Humanities Arts Cultural Stu 0274 - Aesthetics, Politics, Address

Philosophers and critical theorists such as Fanon, Althusser, Foucault, Butler, Johnson, and Ahmed indicate that subjectivity, embodiment, and social difference emerge within relationships of address among persons, and among persons and objects. Cultural critics place address at the center of the ethical, political, and aesthetic dimensions of artworks and other cultural productions. What can we learn about representation and reading by considering modes in which we address and are addressed? What insights into institutionality, power, and the global does a framework of address make possible? What conceptions of address inform writings by Benjamin, Barthes, Hansen, Bhabha, Kafka, and Cortazar, among others? How is address linked to desire, experience, publicity, collectivity, aesthetic form, perception, materiality, technology, and the senses? These questions form our point of entry into key texts in twentieth- and twenty-first century philosophy and cultural criticism. Prerequisites: Two theory courses required. Division II and III students only.

Writing and Research Multiple Cultural Perspectives Independent Work In this course, students are expected to spend 7-8 hours weekly in prepartion and work outside of class time. Prerequisite: Division II and III students only.