English 179-A - Fall, 2011

Topics in Comparative American Literatures

Class Information

Instructor: Jerng, Mark
Time: MWF 12:10-1:00
Location: 106 Olson

Description

Topic: Literature of Asian Diasporas

This course will explore narratives of Asian diasporas and how they rethink forms of community, national belonging, and settlement. The Asian diasporan subject is often defined in terms of perpetual movement, travel, and migration. But this definition does not account for the problem of what it means to settle, and how the attempts to settle and make a home disrupt conventional forms of belonging such as the nation and family, as well as conventional narratives of immigration. Our primary interest will be in analyzing novels and films and how they figure such difficult modes of settlement in relation to identity-based bonds, sociality, the politics of race and language, and citizenship. We will also analyze relevant theoretical and legal texts on citizenship, cosmopolitanism, and migration. The primary goal of the course is to rethink what “Asian American” and other racial and social categories might mean in relation to a global politics of settlement. We will read novels by Chang-rae Lee, Gish Jen, Julie Otsuka, and Patricia Powell. Additional Readings will include novellas by Onoto Watanna, Karen Tei Yamashita, and Lan Samantha Chang; short stories by Nam Le, Sui Sin Far, Hisaye Yamamoto, Carlos Bulosan, Jhumpa Lahiri, V.S. Naipaul; films directed by Deann Borshay Liem and Rea Tajiri.

Grading

Class Participation
Midterm
One 5-7 page paper
One 8-10 page paper
Take-home Final Exam

Texts

The Love Wife, Gish Jen
Native Speaker, Chang-rae Lee
The Pagoda, Patricia Powell
When The Emperor Was Divine, Julie Otsuka