This course has been changed to an online format. You will be contacted by your instructor after the end of the registration period. Please check you HU-email address to receive the URL and password to the Moodle course!
In this seminar we will take a look at various responses to struggles over identity during the last twenty years. Some of them are fictions, some are semi-fictional and some are straightforward non-fictional accounts. At the center of the struggles are poverty and the neoliberal transformation of the United States, racial and ethnic identification and self-esteem, queer becoming, transsexuality, sex work, memory and postmemory. We will discuss why we are talking so intensely about identity these days, how we talk about it, and which means and strategies of representation are used to do it. We will, of course, also look at some theories of identity and debate what makes up our psychological and mental economies.
This seminar has two parts: From 12 to 2 PM we will discuss the authors, the texts and their historical/cultural and narrative ramifications (all students). From 2 to 4 PM (BA English, Module 14 students) we will discuss methodological questions, read additional texts and theory, discuss open questions and talk about possible topics for BA theses.
The Moodle Key will be announced during the first meeting.
Reading/Viewing (in the order of appearance):
- J.D. Vance – Hillbilly Elegy (2016)
- Fred Wah – Diamond Grill (1996)
- Alison Bechdel – Fun Home (2006)
- Ta-Nehisi Coates – Between the World and Me (2015)
- Tangerine (2015), a Movie by Sean Baker
- Ocean Vuong – On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous (2019)
Additionally for the second part (Modul 14): Angela Flournoy, The Turner House (2015)
Requirements:
“Spezielle Arbeitsleistungen” (within the seminar): Bachelor students will write summaries about the additional discussion- and reading-meetings and/or a personal response paper (ca. 3 pages) about one of the primary texts.
For the entire module (MAP) BA students have to write a term paper (15 pages) in Module 14, for Module 8 the exam takes place in the other courses of the module. Gender Studies students please ask.
Registration through Agnes. |
