English 287 - Spring, 2018

Topics in Literature & Media

Class Information

Instructor: Martín, Desirée
CRN: 81981
Time: W 12:10-3:00
Location: 120 Voorhies
Breadth: Later American
Focus: Genre, ID, Interdiscipline

Description

Word, Image, Sound: Racialized Mediatization

This course will focus on the limits, boundaries, and delineation of genre and form through a consideration of word, image, and sound and their intersection in a variety of texts, with a particular focus on the mediatization of race. We will focus on a range of genres from more traditional forms like the novel, poetry, film and photography to new media forms such as the visual novel or web-based publishing. We will ask ourselves how “hybrid” forms such as the graphic novel and visual novel, and musical sampling, karaoke, and cover versions, depend as much upon the crossing of various genres as on their separation or alienation. We will also consider how a variety of keywords such as race, queer, gender, undocument(ation), border, non-binary, disability, politics, etc, function in relation to different media.


NB: Although this course is scheduled as two weekly 3 hour periods, we will only conduct seminar during one of the 3 hour periods. The other period will be dedicated to your own media viewing/study on your own time.

Possible primary texts may include:

Alison Bechdel, Fun Home
Theresa Hak Kyung Cha, Dictee
Ta-Nehisi Coates, We Were Eight Years in Power
Junot Diaz, The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao
Los Bros Hernandez, Love and Rockets (excerpts)
Claudia Rankine, Citizen
Alex Rivera, Sleep Dealer

and others.

In addition, we will study some photography, art and music, TBD.

Grading

TBA