ENGL 194 A-Z - Special Topics: Junior/Senior SeminarSemester Hours: 3-4
Fall, Spring
Intensive consideration of critical issues in literary history and interpretation. Topics vary.
Current Special Topics
English 194K, (WI), Junior/Senior Seminar: Literature, Aesthetics & Disability
Disability studies can offer insights into artistic representations of anomalous bodies and minds or mental and physical impairments. Our conversations regarding the interrelations among disability, art, and literature, though, need not stop there. As Michael Berube has observed, literature can involve disability and stigma even without portraying characters with disabilities. Further, disability can influence the form as well as the content of art. In this seminar, then, we will consider not only disability representations but also disability aesthetics, the interactions between anomaly and beauty in art and literature. Why, for example, does Western culture regard the Venus de Milo, a mutilated, armless statue, as an epitome of beauty? How do fictions rely upon disability to set narratives in motion? How do forms of expression dismissed as pathological in the speech and writing of autists become celebrated in the work of creative writers? How does ASL poetry expand our understanding of literature’s expressive potential? The texts we study may include Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “The Birthmark,” selections from the Harry Potter series, Christopher Nolan’s film Memento, selected ASL poetry (in translation), and Philip K. Dick’s Martian Time-Slip. No prior coursework in disability studies is required for this course, which will introduce fundamental disability studies concepts and relate them to literary analysis.
Prerequisite(s)/Course Notes:
WSC 001 . Required course for English majors in the Literatures in English concentration. May not be taken on a Pass/D+/D/Fail basis. As individual subjects are selected, each is assigned a letter (A-Z) which is affixed to the course number. Specific titles and course descriptions for special topics courses are available in the online class schedule. (Formerly Junior/Senior Seminar.)
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