Harry Potter and Western Culture
GER 199/Campus Honors Program How does the literary and cultural phenomenon of the Harry Potter series reflect and transform central aspects of Western culture? How do myth, fantasy, and the novel relate and differ as forms? We will consider of issues of character, genre, structure, and the philosophical and ethical issues raised within and by the Harry Potter series. We will read all volumes in the series and also consider the relation between the books and the corresponding films, and explore how different media represent and transform content. Students will learn and use the tools of close reading, explore different methods of literary and cultural analysis, acquire familiarity with significant movements in Western thought, and become acquainted with contemporary discussions about connections between traditional and popular culture as well as between literature and film. The Grimms' Fairy Tales GER 251/CWL 254/ENGL 266 Join us to experience tales you thought you knew and tales you never knew. We read substantial parts of the Grimms' 19th-century collections and some of their French and Italian predecessors, and we consider other storytelling forms, film, and illustration. All the while, we investigate how power, gender, race, class, and ecological issues play out in these surprisingly dense, meaningful, and very old stories. Why do we continue to tell and to know these tales? Why do certain stories recur again and again, in Western and other cultures? The power of narrative is at the center of our lives, and of these tales, and by the end of the semester we will understand this power much better. Freud - Nietzsche - Kafka GER 496/CWL 496/PHIL 444 We explore hope and redemption, self and community, art and life via texts by Freud, Nietzsche, and Kafka. How are psychoanalytic, philosophical, and aesthetic views of the self compatible, and where do they differ? What are these thinkers’ messages for us today? At the end of the semester, you will: 1) have a rich understanding of the ways talk in different disciplines forms our experience of the world at the most fundamental level; 2) understand the essential vocabulary of psychoanalysis; and 3) be able to articulate the significance of philosophy for literature and the arts. Open to undergraduate and graduate students. Readings and discussion in English. No prerequisites. For additional information, mail [email protected] Modern Critical Theory GER 570 In this course, graduate students and advanced undergraduates receive a comprehensive and solid introduction to theories and methods central to the humanities. Due to its content and unique structure, this course also provides a basis for interdisciplinary conversation and intellectual community among graduate students and faculty members across the university. You will be challenged to think deeply and broadly, and by the end of the semester you will have a foundation that will enable you either to knowledgeably choose a field of specialty, or to enrich the specialty you already have chosen. Thinkers and movements covered include Kant, Hegel, Marx, Nietzsche, Freud, Derrida, Foucault, Butler, Spivak, indigenous criticism, ecocriticism, LGBTQ theory, critical race theory, digital media studies. Grand Challenge Learning - Crime and Punishment in Documentary Film GCL 195 We examine emerging theories about restorative versus retributive justice, fairness and unfairness within the legal system, and the histories of various (in)famous crimes—all by viewing and analyzing documentary films. We explore social, political, racial, cultural, and other “fictions of equality” that the films either reveal or represent. We also will consider film as a form, and think about its relation to other media (photography, literature, online content). By the end of the semester, students will have learned and used different methods of cultural and film analysis, acquired familiarity with the genre of documentary film, and become acquainted with contemporary discussions about crime, punishment, and justice, in the U.S. and abroad. Films include The Act of Killing (Oppenheimer, 2013), 13th (DuVernay, 2016), Four Little Girls (Lee, 1997), The Last of the Unjust (Lanzmann, 2013), and Standard Operating Procedure (Morris, 2008), among others. We'll have visits from faculty guest stars Robert Rushing (Comparative Literature/Italian) and Colleen Murphy (Law/Philosophy). Readings and discussions are in English, with no prerequisites. This course satisfies the General Education criteria for Literature and the Arts. Romanticism and its Afterlives GER 574/472 Romanticism and its philosophical predecessor, Idealism, are among the most significant movements in Western intellectual history. And they supposedly ended by 1850. In this course, however, we will consider and test the notion that Romanticism is still with us, in various guises. And, we will investigate the extent to which Romanticism’s afterlives still matter – how Romantic are we? And is this a good thing? Texts include Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein (1818), Christoph Ransmayr’s The Terrors of Ice and Darkness (1996), contemporary films, paintings, and core works of German Romanticism. We will trace the evolution of Romanticism through Realism, Expressionism, and up to the present day. By the end of the term, you will have a clear understanding of Romanticism, its impacts, and of important trends in literary, philosophical, and cultural history since the late eighteenth century. You also will have developed your ability to read critically and to write accessibly. Open to graduate and undergraduate students, in English, with no prerequisites. However, graduate students in German should read the originally German course texts in German (and may choose to write essays in German), and undergraduate German majors/minors are encouraged to do so. This course is an affiliated seminar with the Unit for Criticism and Interpretive Theory. |