Saturday, December 1

Optional Essay Revision:

Submit it here

• This will replace your original grade if it involves the following:
  1. A cover letter giving a clear overview (not a list) of the revisions and how they have improved the paper
  2. A revised version of the essay that meets the requirements of the original
  3. Connecting it, when appropriate, to later materials in the class
  4. Works Cited Section

Unessay

This is basically your final.
Submit it here
Your project with its analytical reflective piece is due on:

Tuesday, December 11

This is the original date scheduled by Howard for our class. This is not an in-person assignment. Submission instructions will be provided. See the Rubric and Requirements here.
 

Week 10

Tuesday, October 23

• Gates.Introduction to The Signifying Monkey: A theory of Afro-American Literary Criticism” (entire book available online through HU Library)
• Hayles. “Speech, Writing, Code: Three Worldviews” from My Mother was a Computer: Digital Subjects and Literary Texts.
  • Optional: if you like this piece by Hayles, you might also like: "Hyper and Deep Attention: The Generational Divide in Cognitive Modes"
• hooks. “Essentialism and Experience”
• Christian. "The Race for Theory" 
• Reflect on the class so far
• Related to our discussion today. Here's Holland's overview (and perspective) on debates over theory within African American Studies in the 1980s.

Thursday, October 25

• Stevens. Chapter 7
• Foucault. “Introduction to Discipline and Punish” and (from the same volume) see the section on “Panopticism” (this site, in general, is a good place to learn more about his work)
  • Optional: Thinking Aloud (BBC 4 Radio) episode on Foucault
  • The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy is also a really useful resource
• Hughes."Note on Commerical Theatre"
  • Optional: Digitial images of the musical adaptation.

Mini Essay 5 Moved

Week 11

Tuesday, October 30

• Stevens Chapter 8: Twentieth and Twenty-first Century political approaches; Focus on Karl Marx 181-185
• Marx and Engels “from Manifesto of the Communist Party ”
• Marx “From the Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts” and “The Fetishism of Commodities and the Secret Thereof”

Thursday, November 1

• Kafka. “The Metamorphosis”
• In Class Exercise (not required reading beforehand): Williams. “Keywords”
• Veblen. Excerpt One and Two (there is a bit of overlap between the two excerpts from The Theory of the Leisure Class: An Economic Study in the Evolution of Institutions
  • Optional: you can read the whole book here (and many other places) or listen to an audio version.

Optional: Screening and Discussion of Sorry to Bother You

Friday, November 2

6:30-9:30pm

Locke 105

Saturday, November 3

Mini Essay 5 of 5 Due

Submit it here

Respond to one of the readings from the unit so far (Sorry to Bother You is an option for this). To what extent do you agree or disagree? Are there contemporary examples that fit into your response?

Essay 3 Moved

Week 12

Tuesday, November 6

• Stevens Chapter 8: Review Early Marxist Theory and Criticism 186-93
• Required Viewing:
  • Riley. Sorry to Bother You (2018) (111 minutes)
  • Lang. Metropolis (1927) (149 minutes)
    • To view, log in with your Howard Library Id.
    • Optional: There are a lot of alternate versions floating around, such as the 1984 version that added color tinting and an 80s soundtrack (84 minutes), as well as versions on YouTube. This one is (I am pretty sure) the same as the one on Kanopy, so if you have trouble logging into your Howard account, try this.
      • An earlier attempt to reconstruct the film is here. 

Thursday, November 8

Essay 3 Workshop

Please bring a draft for Essay 3

Saturday, November 9

Essay 3 of 3 Due

Submit here

Prompts

1. Write a proposal for your UnEssay. This can include 1-3 possible ideas. You must weigh the merits based on its relevance to the class material and what parts of it can be accomplished by the end of the semester. That last sentence is your thesis.
2. Using one of the "literary" texts from the whole semester (including films), use a theory from this unit to frame your interpretation of that text
3. Respond to any text from this unit. What is its argument? To what extent do you agree/disagree? Why? Emphasis should be on your explanation of your position. Use what evidence is appropriate.
4. Using any theory or scholar as your framework, find an opposing but related perspective. Using one of the assigned films (or a film of your choice), to what extent do you think that film is ideologically aligned with either text? For example, to what extent is Metropolis more aligned with the arguments of Marx or Veblen?
5. I am open to you proposing your own topic, as well

Week 13

Tuesday, November 13

• Stevens Chapter 8 Review Postcolonial and Ethnic Studies 194-202
• Excerpts from:
  • Anzaldua. “How to Tame a Wild Tongue ."
  • Bhabha. “ On Mimicry and Man”
  • DuBois. "1 Of Our Spiritual Strivings" from Souls of Black Folk
  • Fee. “Writing Orality: Interpreting Literature in English by Aboriginal Writers in North America, Australia, and  New Zealand "
    • Optional: McKenzie. Bibliography and the Sociology of Texts (see its last essay)
  • Ngugi. “ The Language of African Literature”
  • Said. Excerpt of the Introduction to Orientalism

Thursday, November 15

• Stevens Chapter 8: Review Feminist Theory and Criticism. Sexuality, and Queer Theory as well as Disability and Environmental Studies 203-210
• Crenshaw. "Mapping the Margins: Intersectionality, Identity Politics, and Violence against Women of Color"
• Puar. “‘I would rather be a cyborg than a goddess’ Intersectionality, Assemblage, and Affective Politics”
• Sedgwick. “Introduction to Between Men”
• Walker. “In Search of our Mothers Gardens”

Week 14

Tuesday, November 20

• Stevens Chapter 9: Twentieth and Twenty-first Century Psychoanalytic Approaches
• Freud. “From Ego and Id” and “from On the Interpretation of Dreams”
• Cixous. “The Laugh of the Medusa.”
• Lacan. “Seminar on ‘The Purloined Letter’” and “The Mirror Stage as Formative of the Function of the I as Revealed in Psychoanalytic Experience”
  • Optional: Poe's "The Purloined Letter" and an overview of theoretical approaches to it
• Required Viewing: Hulme. Forbbidden Planet (1956)

Thursday, November 22

No Class Today. We are on break.

Week 15

Tuesday, November 27

• Required Viewing:
  • Peele. Get Out (2017)
  • Pontecorvo. The Battle of Algiers. (1967)
    • Use your HU Library account to view this
    • Optional: Review earlier Fanon texts and “Algeria Unveiled”

Thursday, November 29

• Closing Discussion.
• UnEssay workshop; bring in the work in progress
• Senior UnEssay Due

1. Notes!