ENGL*3870 - Topics in Literary and Cultural Studies

Course Description

These variable-content courses provide opportunities for topics in cross-period studies, inter- and transdisciplinary studies and cultural studies, among others that are not available in regular offerings. Consult the School for specific offerings in a given semester. Reading-intensive course. 

Learning Outcomes

By the end of the course, the learner should be able to:

• Utilize theoretical concepts and analytical methods to interpret and contextualize works of and tendencies in contemporary culture, such as in literature, film, television/digital media, music, food, clothing, visual cultures, medicine, technology, video gaming, comics, animation, etc.
• Assess challenging or contradictory social and ethical implications of currents and issues in contemporary cultural production and critical theory.
• Synthesize methodological approaches in a recursive process of reflecting and re-reflecting, application and re-application.
• Create an innovative and compelling critical and/or creative project, based on the topic(s), motivating questions, and theoretical apparatus studied in and for course activities and assignments over the term.
• Gain and refine new proficiencies with online research and networking tools and software through online content generation.
• Evaluate diverse cultural works as an active, informed, and critically aware reader, viewer, and listener.

Course Topics

• Historical Groundwork: Taking Art off the Pedestal
• Historical Groundwork—What is Mass Culture?
• Cultural Reproductions—Contemporary Sightings
• Reproductive Technologies—Viewing the Womb
• Reproduction and Consumption—Are We What We Eat?
• Androids, Cyborgs...and Animals?
• Cyborgs, Animals....and Women?
• On Longing; and Gender as Impersonation—Are We What We Wear?
• Race and Mimicry—Repeating, “Racing,” and “Erasing” Cultures 
• “Reel Realities”?
• Reinventing the Real (and/or Realism)

Assessment