The Modern Critical Theory Lecture Series - Fall 2011

Once again the Unit for Criticism and Interpretive Theory will be offering semi-formal public lectures for graduate students on the history of critical theory. These lectures, each of which will be followed by open discussion, will take place on Tuesdays from 7:30-9:00 pm in English 259 (note 8pm timing on Week 11). The lectures are open to all interested graduate students. 

Many readings can be found in the Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism, Second Edition (2010) .

 

Week 1 - No Public Lecture.

 

Week 2 (8/30): Kant and Aesthetic Theory

Lecture: Bruce Rosenstock, Religion/Jewish Studies, Illinois

Readings:

Kant, Immanuel. Critique of Judgment. (Selections in Second Edition Norton)

 

Week 3 (9/6): Hegel

Lecture: William Schroeder, Philosophy, Illinois

Readings:

Hegel, G.W.F. "Introduction." Phenomenology of Spirit. Clarendon Press, 1977. 46-57.

Hegel, G.W.F. "Self-Consciousness." Phenomenology of Spirit. Clarendon Press, 1977. 104-119.  

Schroeder, William. "Hegel." Continental Philosophy: A Critical Approach. Malden, MA: Blackwell, 2005. 30-59.

 

Week 4 (9/13): Nietzsche

Lecture: Melissa Orlie, Political Science, Illinois

Readings:

Nietzsche, Friedrich. On the Genealogy of Morals and Ecce Homo. Kaufmann, Walter (trans.).

Orlie, Melissa A. "Impersonal Matter." New Materialisms: Ontology, Agency, and Politics. Diana Coole and Samantha Frost, eds. Duke, 2010. 116-130.

 

Week 5 (9/20): Marx and Marxism

Lecture: Emanuel Rota, Spanish/Italian/Portuguese, Illinois

Readings:

Gramsci, Antonio. “Our Marx,” Antonio Gramsci: Pre-Prison Writings. Eds. Virgina Cox and Richard Paul Bellamy. Cambridge, 54-59.

Marx, Karl. “Fragment on Machines,” Grundrisse.

Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels (selections in Norton)

 

Week 6 (9/27): Freud

Lecture: Lilya Kaganovsky, Slavic/Comparative Literature/Cinema Studies, Illinois

Readings:

Freud, Sigmund. "From The Interpretation of Dreams." Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism. WW Norton, 2001. 919-929.

Freud, Sigmund. "Analysis of a Specimen Dream." The Standard Edition of the Complete Psychological Works of Sigmund Freud. Hogarth, 1953. 106-121.

Freud, Sigmund. "The Uncanny." Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism. WW Norton, 2001. 929-952.

Freud, Sigmund. "Fetishism." Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism. WW Norton, 2001. 952-956.

Also Recommended:

Freud, Sigmund. "Negation." The Standard Edition of the Complete Psychological Works of Sigmund Freud. Hogarth, 1953. 231-239.

Freud, Sigmund. "Some Psychological Consequences of the Anatomical Distinction Between the Sexes." The Standard Edition of the Complete Psychological Works of Sigmund Freud. Hogarth, 1953. 248-258.

 

Week 7 (10/4): Structuralism

Lecture: Robert Dale Parker, English/American Indian Studies, Illinois

Readings:

Ferdinand de Saussure (selections in Norton)

Jakobson, Roman. “Linguistics and Poetics.” Style in Language p353-359

Jakobson, Roman. "The Metaphoric and Metonymic Poles" (Norton)

Hall, Stuart. “Encoding/Decoding”

Parker, Robert Dale. "Ch.3: Structuralism". How to Interpret Literature: Critical Theory for Literary and Cultural Studies (2011)

 

Week 8 (10/11): Derrida

Lecture: Patrick Bray, French, Illinois

Readings:

Derrida, Jacques. "Ch. 2: Cogito and the History of Madness (with notes)." Writing and Difference. Routledge, 2001. 36-76, 389-395.

Derrida, Jacques. "Ch. 7: Freud and the Scene of Writing (with notes)." Writing and Difference. Routledge, 2001. 246-291, 426-430.  

Derrida, Jacques. "Ch. 10: Structure, Sign and Play in the Discourse of the Human Sciences (with notes)." Writing and Difference. Routledge, 2001. 351-370, 443-444.

 

Week 9 (10/18): Foucault

Lecture: Lauren Goodlad, English/Unit for Criticism, Illinois

Readings:

Michel Foucault (Introduction and all selections in Norton)

Michel Foucault. Society Must Be Defended, Lectures at the Collège de France 1975-1976: Picador, 2003.

--Ch. 11: 17 March 1976 (1st excerpt)

--Ch. 11: 17 March 1976 (2nd excerpt)

Optional:

Foucault, Michel. "The Subject and Power," in Michel Foucault: Beyond Structuralism and Hermeneutics. University of Chicago 1983, pp. 208-228.

 

Week 10 (10/25): Lacan and Zizek

Lecture: Rob Rushing, Italian/Comparative Literature/Cinema Studies, Illinois

Readings:

Lacan, Jacques. "The Mirror Stage", "The Agency of the Letter in the Unconscious" (Norton)

Zizek, Slavoj. "Courtly Love, or Woman as Thing," The Metastases of Enjoyment (89-112; E-Reserves)

 

Week 11 (10/31): Feminism MONDAY 8PM

Lecture: Robyn Warhol, English, Ohio State

Readings:

Virginia Woolf, A Room of One’s Own, Chapters 1 & 2 (1929)

Audre Lorde, “The Master’s Tools Will Never Dismantle the Master’s House,” from Sister Outsider (1984).

Gayatri Spivak, “Three Women’s Texts and a Critique of Imperialism” (1985)

Barbara Johnson, “Apostrophe, Animation, and Abortion” (1986)

Judith Butler, “Critically Queer” (1993)

 

Week 12 (11/8): Queer Theory

Lecture: Martin Manalansan, Anthropology/Asian American Studies, Illinois

Readings:

Judith Butler, "Imitation and Gender Insubordination"

Cathy Cohen, "Punks, Bulldagger, and Welfare Queens: The Radical Potential of Queer Politics?" (GLQ 3: 437-485; E-Reserves)

Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick, "Introduction: Axiomatic," Epistemology of the Closet (1-67; E-Reserves)

Foucault, Michel. "Part 1: We "Other Victorians"." The History of Sexuality, Volume I: An Introduction. Vintage Books, 1990. 1-13.

Foucault, Michel. "Part 2, Ch. 1: The Incitement to Discourse." The History of Sexuality, Volume I: An Introduction. Vintage Books, 1990. 17-35.

Recommended:

Michael Warner, "Introduction" in Fear of a Queer Planet: Queer Politics and Social Theory (vii-xxxi; E-Reserves)

Esther Newton, "Ch. 5 Role Models", Mother Camp: Female Impersonators in America 97-111  

Gayle Rubin, "Thinking Sex: Notes for a Radical Theory of the Politics of Sexuality"

 

Week 13 (11/15): Postcolonial Theory

Lecture: Manisha Basu, English/African Studies, Illinois

Readings:

Chaturvedi, Vinayak. “Introduction.” Mapping Subaltern Studies and the Postcolonial pp. vii-xix.

Fanon, Frantz. "The Negro and Recognition," from Black Skin, White Masks

Pandey, Gyanendra. “Voices from the Edge: The Struggle to Write Subaltern Histories” from Mapping Subaltern Studies and the Postcolonial. pp. 281-299.

Said, Edward. Introduction to Orientalism (Norton)

Sartre, Jean-Paul. Preface to Frantz Fanon, The Wretched of the Earth

Spivak, Gayatri. "Literature" from Critique of Postcolonial Reason. pp. 112-140;

Optional:

Chakrabarty, Dipesh. “Radical Histories and Question of Enlightenment Rationalism: Some Recent Critiques of Subalternity” from Mapping Subaltern Studies and the Postcolonial. pp 256-280.