2021 Remote Literature Summer Courses

LIT 61U

Session 2

Examines speculative and science fiction (SF) texts to develop critical methods for the analysis and interpretation of SF as a critique of science, technology, and culture. Themes include encounters across species; novelty and change; expanded concepts of life; and the role of technology in human development. General Education Code PE-T

Proposed Instructor - Zac Zimmer

LIT 80I

Session 1

This course introduces students to sequential art through engagement with three comics, one graphic novel, and contemporary comics scholarship. Primary texts for the course belong to an emerging genre of Afrofuturist comics that center black womxn and intervene in dominating tropes of black female characters in popular culture. These texts rely on elements of science fiction, fantasy, magic, and dystopian imaginaries to animate Afrocentric cosmologies, futuristic technologies, and non-Western ways of being and communing. General Education Code TA

Proposed Instructor - Kirstin Wagner

LIT 102

Session 2

Promotes the understanding of translation and its role in redefining meanings across epochs and cultures, in establishing common norms, and in advancing mutual intelligibility; but also providing encounters with absolute alterity. Actual translations are used as case studies. General Education Code TA

Prerequisite(s): one year of college-level, non-English language study or the equivalent reading ability in a non-English language.

Proposed Instructor - Camilo Gomez-Rivas

LIT 111D

Session 2

Study of representative works by William Shakespeare. Course topic changes; please see the Class Search for the current topic. Critical approach designations: Canons, Media. Distribution requirements: Poetry, Pre-1750. General Education Code TA

Proposed Instructor - Sean Keilen

LIT 112C

Special Session - July 26-30, 2021

Study of representative work by Charles Dickens. Critical approach designations: Canons, Histories. Offered in conjunction with the annual Dickens Universe scholarly conference, this intensive, one-week, online course will focus on Dicken’s A Christmas Carol, its many adaptations and re-interpretations, and its continuing relevance today. The course includes lectures by distinguished scholars, panel discussions, film screenings, as well as a small undergraduate seminar and writing workshop. The course carries 5 units of academic credit.

Proposed Instructor - John Jordan

LIT 120A

Session 1

Close reading--critical and creative--of poetry. Examines how poets teach, through their writing, to radically attend to reading. Students will examine nature poetry and how poets have explored humans' interactions with the environment, the wild, and animals. By reading poetry from different historical periods (including ancient Mesopotamia, Greece and Rome and the early modern period) and written in various poetic genres, we will explore how poets from many cultures and traditions (including Diné, African American, and other voices such as those of the Olimpias disability culture artists’ collective) conceptualize the natural along with issues such as climate change, environmental disaster, apocalypse, and sustainability. Assessments will include weekly short writing assignments, quizzes, an essay, and a final exam. Critical approach designations: Genres, Histories. Distribution requirement: Poetry. General Education Code TA

Proposed Instructor - Kristina Chew

LIT 131D

Session 2

Comparative examination of fiction in the modern world and of fictional responses to social change and crisis. Central to film analysis of King Kong and Godzilla, the class further investigates the U.S. and Japanese empires through interdisciplinary approaches of literature, history, and visual culture. With a mixture of literary texts, ranging from Euro-U.S. canonical works to newly translated Japanese texts, this class will offer a variety of viewpoints from different nations and eras. Critical approach designations: Geographies, Power and Subjectivities. Distribution requirements: Global. General Education Code TA

Proposed Instructor - Yuki Obayashi

LIT 133D

Session 1

Provides in-depth analysis of literary and cultural phenomena of southern Asia. This course introduces students to a selection of major writers in twentieth century Indian literature, with a focus on questions of the nation and nationalism. Readings will probe into issues of national borders, languages, and communities, and also examine the development of nationalism and modernity in the postcolonial South Asian context. Over the course of five weeks, students will read texts originally written in Hindi, Marathi, Urdu, and Tamil in English translation. These texts will offer multiple rewritings of histories of the Indian subcontinent from marginalized subject positions. They will also explore questions around democracy, diversity, and citizenship, which have become urgent in many parts of the world. Critical approach designations: Geographies, Histories. Distribution requirement: Global. General Education Code CC

Proposed Instructor - Radhika Prasad

LIT 155L

Session 1

Examines development and central themes of vampire film from the silent era to the present. Critical approach designations: Genres, Media. General Education Code IM

Proposed Instructor - Erik Bachman

LIT 164G

Session 1

Reading and analysis of fiction and poetry, focusing on Holocaust literature as a problem in critical theory, cultural studies, and literary history. Though most of the works are read in translation, some knowledge of European languages is helpful. Critical approach designations: Histories, Power and Subjectivities.

Proposed Instructor - Filippo Gianferrari

LIT 164K

Session 2

Examines literary, theatrical, cinematic, and televised representations of Jewish culture, focusing on the ways in which Jews have negotiated the transition to modernity via comedy and humor. Critical approach designations: Media, Power and Subjectivities. General Education Code ER

Proposed Instructor - Thais Miller

Pending CCI Approval

LIT 179C

Special Session - June 21-July 2, 2021

An intensive exploration of the memoir genre. We will read creative and craft-oriented autobiographical texts from Augustine to Baldwin to Carmen Maria Machado in order to explore the ways the genre forms and interrogates truth, imagination, and memory. Students will write creative/critical responses to the readings and write their own 7-12 page memoir. General Education Code PR-C

Proposed Instructor - Micah Perks