CL206.01 Literary Theory and Criticism II / Syllabus / Spring 2016-2017
Tu 15:00-16:50 JF334, R 11:00-11:50 TB415
Instructor: Matthew Gumpert
Introduction. The second part of our introduction to literary theory and criticism: a survey of distinct approaches to understanding what and how texts mean. We examine these approaches as historically and culturally determined methodologies. This semester we turn to selected critical works of European Romanticism; the foundational figures of modern criticism (Marx, Nietzsche, Freud, Heidegger, Saussure); the rise of structuralism; and the emergence of critical methodologies based in identity politics, from feminism to theories of race and ethnicity.
Course Materials. The reader for Literary Theory and Criticism II, which includes all required readings for the course, is available at X. Supplementary and/or optional readings may be distributed as handouts during the course of the semester.
Grading. Midterm 30%; Class Performance and Short Papers 30%; Final 40%
---Class performance is a large part of your grade, and includes preparation, participation, attendance, and a number of short response papers assigned during the semester. It is your responsibility to have the text we are covering in class with you.
---There is an in-class midterm and final exam for this course. To be admitted to the final, the student must fulfill the attendance requirement. The midterm, class performance, and the final exam together make up the grade for the course.
Reading Schedule. Note: NA = Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism; LTRG = Literary Theory: A Reader and a Guide; LTA = Literary Theory: An Anthology
Week 1 (6-10 Feb)
Victorian Criticism
Arnold, “The Function of Criticism at the Present Time” (NA 806-25); “Culture and Anarchy” (NA 825-32); Baudelaire, "The Painter of Modern Life" (NA 792-802); Wilde, "The Critic as Artist" (NA 900-12)
Week 2 (13-17 Feb)
Nietzsche
On Truth and Lying in a Non-Moral Sense (NA 874-84); The Will to Power (?) The Birth of Tragedy (NA 884-95)
Week 3 (20-24 Feb)
Marx
Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts of 1844 (NA 764-67); The German Ideology (NA 767-69); Grundrisse (NA 773-74); Preface to A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy (NA 774-75)
Week 4 (27 Feb – 3 March)
Marx
The Communist Manifesto (NA 769-73); Capital (NA 776-87)
Week 5 (6-10 March)
Freud
Selections from Some Elementary Lessons in Psycho-Analysis, The Ego and the Id, The Psychopathology of Everyday Life, An Outline of Psycho-Analysis, New Introductory Lectures on Psycho-Analysis
Week 6 (13-17 March)
Freud
The Interpretation of Dreams (NA 919-29); "Creative Writers and Day-Dreaming"; "The Uncanny" (NA 929-52); “Fetishism” (NA 952-56)
Week 7 (20-24 March)
Semiotics/Structuralism
Saussure, Course on General Linguistics (NA 960-77); Culler, "The Linguistic Foundation" (LTA 56-58)
Week 8 (27-31 March)
Semiotics/Structuralism
Propp, “Morphology of the Folk-tale” (LTA 72-75); Eichenbaum, The Theory of the “Formal Method” (NA 1062-87)
Week 9 (3-7 April)
Frankfurt Schooli and other responses to Marx
Benjamin, “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction” (NA 1166-86); Horkheimer and Adorno, “The Culture Industry as Mass Deception” (NA 1223-40); Lukacs, "Realism in the Balance" (NA 1033-58)
Week 10 (10-14 April)
Phenomenology
Heidegger, “The Origin of the Work of Art”
17-21 April: Spring Break
Week 11 (24-28 April)
Phenomenology
Heidegger, “The Question concerning Technology”
New Criticism
Eliot, “Tradition and the Individual Talent” (NA 1092-98); Brooks, "The Heresy of Paraphrase" (NA 1353-65); "The Formalist Critics" (NA 1366-71)
M 1 May: Tatil
Week 12 (2-5 May)
New Criticism
Wimsatt and Beardsley, "The Intentional Fallacy" (NA 1374-87)
Foundational Texts of Feminist Criticism
Woolf, A Room of One’s Own (NA 1021-29)
Week 13 (8-12 May)
Foundational Texts of Feminist criticism
de Beauvoir, The Second Sex (NA 1406-14)
Foundational Texts of Black Criticism
Du Bois, Criteria of Negro Art (NA 980-87)
Week 14 (15 May)
Foundational Texts of Black Criticism
Hurston, "Characteristics of Negro Expression" (NA 1146-58); Hughes, "The Negro Artist and the Racial Mountain" (NA 1313-17)
15 May: Last Day of Classes
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