Key texts, positions, problematics in field of comparative critical theory. Historical precursors, influential contemporary debates, disciplinary genealogies.

Key texts, positions, problematics in field of comparative critical theory. Special attention to historical precursors, influential contemporary debates, disciplinary genealogies.

Society, ideology, and aesthetic value considered in light of recent critical theories of visual art, music, and literature. Meditations of place, social class, gender and ideology on aesthetic judgment in post-Renaissance Western culture.

Central role of vision/visuality in modernity. Modern age as scopic regime. Ways that ideas/ideologies of perception have shaped aesthetic experience within social existence.

Comparative study of the novel, 18th century to present. Its relations to ordinary language practices, emergent reading publics, technologies of cultural dissemination, problems of subjectivity, and its role in articulating international cultural relations.

Intellectual map of the creation of cultural studies as a unique approach to studying social meanings. Key figures and concepts, including nineteenth- and early twentieth century precursors.

In 1939, the art critic Clement Greenberg defined avant-garde art in opposition to the ?kitsch? of mass-produced culture. To what extent does this conception of the avant-garde apply to the cinema?an institution and art form that supposedly requires machines and industrial modes of production? This course introduces students to key works of avant-garde and experimental film made by artists working on the margins of commercial film and mainstream art institutions. From the first half of the twentieth century, we will consider influential films made under the banners of Futurism, Constructivism, Surrealism, and Dada, and discuss their complex relation to Hollywood commodities. In the postwar period, we will explore a range of increasingly global experimental film practices, from the queer underground cinema in Latin America to the use of film projection in avant-garde performance. We will examine these practices in light of larger debates about medium specificity as well as the aesthetics and politics of the personal vs. the structural. In the final unit, we will reflect on the way contemporary artists, scholars, and curators have assembled a tradition of avant-garde cinema in the age of new media, and contemplate new directions we want it to take.

Problems of the nature of the sign; sign function; sign production; signifying systems as articulated in philosophy, linguistics, anthropology, psychoanalysis, and art theory. Application of semiotics to various signifying practices (literature, cinema, daily life).

Role of music in American/European film from early 20th century silent cinema to near present. Narrative features, shorts, documentary, horror, thriller, science fiction, comedy, cartoon. Film music as social/cultural practice and as part of political economy within culture industry.

Three thinkers who defined modernity: Marx, Freud, and Nietzsche. Central tenets of their thought/terms associated with their theories. Their careers portrayed against the background of their times; their place in intellectual history.

Topics specified in Class Schedule.

Practical applications of specific methodologies and theories to a determined area. Topics vary by instructor and semester.

Prereq: instructor consent

Catalog Description: Directed Study in Cultural Studies and Comparative Literature prereq: instr consent

irected Research in Comparative Studies in Discourse and Society prereq: instr consent