2026-2027 Catalog

CMLT 14920. Comparative Media Poetics: Horror. 100 Units.

Cinema, videogames, and VR: all moving-image media, which have at times exerted multi-directional aesthetic influences on each other. This course will investigate the raw materials and basic forms at the disposal of artists working in and across these media, with a special focus on horror as a genre. Along with fundamental questions regarding the social, psychological, and political uses (and abuses) of horror as a genre, this course will also look at how horror works across a variety of media. In what way do the possibilities available to game developers differ from those available to filmmakers, and vice versa? How are space, time, and action presented and segmented differently across moving images (cinema), interactive moving images (games), and fully-immersive virtual environments (VR)? How do techniques ranging from psychological identification to jump scares work in each medium, and what aesthetic effects are open to one that are not open to the other? Course materials will include horror cinema, horror games (video and otherwise), VR experiences, and written horror literature.

Instructor(s): Ian Bryce Jones     Terms Offered: Autumn
Equivalent Course(s): MADD 14920, CMST 14920

CMLT 20030. Short Russian Novels. 100 Units.

In 19th century Russia, the printed book was an emergent technology offering a new form of shared intelligence, challenging the Bible (which at that time was still primarily experienced liturgically) as the authoritative Book of life. In this course we begin by thinking about the book as a new medium and read some of the best examples of the short novel in 19th and 20th century Russia, considering how they create explanatory and moral authority by reflecting reality and imagining new ways of being. We will observe traditions established at that time, reading books printed on paper and discussing them in a public forum, the classroom, as they were discussed then in coffeehouses, intellectual circles, and salons. We will consider the functions of literature and the roles played by authors, printers, critics, and readers. And we will read some of the best works in the Russian tradition, finding throughlines from the golden age of Russian literature (Pushkin, Lermontov, Dostoevsky, Tolstoy) to 20th century socialist realist and science fiction dystopias (Platonov, Solzhenitsyn, Strugatsky Brothers), and considering how Panaeva and Chukovskaya chart a distinct path for women writers and express alternative perspectives on Russian realities and potentials. All readings are assigned in translation with an option (pending enrollment) to participate in a Russian-language section through Languages across the Curriculum (LxC).

Instructor(s): William Nickell     Terms Offered: Autumn
Note(s): This course fulfills the GATEWAY requirement for REES majors matriculating in AY 2025-26.
Equivalent Course(s): FNDL 20030, REES 30030, CMLT 30030, ENGL 30030, ENGL 20030, REES 20030

CMLT 20036. Travel and Exploration in the Global Middle Ages. 100 Units.

This course explores travel and exploration in the medieval Middle East, presenting the region as a central crossroads of the Global Middle Ages. Through the accounts of pilgrims, merchants, diplomats, scholars, and adventurers, students will follow routes that connected the Islamic world with Africa, Asia, and Europe. Reading travel narratives, maps, and material evidence, the course asks how movement shaped knowledge, identity, power, and cultural exchange-questions that resonate in today's world of migration, globalization, and unequal mobility. By foregrounding the Middle East as a hub rather than a periphery, the course offers a historically grounded way to think about connection, difference, and belonging in a global age. This course is open to both undergraduate and graduate students. This course participates in the Languages Across the Curriculum (LxC) program for Arabic. The course is conducted fully in English, and students with no prior knowledge of Arabic are very welcome. Students with some Arabic may choose, through the LAC program, to read short texts in Arabic.

Instructor(s): Pamela Klasova (pamelaklas)     Terms Offered: Spring
Equivalent Course(s): CMLT 30036, NEHC 20036, RLST 27658, NEHC 30036

CMLT 20109. Comparative Literature - Theory and Practice. 100 Units.

This course introduces the methods and practices that form the field of Comparative Literature. Students will read major critical texts from the middle of the twentieth century to the present, gain theoretical literacy, and hone their skills of close reading, contextual framing, and comparative analysis of texts and other art forms. Broad themes to be explored include: world literature, translation, Structuralism/Poststructuralism, Psychoanalysis and literature.

Instructor(s): Na'ama Rokem     Terms Offered: Winter
Prerequisite(s): Prerequisite: Completed Humanities, or Civilization Core requirement. The course is designed for the second-year students and above.
Equivalent Course(s): CMLT 30109, ENGL 28918

CMLT 20114. Love, Sex, Desire in Middle Eastern Literatures. 100 Units.

This course examines the diverse ways in which love, sex, and desire are represented in Middle Eastern literatures from the seventh century through the modern period. With a focus on primary source readings (in English translation), we will explore love as a concept, affect, and practice as it pertains to all kinds of relationships: familial, romantic, pederastic, political-even the relationship between believers and God. We will pay special attention to how literary representations of love and sex are informed not only by genre conventions but also medical, legal, and philosophical discourses and consider the ways in which these texts can-and cannot-shed light on actual social practices and lived realities. Throughout our investigations, we will remain cognizant of how the Orient has been erotically fantasized in the Euro-American imaginary, while also noting how widespread modern notions of love and sex often fail to fully account for the modes of eroticism portrayed in the works that we will study.

Instructor(s): Austin O'Malley (omalley)     Terms Offered: First offering Spring 2026
Equivalent Course(s): NEHC 30114, CMLT 30114, NEHC 20114

CMLT 20123. Orientalism. 100 Units.

In 1978, Edward Said transformed "Orientalism" from a somewhat innocent term for a fascination with the cultures of the Orient into a label for a "discursive formation" that systematically objectified, essentialized, and distorted the non-West in the service of Western ideology and power. His intervention provoked a number of responses: some critiqued the critique, on empirical or theoretical grounds; some extended his analysis, which was based primarily on the Middle East, to other "Orients"; some argued that his critique did not go far enough. We will examine Said's Orientalism, some important precursors in the critique of Orientalist knowledge, and a selection of responses to Said's work, with a focus on theoretical questions. Why do the overarching structures of knowledge change so slowly when it comes to the non-West, and why, at the same time, does "knowledge" about the non-West appear so compromised when we examine it a century or so after it is produced? What are the rules of the "discursive formation" Said claimed to have identified? On what basis can a critique of an entire "way of knowing" be justified and undertaken? How does Orientalism reframe the Baconian cliché that "knowledge is power"? In the end, what is the epistemic and political status of "knowledge of the non-West"?

Instructor(s): Andrew Ollett     Terms Offered: Winter
Equivalent Course(s): SALC 30123, CMLT 30123, SALC 20123

CMLT 20210. Narrative Doubles. 100 Units.

Dostoevsky's early novel "The Double" leads the readers on a descent into the madness of the main character as his double takes over his life. From uncanny usurpers to empathic gateways into alternative identities, in this course doubles teach us about our selves. We will consider how narratives conceptualize the human self and its reality, and how they conjure alternatives. We also ask about the political power of these alternative selves and doubling temporalities - from subversive possibilities to dystopian political nostalgias.

Instructor(s): Angelina Ilieva     Terms Offered: Spring
Equivalent Course(s): REES 20210, CMLT 30210, REES 30210

CMLT 20211. Poetry and Empire: Readings in Abbasid Arabic Poetry. 100 Units.

Arabic poetry has been a major force in Middle Eastern societies since the seventh century when it became the elite culture of the Arabo-Islamic empire until today. This course focuses on poetry from the "Golden Age of Islam" during the Abbasid period and especially on three famous poets: Abū Nuwās (d. 814), al-Mutanabbī (d. 965), and al-Maʿarrī (d. 1057). While the emphasis will be on close reading of their poems (in Arabic), we will also discuss broader questions: How does this poetry reflect the world of the vast and quickly evolving world of the Islamic empire? How does it relate to its societies, political structures, and religious institutions? Ideally, students with 3 years of Arabic (or equivalent) would take this class. If you have less and have a good reason to take it, please contact the instructor.

Instructor(s): Klasova, Pamela     Terms Offered: Autumn
Prerequisite(s): 3 years of Arabic (or equivalent) If you have less and have a good reason to take it, please contact the instructor.
Equivalent Course(s): ARAB 20211, ISLM 36211, ARAB 30211, CMLT 30211

CMLT 20601. Drama. 100 Units.

This course explores the unique challenges of experiencing performance through the page. Students will read plays and performances closely, taking into account not only form, character, plot, and genre, but also theatrical considerations like staging, acting, spectatorship, and historical conventions. We will also consider how various agents-playwrights, readers, directors, actors, and audiences-generate plays and give them meaning. While the course is not intended as a survey of dramatic literature or theater history, students will be introduced to a variety of essential plays from across the dramatic tradition. The course culminates in a scene project assignment that allows students put their skills of interpretation and adaptation into practice. No experience with theater is expected. (Gateway, Drama)

Instructor(s): John Muse     Terms Offered: Winter
Equivalent Course(s): TAPS 19300, ENGL 10600

CMLT 20615. Aesthetic Encounters. 100 Units.

Ever find yourself getting emotional over a painting or a song? Or staring at a piece of art and thinking, "What on earth am I looking at?" What does art do to us? Is there a "right" way to experience it? Why do we feel the need to talk about artworks we have seen? In college classes and beyond, we spend a great deal of time engaging with and responding to literary texts and artworks. This course offers a chance to step back and reflect on the nature of those encounters-how and why we respond the way we do, why those responses might matter, and how we go about sharing them with others. While we will occasionally turn to aesthetic philosophy, our main focus will be on developing our own concepts and categories for understanding these encounters-the very event of experiencing art, how those experiences linger, and how they shape our social interactions. Readings will include fiction where characters are profoundly transformed by their encounters with art, essays on paintings and museums, poems drawn from music, travelogues that chronicle sustained exposure to art, ekphrastic dialogues between visual arts and poetry, and creative literary translations. Authors may include Ben Lerner, Fyodor Dostoevsky, Alice Oswald, Anne Carson, Rachel Cusk, Ciaran Carson, Natasha Trethewey, and Mary Jo Salter.

Instructor(s): Levi, Melih     Terms Offered: Autumn
Equivalent Course(s): ENGL 20615, FNDL 20615

CMLT 21208. Poets in Dialogue: Galip & Robinson. 100 Units.

Picture a tête-à-tête between Seyh Galip (1757-1799), a mystic poet and leader of a Sufi order in Istanbul, and Mary Robinson (1757-1800), otherwise known as "the English Sappho," a prolific Romantic poet and actress renowned for Shakespearean roles. We'll dive into their narrative poems on love: Galip's masnavi Love and Beauty breathes new life into rhyming couplets, and Robinson's "Sappho and Phaeon" contributes to the revival of the sonnet sequence, with both poets writing at historical crossroads. As the Ottoman Empire undertakes structural modernization efforts amidst decline, England expands its colonial outreach while contending with the legacies of the American and French Revolutions. We will analyze how these poets navigate the delicate balance between tradition and innovation, with a fundamental inquiry into their use of ornamentation and excess. Coleridge's quip, "she overloads everything," nods to Robinson's affiliation with the "Della Cruscans," while Galip's opulent works reflect the so-called "Indian style." What draws poets, or anyone, to such ornate expressive techniques? We'll ponder these questions, exploring their intersections with gendered, cultural, and political realms. In doing so, we might just stumble upon intriguing theories to explain the eventual rise of symbolist movements in modern art.

Instructor(s): Melih Levi     Terms Offered: Autumn
Equivalent Course(s): FNDL 21208

CMLT 21355. Diaspora, Language, Identity: North African Literature and Film. 100 Units.

What happens when your "mother tongue" is a language you were never taught to speak or write? In the Maghreb (Algeria, Morocco, Tunisia), language is not just a tool of communication, but a contested territory. It is a space where French, Classical Arabic, Amazigh (Berber), and Darija (colloquial dialect) collide-and where identity is often shaped in the gaps between them. This course explores how North African writers and filmmakers navigate the tension between mother tongues and colonial languages, the body as a site of resistance, and the search for belonging. Through selections of memoir, short stories, and film, we will examine questions of language, identity, and displacement-from colonial history to contemporary diaspora in France. Readings include Assia Djebar, Leïla Sebbar, and Mohamed Choukri; films range from The Battle of Algiers to recent works by Nabil Ayouch, Leyla Bouzid, and Mounia Meddour.

Instructor(s): Esther Kim     Terms Offered: Spring
Prerequisite(s): Note: Taught in English. Students registered for French credit will complete all primary source readings and written assignments in French.
Equivalent Course(s): FREN 24326, RDIN 31355, NEHC 31355, CMLT 31355, RDIN 21355, NEHC 21355

CMLT 21600. Comparative Fairy Tales. 100 Units.

How do we account for the allure of fairy tales? For some, fairy tales count as sacred tales meant to enchant rather than edify. For others, they are cautionary tales, replete with obvious moral lessons. For the purposes of the course, we will assume that these critics are correct in their contention that fairy tales contain essential underlying meanings. We will conduct our own readings of fairy tales from the German Brothers Grimm, the Norwegians, Asbjørnsen and Moe and the Dane, Hans Christian Andersen, relying on our own critical skills as well as selected secondary readings.

Instructor(s): Kimberly Kenny     Terms Offered: Winter
Equivalent Course(s): HUMA 28400, GRMN 28500, NORW 28500

CMLT 21709. Italian American Chicago. 100 Units.

This course explores the origins and evolution of the Italian American community in Chicago, examining its local presence and artistic, cinematic, and literary representations in the context of a global history of the twentieth century. For example, we will compare the current absence of Christopher Columbus statues in Little Italy to the permanence of the Balbo monument, an ancient column gifted to the city by the Italian fascist regime in 1933. These case studies will allow us to engage with broader issues, such as local and national Italian-American identity and how it is represented artistically. The course will be structured in three units: Past, Present, and Fiction. Past: Where did Italian Americans come from? What are the racial implications of this migrant community's existence in the United States? How does the local history of Chicago's Italian Americans intertwine with the global history of the 20th century? Present: How does the city show traces of Italian American history? When and how have Italians assimilated? What does it mean for a migrant group to be assimilated? Fiction: What role have fictional representations of Italian Americans played in their assimilation? In what ways do representations of the home-country and of the migrant experience differ in texts by Italian authors and ones by Italian American authors? As a Chicago Studies class, we will also engage deeply with Chicago's urban landscape and local heritage sites.

Instructor(s): Taddei, Fara     Terms Offered: Spring. This class will involve field trips, engage with guest speakers, and offer weekend enrichment opportunities throughout the city.
Equivalent Course(s): RDIN 21701, HIST 27319, CHST 21700

CMLT 22400-22500. History of International Cinema I-II.

This sequence is required of students majoring in Cinema and Media Studies. Taking these courses in sequence is strongly recommended but not required.

CMLT 22501. Vico's New Science. 100 Units.

This course offers a close reading of Giambattista Vico's seminal work, "New Science" (1744), which aimed to challenge prevailing notions regarding the fundamental principles of humanity. Often dubbed the "last Renaissance man" or a representative of the "Counter-Enlightenment," Vico rejected the detached rationalism of his time as he set out to recover the attitude and emotions relevant to the humanities in contrast to the natural sciences. His inquiry revolves around the connection between the factum or what is "made" - anything resulting from human skills (literature, art, law, institutions, etc.) - and the verum or God-begotten truth. What kind of epistemology and interpretive methodologies arise when we turn to Vico, Descartes's scourge? In our own dissatisfaction with rational empiricism, Vico's alternative unfolds as an epic exploration through time, guiding us to witness primitive humans uttering their first word, partake in Noah's ark journey, and retrace the origins of writing and the foundation of civilizations.

Instructor(s): Rocco Rubini     Terms Offered: Autumn
Prerequisite(s): Taught in English.
Equivalent Course(s): ITAL 32900, FNDL 21408, CMLT 32501, ITAL 22900

CMLT 22510. Power, Visuality, and Sound in the Americas. 100 Units.

TBD

Instructor(s): Gabriela Lomba Guzman     Terms Offered: Autumn

CMLT 22660. Jane Johnston Schoolcraft's Native and American Voice. 100 Units.

TBD

Instructor(s): Julia Kopesky     Terms Offered: Spring

CMLT 22671. Orhan Pamuk. 100 Units.

What happens when postmodern fiction refuses to stay post? What if the most radical act of postmodernism is embracing history? Pamuk's novels reimagine the past in ways that refuse to settle for the fragmented, chaotic world we are told to expect. This course explores a selection of key works by Nobel Prize-winning author Pamuk, including his modernist novel The New Life and his postmodern masterpieces such as The White Castle, My Name is Red, and A Strangeness in My Mind. How does Pamuk use Istanbul in his work? Does it function merely as a setting, or does it take on the role of a character, with its history, contradictions, and politics reshaping the narrative? We will also engage with selections from Pamuk's essays on literary craft and his memoir Istanbul to better understand his layered relationship with this complex city. Pamuk's works offer a nuanced exploration of East and West, confronting the legacy of Orientalism while subverting postmodern conventions. How does he reframe techniques like metafiction, unreliable narrators, or nonlinear time to explore memory, identity, and the restless nature of modernity? We will also trace the evolution of Pamuk's style and examine how his growing global audience influences his self-presentation as a writer.

Instructor(s): Levi, Melih     Terms Offered: Winter
Equivalent Course(s): ENGL 22671, NEHC 22671, FNDL 22671

CMLT 23120. Translation Theory and Practice. 100 Units.

This course introduces students to the field of Translation Studies and its key concepts, including fidelity, equivalence, and untranslatability, as well as the ethics and politics of translation. We will investigate the metaphors and models that have been used to think about translation and will consider translation as a transnational practice, exploring how "world histories" may be hidden within "word histories," as Emily Apter puts it. In the process, we will assess theories of translation and poetry from classical antiquity to the present; compare multiple translations of the same text; and examine notable recent translations. Students will regularly carry out translation exercises and create a final translation project of their own. (20th/21st)

Instructor(s): Rachel Galvin     Terms Offered: Spring
Equivalent Course(s): ENGL 23120, ENGL 36210, CMLT 33120

CMLT 23301. Balkan Folklore. 100 Units.

Vampires, fire-breathing dragons, vengeful mountain nymphs. 7/8 and other uneven dance beats, heart-rending laments, and a living epic tradition. This course is an overview of Balkan folklore from historical, political, and anthropological perspectives. We seek to understand folk tradition as a dynamic process and consider the function of different folklore genres in the imagining and maintenance of community and the socialization of the individual. We also experience this living tradition firsthand through visits of a Chicago-based folk dance ensemble, "Balkan Dance."

Instructor(s): Angelina Ilieva     Terms Offered: Spring
Equivalent Course(s): CMLT 33301, ANTH 35908, ANTH 25908, NEHC 20568, REES 29009, REES 39009, NEHC 30568

CMLT 23324. The Human Form in Contemporary Art. 100 Units.

In a present where humanity faces planetary challenges with an unprecedented urgency, the human form - what Marx calls our "genus-being" (Gattungswesen) - has become a focus for artistic production of all sorts. The thesis of the class is this: Contemporary art is an actualization of the human form that doesn't presuppose the form, doesn't take it for granted, but instead troubles the form and poses it as a question. The class considers presentations of the form in performance art (Tino Sehgal, Anne Imhof, Wu Tsang), sculpture (Kara Walker, Cai Guo-Qiang, Cecilia Vicuña), writing (Friederike Mayröcker, Layli Long Soldier, Tracie Morris), sound (Maria Chavez, Christina Kubisch, Samson Young), and painting (Michael Armitage, Tammy Nguyen, Mark Bradford). The class contextualizes these artists with theoretical work by Sylvia Wynter, Donna Haraway, Bruno Latour, Peter Sloterdijk, Dipesh Chakrabarty, Jane Bennett, Achille Mbembe, Eva Horn, and Emanuele Coccia. Readings and discussion in English.

Instructor(s): Florian Klinger     Terms Offered: Winter
Equivalent Course(s): GRMN 23324, MUSI 23324, ARTH 23324

CMLT 23401. The Burden of History: The Nation and Its Lost Paradise. 100 Units.

How and why do national identities provoke the deep emotional attachments that they do? In this course we try to understand these emotional attachments by examining the narrative of loss and redemption through which most nations in the Balkans retell their Ottoman past. We begin by considering the mythic temporality of the Romantic national narrative while focusing on specific national literary texts where the national past is retold through the formula of original wholeness, foreign invasion, Passion, and Salvation. We then proceed to unpack the structural role of the different elements of that narrative. With the help of Žižek's theory of the subject as constituted by trauma, we think about the national fixation on the trauma of loss, and the role of trauma in the formation of national consciousness. Specific theme inquiries involve the figure of the Janissary as self and other, brotherhood and fratricide, and the writing of the national trauma on the individual physical body. Special attention is given to the general aesthetic of victimhood, the casting of the victimized national self as the object of the "other's perverse desire." With the help of Freud, Žižek and Kant we consider the transformation of national victimhood into the sublimity of the national self. The main primary texts include Petar Njegoš' Mountain Wreath (Serbia and Montenegro), Ismail Kadare's The Castle (Albania), Anton Donchev's Time of Parting (Bulgaria).

Instructor(s): Angelina Ilieva     Terms Offered: Autumn
Equivalent Course(s): REES 29013, NEHC 20573, REES 39013, HIST 24005, NEHC 30573, CMLT 33401, HIST 34005

CMLT 23404. Romanticism and Religion. 100 Units.

Romanticism" refers to a broad movement in European thought and culture from the late-18th to the mid-19th century, a period of intense political, intellectual, and religious upheaval. Romantic writers are often portrayed as responding to the emerging "rationalization" of society by celebrating intuition, imagination, and nature. This image obscures a more interesting reality: Romantic writers drew from Enlightenment ideas, saw poetry and natural science as closely related, and held diverse views on issues of religion, reason, and art. They approached these topics rationally, as well as through dream visions, opium-eating, self-mythologizing, fragmentary texts, and pastoral lyrics. In this survey course, we will read English and German Romantic writers to see how they grappled with these issues, and to pose our own questions. What is "nature," and how should we relate to it? What roles do intuition, feeling, and imagination play in our understanding of ourselves, and the divine? Are secularization and rationalization forces to contend with, or preconditions for a new spiritual freedom? How do atheists, pantheists, Christian radicals, and orthodox believers fall under the same label, and to what extent did they really share artistic and spiritual aims? How did Romantics engage with non-European religious ideas? We will read, among others, Goethe, Wordsworth, Coleridge, Schleiermacher, de Quincey, and Novalis. No prior knowledge is required. All texts will be read in English.

Instructor(s): Pieter Hoekstra     Terms Offered: Autumn
Equivalent Course(s): RLST 23404

CMLT 23425. Helen of Troy Through The Centuries. 100 Units.

Helen of Troy has been a source of fascination for ancient and modern writers alike, serving as a symbol of unattainable beauty and destructive femininity. This course explores the various portrayals of Helen throughout Greco-Roman poetry (epic, lyric, tragedy, comedy) and prose (historiography, oratory), as well as contemporary literature and film. Taking into account the conventions and historical context of each genre we will examine her character as it relates to questions of gender, sexual power, agency, identity, embodiment and social structures. All readings will be in English and include but are not limited to selections from Homer, Euripides, Gorgias, Ovid, Seferis, Marlowe, and Walcott.

Instructor(s): C. Filippaki     Terms Offered: Autumn. 25-26
Equivalent Course(s): CLAS 33425, CMLT 33425, GNSE 33425, CLCV 23425, GNSE 23425

CMLT 23810. Spanish Cinema-Basque Cinema. 100 Units.

This course explores Basque cinema from its beginnings to our days while also reviewing Spanish cinema from a Basque point of view. Among other topics, the course will explore the nationalist imaginary and its influence in film, the centrality of gender (and motherly) representations in Basque cinema, Basque films' recent tendency to become Spanish blockbusters outselling Hollywood, and allusions to the Basque Country in Spanish cinema.

Terms Offered: Not offered this academic year
Equivalent Course(s): SPAN 24716, BASQ 24710

CMLT 23823. Melancholy: Readings in Medieval Christian Literature. 100 Units.

The idea of melancholy, a persistent affective orientation toward sadness and/or despair, is ubiquitous in Christian writings from the Middle Ages. This course considers the nature and function of melancholy and possible remedies in Christian discourses, and in so doing it provides a survey of medieval Christian literature. Readings may be drawn from authors such as Boethius, Alan of Lille, Jean de Meun, Marguerite Porete, Dante, and Christine de Pizan. Special attention will be given to the role of literary form in Christian writing, competing accounts of despair and hope, and the relationship of Christianity to non-Christian discourses. There are no language prerequisites, though reading groups may be formed if sufficient students posses relevant language skills.

Instructor(s): M. Vanderpoel     Terms Offered: Winter
Equivalent Course(s): RLST 23823, MDVL 23823

CMLT 24026. Translating Gender Across France and Italy. 100 Units.

Frenemies" since the Middle Ages, the literary traditions of Italy and France illustrate the productive tensions that can arise from cultural and geographic proximity. This course explores practices of rewriting and adaptation across the Alps through the lens of gender and sexuality. We will focus on two periods of literary flourishing: the early modern age, when Italy led Europe into the era we now call the Renaissance, and the dawn of literary modernism in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, when France stood out for its innovations. We will address topics such as: how do female authors adapt works originally written by men? how do treatments of masculinity change when they move from one cultural setting to another? what role does sexuality play in realist genres? how does the post-modern representation of love and femininity change across French and Italian works in the twenieth century? Authors and works may include fabliaux, chansons de geste, Boccaccio, Marguerite de Navarre, Christine de Pizan, Orlando furioso, Émile Zola, Giovanni Verga, Italo Calvino, Raymond Queneau. Theory readings will include Roland Barthes, Hélène Cixous, Umberto Eco, Susan Sontag, and others.

Instructor(s): Fara Taddei     Terms Offered: Not offered this academic year
Equivalent Course(s): ITAL 24026, FREN 24026, GNSE 12146

CMLT 24425. Invasion Culture: Russia through its Wars. 100 Units.

This course looks at contemporary culture through Russia's invasions, from the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979 to the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. Broadly, this course explores how war shapes cultural life. How do the policies and strategies of war, and the art and literature of wartime, convey ideas about power and the state, traditional vs. modern values, civilizational mission vs. cultural pluralism? Beyond Russian literature and film, we consider voices from Afghanistan, the Caucasus, Chechnya, Syria, Belarus, and Ukraine, asking, How are Russia's wars fought and resisted in the domain of culture?

Instructor(s): Ania Aizman     Terms Offered: Autumn
Equivalent Course(s): GLST 24424, HIST 24009, MAPH 34425, HIST 34009, REES 34425, REES 24425

CMLT 24510. Kawaii (cuteness) culture in Japan and the world. 100 Units.

The Japanese word kawaii (commonly translated as "cute" or "adorable") has long been a part of Japanese culture, but, originating from schoolgirl subculture of the 1970s, today's conception of kawaiihas become ubiquitous as a cultural keyword of contemporary Japanese life. We now find kawaii in clothing, food, toys, engineering, films, music, personal appearance, behavior and mannerisms, and even in government. With the popularity of Japanese entertainment, fashion and other consumer products abroad, kawaii has also become a global cultural idiom in a process Christine Yano has called "Pink Globalization". With the key figures of Hello Kitty and Rilakkuma as our guides, this course explores the many dimensions of kawaii culture, in Japan and globally, from beauty and aesthetics, affect and psychological dimensions, consumerism and marketing, gender, sexuality and queerness, to racism, orientalism and robot design.

Instructor(s): Nisha Kommattam     Terms Offered: Winter
Equivalent Course(s): MADD 14510, ENGL 24510, EALC 24520, GNSE 24511

CMLT 24525. Mengzi and Epictetus. 100 Units.

How to cultivate excellence in human life and leadership, justice in human communities, and benevolent kindness in human relationships? These always timely questions were concerns shared by two ancient teachers of inherited wisdom in established philosophical schools: the Confucian Mengzi (Mencius), in third-century BCE China, and the Stoic Epictetus, in the second-century CE Greco-Roman Mediterranean. While working in very different cultural contexts and conceptual models, the two thinkers shared a deep optimism about human goodness and potential, together with a rigorous insistence on the highest ethical commitment. While their theories are richly and fascinatingly complex, the teaching style of both Mengzi and Epictetus (as recorded by their students) is conversational, vividly colorful, and often hilariously satirical. This course is a literary and philosophical comparative study of Mengzi's writings alongside the Handbook and Discourses of Epictetus. Readings will be in English translation, but optional additional meetings will be available for students wishing to read some Mengzi in classical Chinese or some Epictetus in classical Greek.

Instructor(s): David Wray     Terms Offered: Winter. 25-26
Prerequisite(s): No knowledge of classical Chinese or classical Greece or ethical philosophy needed
Equivalent Course(s): CLCV 24525, FNDL 24325, CLAS 34525, CMLT 34525

CMLT 24788. Getting the 90s We Deserve. 100 Units.

The aim of this seminar is to help its members recover visions, texts, sounds, concepts, moods and utopian impulses from the 1990s that can help us to see our way out of our current situation, that help us to imagine different worlds. Through a series of readings, viewings, listenings, and conversations, we will engage in an ongoing collaborative project that will culminate with a collectively composed and designed performance and publication at the end of the quarter. Two areas of thematic focus will be 1) the nature and effects of the fall of the Berlin wall, the collapse of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War on political situations ranging in scale from the intimate and personal to the global and geopolitical and 2) the emergence of a new queer politics in response to the AIDS crisis and the corresponding emergence of queer theory. Our course title is inspired by a 1999 essay by Douglas Crimp, in which he argued for a return to Andy Warhol's films and art through the methods and concepts offered by cultural studies and queer theory, instead of the ones that a conservative art history had theretofore presented. Crimp's retrospective look at the gender and sexually transgressive underground film and theater scene of the 1960s in order to demonstrate the contemporary relevance of cultural, visual and queer studies motivates our desire to get more out of the 1990s for our troubled present.

Instructor(s): Jonathan Flatley     Terms Offered: Winter
Equivalent Course(s): GNSE 44788, ENGL 24788, ENGL 44788, ARTV 30478, CMLT 44788, ARTV 20478, GNSE 24788

CMLT 25340. The 'Child' in South Asia: Minor Lives, Major Questions. 100 Units.

What does it mean to think about the history, culture, and politics of a region through the figure of the "child"? This course explores "childhood" as a powerful concept that has shaped debates about race, colonialism and development, particularly in the history of colonial and postcolonial South Asia. From the stereotype of the "childlike native" to the infantilization of women, the child figure repeatedly gets invoked to mark social hierarchies. Even in a globalized world, the status of children across the world, measured under the rubric of the UN Child Rights Convention, fuels understandings of "development" and "progress" among nations and communities. We will survey Southern Asia's colonial legacy, postcolonial present and globalized afterlife to examine how "childhood" has been imagined in relation to national and ethnic identities as well as class, caste, gender, and religious affiliations of people. Taking a wide range of visual and textual genres as objects of study -  such as textbooks, educational charts, children's literature, advertisements, biographies and films -- this course will enable students to study the category of the "child" through a humanistic lens and see how it's embedded in the cultural history of South Asia.

Instructor(s): Titas Bose     Terms Offered: Winter
Equivalent Course(s): HIST 26705, SALC 25340, EDSO 25340, RDIN 25340, HMRT 25340, CHDV 25340, GNSE 25340

CMLT 25540. New Caribbean Writing. 100 Units.

Caribbean literature is having a moment. NPR reported in 2023 that "this region has long been punching above its weight on the international literary scene." We will read Safiya Sinclair's (Jamaica/U.S.) How to Say Babylon, a memoir of self-discovery after being raised by an authoritarian father; a new translation of Mayra Santos Febres' (Puerto Rico) collection of migration poems, Boat People; Myriam Chancy's novel What Storm, What Thunder (Haiti/Canada/U.S.), set after the 2010 earthquake in Haiti; and poems from Shivanee Ramlochan (Trinidad & Tobago) and Dionne Brand (Canada/T&T). Our class will also include trips to literary events and visiting speakers.

Instructor(s): Kaneesha Parsard     Terms Offered: Spring
Equivalent Course(s): LACS 25540, RDIN 25541, ENGL 25540

CMLT 25550. Machiavelli: Politics and Theater. 100 Units.

Arguably the most debated political theorist of all time due to The Prince, Machiavelli genuinely aspired to be remembered for his creative prowess. He explored various literary genres, such as short stories, dialogues, satirical poetry, letter writing, and, notably, theater, where he demonstrated mastery with The Mandrake, an exemplary Renaissance comedy. This course aims to reintegrate these two aspects of Machiavelli: the serious politician and the facetious performer, a Janus-faced figure who serves as a precursor of both Hobbes and Montaigne. We will revive the image of this "Renaissance man," and, through him, shed light on his era and fellow humanists by restoring their intellectual unity of prescription and laughter. Indeed, we will discover that Machiavelli encourages us not to take things, including him and ourselves, too seriously! Taught in English.

Instructor(s): Rocco Rubini     Terms Offered: Not offered this academic year
Equivalent Course(s): TAPS 28481, CMLT 35550, FNDL 29305, ITAL 35550, TAPS 38481, ITAL 25550

CMLT 25603. Narratives of Power. 100 Units.

For the past four years we've been transfixed by the news-but also by the way the news has been reported. Longstanding practices have been questioned or abandoned as our media have grappled with how to cover a changing political landscape. A similar situation unfolded in late and post-Soviet Russia, where it seemed that newspapers and TVs were not only reporting, but also carrying out, a regime change. This course will examine media regimes in both the U.S. and Russia (and the U.S.S.R.), with careful attention to historical and theoretical frameworks that will help us better understand current media events. On the Russian side we will explore how political and cultural regimes have systematically exploited the gap between experience and representation to create their own mediated worlds-from the tight censorship of the imperial and Soviet periods to the propaganda of the Soviet period and the recent use of media simulacra for strategic geopolitical advantage. We will compare this tradition with that of the United States, where freedom of expression has been privileged, but has also been shaped and distorted by the economic and cultural markets that constitute our media.

Instructor(s): William Nickell     Terms Offered: TBD
Note(s): A companion to Media and Power in the Age of Putin and Trump, this course covers different material and does not require the former as a prerequisite. Together the courses consider how form and content shape the spread of information.
Equivalent Course(s): MAPH 35603, SIGN 26029, REES 35603, CMLT 35603, PARR 25600, REES 25603

CMLT 25727. Sextus Empiricus and Zhuangzi. 100 Units.

Embracing the condition of not knowing as a pathway to freedom is at the core of two ancient philosophical schools now commonly known as Skepticism and Daoism. This course is a literary and philosophical comparison of two highly sophisticated texts in these traditions: the Greek Outlines of Pyrrhonism of Sextus Empiricus, which records the teachings of Pyrrho, founder of the Hellenistic Skeptic school; and the Chinese text known as the Zhuangzi, which records that teacher's anticonventionalist and paradoxical counsels for achieving a life of "free and easy roaming." Course readings are all in English, and no knowledge of the classical Chinese and Greek languages or their philosophies is needed, but separate meetings can be scheduled for students interested in reading either of these texts in the original.

Instructor(s): D. Wray     Terms Offered: Winter. Winter 2027
Equivalent Course(s): FNDL 25727, CLCV 25727

CMLT 25801. Machiavelli and Machiavellism. 100 Units.

This course is a comprehensive introduction to Machiavelli's The Prince in light of his vast and varied literary corpus and European reception. The course includes discussion of Machiavelli as playwright ("The Mandrake"), fiction writer ("Belfagor," "The Golden Ass"), and historian ("Discourses," "Florentine Histories"). We will also closely investigate the emergence of myths surrounding Machiavelli (Machiavellism and anti-Machiavellism) in Italy (Guicciardini, Botero, Boccalini), France (Bodin and Gentillet), Spain (Ribadeneyra), and Northern Europe (Hobbes, Grotius, Spinoza) during the Counter Reformation and beyond.

Instructor(s): Rocco Rubini     Terms Offered: Not offered this academic year
Equivalent Course(s): CMLT 35801, FNDL 21603, ITAL 23000, ITAL 33001

CMLT 25810. Childhood and Fairy Tale in Bachelard, Benjamin, and Agamben. 100 Units.

'The child' is a complex and fascinating notion that plays a crucial role in the writings of some of the major twentieth-century thinkers. The child is often linked to 'fairy tale,' as if one concept couldn't exist without the other. What constitutes a fairy tale, what is the difference between fairy tale, myth, and allegory, and who is the real narrator and listener of fairy tales are questions that can only be addressed through a second, fundamental query: What is 'the child'? What does 'the child' represent? What role does the imagination play in the formation of 'the child'? These issues are especially significant in the writings of Gaston Bachelard, Walter Benjamin, and Giorgio Agamben. Readings will include: Bachelard, "Poetics of Reverie: Childhood, Language, and the Cosmos"; Bachelard, "Air and Dreams. An Essay on the Imagination of Movement"; Bachelard, "The Flame of a Candle"; Benjamin, One-Way Street; Benjamin, "The Fireside Saga"; Benjamin, "Berlin Childhood around 1900"; Benjamin "Goethe's Elective Affinities,"; Benjamin, "The Storyteller"; Agamben, "Infancy and History"; Agamben, "Profanations"; Agamben, "Pulcinella or Entertainment for Children"; Agamben, "Pinocchio". We will also read an ample selection of classic fairy tales from Giambattista Basile ("The Tale of Tales"), the seventeenth-century French conteuses, The Brothers Grimm, Clemens Brentano, and Collodi's "Pinocchio." Taught in English.

Instructor(s): Armando Maggi     Terms Offered: Not offered this academic year
Equivalent Course(s): CMLT 35810, ITAL 25800, ITAL 35800

CMLT 25823. Three Comedies of Sexual Revolution. 100 Units.

This seminar will discuss three comedies of sexual revolution from three different times and places. Aristophanes's Assemblywomen recounts how under the leadership of the able Praxagora the women of Athens take over the Assembly and legislate a new regime in which private property is replaced by communism and sexual equity is achieved in favor of the old and unattractive at the expense of the young and attractive. Machiavelli's Mandragola dramatizes the tricks by which young Callimaco manages with the aid of the trickster parasite Ligurio to have sex with Lucrezia, the beautiful young wife of the elderly lawyer Nicomaco, with the consent of both her and her husband, ushering in a new regime in which all are satisfied. In Shakespeare's Measure for Measure Angelo the interim duke of Vienna institutes a repressive sexual regime in which the brothels are closed and extramarital sex is a capital crime. What might we learn about sexual relations from these diverse plays? Why are they comedies?

Instructor(s): Nathan Tarcov & Glenn Most      Terms Offered: Spring. Spring 2024
Prerequisite(s): Undergraduates need the Instructor's permission to register.
Equivalent Course(s): GNSE 25997, PLSC 25997, FNDL 21772, SCTH 25823, GNSE 35997, PLSC 35997, CLCV 27623, CLAS 37623, SCTH 35997, CMLT 35997

CMLT 25985. Postcoloniality and Modernity: Perspectives from South Asia. 100 Units.

This course will focus on selected themes and issues that are central to a broad understanding of recent academic approaches to the philosophy of modernity, nationalism, Orientalism, postcoloniality, cultural studies, and social practice. Postcolonial theory and critical traditions addressing empire, the nation, and the subaltern will be explored through individual texts that address key conceptual and theoretical issues. The class will discuss the poetics of anticolonialism, the invention of tradition in modernity, the cultural turn, and the concepts of language, culture, and the understanding of the past. We will also examine some fundamental ideas on the shape of the social in India through writings by some of its most formative thinkers. Readings will include the work of Aimè Cesaire, Frantz Fanon, Edward Said, Benedict Anderson, Stuart Hall, Frederick Jameson, Reinhart Koselleck, Walter Benjamin, E. P. Thompson, Bankimchandra Chatterjee, Rabindranath Tagore, MK Gandhi, Dipesh Chakrabarty and Partha Chatterjee.

Instructor(s): Rosinka Chaudhuri     Terms Offered: Spring
Equivalent Course(s): CMLT 45985, ENGL 45985, ENGL 25985

CMLT 26002. Gramsci. 100 Units.

In this course we read selections from Antonio Gramsci's Letters and Prison Notebooks side by side with their sources. Gramsci's influential interpretations of the Italian Renaissance, Risorgimento, and Fascism are reviewed testi alla mano with the aim of reassessing some major turning points in Italian intellectual history. Readings and notions introduced include, for the Renaissance, Petrarch (the cosmopolitan intellectual), Savonarola (the disarmed prophet), Machiavelli (the modern prince), and Guicciardini (the particulare; for Italys long Risorgimento, Vico (living philology), Cuoco (passive revolution), Manzoni (questione della lingua), Gioberti (clericalism), and De Sanctis (the Man of Guicciardini); and Croce (the anti-Croce) and Pirandello (theater and national-popular literature), for Italy's twentieth century.

Instructor(s): Rocco Rubini     Terms Offered: Not offered this academic year
Equivalent Course(s): ITAL 26000, FNDL 26206, CMLT 36002, ITAL 36000

CMLT 26040. Theater in East and Central Europe: Between Power and Powerlessness. 100 Units.

National independence movements, revolutions, authoritarian regimes, and the decline of empire: playwrights in East and Central Europe wrote major works of world literature in response to these events - and sometimes in prescient anticipation of them. This seminar introduces students to the plays that, from Chekhov to Havel, shaped the fates of nations. Topics include: the avant-garde, theater of the absurd, acting methods, performance art, and documentary theater.

Instructor(s): Ania Aizman     Terms Offered: Spring
Equivalent Course(s): REES 24404, TAPS 35214, TAPS 25214, REES 34404

CMLT 26105. Queering God. 100 Units.

Can God be an ally in queer worldmaking? Is God queer? What does queerness have to do with Judaism, Christianity, or Islam? This course introduces students to foundational concepts in queer and trans studies by focusing on queer Jewish, Christian, and Islamic theologies. We will analyze the ways that contemporary artists, activists, and scholars are using theology to reimagine gender and experiment with new relational forms. Our readings will include a variety of genres: memoir, letters, scriptural interpretation, and a novel. There will be no presumption of previous acquaintance with any of the readings or topics discussed, or indeed with any academic theology or queer theory at all.

Instructor(s): Olivia Bustion     Terms Offered: Autumn
Equivalent Course(s): GNSE 12124, RLST 26105

CMLT 26180. Caring for the Earth: Nature and Ecology Before Modernity. 100 Units.

What do we mean by nature, and how do humans relate to it? A recent French translation of Virgil's "Georgics" was titled anew: "Le souci de la terre" ("care for the earth") What does it mean to care? Is care disinterested, or does it serve a purpose? What logics of dominion or obligation shape it? This course traces ideas of nature and care from Antiquity to early modernity. How did humans conceive of their place in the world? How did they understand its resources and their impact? From the commons to enclosures, from caretaking to exploitation, from interpreting nature to organizing it (aménagement), we will question linear narratives of progress (humans caring more) and degradation (humans caring less). Focusing on France and French texts while engaging classical and theological sources, we will also consider exploration and exploitation beyond France. We will examine how religious ideas, canonical texts, and philosophical concepts have shaped discourses on nature, as well as the relevance of contemporary ecological terms. Attending closely to the multiple ways in which human beings variously have articulated their relationship to nature or the environment permits us to ask, instead of assume, what might be the conditions and practices of care incumbent upon human beings today.

Instructor(s): Daisy Delogu, Pauline Goul     Terms Offered: Not offered this academic year
Equivalent Course(s): RLST 26180, FREN 36180, FREN 26180, CMLT 36180, MDVL 26180, CLCV 26181, CEGU 36180, CEGU 26180, CLAS 36181

CMLT 26211. The World in Ruins. 100 Units.

In this course we will not limit ourselves to the traditional view of 'ruins' as remains of ancient or modern buildings. Our course will involve a variety of different artifacts (literary texts, paintings, films, philosophical tracts, etc.) from different cultural moments, in order to attain a clearer understanding of our notion of ruins, decay, and decadence. We will first examine 'ruins' in classical cultures, focusing on Plutarch's short treatise On the Obsolescence of Oracles. We will investigate the 'discovery' of ruins in the Renaissance through Petrarch's Letters on Familiar Matters, his canzoniere, and his epic poem Africa, Francesco Colonna's verbal/visual Hypnerotomachia Poliphili (The Strife of Love in a Dream), and Joaquim De Bellay's The Antiquities of Rome. 17th-century approach to ruins and decay will focus on Benjamin's texts (Origins of the German Tragic Drama among others), Agamben's response to Benjamin in Man Without Content, and European poetry and paintings. After an analysis of Piranesi's famous etchings Vedute di Roma, we will approach Romanticism through Leopardi's and Hölderlin's works. There will be a screening of Pasolini's The Walls of Sana'a (1970), which will open our discussion of the concepts of decay and annihilation in modern times. We will read Curzio Malaparte's novel The Skin and W. G. Sebald's On the Natural History of Destruction, César Aira's Episode in the Life of a Landscape Painter, and the recent Anthropocene: The Human Epoch.

Instructor(s): Armando Maggi     Terms Offered: Not offered this academic year
Equivalent Course(s): CMLT 42311, ITAL 36210, ITAL 26210

CMLT 26269. Religious Authority in Comparative Perspective. 100 Units.

When somebody tells us about the nature of God or the gods, about what such beings want from us, about our experiences before this life or our destinies after it-why should we believe them? With equal and opposite force, why shouldn't we believe them? Are the standards of acceptable belief entirely independent of what we're told by religious authorities, or is it impossible to arrive at any such standards without presuming something we've been told? When confronted with diverse claims about the divine, should we try to ascertain which ones are true, should we combine or harmonize them in some way, or should we dismiss the entire conversation as wrongheaded? In this course, we'll think through these questions with the help of influential texts drawn from the Buddhist, Hindu, Platonic, and classical Chinese traditions.

Instructor(s): Stephen C. Walker     Terms Offered: Spring
Note(s): This course meets the CS Committee distribution requirement for Divinity students.
Equivalent Course(s): DVPR 36269, RLST 26269

CMLT 26400. Introduction to the Renaissance. 100 Units.

The Renaissance, which first and foremost flourished in Italy, founded our modern concept of the self. The way we see ourselves, the values we cherish, derive from the Renaissance. Modernity is a product of the Renaissance. This course emphasizes the importance of introspection in Renaissance culture, poetry, and philosophy. The books I have selected have a strong autobiographical element. However, they also illuminate how the Renaissance theorizes the relationship between the individual and society. We will read, in Italian, passages from major Italian texts in prose, such as Castiglione's Il cortigiano, Machiavelli's Discorsi, Campanella's Città del Sole, and poetry by Michelangelo, Monsignor della Casa, and numerous women poets, such as Veronica Franco, Vittoria Colonna, and Veronica Gambara.

Instructor(s): Armando Maggi     Terms Offered: Not offered this academic year
Equivalent Course(s): ITAL 22200

CMLT 26523. Motherless Tongue:" Introduction to Transnational Writing in German. 100 Units.

This course introduces students to contemporary authors writing in German whose texts explore cross-pollinations between languages and cultures. Discussions will center around topics such as: identity; cosmopolitanism; memory; cultural hybridity and alterity; hospitality; guests and hosts; storytelling; migration; what are transnational German Studies? Authors include: the Japanese writer Yoko Tawada who lives in Berlin and writes in Japanese and German; the Romanian-born author Herta Müller (Nobel Prize in 2009); the Black British author Sharon Dodua Otoo who resides in Berlin and writes in German and English; the Ukrainian-German writer Katja Petrowskaja; the Turkish-born writer Feridun Zaimoglu; and others. Course conducted in English with an LxC option for interested students.

Instructor(s): Margareta Ingrid Christian     Terms Offered: Autumn
Equivalent Course(s): GRMN 36523, GRMN 26523, CMLT 36523

CMLT 26602. Materiality and Socialist Cinema. 100 Units.

What constitutes the materiality of film? How do we understand the "material world" in relation to cinema, and how does the film camera mediate it? What does the process of mediation look like when the goal of cinema is not solely to represent but also change the world? This course will pair theoretical readings on new materialist approaches to cinema with select case studies drawn from Chinese and Soviet revolutionary cinema. Our primary aim is twofold: to introduce students to the "material turn" in cinema and media studies, and to reflect on what the specific fields of Soviet and Chinese Film Studies bring to the discussion. We will look closely at works by socialist filmmakers in the twentieth century who argued that cinema had a special role to play in mediating and transforming the material world. How does socialist cinema seek to orient its viewer to a particular relationship to objects? How does it treat the human relationship to the environment? How does it regard the material of film and the process of filmmaking itself? Ultimately, the course will familiarize students with diverse understandings of materiality and materialism and with key figures and works in global socialist cinema. Readings and screenings will range from the Soviet avant-garde of the 1920s to Chinese revolutionary cinema of the early 1970s, and conclude with recent documentary and video experiments that engage with their legacies.

Instructor(s): Anne Eakin Moss and Paola Iovene     Terms Offered: Spring
Equivalent Course(s): CMLT 36602, REES 26600, EALC 26611, CMST 26611, CMST 36611, REES 36600, EALC 36611

CMLT 26677. American Jewish Experience: Texts and Contexts. 100 Units.

What texts and contexts constitute American Jewish experience? In this class, we will consider the birth of a unique Jewish ethnicity in America, with a deep dive into the literature, the theology, and the politics of American Judaism from the post-Holocaust period to the American-Jewish response to October 7th.

Instructor(s): Sheila Jelen     Terms Offered: Autumn
Equivalent Course(s): RLST 26677, CMLT 46677, AMER 26677, JWSC 26677, AMER 46677, RLVC 46677, JTAC 46677

CMLT 26680. Literary Games: Oulipo and Onward. 100 Units.

Does constraint foster creativity? Can wordplay carry political meaning? Is formal innovation divorced from lyrical expression? How do experimental literary movements respond to their sociopolitical moments and local contexts, and how do they transform when they travel across geographical and linguistic borders? We will consider these questions via the work of the longest-lived French literary group, the Oulipo (Ouvroir de littérature potentielle or Workshop for Potential Literature), examining its origins as a quasi-secret society in 1960 and its expansion into an internationally visible and multilingual collective (with members from Italy, Spain, Argentina, and the US). We will investigate debates about inspiration and authorship, copying and plagiarism, collective creation, multilingualism, constraint and translation, and the viability of the lyric subject. While considering antecedents (Edgar Allan Poe, Raymond Roussel), our readings will explore several generations of Oulipians (Raymond Queneau, Georges Perec, Italo Calvino, Michèle Métail, Anne Garréta, Frédéric Forte), and conclude with some very contemporary Oulipo-inspired writing from around the world (Christian Bök, Urayoán Noel, Mónica de la Torre, K. Silem Mohammed). Alongside critical essays, students will carry out short experiments with constraint and procedure, as well as translation exercises; and they will have the opportunity for dialogue with acclaimed writers and scholars who will visit our seminar.

Instructor(s): Rachel Galvin and Alison James     Terms Offered: Not offered this academic year
Prerequisite(s):
Equivalent Course(s): FREN 26680, CMLT 36680, ENGL 36680, ENGL 26680, FREN 36680

CMLT 26700. Renaissance and Baroque Fairy Tales and Their Modern Rewritings. 100 Units.

We study the distinctions between myth and fairy tale, and then focus on collections of modern Western European fairy tales, including those by Straparola, Basile, and Perrault, in light of their contemporary rewritings of classics (Angela Carter, Calvino, Anne Sexton). We analyze this genre from diverse critical standpoints (e.g., historical, structuralist, psychoanalytic, feminist) through the works of Croce, Propp, Bettelheim, and Marie-Louise Von Franz.

Instructor(s): Armando Maggi     Terms Offered: Spring
Equivalent Course(s): ITAL 26200, ITAL 36200, CMLT 36700

CMLT 26701. Marsilio Ficino's "On Love" 100 Units.

This course is first of all a close reading of Marsilio Ficino's seminal book On Love (first Latin edition De amore 1484; Ficino's own Italian translation 1544). Ficino's philosophical masterpiece is the foundation of the Renaissance view of love from a Neo-Platonic perspective. It is impossible to overemphasize its influence on European culture. On Love is not just a radically new interpretation of Plato's Symposium. It is the book through which sixteenth- and seventeenth-century Europe read the love experience. Our course will analyze its multiple classical sources and its spiritual connotations. During our close reading of Ficino's text, we will show how European writers and philosophers appropriated specific parts of this Renaissance masterpiece. In particular, we will read extensive excerpts from some important love treatises, such as Castiglione's The Courtier (Il cortigiano), Leone Ebreo's Dialogues on Love, Tullia d'Aragona's On the Infinity of Love, but also selections from a variety of European poets, such as Michelangelo's canzoniere, Maurice Scève's Délie, and Fray Luis de León's Poesía.

Instructor(s): Armando Maggi     Terms Offered: Not offered this academic year
Equivalent Course(s): CMLT 36701, FNDL 21103, ITAL 23900, ITAL 33900

CMLT 26702. Arabic into Hebrew: Translation and Cultural Change during the Middle Ages. 100 Units.

Religions, like all cultural phenomena, are akin to organic beings: they change, grow and adapt, absorb and assimilate what they encounter, become transformed constantly in relation to challenges and opportunities - and sometimes react against them. This course will focus on one example of religious-cultural-philosophical adaptation and change through a study of the medieval translation of Arabic and Judeo-Arabic works into Hebrew during the 12th-15th centuries. We will focus on the translations themselves and translation technique, but principally on what was translated and why, when and where, by whom and for whom. All this with an added emphasis on the result: how did Judaism and Jewish culture change through translation - in all its forms - during the high middle ages.

Instructor(s): James T. Robinson     Terms Offered: Autumn. Not offered 2025–26
Note(s): This course meets the HS or CS Committee distribution requirement for Divinity students.
Equivalent Course(s): RLST 26702, CMLT 36702, HIJD 36702, NEHC 26702, JWSC 26702, HREL 36702, ISLM 36702, RLVC 36702, NEHC 36702, MDVL 26702

CMLT 26771. Stories of Oceans and Archipelagos. 100 Units.

According to Fijian-Tongan writer Epeli Hau'ofa, "There is a world of difference between viewing the Pacific as 'islands in a far sea' and as 'a sea of islands.'" In this course, we will delve into the "world of difference" that exists between viewing islands as remote and insignificant, and considering them as crucial nodes in an ever-expanding planetary network. Simultaneously, we will consider the stakes of moving away from traditional representations of the ocean as a blank canvas for human movement, to instead consider it as a vibrant material and multispecies space. This course will encourage students to formulate their own approaches to cutting-edge debates in archipelagic theory and critical ocean studies, and to situate those debates within the broader fields of environmental humanities and postcolonial studies. Readings will be drawn from the Pacific Ocean, the Atlantic Ocean (including the Caribbean Sea), and the Indian Ocean.

Instructor(s): Nikhita Obeegadoo     Terms Offered: Not offered this academic year
Prerequisite(s): For students seeking French credit, FREN 20500 or equivalent.
Equivalent Course(s): CEGU 26770, FREN 26770, RDIN 26770

CMLT 26855. Queer Theory. 100 Units.

This course offers a foundation in queer theory. In order to understand the contested definitions of the term "queer" and explore the contours of the field's major debates, we will work to historicize queer theory's emergence in the 1980s and 1990s amidst the AIDS crisis and later developments in the twenty-first century, especially the emergence of queer and trans of color critique. The course aims to place these theoretical texts within the context of the intellectual, activist, and artistic and literary communities out of which they emerged. Major topics to discuss will include queer grief and melancholia; coalition and community; desire, devotion, and affective attachment; queer theory's ritual conventions; modes of queer critique; assumptions about queer theory's secularity; and the significance, challenge, and critiques of queer and trans joy.

Instructor(s): Kris Trujillo     Terms Offered: Spring
Equivalent Course(s): RLVC 36855, RLST 26885, ENGL 26855, CMLT 36855, GNSE 36855, ENGL 36855, GNSE 20130

CMLT 26912. Strangers to Ourselves: Emigre Literature and Film from Russia and Southeast Europe. 100 Units.

Being alienated from myself, as painful as that may be, provides me with that exquisite distance within which perverse pleasure begins, as well as the possibility of my imagining and thinking," writes Julia Kristeva in "Strangers to Ourselves," the book from which this course takes its title. The authors whose works we are going to examine often alternate between nostalgia and the exhilaration of being set free into the breathless possibilities of new lives. Leaving home does not simply mean movement in space. Separated from the sensory boundaries that defined their old selves, immigrants inhabit a warped, fragmentary, disjointed time. Immigrant writers struggle for breath-speech, language, voice, the very stuff of their craft resounds somewhere else. Join us as we explore the pain, the struggle, the failure, and the triumph of emigration and exile. Vladimir Nabokov, Joseph Brodsky, Marina Tsvetaeva, Nina Berberova, Julia Kristeva, Alexander Hemon, Dubravka Ugrešić, Norman Manea, Miroslav Penkov, Ilija Trojanow, Tea Obreht.

Instructor(s): Angelina Ilieva     Terms Offered: Autumn
Equivalent Course(s): REES 29010, CMLT 36912, REES 39010

CMLT 27500. From Romanticism to Weird Fiction. 100 Units.

Weird fiction is a form of (mostly) short fiction that emerged as a distinctive kind of writing in the late nineteenth century: strange landscapes, uncanny presences, historical beings encountered where they ought not to be. We will read representative works by some of the major figures: Algernon Blackwood, Vernon Lee (Violet Paget), H. P. Lovecraft, Arthur Machen, Harriet Spofford. To frame our guiding question - what is so weird about weird fiction? - we will also read short fiction by significant precursors in European and American Romanticism: Ludwig Tieck, E. T. A. Hoffmann, and Nathaniel Hawthorne.

Instructor(s): Mark Payne     Terms Offered: Spring
Equivalent Course(s): FNDL 27500, CMLT 37500

CMLT 27602. Renaissance Demonology. 100 Units.

In this course we analyze the complex concept of demonology according to early modern European culture from a theological, historical, philosophical, and literary point of view. The term 'demon' in the Renaissance encompasses a vast variety of meanings. Demons are hybrids. They are both the Christian devils, but also synonyms for classical deities, and Neo-platonic spiritual beings. As far as Christian theology is concerned, we read selections from Augustine's and Thomas Aquinas's treatises, some complex exorcisms written in Italy, and a recent translation of the infamous "Malleus maleficarum," the most important treatise on witch-hunt. We pay close attention to the historical evolution of the so-called witch-craze in Europe through a selection of the best secondary literature on this subject, with special emphasis on Michel de Certeau's "The Possession at Loudun." We also study how major Italian and Spanish women mystics, such as Maria Maddalena de' Pazzi and Teresa of Avila, approach the issue of demonic temptation and possession. As far as Renaissance Neoplatonic philosophy is concerned, we read selections from Marsilio Ficino's "Platonic Theology" and Girolamo Cardano's mesmerizing autobiography. We also investigate the connection between demonology and melancholy through a close reading of the initial section of Robert Burton's "Anatomy of Melancholy" and Cervantes's short story "The Glass Graduate" ("El licenciado Vidriera").

Instructor(s): Armando Maggi     Terms Offered: Not offered this academic year
Equivalent Course(s): HIST 22110, ITAL 26500, RLST 26501, GNSE 26504

CMLT 27621. Philosophical Aesthetics: Heidegger and Adorno. 100 Units.

Two major positions in German philosophical aesthetics of the 20th century will be considered in detail: 1) the ontological-hermeneutic theory advanced by Martin Heidegger; 2) the dialectical-critical theory developed by Theodor W. Adorno. Primary readings will be Heidegger's Origin of the Work of Art and selections from Adorno's Aesthetic Theory. In addition, selected shorter pieces by the two authors will be studied, with a special emphasis on their work on lyric poetry. The seminar will also consider contributions by Georg Simmel, Walter Benjamin, Helmut Plessner, Arnold Gehlen, Georg Lukács. The course seeks to develop an understanding of the conceptual foundation of each of the two philosophical positions. Particular topics to be considered: a) the nature of artistic presentation (Darstellung); b) the nature of artistic truth; c) the historical character of art; d) the political significance of art; e) the relation of art to philosophy.

Instructor(s): David Wellbery     Terms Offered: Spring
Note(s): Undergrads must receive consent.
Equivalent Course(s): GRMN 37621, GRMN 27621, SCTH 27621, CMLT 37621, SCTH 37621

CMLT 27660. Animality and Jewish Literature. 100 Units.

This course explores the representation of animality in Jewish literature and visual art. We will explore questions of animal ethics and ecological entanglement across a range of secular and religious genres, from folklore and poetry to Hasidic tales and rabbinic narrative. Writers will include Kafka, Sholem Aleichem, Celan; artists will include Soutine, Chagall, Sarah Shor, and more. No prerequisites. Open to undergrad and grad students.

Instructor(s): Anna Elena Torres     Terms Offered: Winter
Equivalent Course(s): ENGL 27660, RLVC 37660, RLST 27660, CMLT 37660, ENGL 37660, JWSC 27660, HIJD 37660

CMLT 27721. Jewish Civilization III: The Jewish Question and the Color Line. 100 Units.

This class opens with a simple question: why are Jewishness and Blackness represented as both comparable and conflicting in the twentieth century? The answer sometimes appears just as simple: because they are divided by what W.E.B. DuBois called the problem of the twentieth century: the color-line. But such an answer not only glosses over the varied racial and religious identities of Jewish and Black people throughout history; it also begs another question: what is the relationship between race and religion, and how is it overdetermined by Christianity and political construct known as "the West"? Examining the relationship between Jews, religion, and race on an international scale, this course begins with the Dreyfus Affair in France, and crosses the Atlantic to discuss how that relationship changed through two world wars, the Civil Rights Movement, the politics of Black Power, and the global rise of discourses on colonialism and feminism. Drawing on historical and philosophical work by Jean-Paul Sartre, Frantz Fanon, Albert Memmi, and James Baldwin, as well as literary classics by Nella Larson and Sarah Kofman, this course traces out how Jewishness and Blackness have been reconstructed over and over in relation to each other, and in reference to the concepts of gender, race, religion, and colonization that continue to circulate in political discourse today.

Instructor(s): Kirsten Collins     Terms Offered: Spring
Equivalent Course(s): GLST 27721, RLST 27721, RDIN 27721, ANTH 23916, JWSC 12013

CMLT 27750. Asia in the Making of the West: Cultures, Peoples, Histories. 100 Units.

TBD

Instructor(s): Sascha Ebeling     Terms Offered: Spring

CMLT 28005. Arabfuturism: Other Worlds and Worlding Otherwise. 100 Units.

Interrogating the possibilities and limits of futurity amidst existential, territorial, ecological, and ideological states of crisis, Arabfuturism-like its sister project of Afrofuturism/s-speaks to how speculative cultures turn to sites of historical or present rupture to envision alternate, possible, or impossible worlds. It is a critical mode of reading assemblages of colonialism, capitalism, and biopolitics that theorizes other ways of being, knowing, and imagining. These counter-futures disrupt the logics of the past, present, and assumed future to envision entirely new archeologies of futurity. Beyond the toll of US-backed "forever wars," recent years have cast the MENA region into unprecedented turmoil. We have also witnessed the promise of revolutions sweeping the region following the 2010 Arab Spring. This seminar explores representations of apocalypse, dystopia, science fiction, speculative history, (non)futurity, and fantasy across works of literature, film, and art from the Middle East and North Africa. Fictional works will be paired with theoretical readings that frame imagination and futurity in relation to the extractive economies of war, colonialism, and capital. Foregrounding the political and ethical stakes of futurity as an existential, epistemic, and aesthetic project, we consider how speculative acts of world-building can not only chart possible paths forward but also reveal the critical potential of impossible acts of imagination.

Instructor(s): Hoda El Shakry     Terms Offered: Autumn
Note(s): Graduate students by consent only.
Equivalent Course(s): AASR 37885, ENGL 28005, NEHC 38005, ENGL 38005, RLST 27885, ISLM 37885, CMLT 38005, NEHC 28005

CMLT 28101. Cervantes: Don Quixote. 100 Units.

In this course we will read Cervantes's "Don Quixote" (1605, 1615), paying attention to narrative aesthetics, language, genre, the politics of the novel, and the history of interpretation, among other aspects. Our close reading of the text will be informed by thorough contextualization within the social, cultural, and intellectual history of early modern Spain, Europe, and the Mediterranean, as well as by major critical and theoretical approaches to the novel.

Instructor(s): Miguel Martínez     Terms Offered: Spring
Prerequisite(s): This course will be taught in English and has no prerequisites. Additional discussion sessions in Spanish will be available for interested students.
Equivalent Course(s): CMLT 38101, SCTH 38250, SPAN 34202, SPAN 24202, FNDL 21221

CMLT 28280. The Good Place and the Bad Place: Judgement, Punishment, and Living a Good Life. 100 Units.

Do you believe that you are a good person and, if so, why are you good? This course will investigate the connections between personal intentions to be a "good person" and the fear of punishment. What do we owe each other as ethical actors? Do the intentions of our actions matter or only the results of our actions? How can one be good in an increasingly complicated web of intersecting needs, social developments, and understandings of morality? This course will examine conceptions of hell, eternal punishment, and justice in a variety of religious traditions. In addition to reading authors such as Dante and John Milton, students will critically engage The Good Place, a sitcom which tackles deep questions of faith, morality, and the complexity of the human person. We will think through competing understandings of justice (retributive, distributive, and restorative) alongside our individual beliefs surrounding fairness and deservingness. No prior knowledge of religious studies or ethics is expected.

Instructor(s): Foster Pinkney     Terms Offered: Spring
Equivalent Course(s): FNDL 28280, RLST 28280

CMLT 28405. Religion in Anime and Japanese Pop Culture. 100 Units.

How does Spirited Away reflect teachings of Japanese Buddhism and Shinto? Or what about Neon Genesis Evangelion? What can pop culture tell us about religion? In this course, we will consider the complex relations between religion and pop culture through Japanese anime and manga. Examples are drawn from a wide range of popular shows and series in these media and others to explore how they represent, borrow, invent, draw inspiration from, and participate in religious life in Japan. The course covers foundational aspects of Japanese religious life through non-traditional sources like Princess Mononoke, Attack on Titan, and Your Name. At the end of the course, students will be able to critically analyze intersections of anime and religion, drawing on their acquired knowledge of the great diversity of religious practices and viewpoints in Japan. Meanwhile, we will consider broader questions about religion, popular culture, and what it means to think of these two things together.

Instructor(s): Stephan Licha     Terms Offered: Autumn
Equivalent Course(s): EALC 28405, RLST 28405, MADD 14805

CMLT 28410. Ecrire le "Printemps arabe" au Maghreb : témoignages et perspectives littéraires. 100 Units.

Fin 2010, l'immolation de Mohamed Bouazizi, un vendeur ambulant tunisien, déclenche un soulèvement populaire qui s'étend rapidement au reste du monde arabe, entraînant notamment la chute des régimes en Tunisie et en Egypte et une série de reconfigurations d'ordre politique et socio-économique. Si les pays du Maghreb ont vécu ces soulèvements et leurs conséquences de manières différentes, les écrivains maghrébins ont été particulièrement sensibles à l'élan et à la promesse de changement portés par la rue. Ceci étant, et à l'image de l'appellation « Printemps arabe », à la fois utilisée et récusée, les dynamiques et les résultats des protestations ont fait l'objet de nombreux débats. En s'appuyant sur ce contexte historique, ce cours s'intéresse aux différentes modalités d'écriture des soulèvements au Maghreb à travers divers genres littéraires, du témoignage à la fiction, en passant par l'essai, la nouvelle ou encore la poésie. En étudiant un corpus de textes francophones issus de la Tunisie (Meddeb, Bekri, Ben Mhenni), de l'Algérie (Daoud, Tamzali, Sebbar) et du Maroc (Ben Jelloun, Elalamy, Terrab), nous nous intéresserons à la représentation de la révolte populaire dans ses dimensions socio-politique et culturelle mais aussi à des questions clés telles que les formes d'engagement des écrivains, leurs approches et choix esthétiques et le rapport entre la dynamique des soulèvements et la construction narrative ou poétique des textes.

Instructor(s): Khalid Lyamlahy     Terms Offered: Not offered this academic year
Prerequisite(s): FREN 20500 or 20503.
Equivalent Course(s): FREN 28410, FREN 38410, CMLT 38410

CMLT 28447. It's the End of the World as We Know It: Apocalypticism and Religious Thinking about the End Times. 100 Units.

Why and how will the world end? How much time is left? What happens to humans in those final days-and after? This course will examine art, rituals, and sacred texts - along with the movements that produced them - in order to understand how religious communities have answered such questions throughout history. Along the way, we will learn about the circumstances that have inspired Apocalyptic movements, the religious traditions that they have emerged from, and the theological and political principles that have animated them. We will cover a wide range of contexts, including Roman-occupied Judea during the first century CE, the Xhosaland of southern Africa in the mid 19th century, and the rise of QAnon and climate activism in the 21st century United States. No prerequisite knowledge of the historical periods or religious traditions examined required.

Instructor(s): Marshall Cunningham     Terms Offered: Autumn
Equivalent Course(s): RLST 28447, HIST 25219, JWSC 28447, GLST 28447

CMLT 28500. Journey to the West II. 100 Units.

TBD

Equivalent Course(s): CMLT 38500, CHIN 21306, RLIT 49200, CHIN 31306

CMLT 28506. Jesus: From Scripture to the Silver Screen. 100 Units.

Jesus holds particular significance for believers all around the world. But how is he portrayed in modern films? How faithful are these depictions to the Bible? Do these portrayals push a certain kind of theological position? In this course, we will examine film adaptations of Jesus, including biopics, dramas, comedies, and musicals. As we watch everything from Martin Scorsese's The Last Temptation of Christ (1988) to Monty Python's Life of Brian (1979), we will compare these modern depictions to ancient texts and theology. During the course, students will become familiar with significant aspects of Jesus's life both in canonical and noncanonical Gospels, as well as to how those texts have been understood in the antiquity and today. After the class, students will be able to analyze critically portrayals of Jesus in order to understand why certain decisions are made and address pivotal questions about biblical interpretation, cinema and adaptation, and the ethical challenges of representing religious figures in media. No prior familiarity with biblical studies or film criticism is required.

Instructor(s): Richard Zaleski     Terms Offered: Spring
Equivalent Course(s): RLST 28506

CMLT 28509. Reinterpretations of Time and Death. 100 Units.

This class will explore philosophical, religious and literary reimaginings and reconceptualizations of the nature of time and of death. Of special concern will be both conceptual and imaginative speculations that contravene commonsensical notions such as 1) time as a sequence of nonconsecutive and nonoverlapping "moments," 2) time as unidirectional, 3) time as uninterrupted, 4) time as synordinate, 5) time as nonrepeating, 6) death as either the end of individual consciousness or the continuation of individual consciousness, 7) death as either leading to consequences of the life lived or having no such consequences, and so on. Readings may include the following: Borges, "A New Refutation of Time," Amis, Time's Arrow; Baker The Fermata; Vonnegut, Slaughterhouse-Five; Nietzsche, Thus Spake Zarathustra; Eagleman, Sum: Forty Tales from the Afterlives; and Ziporyn, Death Time Perception (in progress), among others.

Instructor(s): Brook Ziporyn     Terms Offered: Spring
Note(s): This course meets the CS Committee distribution requirement for Divinity students.
Equivalent Course(s): RLST 28509, DVPR 35809, HREL 35809

CMLT 28705. Christian Iconography. 100 Units.

In Christian culture, visual images have for many centuries played a pivotal role in ritual, devotion, intellectual thought, and religious instruction. The most important aims of this course are that students understand images convey meaning in very unique ways and learn how to decode their visual messages. The study of iconography encompasses a variety of methods used to identify the subject matter of a pictorial image, describe its contents, and analyze its discursive strategies in view of its original cultural context. We will cover some of the most important themes visualized in the arts of Christianity by analyzing imagery spanning different periods, geographical regions, pictorial media, and artistic techniques. While special emphasis is placed on the intersections of art and literature, we will also examine pictorial themes that are independent of a specific textual basis. Alongside the study of Christian iconography, this course will address broader issues of visual inquiry, such as patronage, viewer response, emotions, and gender roles. In this course, students will acquire a 'visual literacy' that will enable them to explore all kinds of works of art fruitfully as primary sources in their own right. Students will be examined on the basis of an essay and one oral presentation of a work of art. Active participation in the classroom discussion is also a requirement.

Instructor(s): Karin Krause     Terms Offered: Spring
Note(s): This course is intended primarily for students who have little or no familiarity with the methods of visual analysis.
Equivalent Course(s): RLST 28705, MDVL 28705, ARTH 28705

CMLT 28800. The (Auto)Biography of a Nation: Francesco De Sanctis and Benedetto Croce. 100 Units.

At its core, this course examines the making and legacy of Francesco De Sanctis's History of Italian Literature (1870-71), a work that distinguished literary critic René Wellek defined as "the finest history of any literature ever written" and "an active instrument of aesthetic evolution." We will read the History in the larger context of De Sanctis's corpus, including his vast epistolary exchanges, autobiographical writings, and so-called Critical Essays in order to detail his reform of Hegelian aesthetics, his redefinition of the intellectual's task after the perceived exhaustion of the Renaissance, Enlightenment, and Romantic moments, and his campaign against the bent toward erudition, philology, and antiquarianism in 19th-century European scholarship. We will compare De Sanctis's methodology to that of his scholarly models in France (Alphonse de Lamartine, Alfred Mézières) and Germany (Georg Gottfried Gervinus, Georg Voigt) to explore De Sanctis's claim that literary criticisms - not just literary cultures - are "national." In the second part of the course, we assess Benedetto Croce's appropriation of De Sanctis in his Aesthetics (1902), arguably the last, vastly influential work in its genre and we conclude with Antonio Gramsci's use of De Sanctis for the regeneration of a literary savvy Marxism or philosophy of praxis.

Instructor(s): Rocco Rubini     Terms Offered: Not offered this academic year
Equivalent Course(s): CMLT 38800, KNOW 37700, KNOW 27700, ITAL 27700, ITAL 37700

CMLT 28826. Print, Media Transformation and the Beginnings of Mass Communication. 100 Units.

Printing is one of the truly transformative communication technologies, but in the fifteenth century it was by no means certain it would succeed or even survive. One thing that we will learn in this course, is that new media are always accompanied by a deluge of optimistic prophecy, and this was the case with printing just as much as with the internet. New technologies do not destroy what went before: instead they take their place in an ever-richer communication nexus. This course will examine all aspects of this fragile trade, authors and readers, booksellers, printers and publishers, along with the numerous strategies pursued by members of the book trade to find their audience. It will engage with how the new tools at the disposal of book historians are transforming our understanding of the early modern print world. It takes the story through to the new technologies of the last two centuries, and how the knowledge revolution made possible through new technology and the provision of universal educational transformed the book world. This course will be taught in Special Collections.

Instructor(s): Andrew Pettegree     Terms Offered: Spring
Equivalent Course(s): GRMN 28826, HIST 35428, ENGL 28826, HIST 25428, ENGL 38826, GRMN 38826, SIGN 28826, CMLT 38826

CMLT 28830. Psychoanalysis: Freud and Beyond. 100 Units.

This course offers an introduction to psychoanalytic theory by surveying significant writings by Freud and Freud's readers. We will pay particular attention to the way that Freud's theories of the mind translate into theories of the social world and of history. Taking its cue from the "beyond" of Freud's Beyond the Pleasure Principle, the course will pay especial attention to the development of the death drive and explore its relationship to a constellation of psychoanalytic terms including but not limited to instincts and the drive, narcissism, melancholia, masochism, and religion/illusion. How have these concepts evolved over the course of their deployment in 20th- and 21st-century critical and political projects like feminism and queer theory? How have major developments in psychoanalysis read Freud anew? And in what ways do these psychoanalytic projects respond to their historical conditions-especially conditions marked by political, ecological, economic, and public health crises?

Instructor(s): Kris Trujillo     Terms Offered: Spring
Equivalent Course(s): GNSE 28830, ENGL 38830, RLST 28830, RLVC 38830, ENGL 28380, CMLT 38830, GNSE 38830, COGS 26504

CMLT 28888. Mosquitos and Morphine: A Seminar in the Global Medical Humanities. 100 Units.

This course examines well-being and illness from transnational, decolonial and intersectional perspectives. Together, we will explore the various ways in which fiction and film can help challenge and expand our notions of what it means to be sick or healthy in complex circumstances. Some guiding threads: To what extent is illness an intensely personal experience, and to what extent does it draw in those around us - family members, friends, partners, medical practitioners, legal counsel? What renewed valences do concepts of autonomy, care and responsibility take when overshadowed by the spectre of disease? How might we ethically and productively relate the medical humanities to broader entangled concerns such as migration (both legal and clandestine), gender, class, race, community, queerness and neocolonialism? Beyond the justified responses of fear and anger, what are other ways to relate to death and mortality - ways that are infused with creativity and resilience? How does human "health" relate to planetary and interspecies well-being?

Instructor(s): Nikhita Obeegadoo     Terms Offered: Not offered this academic year
Prerequisite(s): For students seeking French credit, FREN 20500 or equivalent.
Equivalent Course(s): CMLT 38888, GNSE 38888, RDIN 28888, GNSE 28888, HLTH 28888, FREN 28888, FREN 38888, RDIN 38888

CMLT 28990. La Princesse de Clèves and the Genesis of the Modern Novel. 100 Units.

Madame de La Fayette's 1678 novel represents a turning point in the international development of the psychological novel and historical fiction. Set in a Renaissance past of courtly international intrigue, the novel plumbs its characters' interiorized struggles with erotic desire, marriage, and adultery, forging a path for later novelists such as Flaubert, George Eliot, and Tolstoy. We will examine debates about its literary form and moral impact, as well as around gender and women's writing, placing the novel in a transnational context (Spanish, Italian, and English romances, drama, and moral philosophy) and its later reception, including film adaptations and its role in heated contemporary controversies around the place of the humanities in society. Students are encouraged to undertake individual comparative research projects in relation to the novel. Course taught in English but reading ability in French required.

Instructor(s): Larry Norman      Terms Offered: Not offered this academic year
Prerequisite(s): Consent of instructor required for undergrads; those seeking FREN credit must have completed at least one French literature course, 21700 or higher.
Equivalent Course(s): CMLT 38990, FREN 28900, FNDL 29405, FREN 38900

CMLT 29003. Islam Beyond the Human: Spirits, Demons, Devils, and Ghosts. 100 Units.

This seminar explores the diverse spiritual and sentient lifeforms within Islamic cosmology that exist beyond the human-from jinn, angels, and ghosts to demons and devils. We will focus on theological, scientific, philosophical, anthropological, and historical accounts of these creatures across a variety of texts, as well as their literary and filmic afterlives in contemporary cultural representations. In so doing, we consider the various religious, social, and cultural inflections that shape local cosmological imaginaries. We ask how reflecting on the nonhuman world puts the human itself in question, including such concerns as sexuality and sexual difference, the boundaries of the body, reason and madness, as well as the limits of knowledge.

Instructor(s): Alireza Doostdar and Hoda El Shakry     Terms Offered: Autumn
Prerequisite(s): Enrollment by consent only for graduate students. Grad students should send the instructors a paragraph explaining their interest and prior preparation or familiarity with the themes in the course.
Note(s): This course meets the LMCS or SCSR Committee distribution requirement for Divinity students.
Equivalent Course(s): NEHC 29003, ISLM 49003, HIPS 29003, KNOW 49003, GNSE 29003, NEHC 49003, GNSE 49003, AASR 49003, CMLT 49003, ANTH 49003, RLST 29003, ANTH 29003

CMLT 29005. East European Folklore. 100 Units.

Folklore is the expressive culture communities make for themselves. In Eastern Europe, a region home to many different ethnic, religious, and linguistic communities, folklore offers a window onto histories of coexistence, difference, and adaptation. This interdisciplinary course explores oral and material traditions among the Slavic, Romanian, Albanian, and other East European groups. We will encounter magical beasts and heroes in oral tales that have fascinated writers from the Brothers Grimm and Goethe to Bram Stoker. We will analyze how folklore genres-from vampire tales and heroic epics to wedding rituals-imagine the individual's place in the community and in relation to the sacred. Texts and practices will be studied through the lenses of anthropology, history, and folklore theory, drawing on thinkers such as Mary Douglas, Arnold van Gennep, Vladimir Propp, and Albert Lord. But folklore is also a participatory culture, so experiential learning is central to the course: students will explore folklore through storytelling, cooking, and hands-on projects, to illuminate how living traditions help build group coherence while making space for individuality and creativity. Local musicians will lead us in the dazzling dance rhythms of the circle dance known by many names in the region.

Instructor(s): Angelina Ilieva     Terms Offered: Spring
Equivalent Course(s): REES 39005, REES 29005, CMLT 39005

CMLT 29023. Returning the Gaze: The West and the Rest. 100 Units.

Aware of being observed. And judged. Inferior... Abject… Angry... Proud… This course provides insight into identity dynamics between the "West," as the center of economic power and self-proclaimed normative humanity, and the "Rest," as the poor, backward, volatile periphery. We investigate the relationship between South East European self-representations and the imagined Western gaze. Inherent in the act of looking at oneself through the eyes of another is the privileging of that other's standard. We will contemplate the responses to this existential position of identifying symbolically with a normative site outside of oneself-self-consciousness, defiance, arrogance, self-exoticization-and consider how these responses have been incorporated in the texture of the national, gender, and social identities in the region. Orhan Pamuk, Ivo Andrić, Nikos Kazantzakis, Aleko Konstantinov, Emir Kusturica, Milcho Manchevski.

Instructor(s): Angelina Ilieva     Terms Offered: Winter
Equivalent Course(s): REES 39023, NEHC 29023, REES 29023, HIST 23609, CMLT 39023, NEHC 39023, HIST 33609

CMLT 29024. States of Surveillance. 100 Units.

What does it feel to be watched and listened to all the time? Literary and cinematic works give us a glimpse into the experience of living under surveillance and explore the human effects of surveillance - the fraying of intimacy, fracturing sense of self, testing the limits of what it means to be human. Works from the former Soviet Union (Solzhenitsyn, Abram Tertz, Andrey Zvyagintsev), former Yugoslavia (Ivo Andrić, Danilo Kiš, Dušan Kovačević), Romania (Norman Manea, Cristian Mungiu), Bulgaria (Valeri Petrov), and Albania (Ismail Kadare).

Instructor(s): Angelina Ilieva     Terms Offered: Autumn
Equivalent Course(s): REES 29024, REES 39024, CMLT 39024

CMLT 29026. Loyalties, Friendships, Loves. 100 Units.

The Eastern European experience of surveillance under the police state is most often associated with the sense of betrayal, the invasion of the innermost spaces of intimacy and individual consciousness by the secret all-seeing eye. What is often overlooked, however, is the obverse side of fear - the fierce code of loyalty, the tenacity of friendship and love nurtured in the interstices of surveillance and resistance. How are love and friendship understood in such circumstances? Are they experienced in the same way as we understand them? This class will explore these emotional cultural scripts through an array of East, Central, South-East European literary and cinematic works.

Instructor(s): Angelina Ilieva     Terms Offered: Spring
Equivalent Course(s): REES 39026, REES 29026

CMLT 29045. Dostoevsky and Critical Theory. 100 Units.

The tormented, obsessed, and sadistic characters of Dostoevsky's novels posed a challenge to positivism and reason too scandalous and compelling to be ignored. The novels inspired some of the most brilliant and influential thinkers of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries in the fields of religion, philosophy, psychology and literary theory. We will read two of Dostoevsky's philosophically challenging novels alongside works by these critics and philosophers, including Nietzsche, Sartre, Freud, Bakhtin, Kristeva, and Levinas. While exploring their ideas about faith and unbelief, madness and reason, violence and torture, society and history, we will also inquire into the relationships among literature, philosophy and biography and examine the processes of influence and adaptation.

Instructor(s): Anne Eakin Moss     Terms Offered: Winter
Equivalent Course(s): RLST 28207, REES 29045, CMLT 39045, REES 39045

CMLT 29071. Magic Nations. 100 Units.

As part of the post-colonial turn, magic realism is a hybrid mode of narration rejects, overcomes, and offers an alternative to the colonial, Enlightenment episteme. It mobilizes the imaginations and narrative modes of pre-colonial pasts in the articulation of new, post-colonial, often national, selves. In this course, we will unpack some captivating narratives from Southeast Europe in which the visions of the pre-modern mythic worlds emerge as the magic, transcendent core of the modern nations. We will indulge in the sheer enjoyment of the brilliance of these text while focusing on the paradoxes they embody - for example, the simultaneous rejection and reliance on the realist mode, the colonial worldview, and its civilizational hierarchies and models.

Instructor(s): Angelina Ilieva     Terms Offered: Winter
Equivalent Course(s): REES 29071, REES 39071

CMLT 29700. Reading Course. 100 Units.

Terms Offered: Autumn,Winter,Spring
Prerequisite(s): Consent of instructor and Director of Undergraduate Studies.
Note(s): Students are required to submit the College Reading and Research Course Form. Must be taken for a quality grade. This course does not satisfy distribution requirements for students who are majoring in CMLT unless an exception is made by the Director of Undergraduate Studies.

CMLT 29801. BA Project and Workshop: Comparative Literature. 100 Units.

This workshop begins in Autumn Quarter and continues through the middle of Spring Quarter. While the BA workshop meets in all three quarters, it counts as a one-quarter course credit. Students may register for the course in any of the three quarters of their fourth year. A grade for the course is assigned in the Spring Quarter, based partly on participation in the workshop and partly on the quality of the BA paper. Attendance at each class section required.

Instructor(s): Gabriela Lomba Guzman     Terms Offered: Autumn Spring Winter

CMLT 29850. Shamanic Literature. 100 Units.

This course explores the multifarious entanglements between shamanism-as a religious phenomenon, as an anthropological imaginary, and as a mode of existence-and global modernity. How did shamanism as a concept emerge in the age of colonial expansion and ethnological racialization, how did it affect modernity's understanding of human history, and how do shamanic (dis)articulations of historicity, personhood, sexuality, trauma, translation, and the "nature/culture divide" intervene in modernity's politics? In contemplating these questions, we will consider a variety of "shamanic" artworks ranging from shamanic liturgies to travelogues, music recordings, film, performance art, contemporary literature, and beyond. We will attend both to the spiritual worlds of the "original" shamans of Northeast Asia (through texts from the Evenki, Khakas, Manchu, Tuvan, and other Siberian languages) and to a much broader corpora of (Anglophone, Chinese, German, Greco-Roman, Indigeneous American, Japanese, Tibetan, etc.) works that can be generatively thought of as shamanic in some way. In doing so, we will reflect on the limitations and powers possessed by the figure of the shaman in various broader contexts, both in the history of ideas and in the contemporary world.

Instructor(s): E.Meng     Terms Offered: Autumn
Prerequisite(s): All assigned readings will be in English, but the ability to read in a variety of languages will likely prove beneficial. Open to MAPH students.
Equivalent Course(s): CMLT 39850, EALC 19850