Undergraduate Courses Spring 2008

CLT 220-J NON-WESTERN LITERATURE: NORTH AFRICAN ENCOUNTERS

Students in this course will explore how the notions of East and West, West and non-West, and Western vs. 'Other" civilizations have influenced literary representations of North Africa, from Egypt to the Maghreb. Examples of travel writing, harem fantasies, advertisements and art will lead our interrogtion of the social and political implications of creative works. Works of colonial, anti-colonial, and post colonial literature and film will raise the concepts of national and international identities. Course texts emphasize the 18th through the 21st centuries, plus excerpts from contemporary critical and theoretical works, and highlight the themes of science, sexuality, political awareness, race, religion, migration, and the representation of history.

Advisory Prerequisite: Completion of D.E.C. category A

MW 3:50PM-5:10PM SB UNION 226 E. DOSWELL/MANNIR

CLT 235-K AMERICAN PLURALISM FILM AND LITERATURES

This course will look at the impact of WWI, and WWII in the definition of a race consciousness amongst blacks across the globe. As such it will not only investigate the modes of self-definition in the US, it will also look at the impact of these two major conflicts in shaping new discourses of the self in Africa.

Advisory Prerequisites: Completion of D.E.C. categories I and J

LEC -MW 10:40PM-11:35PM HUMANITIES 3018
LAB -W 6:50PM-8:50PM HUMANITIES 3018
P. NGANANG

CLT335.01-G INTERDISCIPLINARY STUDY OF FILM-MULTICULTURAL FICTIONS: POPULAR CULTURE AND THE MANAGEMENT OF DIVERSITY

This course aims at a genealogical study of our current understanding of diversity through the interdisciplinary use of film and novels. Diversity is an inherent quality of our world. Recently, however, diversity has become an idea charged with political meanings and is defended or attacked as if it were our choice to have it. As our culture’s most complex narrative texts, films and novels are constantly attempting to naturalize certain views of what diversity means. By means of structured and goal oriented stories, fiction narratives are actively managing diversity, assigning value to it, and shaping it into orderly hierarchies. The films, novels, and critical readings in this course are selected to invite us to perform a reflection on the roots, current use and possible future developments of diversity discourses.

Prerequisite: U3 or U4 standing; Advisory Prerequisites: One course in literature; HUM 201 or 303
or THR 117    

LEC-MW 11:45AM-12:40PM, HUMANITIES 3018
LAB-M 6:50PM-8:50PM, HUMANITIES 3018
A. PEREZ-MELGOSA

CLT335.02-G INTERDISCIPLINARY STUDY OF FILM: IT'S HERE! IT'S QUEER! MAKE USE OF IT!

This course is designed to help you make sense of the concepts and applications of Queer Theory.  We'll begin with an introductory study of the history of gay/lesbian/trans life and politics in the U.S., but will move past the study of sexual orientation and focus our work on the concept of queerness--what it is, its distinction from LGBT identity, and how queer culture has infiltrated, influenced--perhaps even created--mainstream American cultural production.  We'll work across genres, from campy trash cinema and popular television to "high art" and opera, and take an irreverent approach to the academic style.  Through examination of films (both Hollywood and independent), literature, art and popular culture from the early 20th Century to the present, students in this course will garner lots of practice applying theoretical ideas to actual texts.
Prerequisite: U3 or U4 standing; Advisory Prerequisites: One course in literature; HUM 201 or 303
or THR 117    

LEC- TUTH 9:50AM-10:45PM MELVILLE LBR E4330
LAB-TU 11:20AM-1:20PM MELVILLE LBR E4330
K. PAPE  

CLT 361-G LITERATURE AND SOCIETY: MASCULINITY AND AMERICAN LITERATURE

This course offers an introduction to the construction and de-construction of masculinities in American fiction.  The first part will provide a theoretical interdisciplinary perspective on masculinity studies, bringing together recent approaches from the fields of sociology, psychology, anthropology, philosophy, and literary theory, among others.  The second part will apply this interdisciplinary corpus to the analysis of American literary representations of masculinities.  The readings will range from Washington Irving’s Rip Van Winkle to Chuck Palahniuk’s Fight Club in order to discuss such topics as friendships between men, fatherhood, male sexuality, homphobia, and masculinity and ethnicity, among others.  The main goal of this course is to examine and question the traditional construction of hegemonic masculinity as well as to explore new, alternative, and less oppressive models of manhood in and through American fiction.

LEC-TUTH 2:20PM-3:40PM HUMANITIES 3018
J.AREMENGOL- CARRERA

CLT 475,476 UNDERGRADUATE TEACHING PRACTICUM I, II

Work with a faculty member as an assistant in one of the faculty member's regularly scheduled classes. The student is required to attend all the classes, do all the regularly assigned work, and meet with the faculty member at regularly scheduled times to discuss the intellectual and pedagogical matters relating to the course. In CLT 476, students assume greater responsibility in such areas as leading discussions and analyzing results of tests that have already been graded. Students may not serve as teaching assistants in the same course twice.

Prerequisites to CLT 475: U4 standing; permission of instructor and chairperson.

Prerequisites to CLT 476: CLT 475; permission of instructor and chairperson.

by appointment J. REICH

CLT 487 INDEPENDENT READING AND RESEARCH

Intensive reading and research on a special topic undertaken with close faculty supervision. May be repeated.

Prerequisites: Permission of instructor and department

by appointment J. REICH

CLT 495 COMPARATIVE LITERATURE HONORS PROJECT

A one-semester project for comparative literature majors who are candidates for the degree with departmental honors. The project involves independent study under close supervision of an appropriate faculty member, and the written and oral presentation to the department faculty colloquim of an honors thesis.

Preerequisite: Permission of instructor and department

by appointment J. REICH