| Course Title: Advanced Topics in English: 'I Would Prefer Not To: Marxism and Early American Literature' |
| Start Date: 09/04/2024 End Date: 12/17/2024 |
| Term: Fall Semester 2024 |
| Description: This course considers how early American and African American writers have critiqued labor under capital: from the plantation, to the factory, and to the office. At its core, this course considers how slavery functions as the political unconscious of early American literary critiques of labor. Throughout the semester, we will put a range of early American literary texts in conversation with the Marxist tradition and anti-capitalist theory in order to uncover a latent leftist politics of possibility in the early American period while also exploring how early American authors were anti-capitalist theorists in their own right. Literary authors may include: Harriet Wilson, William Wells Brown, Herman Melville, and more. Marxist theoretical thinkers may include Karl Marx, Cedric Robinson, Angela Davis, and Gyorgy Lukács. |
| Distribution(s): I - Humanities , MP - Multicultural Perspectives , SI - Speaking-Intensive , TP - Topics Course |
| Academic Level Of Course: Undergraduate | Credits:4.00 |
| Faculty | Phone | Email address |
| Alex Moskowitz | 413-538-2457 | amoskowitz@mtholyoke.edu |
| Meeting Dates | Method | Meeting days | Meeting times | Building name | Room | Frequency |
| 09/04/2024 - 12/17/2024 | Seminar | Monday and Wednesday | 01:45PM - 03:00PM | SHTK - Shattuck Hall | 319 | Weekly |
| Requisite Courses | ||
| Prereq: 8 credits in English. | Take previously | Required |
| Comments |
| Additional Comments |
| Course Tags | ||
| CRPE0001 | CRPE-1: CRPE - Major Pathway/Minor | This course has been approved to count towards the CRPE major pathway and the CRPE minor. |
| CRPE0003 | CRPE-3: Critical Social Thought - Major Pathway | This course has been approved to count towards the CRPE Critical Social Thought major pathway. |
| Cross-listed Sections |
| None |
| Course Availability | ||||
| Section status: Open | Capacity: 18 | Enrollment: 16 | Available: 2 | Waitlist: 0 |
BOOK INFORMATION
| Book List | Required | Publisher Full Price |
| Title: Clotel; or, The President?s Daughter Author: Wells Brown, William Copyright: Edition: Volume: ISBN: 9780142437728 Publisher: Penguin |
Required | 14.00 |
| Title: The Piazza Tales Author: Melville, Herman Copyright: Edition: Volume: ISBN: 9780810114678 Publisher: Northwestern University Press |
Required | 18.00 |
| Title: The Confidence-Man: His Masquerade Author: Melville, Herman Copyright: Edition: Volume: ISBN: 9780810119680 Publisher: Northwestern University Press |
Required | 13.95 |
| Title: Our Nig Author: Wilson, Harriet Copyright: Edition: Volume: ISBN: 9780143105763 Publisher: Penguin |
Required | 12.00 |
| Additional Book Comments |
| This is the complete book list for this class. |