82 courses with the subject LITR, each shown exactly as we captured it from the college's catalog, with every element we hold. Where the wording looks broken, that is our reading of the catalog, not the college's text.
LITR 005RFirst Year Seminar: Back to the Future: Contemporary Russian Culture and Society1
(Cross-listed as RUSS 005 ) Hailed as the “end of history” and “the greatest geopolitical tragedy of the 20th century,” the fall of the Soviet Union forced Russia to reconcile a past that had long been suppressed with a present reality full of possibility. We’ll discuss works that address contemporary issues (Putinism, protests, refugees, corruption) and resurrect historical traumas (WWII, Stagnation, Soviet anti-Semitism, the Leningrad Siege) to understand Russia today. We will also have the opportunity to speak with some of the authors we’ll be reading. FYS and W. Taught in translation. No knowledge of Russian required. Open to all. Humanities. W 1 credit.
LITR 007Hot off the Press: Current Headlines from a German Perspective
(Cross-listed as GMST 007 ) This half-credit course invites students to explore the urban culture of Berlin, a European hotspot for politics, the arts, media, high-tech start-ups, and clubbing. Venturing beyond the capital, students then examine facets of Germany’s contemporary cultural, social, and political landscape. Students will help select specific topics for readings, discussions, and presentations, and participants interested in developing their German language skills will have the opportunity to engage with relevant texts and media in German. Taught in English. .5 credit. Eligible for GMST
LITR 007RFYS: Childhood in East European Literature1
(Cross-listed with RUSS 007 ) Ever since Philippe Ariès, in his seminal study Centuries of Childhood (1962), startled the reading public by positing the concept of childhood as a fairly recent, 17th-century invention, debates on its historical and cultural conditioning have been raging unabated. The very defining features of childhood are still contested by enduring dichotomies: is it an autonomous world unto itself, or just a crucible for imminent maturity? A mere time span or a category of experience; a sanctuary of original innocence or a playground for diabolical adventure? Does the child’s mind amount to a clean slate or a network of predetermined patterns? Who bears the ultimate responsibility for the welfare, as well as transgressions, of the child: the parent or the state?–and what, then, can be said for the child’s own agency? The child’s knotted symbolic status, caught between exemplarity and dispensability, promise and confoundment, is what we will grapple with in this course, along with other meanings that this figure has accrued over the years in various East European contexts. No knowledge of Russian or any other Slavic language is required; all readings, papers, and discussions will be in English. FYS Humanities. Writing Course. 1 credit.
(Cross-listed as GMST 009 ) In this course, we will compare two historical periods of mass migrations: refugees fleeing Nazi Germany in 1930s and 1940s and refugees from conflict zones coming to Germany today, and especially during the so-called “refugee crisis” between 2015 and 2019. Connecting political reality with literary and artistic representation, we will use texts, films, current news coverage, and activist art projects to place flight narratives in their historical contexts and to learn about refugee lives, the lasting effects of migration, the social and political reality of those considered “migrants,” and the ways in which migration enables new connections between marginalized histories and precarious positionalities. Humanities. Writing Course. 1 Eligible for CPLT, GLBL-paired, PEAC
LITR 013RThe Meaning of Life and the Russian Novel1
(Cross-listed as RUSS 013 ) This course surveys nineteenth-century Russian-language literature, with a particular focus on the novel, and considers its major themes: nationalism, colonialism, and the ideology of Empire; the meaning of life in the face of death; women’s fate in a patriarchal society; the individual, the collective, and the experience of modernity; reason and irrationality; and the danger and promise of utopian thought. Our approach will be 1) to read and closely analyze a series of texts that became the foundation for the novelistic tradition in Russian within their own contexts and 2) to explore how these texts speak to contemporary issues, our lives, and eternal questions that all of humanity faces. We will read major novels by Fedor Dostoevsky and Lev Tolstoy, as well as novels, poems, and stories by numerous other authors, including Mikhail Lermontov, Sophia Khvoshchinskaya, and Nikolai Gogol. Taught in translation. No knowledge of Russian language or culture required. Humanities. Writing course. 1 credit. Eligible for RUSS, CPLT Fall 2027 Svynarenko.
LITR 014RThe Russian Novel: Revolution, Terror and Resistance1
(Cross-listed as RUSS 014 ) What does a culture look like after it undergoes a series of revolutions-sexual, political, linguistic-in short succession? To answer this question, this course surveys literature from the last days of the Russian Empire, the rise and fall of the Soviet Union, and the turbulent present of the Post-Soviet World. Together, we will consider how literary authors grapple with catastrophic upheaval, from the rapid construction of industrial socialism, to Stalin’s purges, World War II, the Gulag labor camps, and the Russian war on Ukraine in 2014 and the present. We will encounter fantastic, tragic, and absurd tales from a wild century: a battle of values in the early USSR between a rebel and a sausage maker; the joys and tribulations of post-revolutionary sexual liberation; a surreal night of drunkenness on the Moscow Metro; a lifetime in Soviet Central Asia recounted as astronauts make contact with a utopian society in a distant galaxy. All are welcome. Taught in translation. No previous knowledge of Russian language or culture required. Humanities. Writing course. Humanities. Writing course. 1 credit. Eligible for GLBL-paired.
LITR 015RFirst Year Seminar: East European Prose in Translation1
(Cross-listed as RUSS 015 ) Novels and stories by the most prominent 20th-century writers of this multifaceted and turbulent region. Analysis of individual works and writers with the purpose of appreciating the religious, linguistic, and historical diversity of Eastern Europe in an era of war, revolution, political dissent, and outstanding cultural and intellectual achievement. Readings, lectures, writing and discussion in English; qualified students may do some readings in the original language(s). Humanities. Writing course. 1 credit. Eligible for CPLT
LITR 015SFirst Year Seminar: Introduction to Latinx Literature and Culture1
(Cross-listed as SPAN 015 , ENGL 009F , LALS 015 ) This course is an introduction to the writings of Latino/as in the U.S. with emphasis on the distinctions and similarities that have shaped the experiences and the cultural imagination among different Latino/a communities. We will focus particularly in works produced by the three major groups of U.S. Latino/as (Mexican Americans or Chicanos, Puerto Ricans or Nuyoricans, and Cuban Americans). By analyzing works from a range of genres including poetry, fiction, film, and performance, along with literary and cultural theory, the course will explore some of the major themes in the cultural production of these groups. Topics to be discussed include identity formation in terms of language, race, gender, sexuality, and class; diaspora and emigration; the marketing of the Latino/a identity; and activism through art.
LITR 017FFirst-Year Seminar: Francophone Bande Dessinée and Graphic Novels1
Francophone Bande Dessinée and Graphic Novels Bande dessinée and Graphic Novels of the Francophone World* The bande dessinée , the Francophone analog to comics, has evolved alongside art and youth culture to become a locus for expressions of sociocultural and aesthetic changes, as well as antiestablishment discourses. In the context of political and societal issues at stake in the francophone world such as social class, cultural diversity, and gender representation, this course will connect canonical comics (such as Topffer, Asterix and Tintin) with more current cutting-edge art forms including la nouvelle Manga and experimental graphic novels from Rwanda, Lebanon and Iran. Conducted in English. Texts in Translation. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for FREN
LITR 017GFirst Year Seminar: Testimonial Literature1
(Cross-listed as GMST 017 ) This course explores the notion of testimony as an important aspect of a literature of resistance. We investigate how testimony intertwines with questions of writing and truth, and creates a response to cultural violence. Students read theories and literature of resistance and testimony in a wide-ranging selection of time periods and cultures, from the formation of a philosophical and religious idea of testimony in antiquity (Greek and Judeo-Christian traditions) to its later development in the theories of Emmanuel Levinas. We will also study the emergence of the literary notion of testimony by analyzing works of poetry, narrative, and film, with a particular focus on Jewish responses to the Shoah, and Latin American and Latino responses to political and social repression. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for PEAC
LITR 017RFirst-Year Seminar: Love and Sex in Russian Literature1
(Cross-listed as RUSS 017 ) Best known for political priorities and philosophical depth, Russian literature has also devoted many works to the eternal concern of love and sex. We will read significant and provocative works from traditional folk tales through the 21st century to discuss their construction of these most “natural” impulses-and how they imagine the relationship of human attraction to art, politics and philosophy. Humanities. Writing course. 1 credit. Eligible for GSST Spring 2028 Svynarenko.
(Cross-listed as CPLT 050 ) Literature and music have at some times been viewed as natural allies, and at others - in philosopher Peter Kivy’s phrase - as “antithetical arts.” This course approaches the rich relationship between music and literature from a variety of angles, including aesthetics, form, style and genre, reception, and adaptation. Case studies toward the end of the semester will explore the literary legacy of Richard Wagner’s provocative music drama Tristan and Isolde as well as two very different adaptations of Tolstoy’s War and Peace: an opera by Sergei Prokofiev and an electropop musical by Dave Molloy. No prior musical training is required, though students with score-reading ability may be given alternate assignments. Humanities. 1 credit.
(Cross-listed as SPAN 020 ) Uruguayan-born writer Horacio Quiroga stated that “as long as the human language is our preferred vehicle of expression, man will always make stories, because the short story is the one natural, normal and irreplaceable form of storytelling”. Latin American writers moved the short story genre into new and exciting directions. Fantastic tales, magical realism, metafiction, neogothic, and postmodernism are some of the distinctive features of the Latin American short story. We will read a wide variety of short stories from the 20th and 21st century. We will learn about story structure and key elements of storytelling. First, we will study works by Horacio Quiroga and Jorge Luis Borges, whose innovations redefined the genre and moved Latin American fiction into the forefront of world literature. Afterwards, we will read short stories by Gabriel García Márquez, Carlos Fuentes, Clarice Lispector, and Mariana Enríquez, among others. This course affords students the possibility of reading for pleasure while refining critical reading skills. No prior preparation in literature or Spanish is necessary. Taught in English.
This fifth semester course explores the uneasy relationship of humans with technology, including the most prominent forms of artificial intelligence present throughout centuries of cultural production in German-speaking territories: golems, alrauns, homunculi, automata, clones, cyborgs, artificial humans. Students will learn that many of the current challenges posed by technological developments, and particularly by artificial intelligence, are not unique to the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. Class discussions, as well as short class presentations, will support students’ efforts to learn and correctly use the necessary vocabulary. Weekly language games will help students retain vocabulary, review grammar, and learn new structures. Students will learn how to write an essay by producing several drafts and improving them. Students will engage literature, music, visual art and media, as well as current newspaper articles. This course serves as the introduction to the interdisciplinary field of German Studies. Humanities. 0.5 credit.
(Cross-listed as RUSS 021 ) Writer, gambler, publicist, and visionary Fedor Dostoevsky is one of the great writers of the modern age. His work inspired Nietzsche, Freud, Woolf, and others and continues to exert a profound influence on thought in our own society to the present. Dostoevsky confronts the “accursed questions” of truth, justice, and free will set against the darkest examples of human suffering: murder, suicide, poverty, addiction, and obsession. Students will consider artistic, philosophical, and social questions through texts from throughout Dostoevsky’s career. Students with knowledge of Russian may read some or all of the works in the original. Humanities. 1 credit.
LITR 022Representing Colonial Taiwan: City and Public Space in Print1
Cross-listed with CHIN 022 This course introduces students to a variety of methods for approaching the visual images and literary work produced to represent the lived experience of people in colonial Taiwan. Acknowledging the role that print capital has played in the rise of modernization and its momentum to forge a new identity, the class will read in detail the maps, postcards, photos, and literary works available to the growing number of common readers in colonial Taiwan. Through analysis of various representations of public space, the course discloses how people perceived their world, and how representations of public space were articulated in relation to the colonial agenda and particular struggles to reconfigure the power relations among different communities. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for ASIA, CPLT.
(Cross-listed as RUSS 023 ) The long and strong relationship of Russia and Islam has been neglected in scholarship until recently. This course will examine texts (and films) spanning more than a thousand years, to introduce actual interactions of Russians and Muslims, images of Muslims in Russian literature (and a few Muslim images of Russia), the place of Muslim writers in Soviet literature, and the current position of Muslims in Russia and in Russian discourse. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for ISLM, CPLT, GLBL paired.
(Cross-listed as JPNS 024 , FMST 057 ) This course offers a historical and thematic introduction to Japanese cinema, one of the world’s great film traditions. Our discussions will center on the historical context of Japanese film, including how films address issues of modernity, gender, class conflict, and national identity. Through our readings, discussion, and writing, we will explore various approaches to film analysis, with the goal of developing a deeper understanding of formal and thematic issues. A separate unit will consider the development of Japanese animation (anime) and its characteristics. Screenings will include films by Ozu, Kurosawa, Koreeda, Tanaka, Miyazaki, and Shinkai. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for CPLT Fall 2026. Gardner.
(Cross-listed as RUSS 024 ) This course will introduce students to cinema from “the other Europe.” We will begin with influential early Soviet avant-garde cinema and survey the traditions that developed subsequently with selections from Caucasian, Czech, Hungarian, Polish, Russian, Ukrainian and Yugoslav cinema. Screenings will include films by Eisenstein and Tarkovsky, Wajda, Kusturica and Paradzhanov, among others. Students will hone critical skills in filmic analysis while considering the particular cultural, national and political forces shaping the work of filmmakers in this “other Europe” from the early 20th to the early 21st century. Humanities. 1 credit. Spring 2027. Svynarenko.
(Cross-listed as ARAB 025 ) This course will explore literary and cinematic representations of war in the Arab world, focusing on the Arab-Israeli Conflict, the Lebanese Civil War, and the Iraq wars. We will look at poetry, fiction, memoir, prison narratives, film, and experimental texts. Through the examination of a variety of experiences, genres, and perspectives, we will ask questions like: How do narratives of war contribute to the formation of national, local, and Arab identities? How has the experience of war impacted understandings of religion, masculinity, gender, and domestic violence? We will identify common themes and images, and also investigate how these patterns change and develop in different spatial and temporal contexts. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for ISLM, PEAC
LITR 025JContemporary Japanese Literature and Film.1
Cross-listed as JPNS 025 This course will explore the confluence of literary and cinematic imagination with contemporary Japanese social and historical currents through an examination of works by Japanese writers and filmmakers active today–primarily works created in the 21st Century. Themes considered will include youth culture and urban life; precarity and social critique through the lenses of class, ethnicity, and gender; and disaster and dystopia. Writers encountered will include Murakami Haruki, Kirino Natsuo, Kawakami Mieko, Murata Sayaka, Ogawa Yôko, and Tawada Yôko; filmmakers will include Koreeda Hirokazu, Anno Hideaki, Sono Sion, and Shinkai Makoto. No prerequisites; the class will be conducted in English and all works will be available in English translation or with English subtitles. HU. 1 credit.
(Cross-listed as RUSS 025 ) This course will explore Russian literature in its cultural and historical contexts. In Russia, a poet has always been a voice, a herald of freedom or non-conformism, if not an envoy of the regime. The poet is also a philosopher and a thinker. Students will read Russian literary texts from the early 18th century through the beginning of the 21st century. The circle will begin with Lomonosov, whose poetry glorified the Tsarinas. We will continue with censored works by Pushkin, Griboedov, Chaadaev, Gogol, Akhmatova, Chukovskaya, Solzhenitsyn and others who underwent political or social pressure from the Russian or Soviet state. We finish with postmodernist Pelevin, who was neither harassed nor arrested for his prose in a new phenomenon for Russia: during the last two decades literature has come to exist independently from power, in a parallel world. Humanities. 1 credit.
LITR 025SReading Borges: Labyrinths and Forking Paths1
(Cross-listed as SPAN 025 ) Embark on an engaging exploration of Jorge Luis Borges, widely regarded as the most influential writer of the 20th century. His impact on literature and science is unparalleled, with works that foreshadow key themes in literary theory and anticipate the advent of the Internet. Particularly resonant with scientists in computer science, mathematics, and physics, Borges’s ideas on infinity, parallel universes, labyrinths, and forking paths continue to inspire contemporary thought. As a truly global author, Borges’s short stories seamlessly blend influences from Latin America, Europe, Asia, the Middle East, and various belief systems, including Judaism, Buddhism, and Islam. Discover the artful combination of theoretical concepts and aesthetic brilliance in Borges’s works as you venture through the mind of a visionary writer who transcended cultural and linguistic boundaries. This humanities course caters to students of all majors, including those in STEM fields, and requires no prior preparation in literature or Spanish. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for INTP, LALS. Spring 2027. Martínez. Spring 2028 Martínez.
(Cross-listed as GMST 026 , FMST 026 , MUSI 005E ) What do classical music, teenie bop, soul, battle rap, and jazz have in common? Philadelphia. This team-taught interdisciplinary course investigates the histories, structures and cultural connections between popular music and other media in the city of Philadelphia. What links sound, image, and place? How do musical expressions and genres interact with urban life at specific junctures in Philadelphia history? How do modes of production and exhibition formats (radio vs. television, club v.s stadium) along with distribution venues (record store vs. Spotify) engage with genre, gender, and race configurations? What lies at the intersection of regional, national, and global fan cultures? How does celebrity culture then and now impact what is popular and how does it affect Philadelphia’s music industry and vice versa? Providing a grounding in music and media history and theory, we will research and analyze mainstream and independent Philadelphia-specific case studies in radio, film, theater, television and social media in order to better understand and engage with the complex webs that characterize contemporary media, its production, and its consumption. Student projects will explore the intersections and interactions between individuals, ethnic and racial groups, established and new Philadelphians, city government, region, empire, and nation that have and continue to shape Philadelphia through the music and media created here. This course will be taught in Philadelphia. Core class in the Tri-Co Philly Program . Humanities. 1 credit. Spring 2027. Simon.
LITR 026RRussian and East European Science Fiction1
(Cross-listed as RUSS 026 ) Science fiction enjoyed surprisingly high status in Russia and Eastern Europe, attracting such prominent mainstream writers as Karel Čapek, Mikhail Bulgakov, and Evgenii Zamiatin. In the post-Stalinist years of stagnation, science fiction provided a refuge from stultifying official Socialist Realism for authors like Stanisław Lem and the Strugatsky brothers. This course will concentrate on 20th-century science fiction (translated from Czech, Polish, Russian and Serbian) with a glance at earlier influences and attention to more recent works, as well as to Western parallels and contrasts. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for CPLT, GLBL-paired Fall 2027 Forrester.
(Cross-listed as ARAB 029 ) Drawing on historical, fictional, and autobiographical narratives, this course investigates Arab representations of the Occident. These texts explore cultural encounters, both at home and abroad, border crossings, hybridity, experiences of colonialism and neocolonialism, the psychology of Orientalism and Occidentalism, processes of assimilation and resistance, and the question of contact zones. Differences in geography, period, context, and positionality will provide a variety of perspectives on the theme. Works by Abd Al-Rahman Al-Jabarti, Rifa’a Al-Tahtawi, Yahya Haqqi, Sulaiman Fayyad, Tayyib Salih, Leila Ahmed, and Fadia Faqir will be discussed. This course is taught in English. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for ISLM
LITR 033JTokyo Central: The Metropolis in Modern Japanese Literature and Film1
(Cross-listed as JPNS 033 ) This course aims to equip students to recognize and contextualize changing concepts of self and individual identity, family, community, and labor as represented in literature and film narratives depicting the urban center of modern Japan: Tokyo. Brief lectures on literary historical and historical contexts will precede guided discussions of literary texts and films. Students will be asked to consider, compare, and contrast representations of Tokyo and its inhabitants over time, using close reading, historicization, and visual critical strategies from film studies. In discussions we will also treat Tokyo’s relationship to the nation of Japan, other Japanese regions, East Asia, and the world. We will further assess how the course texts represent shifting views and experiences of the urban populace regarding family roles, romance, marriage, gender roles, socio-economic class and social status, social responsibility, consumerism, and leisure over the course of Japan’s modern history, from the late 19th century through to the present. Humanities 1 credit Eligible for ASIA
LITR 033RPropagandize This: LGBTQ Russia, Past and Present1
(Cross-listed as RUSS 033 ) In 2013, the Russian government passed a law forbidding the “promotion of nontraditional sexual relations to minors” - that is, restricting and potentially criminalizing any open discussion of LGBTQ identities or direct acknowledgment of the existence of queer people in Russia. Homophobic Russian rhetoric emphasizes the supposedly recent and foreign nature of LGBTQ identity and ideas - an idea at odds with the diverse sexuality and gender legacies of Russia and the USSR explored in this course. We will consider the authors represented in this course, which covers the 19th century through the present, as participants in legacies, but also as individual creators, and sometimes theorists, of queer strategies of survival, as well as LGBTQ thought and art. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for GSST, GLBL-paired.
LITR 035JNarratives of Disaster and Rebuilding in Japan1
(Cross-listed as JPNS 035 ) This course will explore documentary and fictional representations of the modern Japanese landscape and cityscape in crisis, with special attention to the role of the March 2011 earthquake, tsunami, and nuclear disaster as a catalyst for change in contemporary Japan. Documentaries and fictionalizations of the 2011 “triple disaster” reignited debates over cultural trauma and the ethics of representing disaster. Through the study of literature, film, and critical discourse, we will examine the historical and cultural implications of such famous 20th-century disaster narratives as Godzilla and Japan Sinks, as well as the latest writing and films from Japan, in the context of public debates about safety, sustainability, and social change after the March 2011 tsunami and nuclear disaster. Readings and discussion will be in English. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for ASIA, ENVS
(Cross-listed as RUSS 035 ) This course examines narratives of illness, healing, and recovery in Russian literature, from the mid-19 th century to present. We will read works by leading literary figures who were also physicians (Chekhov, Bulgakov), as well as semi-fictional and fictional case histories (Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, Palei, etc.), and analyze how these texts reveal and affect cultural assumptions about disease and medical authority. We will discuss how literary representation helps us make sense of our lives and our worlds in times of crisis as we trace how medical ideas and history find reflection in literature and, conversely, how literary concepts are marshaled by medicine. Humanities. 1 credit. Fall 2026. Svynarenko.
LITR 037GThe Holocaust: History, Representation, and Culture1
(Cross-listed as GMST 037 and HIST 037 ) Seventy-five years after the Holocaust, and despite an enormous amount of research and testimony, the genocide of European Jewry continues to generate compelling interpretive questions. This course is a multidisciplinary exploration of the Holocaust with special attention paid to forms of memory, commemoration, and artistic representations through the study of fiction, poetry, film, memoirs, and historical scholarship. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for PEAC
LITR 037RCrime or Punishment: Russian Narratives of Captivity and Incarceration1
(Cross-listed as RUSS 037 ) The degree of civilization in a society can be judged by entering its prisons.” - Dostoevsky. While the Gulag remains the most infamous aspect of the Soviet justice system, Russia has a long history of inhumane punishment on a terrifying scale. This course explores narratives of incarceration, punishment, and captivity from the 17th century to the present day. In discussing (non-)fiction, history, and theory, we will consider such topics as justice, violence and its artistic representations, totalitarianism, witness-bearing, and the possibility of transcendence in suffering. Readings include works by Dostoevsky, Tolstoy, Chekhov, Akhmatova, Nabokov, Solzhenitsyn, Pussy Riot, Foucault, Arendt, and Sontag, among many others. For more information or the syllabus, please contact the instructor (jvergar1). Taught in translation; no knowledge of Russian required. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for PEAC, INTP, GLBL-Paired, ESCH
(Cross-listed with GMST 038 , GLBL 038 ) In this course we will compare two historical periods of mass migrations: refugees fleeing Nazi Germany in 1930s and 1940s and refugees from conflict zones coming to Germany today, and especially during the so-called “refugee crisis” between 2015 and 2019. Connecting political reality with literary and artistic representation, we will use texts, films, current news coverage, and activist art projects to place flight narratives in their historical contexts and to learn about refugee lives, the lasting effects of migration, the social and political reality of those considered “migrants,” and the ways in which migration enables new connections between marginalized histories and precarious positionalities. Taught in English. Humanities. Writing course. 1 credit. Eligible for CPLT, PEAC, GLBL paired
LITR 041JFantastic Spaces in Modern Japanese Literature1
(Cross-listed as JPNS 041 ) As Japanese society has transferred rapidly in the 20th century and beyond, a number of authors have turned to the fantastic to explore the pathways of cultural memory, the vicissitudes of interpersonal relationships, the limits of mind and body, and the nature of storytelling itself. In this course, we will consider the use of anti-realistic writing genres in Japanese literature from 1900 to the present, combining readings of novels and short stories with related critical and theoretical texts. Fictional works examined will include novels, supernatural tales, science fiction, and cyber-fiction by authors such as Tanizaki Junichirô, Abe Kôbô, Kurahasi Yumiko, and Murakami Haruki. Humanities. Writing course. 1 credit. Eligible for JPNS
LITR 041RViolence in Soviet Russophone Literature and Film1
(Cross-listed as RUSS 041 ) What does it mean for a work of art to engage with violence? How does violence intersect with aesthetics? In this course, students will confront these intricate questions while developing their understanding of the nuanced interplay between violence and artistic representation within Soviet Russophone cultural expression. Through the exploration of various literary and cinematic genres, students will critically examine the portrayal, interpretation, and mediation of violence within the cultural context of the time. The course spans key historical periods, encompassing avant-garde experimentation, the profound impact of World War II, expressions of dissent and repression, the perestroika era leading to the dissolution of the Soviet Union, and subsequent reflections on the post-Soviet period. Organized chronologically, the syllabus consists of four parts, each emphasizing distinct types of violence reflected in the selected works. Students will be encouraged to approach the differentiation between the four parts of the course critically, fostering their own complex understanding of the interrelation between violence and artistic expression. Humanities. Writing course. 1 credit.
(Cross-listed as RUSS 042 ) We start with Konstantin Stanislavsky’s founding of the Moscow Art Theatre, whose revolutionary approach to acting, directing and set design exertsa profound effect on Western theater to this day. Concurrently we will examine Anton Chekhov’s four major plays and their integral part in the success of the Moscow Art Theatre. We then examine the effect of the Soviet revolution on Russian theater from two viewpoints. On the one hand, we will follow the arc of directors and playwrights such as Vsevelod Meyerhold who embraced the Soviet revolution and reflected this embrace in their radically innovative and futuristic productions and set designs. On the other hand, we will follow the tragic arc of playwright Mikhail Bulgakov and his stormy relationship with the Moscow Art Theater and the Soviet regime by reading his plays and his bitingly funny satire Black Snow . Humanities. 1 credit.
(Cross-listed as SPAN 042 ) Given his profound impact on modern literature and science, Jorge Luis Borges is, perhaps, the most influential writer of the 20 th century. His fiction anticipated the major topics of contemporary literary theory, and for many, Borges even prefigured the World Wide Web. His short-stories showcase a deep engagement with his readings on mathematics, physics and astronomy, political science, linguistics and philosophy as well as deep connections with psychology and neuroscience. As a world author, Borges worked inside all cultural traditions: Asia and the Middle East, Judaism, Buddhism and Islam, and he offered a creative and irreverent response to Western literary tradition. We will explore how Borges fictionalized theoretical problems without ever allowing the development of the tale to lose its aesthetic brilliance. This is an ideal Humanities course for students in all majors, including STEM students. No prior preparation in literature or Spanish is necessary.
LITR 043RChernobyl: Nuclear Narratives and the Environment1
(Cross-listed as RUSS 043 ) What really happened on April 26, 1986? This course will introduce students to the Chernobyl nuclear disaster, its consequences, and its representations across a range of cultures. Texts will be drawn from (non-)fiction, poetry, film, TV, video games, VR, and other media, as we consider the labyrinth of Chernobyl’s mythology through a comparative lens and as a global phenomenon. Culture meets ecology, science, history, and politics. Fields trips and guest speakers. The final class project will involve an installation at McCabe Library. Taught in translation. No knowledge of Russian required. Open to all. Humanities. Writing course. 1 credit. Eligible for ENVS, INTP, GLBL - Paired
(Cross-listed as ARAB 045 ) This survey course will trace some of the main themes, problems and issues that have been debated among Arab thinkers and intellectuals since the latter part of the 19th century. The course will start with the 19th century but emphasize discussions following the military defeat of 1967 and the ensuing cultural and political crisis. Discussions related to “turath” (heritage), the different strategies of its reading and interpretation, and the possibilities of using these readings to confront the contemporary challenges of a globalized world will be the center of attention of the course. Readings for the course will comprise three types of texts: historical and social background, translations of texts by the different thinkers under discussion, and articles and essays that interpret and critique these thinkers. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for ISLM
LITR 045RPoetry in Translation/Translating Poetry1
(Cross-listed as RUSS 045 ) This course will study the history, practice, and politics of poetic translation from antiquity to the present, including works from a variety of languages. The course has a strong practical component: all students will work on translations of their own throughout the semester (from languages they know or by working with native speakers or literal versions), and the final project may include a portfolio of translations. Especially suitable for students interested in comparative literature or creative writing. Humanities. 1 credit.
(Cross-listed as RUSS 047 ) Folk beliefs are a colorful and enduring part of Russian culture. This course introduces a wide selection of Russian fairy tales in their esthetic, historical, social, and psychological context. We will trace the continuing influence of fairy tales and folk beliefs in literature, music, visual arts, and film. The course also provides a general introduction to study and interpretation of folklore and fairy tales, approaching Russian tales against the background of the Western fairy-tale tradition (the Grimms, Perrault, Disney, etc.). No fluency in Russian is required, although students with adequate language preparation may do some reading, or a course attachment, in the original. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for INTP Spring 2027. Forrester.
(Cross-listed as FMST 051 , GMST 051 ) Setting out from the cornerstones of aesthetics, history and memory, this course introduces you to post-war directors from Italian Neo-Realism, British and French New Waves, Eastern European Cinema, Post-New Wave Italian auteurs, Spanish cinema after Franco, New German Cinema, Swedish and Danish cinema. The course addresses key issues and concepts in European cinema such as realism, authorship, art cinema, and political modernism, with reference to significant films and filmmakers and in the context of historical, social, and cultural issues. Taught in English. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for GMST, FMST, GLBL-Paired
(Cross-listed as JPNS 051 ) Japanese poetic forms such as haiku, renga, and tanka have had a great impact on modern poetry across the world, and have played a central role in the development of Japanese literature and aesthetics. This course will examine Japanese poetry from its roots in ancient oral tradition through the internet age. Topics include the role of poetry in courtship, communication, religion, and ritual; orality and the graphic tradition; the influence of poetic models from China and the West; social networks and game aesthetics in renga linked poetry; and haiku as a worldwide poetic form. Course projects will include translation and composition in addition to analytical writing. Readings will be in English, and there are no language requirements or other prerequisites; however, the course will include a close examination of Japanese poetic sound, syntax, meter, and diction, or how the poems “work” in the original language. Humanities. 1 credit.
LITR 053RThe End of History: Contemporary Russian Culture1
(Cross-listed as RUSS 053 ) Hailed as the “end of history” and “the greatest geopolitical tragedy of the 20th century,” the fall of the Soviet Union forced Russia to reconcile a past that had long been suppressed with a present reality full of possibility. We’ll discuss works that address contemporary issues (Putinism, protests, refugees, corruption) and resurrect historical traumas (the Civil War, the Stalin years, the Leningrad Siege, Chernobyl) to understand Russia today. This course features a wide range of texts: fiction, non-fiction, oral histories, poetry, art, performance, and film. We will also have the opportunity to speak with some of the figures whose work we’ll examine. No knowledge of Russian required. Humanities. Writing Course. 1 credit.
(Cross-listed as GMST 054 , FMST 054 ) This writing intensive course is an introduction to German Cinema from its inception in the 1890s until the present. It includes an examination of early exhibition forms, expressionist and avant garde films from the classic German cinema of the Weimar era, fascist cinema, postwar rubble films, DEFA films from East Germany, New German Cinema from the 1970s, post 1989 heritage films, Turkish-German Cinema, and Berlin School films from the 2000s. Students in the class will analyze a cross-match of popular and arthouse cinemas while discussing concepts of mass culture, medium-specific aesthetics, propaganda, history and memory as identity- and nation-building practices. Taught in English. Fulfills national cinema requirement for FMST.
FMST 001 or instructor’s permission. Humanities. Writing course. 1 credit. Fall 2027 Simon. Catalog chapter: Modern Languages and Literatures: Literatures in Translation Department website: http://www.swarthmore.edu/modern-languages-literatures Access the class schedule to search for sections.
LITR 054SContemporary Cuba: Utopia, Revolution and Reform1
(Cross-listed as SPAN 054 ) This course will focus on Cuban literature and culture produced during the historical period of the Cuban Revolution. By reading varied-and often opposed-literary accounts and artistic representations of those years, the course seeks to analyze the complex socio-economical, political, and ideological processes that have informed Cuban society and culture since 1959 until the present day. Although it will use a panoramic and chronological approach, emphasis will be given to works produced in the last three decades. Issues to be discussed include the relation between national identity, ideology and political discourse, the politics of representation in terms of race, gender and sexuality, exile and diaspora, the role of the intellectual, the balance between ethics and aesthetics, and the current period of political and economic transition.
(Cross-listed as GMST 056 ) This Medical Humanities course invites students to pause and think about the contradiction inherent in human contact: on the one hand, we need it in order to flourish, while on the other hand, it poses potential risks. Informed by a theoretical framework that draws on insights from fields such as Disability Studies, Cultural Studies, and Gender Studies, this course offers students the opportunity to analyze German literature depicting contagious outbreaks, life in isolation, and explore the ethics of cure and human experimentation. As part of a larger focus on the ways in which cultural representations of contagion are informed by cultural norms and how, in their turn, these representations have an impact on shaping and building cultural communities, students will be asked to consider the many connotations and valences of the term “contagion.” Most simply, the word “contagion” denotes a risk of contamination, a potentially lethal danger to the exposed subject. This course invites students to go beyond this literal interpretation of the word in order to contemplate the ways in which contagion challenges the notion of an isolated, self-contained self, to explore the intriguing possibility of a self with fluid boundaries that is constantly shaped by a community, and to cultivate empathy for other community members in the face of shared vulnerability. Using German literature in English translation to explore literature on the plague, cholera, tuberculosis, HIV, as well on as vampires, we will consider how race, gender, class, and historical époques shape illness stories. In particular, we will look at the power dynamics that code contagions either as negative (where it refers, for instance, to a potentially deadly disease) or as positive (where it refers to contagious affects or an exchange of ideas). Authors include Leopold von Sacher-Masoch, Elfreide Jelinek, Thomas Mann, J. W. Goethe, Fanny Lewald, Heinrich Heine, Franz Kafka, Bertha von Suttner. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for GLBL-Paired, GSST
LITR 057SPerforming Latinidad: Latinx Theater, Film, and Performance Art1
(Cross-listed as SPAN 057 , THEA 007 and LALS 057 ) Richard Schechner sums up the notions of performance and performativity as “embodied behaviors”. Embodied behaviors are at the center of the expression and representation of all sort of identities (gender, racial, ethnic, political) and other concepts and practices like ideology, memory, political resistance, citizenship, belonging, and everyday aesthetics. This course will study the notion of Latinidad through the analysis of politically engaged performances, that is, through “embodied behaviors” that represent, reinforce, and resist the expression of Latino/a/x identities and politics. To do so we will study films, stage plays, the work of performance artists and everyday performances (such as political events) while asking questions such as: How is latinidad represented and performed in different contexts across our society? What are the uses, misuses, and politics surrounding the performance of latinidad ? What does it mean to be/behave like a Latino/a/x? What is the role of performances in other forms of identity expression such as memory construction, community building, and citizenship participation? In addition to the in-class discussions of theory texts, films, and plays, the course will offer opportunities to interact directly with performance artists and scholars.
(Cross-listed as SPAN 062 and LALS 062 ) (Art)ivism, or the practice of social and political activism through art and artistic devices, has been fundamental for the development and strengthening of Latinx communities in the US since the beginning of the Chicano movement until today when Latinx writers and artists are actively involved in politically contentious issues such as racial discrimination, gender equality, immigration rights, environmental justice, among others. In this course, we will explore and discuss the work of established and emergent Latinx writers and artists that engage in practices of artivism trying to expose, better understand and fight the many forms of injustice and oppression faced by Latinx communities while promoting practices of radical democracy. Artivists such as Gloria Anzaldúa, Guillermo Gómez Peña, Tania Bruguera, Favianna Rodriguez, Daniel Alarcón, among others, use their art not only to raise awareness about social injustices and oppression; their works function also as springboards for community building, solidarity, and political action that can have lasting impacts. The work of many artivists will also open the door to discuss how non-traditional forms of literary and artistic expression such as street art, spoken word, performance art, and artistic pedagogical projects are powerful forms of political intervention and citizenship participation. Furthermore, we will discuss issues such as the relevance of art in the contemporary world, the reception and distribution of politically engaged art, the ethics of artivism, and the importance of pedagogical practices based on a radical democracy model.
LITR 063RRoots of Feminism & Radicalism in Russia1
(Cross-listed as RUSS 063 ) From the earliest engagements with socialism in the Russian Empire to Russian Jewish émigré anarchism in the United States, radical visions for the transformation of society in Russian intellectual history were intertwined with the question of the social position of women. In this writing intensive course we will trace interlocking questions of social transformation and gender equality through literary and philosophical works by authors including: Tolstoy, Nikolai Chernyshevsky, Rosa Luxemburg, Alexandra Kollontai, Emma Goldman, and many others. This course is writing intensive. Humanities. Writing course. 1 credit. Eligible for GSST.
LITR 067RJews in Russia: Culture, Film, Literature1
(Cross-listed as RUSS 067 ) As the Russian Empire expanded over time, it absorbed territory with large Jewish populations. Jews have played crucial roles in Russian and Soviet history and culture, be it as political radicals and revolutionaries, as moral thinkers or philosophers, or as some of the world’s best poets, artists, and film directors. Humanities. 1 credit.
FREN 070F The following course offers a critical examination of the central ideas guiding the French Enlightenment, paying particularly close attention to the notion of “otherness” underlying the Enlightenment project, that is, that which is facilely left out in the eighteenth century’s valorization of reason. In opposition to the Enlightenment idea of the rational man is the irrational animal, a binary that materialist thinkers like La Mettrie and Condillac are quick to blur; in opposition to the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen (the crowning civil rights document from the French Revolution) is Olympe de Gouges’ Declaration of the Rights of Woman and of the Female Citizen, a text that criticizes eighteenth-century gender inequalities; in opposition to the Enlightenment’s enormous blind spots around race is Claire de Duras’ Ourika, a novel that decries the pervasive racism of the eighteenth century. Throughout the semester, we will study the novels, essays, and dialogues that shape the major ideas of the Enlightenment, while also paying particular attention to that which lies in the shadow of the Enlightenment. Authors include: Voltaire, Diderot, Rousseau, Condillac, La Mettrie, Graffigny, Gouges, Sade, Duras. Humanities. 1 Credit. Spring 2027. Robison.
(Cross-listed as LING 070 , RUSS 070 , ENGL 070T ) This workshop in literary translation concentrates on translation theory and practice, working in poetry, prose, and drama as well as editing. Students will participate in an associated series of bilingual readings and will produce a substantial portfolio of work. Students taking the course for LING credit will write a final paper supported by a smaller portfolio of translations. Excellent knowledge of a language other than English (equivalent to a 004 course at Swarthmore or higher) is highly recommended or, failing that, access to at least one very patient speaker of a foreign language. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for INTP, RUSS Fall 2026. Forrester.
LITR 072FThe French Novel in Translation: Balzac, Flaubert, Proust1
This course is designed to provide students with a broad knowledge of French literature, from before the Revolution to the present. Among the authors included on the syllabus are: Molière, Voltaire, Balzac, Baudelaire, Proust, Camus and Sartre. Students will read works in their entirety, discuss their significance in class, and listen to short lectures to situate the readings in a historical and cultural context. Taught in English; and there is a 0.5 credit French Attachment for students reading in French ( FREN 072A ). Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for FREN
(Cross-listed as FREN 073 and FMST 052 ) This course is an in-depth exploration of the development and evolution of the French New Wave in postwar France. We will concentrate on the history of the New Wave in France from the 1950s through the late 1960s by the close study of the styles of individual filmmakers, the “film movement” as perceived by critics, and the New Wave’s contribution to modernizing France. The primary emphasis will be on the stylistic, socio-political, and cultural dimensions of the New Wave, and the filmmakers and critics most closely associated with the movement. Directors who were once all film critics for the magazine Cahiers du Cinéma will be studied along side other important filmmakers of the era. Taught in English. 0.5 credit attachment for students reading in French. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for FMST, GLBL-paired
LITR 073JTransnational Japanese Literature: Diversity and Diaspora in Modern Japanese Literature1
Cross-listed with JPNS 073 This seminar-style course will challenge the myths of Japanese ethnic homogeny and cultural isolation and will explore how modern “Japanese” literature crosses national and cultural borders. Topics to be examined include Japanese authors writing from abroad, colonial and postcolonial literatures, migration and writing in the Japanese diaspora, and the writings of ethnic minorities in Japan, including writers from Okinawa and Japan’s resident Korean community. Readings and discussion will be in English but students with reading knowledge of Japanese will be encouraged to read works in the original. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for CPLT, ASIA, INTP, GLBL-paired.
Crosslisted with FREN 074 . The following course offers a critical examination of the central ideas guiding the French Enlightenment, paying particularly close attention to the notion of “otherness” underlying the Enlightenment project-that is, that which is facilely left out in the eighteenth century’s valorization of reason. In opposition to the Enlightenment idea of the rational man is the irrational animal, a binary that materialist thinkers like La Mettrie and Condillac are quick to blur; in opposition to the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen (the crowning civil rights document from the French Revolution) is Olympe de Gouges’ Declaration of the Rights of Woman and of the Female Citizen , a text that criticizes eighteenth-century gender inequalities; in opposition to the Enlightenment’s enormous blind spots surrounding race is Claire de Duras’ Ourika , a novel that decries the pervasive racism of the eighteenth century. Throughout the semester, we will study the novels, essays, and dialogues that shape the major ideas of the Enlightenment (and the revolutionary modes of thinking that accompany it), while also studying that which lies in the shadow of the Enlightenment. Authors include: Voltaire, Diderot, Rousseau, Condillac, La Mettrie, Gouges, Duras. Taught in English; and there is a 0.5 credit French Attachment for students reading in French ( FREN 074A ). Humanities 1 credit.
LITR 074JJapanese Popular Culture and Contemporary Media1
(Cross-listed as JPNS 074 ) Japanese popular culture products such as manga (comics), anime (animation), television, film, and popular music are an increasingly vital element of 21st-century global culture, attracting ardent fans around the world. In this course, we will critically examine the postwar development of Japanese popular culture, together with the proliferation of new media that have accelerated the global diffusion of popular cultural forms. Engaging with theoretical ideas and debates regarding popular culture and media, we will discuss the significance of fan cultures, including the “otaku” phenomenon in Japan and the United States, and consider how national identity and ethnicity impact the production and consumption of popular cultural products. We will also explore representations of technology in creative works, and consider the global and the local aspects of technological innovations, including the internet, mobile phones, and other portable technology. Readings and discussion will be in English. The course will be conducted in a seminar format with student research and presentations comprising an important element of the class. Previous coursework in Japanese studies or media studies is recommended but not required. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for ASIA, FMST, JPNS
LITR 074SQueer Issues in Latin American Literature & Cinema1
(Cross-listed as SPAN 074 ) This course will map new forms of representation and interpretation at play in a set of queer issues emerging on recent Latin American literature and cinema. Emphasis will be on gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender subjectivities. The aim is not merely assembling a corpus of readings around the notion of minority sexualities but to analyze how sexuality is culturally constructed in specific spatial and temporal geographies. We will also investigate the ways in which literary genres are disturbed and redeployed by queer interventions, and how cinema becomes a privileged medium for empowerment and visibility. Taught in English.
LITR 075FWitness Draw Resist: Representing Peace and Justice in Comics1
Crosslisted with FREN 075 Witness Draw Resist is a new course that examines the use of modern fictional and nonfiction comics and graphic novels to represent critical conflicts in recent history, including the Holocaust, the Iranian Revolution, the Israelo-Palestinian Conflict, the 1982 and 2006 Lebanon Wars, the Rwandan genocide, and the ongoing “refugee crisis.” This course introduces students to the theory and methodology of comics analysis in conjunction with their role in memorial and democratic praxes, whether to bear witness, teach on socio-political issues, promote human rights or serve advocacy groups. We’ll also explore current debates on the depiction of traumatic history through this highly commercial medium-traditionally associated with lighter content, and the extent to which these graphic works may help understand crises in a new light. Course is taught in English. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for FREN.
(Cross-listed as JPNS 075 ) A lively and cosmopolitan modernist literature and art scene thrived in early 20th Century Japan, as cities such as Tokyo and Osaka grew rapidly, and writers and artists established connections with their counterparts across the globe. During the same decades, stylish “modern girls” and “modern boys” in Japanese cities were hailed in the press as avatars of newly liberated lifestyles and fashions, or derided by conservatives as the dupes of corrupt Western influences. This course will explore Japanese modernist literature, its global connections, and its social context, using a seminar format. Topics include: Japanese avant-garde literature, film, and art; gender, sexuality, and modernism; the politics and aesthetics of “modern” life and lifestyles; socialist and anarchist literature; “ero-guro-nonsense” as subversive literature; wartime censorship and propaganda; and Japanese influences on global modernisms. Readings and discussion will be in English; students with advanced Japanese reading ability are encouraged to read the texts in the original. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for ASIA
(Cross-listed as RUSS 075 ) Laughter is one of the basic human experiences, but in different theories and manifestations it can mean aggression, festivity, freedom, a release of nervous tension or complicity. This course will concentrate on some of the funniest literature from the Russian tradition, be it lighthearted or scalding, fantastic or down-to-earth. Besides the pleasures of laughter, we wil explore what you need to know to get the joke and what this humor means. Humanities. 1 credit.
(Cross-listed as FREN 077 ) You are invited to a cross-cultural exploration of various populations of the Francophone world, through the study or different media and topics, relevant to contemporary societies in France, West Africa and Central America. Taught in English; and there is a 0.5 credit French Attachment for students reading in French ( FREN 077A ). Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for BLST, GLBL - Core
LITR 078FFilm and Place: West African Filmmakers at Home and Abroad1
Crosslisted with FMST 058 , GLBL 078 . The moving image, it is often argued, has a special relationship to time and space, and in this class, we will explore how West African filmmakers explore and represent space by emphasizing place(s), both real and imagined. Using the lens of critical issues in postcolonial film studies, we will consider how to analyze these places by focusing our observations on the built-environment and the natural world; homelands and hostlands; mobility and stillness. Filmmakers studied include Mati Diop (France/Senegal), Sembène Ousmane (Senegal), Abderrahmane Sissako (Mali/Mauritania), Jean-Marie Téno (Cameroon), Apolline Traoré (Burkina Faso), Paulin Soumanou Vieyra (Senegal), among others. This course is open to all students. There are no prerequisites. The course is taught in English. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for BLST, GLBL-paired
LITR 079FCourse in Translation: French Detective Fiction and Film1
(Cross-listed as FREN 079 , FMST 053 ) Detective fiction has a long history in the urban literary and cinematic imagination of France and other French-speaking countries. This course focuses on several points of convergence: the history of urban detectives in various Francophone contexts; theories of genre; and stylized representations of the city, its architecture and populations. Taught in English; and there is a 0.5 credit French Attachment for students reading in French ( FREN 079A ). Humanities 1 credit.
LITR 082SMexico Unbound: History, Culture, and Power1
(Cross-listed as SPAN 082 , LALS 082 ) How do culture and history shape a nation’s identity? This course examines Mexico through an interdisciplinary lens, exploring the forces of power that define its social, political, and artistic life. Drawing on literature, cinema, visual art, and historical texts, we trace Mexico’s trajectory from pre-Columbian civilizations and colonial rule to modern nation-building, the Mexican Revolution, and contemporary struggles shaped by extractivism, neoliberalism, and the drug trade. Cultural production is approached as a site of both domination and resistance. Students will analyze how literature, film, and art reflect, legitimize, and contest systems of power-including colonialism, nationalism, class, gender, and state authority. Particular attention is paid to the politics of representation: who tells Mexico’s stories, how the nation is imagined from within and beyond its borders, and how marginalized voices challenge and redefine national myths. Students will emerge with a nuanced understanding of Mexico as a dynamic, contested, and ever-evolving cultural space. Humanities. 1 credit. Spring 2028 Buiza.
Cross-listed as GMST 083 , FMST 083 . This course looks at the history and format of the crime drama in film and on television. More than other genres, crime dramas have reflected on societies’ historical blind spots, taboos, and peripheries along with its reigning hierarchies of power, and they have debated foundational ethical parameters amidst ongoing struggles to deal with change, particularly in relation to childhood, gender, race, class, and sexuality. At the same time, shows like CSI have altered television aesthetics and spectatorship in dialogue with new forensic and media-specific technologies: What has made the crime drama such a success in different mediascapes (silent and sound cinema, network TV, cable era, and Netflix)? How have its familiar stock characters, plotlines, settings, and recognizable styles adapted? What accounts for its ability to speak to audiences across different cultural backgrounds while emanating from and representing cultural, national, and regional specificities (Scandinavian crime, American film noir)? How has the genre responded to social activism and debates over the prison-industrial complex? How can we explain serial killer fandom in the convergence era (e.g., Twitter followers responding with likes to a mugshot of a suspected murderer)? HU. 1 credit. Fall 2026. Simon. Spring 2028 Simon. Access the class schedule to search for sections.
(Cross-listed as JPNS 083 ) What was the Japanese experience of the World War II and the Allied Occupation? We will examine literary works, films, and graphic materials (photographs, prints, advertisements, etc.), together with oral histories and historical studies, to seek a better understanding of the prevailing ideologies and intellectual struggles of wartime and postwar Japan as well as the experiences of individuals living through the cataclysmic events of midcentury. Issues to be investigated include Japanese nationalism and imperialism, women’s experiences of the war and home front; changing representations and ideologies of the body, war writing and censorship, the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japanese responses to the occupation, and the war in postwar memory. Humanities. 1 credit.
LITR 086RNature and Industry in Russian Literature and Culture1
(Cross-listed as RUSS 086 ) From pre-Christian religion and folklore based in forest, steppe and tundra and the enduring role of peasant culture to today’s Neo-Pagans, Russian culture has been closely bound to nature, developing sustainable agricultural practices, honoring “Moist Mother Earth” and (even sophisticated city dwellers) heading out to gather berries and mushrooms. But the Soviet era pursued science-fictional plans to redesign whole landscapes, make rivers flow backwards and even revolutionize plant genetics (Trofim Lysenko). In practice, such projects led to a shrinking Aral Sea, massive pollution of industrial and agricultural sites, and the worst nuclear disaster in human history (Chernobyl)-at great human cost. Writers have both supported industrial transformation and resisted industrialization. This course will trace the evolution of these elements of Russian culture, focusing on expressions of ideology in literature. No knowledge of Russian is necessary, but students with the language may do some reading in the original. Humanities. 1 credit. Eligible for RUSS, ENVS Spring 2028 Forrester.
Cross-listed as ARAB 095 Societal scandals and controversies surrounding Arabic literary works have arisen across the Middle East and North Africa throughout the 20th and 21st centuries. The free expression fostered in the literary field frequently confronts the realities of state censors and other forces in society, such as political ideologies or religious orthodoxies. In this course we aim to contextualize and study these scandals and controversies by closely analyzing the literary works at their source, as well as the debates and transgressive acts they elicited. From intentional omissions in translation, to debates surrounding the portrayal of homosexual characters, to assassination attempts on authors lives, this course will focus on a number of important inflection points across the Middle East and North Africa in the 20th and 21st centuries. We will study works by authors from Morocco to Saudi Arabia, including Taha Hussein, Naguib Mahfouz, Mohamed Choukri, Nawal El Saadawi, Saud Alsanousi, Alaa Al Aswani, Rashid al-Daif, Rajaa al-Sanea, amongst others. This course will be conducted in English, using texts translated from Arabic.
