CWL 581

Spring 2012 All Classes

All Classes

Seminar Lit Themes

Credit: 4 hours.

Study of a theme or type (the Faust myth, the romantic hero, etc.) to discover its essential components in all the literatures studied and the significance of national variations. The subject of the seminar varies each term.

May be repeated to a maximum of 12 hours if topics vary.

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CWL 581 class schedule data for spring 2012
	CRN	Type	Section	Time	Day	Location	Instructor	Section Details
	46015	Lecture-Discussion	A4	3:00PM -4:50PM	M	1136 Foreign Languages Building	Nielsen, K	Part of Term: 1 Date Range: 01/17/12-05/02/12 Credit: 4 hours Section Title: Aesthetics and Politics Section Info: : The seminar will focus on seminal texts by German social theorists writing on art, culture, and politics in the early 20th century. Meets with GER 496 and GER 576 The course will explore seminal texts by German social theorists and philosophers writing on art, media, mass culture and politics in the early twentieth century. Walter Benjamin and Siegfried Kracauer, Theodor W. Adorno and Max Horkheimer, Herbert Marcuse and other left-wing intellectuals sought to put their theories into practice with the aim of transforming and liberating society from oppressive political systems. These theorists, writing before, during and after the political turmoil of mid-20th century Europe, created and demanded a significant social role for aesthetics, and their cross-disciplinary research involved all cultural dimensions, including literature, music, the visual arts, and mass media. In the 1920s and 30s, Kracauer and Benjamin examined photography, film, and the role of images in ways that linked the social focus of the Frankfurt School with the cultural focus of the Hamburg School (Warburg Institute). The graduate seminar is primarily a reading course designed to familiarize us with some of the most important early texts. But the seminar will also consider later European theorists, such as Peter B�rger and Jacques Ranci�re, tangentially drawing on the ideas of the Frankfurt School while fundamentally concerned with the politics of aesthetics. Instructor: Kristine Nielsen