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Course Descriptions: Fall 2015
COLT 101
Introduction to Comparative Literature I
Leah Middlebrook
Can the history, future and alternative realities of literature be captured in one single book?
Maybe so, if that book is Miguel de Cervantes’ 1605 novel Don Quixote.
In this course, you will be asked to read Don Quixote for fun and interest –it is a novel that
inspires a lot of delight and surprise. But we will also consider how the novel represents
“literature” as a historical and cultural phenomenon, one that is shaped and informed by
notions of world, self and language that were just rising to prominence during the years in
which Cervantes penned and published his book. As we read and discuss, we will make forays
into some other works: poems by Maya Angelou, Gwendolyn Brooks, Pablo Neruda, Adrienne
Rich and William Shakespeare (among others). We will also establish contexts for the novel (1)
Spanish, European and Mediterranean history; (2) in the rise of a notion of social, cultural and
political “modernity”; and (3) in the live, active present. Students should be aware that a central
objective of this course is to develop skills of active reading, reflection and critical engagement.
Assignments include journaling on specific topics and questions and developing substantial
blog posts that link Don Quixote, a novel from 1605, to twenty-first century culture. We will
provide clear instruction and support on these assignments, which may look unfamiliar. Miguel
de Cervantes thought outside the box as he composed the novel, so it’s fitting that we engage
with it in a creative way.
Note: We will use the English version of the novel as our core text, but this is a multicultural
course in which bi- and polylingual students are warmly welcomed. Don Quixote has been
translated into many languages, and we hope students will share their expertise on a range of
different translations. [Fall] [4 credits]
COLT 211
Comparative World Literature: “Literature of the Abject”
Baran Germen
“Contemporary literature,” says Kristeva, “propounds … a sublimation of abjection.”
Following Kristeva, this course approaches modern literature to think through the questions of
the abject and abjection. How does literature aestheticize the debased, the vile, and the
expelled? In what ways does the abject disrupt order and threaten borders? What are the
mechanisms “by which,” à la Butler, “others become shit”? Can we think of a positive ethics of
self-abjection? These will be amongst the questions motivating us, as we revisit some of the
masterpieces of world literature and (re)read them through the lens of the abject. Select texts
include but are not limited to works by Shakespeare, Kafka, Dostoyevsky, Baldwin, Coetzee,
and Pamuk. [Fall] [4 credits]
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COLT 211
Comparative World Literature: “Nature and Text”
Anna Baumeister
Intuitively, we think of literature as antithetically opposed to nature. Speech and writing, which
form the basis of literature, have at times been identified as precisely what separates human
culture from merely animal nature. In a related way, the emergence of literature has been
marked as the initiation of "civilization"--the departure of humanity from a primitive, merely
natural state.
It has also been argued, however, that the same artistic "genius" responsible for creating
literature cannot itself be culturally acquired or "learned," but is, in fact, a "natural" gift or a
product of nature. Moreover, the material forms that literature takes when it appears to us are
themselves often closely tied to "nature"—be it parchment made from animal skin, paper made
from wood, or the embodied voice of a storyteller.
What, then, is the status of literature? Is it "cultural," "natural," or, somehow, "both"? This
course aims to develop a response to these questions, through investigation of the relationship
of literature to nature, and of the new meanings "literature" and "nature" may take when
thought together this way. This investigation takes us from cave paintings to 20th century
abstract art, from Renaissance drama to experimental film, from enlightenment notions of
creativity to the status of artwork in an age of mechanical reproduction. [Fall] [4 credits]
COLT 212
Comparative World Cinema: “Warriors on the Frontier”
Anna Kovalchuk
This course will examine the frontier, or the border, by looking at national icons which both
define and resist the nation-state. The Ukrainian and/or Russian cossacks, the American
cowboys and the Japanese samurai are all iconic representatives of their respective national
traditions. However, they are also resistant to state-codified norms of behavior, property and
law. We will examine these masculine icons through an assortment of visual media,
predominantly film, to consider how masculinity, nationality and the frontier are depicted. We
will not look to equate these figures, but to understand what they represent in the popular
imaginary keeping in mind their evolving historical context and various social positions both
inside and outside the state. We will analyze the space of the frontier, the codification of honor,
iconic representations of masculinity, the role of violence and justice, and gendered social
orders. [Fall] [4 credits]
COLT 231
Literature and Society: “Journalism, Media, and Literature”
Katy Brundan
This course explores the intersections of journalism and literature with a focus on how literary
texts mediate reality. Our texts self-consciously reflect media technology, creating new genres
and modes of representation. We will seek to answer questions such as: How did crime
reporting inspire detective fiction? How do concepts such as the spectator or virtual reality
appear in literature? How did women’s roles as reporters, consumers, or sensational subjects
affect literature? We will read detective and sensation stories about strange crimes in the city, as
well as Emile Zola’s The Ladies Paradise - a novel set in a Parisian department store. The course
involves a journalism-oriented project about Bram Stoker’s Dracula, a novel constructed from
letters and newspaper cuttings. The course also considers media technology in Adolfo Bioy
Casares’ The Invention of Morel, stories by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, and the movie Inception.
Written work will include close-reading tasks, a journalism-driven assignment, and a formal
essay. [Fall] [4 credits]
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COLT 360
Gender and Identity in Literature: “Living Dead Girls”
Rachel Eccleston
In his 1846 essay, “The Philosophy of Composition,” Edgar Allen Poe writes “the death of a
beautiful woman is unquestionably the most poetical topic in the world.” Taking this sentiment
as a point of departure, the course will explore the motif of “living dead girls” as it develops
through time and across national and linguistic traditions in literature and film. Our study will
begin in the Italian Renaissance with Petrarch’s Canzionere in which the poet represents the dead
girl and we will continue through the early 21st century where the dead girl finally narrates her
own story in The Lovely Bones. In addition to analyzing the representation of dead girls in genres
ranging from poetry to film, we will discuss how these texts immortalize their subjects, thus
making them live forever. In order to fully explore the complexity of our theme, we will also
discuss the living dead—ghosts, zombies, and the possessed.
Some important questions we will ask are: Why is the literary motif of the deceased young
woman so popular? How does the motif communicate cultural ideas about love, gender,
sexuality, and beauty? Can “living death” be a metaphor for the often-fraught status of female
subjectivity? How does literature immortalize its subjects and its authors, granting them life
after death?
Crucial to our examination of the motif of “living dead girls” from a comparative perspective is
a critical engagement with gender theory. In addition to primary texts, we will read and discuss
critical essays that address gender, how “living dead girls” are represented artistically in
literature, and the often-problematic way women are depicted on screen. [Fall] [4 credits]
COLT 399
Special Studies: “Theories and Methods of Comparative
Literature”
Katy Brundan
COLT 399 offers an introduction to literary theory, with an emphasis on comparative study in
a global context. Students learn the fundamental theories and methods of Comparative
Literature, reading selections from a wide variety of theoretical schools including
psychoanalysis, linguistics, French feminism, poststructuralism, postcolonial studies, and
translation studies. We will investigate the relevance of such literary theory for the analysis of
short written and visual materials. Coursework will culminate in a student project involving one
artifact chosen by the student (text, painting, film, digital artwork, graphic novel, etc.) to be
analyzed within the critical framework of the course. We may visit the Jordan Schnitzer
Museum of Art during the term to apply theory to exhibits on display. [Fall] [4 credits]
COLT 407
Seminar: “Misanthropy and Solitude”
Corinne Bayerl
"I've always been interested in people, but I've never liked them." Like W. Somerset Maugham,
many writers have harbored a general dislike for the human species or else have exploited the
often exhilarating potential presented by misanthropic characters, as did Molière. In this class
we will explore theories and literary representations of misanthropy and solitude, two
phenomena which may—but do not have to—go together. We will question in what sense
reading and writing can be practices of solitude, and which sort of texts emerge when writers
decide, if only temporarily, to withdraw from the surrounding world.
Readings may include: Lucian, Timon the Misanthrope; Shakespeare, Timon of Athens; Montaigne,
De l’amitié; Pascal, Pensées; Molière, The Misanthrope; Rousseau, Reveries of the Solitary Walker;
Thoreau, Walden; Dostojewski, Notes from the Underground; Maupassant, Solitude; Sartre, No Exit;
Emil Cioran, The Trouble with Being Born; Thomas Bernhard, The Voice Imitator. [Fall] [4 credits]
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COLT 616
Transmedial Aesthetics
Michael Allan
Common as it is to think of textual form in relation to language, history and culture, in what
ways does attention to media transform how we read? This course takes seriously what it means
to compare across media and expands critical methods beyond textual form. With explorations
ranging from discourse analysis and phenomenology to structuralism and objected-orientedontology, we will draw together media historians, cultural theorists and new media scholars to
consider a number of key questions: How does an image differ from a picture? What is the
relation between text and world? How does perspective relate to frame? How does the interface
relate to phenomenology? Each week takes a key aspect of media aesthetics to move beyond
analysis based on language and culture towards a consideration of networks, reflexivity and the
senses. The course will pair together readings with films, photographs and videos, all with the
goal of collapsing the boundaries of theory and practice. Reading back and forth across history,
we will consider media’s past and future in an effort to enact comparativism not only as a
translational and transnational model of inquiry, but as the groundwork for transmedia
aesthetics. [Fall] [5 credits]
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