Overview

Description

CALENDAR DESCRIPTION:

Seminar on a topic in World Literature. This course may be repeated for credit when different topics are offered.

COURSE DETAILS:

WL330 ST:  ECOLOGY & LITERATURE: POETRY, FICTION, & THE POETICS OF THE NATURAL WORLD

This course builds upon the field of ecocriticism – the study of the ways in which NATURE is represented in art and thought.  Open to students from an array of disciplinary backgrounds, and drawing its primary materials from global fiction, film, & visual art, this interdisciplinary course explores the poetics by which representations of nature animate themselves across historical and cultural boundaries.  

 

 

Asking how the rhythms of nature impact human consciousness, our course materials range from the state of nature in the Australian outback (Walkabout), to humans escaping to an abandoned African game park (Tuner of Silences).  We also read about a troubled island paradise in the Dutch East Indies (Ten Thousand Things) and environmental strife in China during the cultural revolution (The King of Trees).  Foremost among the ecocritical models engaged in our readings will be the notion of the “performativity” of the natural scene – the ways in which natural phenomena do not just shape our cultural & personal responses to environments but syncopate them through images and language.  It is in this latter sense that many of our conversations with begin from key examples of naturally focused world cinema and poetry.  

COURSE-LEVEL EDUCATIONAL GOALS:

Ability to understand and compare cultural representations of nature 

Basic comprehension of ecocritical terms and concepts 

Understanding of World Literature as a field practice 

Beginning ability to analyze environments as social discourses  

Grading

Materials

REQUIRED READING:

REQUIRED READING NOTES: