judith Ryan 1135 (on leave fall term), Marc Shell 3176, Werner Sollors 7424, Diana Sorensen 4214, Susan R. Suleiman 7234 (on leave 2009-10), Karen Thornber 5764 (on leave 2009-10), William Mills Todd III 1634 (on leave 2009-10), and Ruth R. Wisse 3177
Candidates for the doctoral degree in Comparative Literature may pursue advanced studies under the individual supervision of these instructors.
Note: Permission of the instructor and the Chairman of the Department required.