Admission requirements
Students must be enrolled in a MA, ReMA, or PhD program at a Dutch University. A background in Gender Studies, Critical Race Theory, Colonial History, or Literature and Media Studies is preferable, but not required.
Description
What are the “genres of the human”? In this course we will speculate on the question of what literary (and artistic) genres might invigorate the imagination to conceive of other genres of the human beyond the version of Human modeled on White European Man. This MA-level comparative literature elective uses the framework of “the law of genre” outlined by Jacques Derrida to examine how convention and social laws operate to divide texts into different genres (literary and artistic), and similarly define the human species vis-a-vis other species (genre humain). We will investigate which forms of violence, physical or epistemic, precipate the mark of genre in instances of categorization, taxonomy, and aesthetic judgment.
Broadly, this course is concerned with gender and diversity concepts developed in critical and cultural theories that challenge the humanist centering of a foundational subject, like ‘Woman’ or a ‘Black community.’ Hence, the course will move through a series of five newly combative approaches to investigating how difference between humans is produced and, relatedly, how different values accorded to (non-) European culture are produced. Together we will explore the question of how these new approaches can be engaged to deepen our critical understandings of cultural theory today and the literary category of genre.
Black philosophy such as practiced by Sylvia Wynter has offered the insight that White Man is but one genre of the human and that racial arrangements are at the core of defining some as fully human and others as less than human. The field of Animal studies raises the question of who is this animal that calls itself human, or differentiates itself from other (nonhuman) animals by killing them? The self in self-determination is under critical scrutiny in Indigenous theories of sovereignty as well as in de-colonial thinking that breaks with (pre-)(post-)modern assumptions about being fully human deriving from land ownership central to colonial/settler cultural domination. In Critical Intersex and Transgender Studies, a non-binary gendered or sexed self arrives in contradistinction to Northern, racialized assumptions perpetuated by medical discourse on the ‘wrong body’. Finally, Disability studies grapples with the norms of whose bodies are rendered capable, and desirable, in turn offering a different set of aesthetics by which to evaluate difference.
We will pursue these critical questions of genre and the human through recently published literature, poetry, theoretical writings, and cultural objects selected by the instructor, and by students. The first session on each of the five topics will be led by the instructor, and the second session will be led by student seminar leaders who take responsibility for determining how to continue the discussion according to their own interests, and in communication with the instructor. Additional sessions will include an introduction to gender and diversity studies, and student presentations of their creative assignment to experiment with genre.
Course objectives
Students will gain knowledge of and insights into the humanistic tradition of gender and diversity studies while becoming aware of new approaches within this field;
they must be able to use these new approaches in their analyses of the limits of the human and related cultural interventions; during the course the student must learn to engage with cultural differences underpinning the critique of the human;
they must understand the role of genre in relation to cultural texts, types, and categories; and they will deepen their critical understandings of the cultural edge of the animal, ability, settler/colonial, colonial/postcolony, trans/cisgender, sex typicality, and racialized groups.
In addition to these theoretical developments, the student will also train their skills in oral presentation, facilitation of group discussion, research-focused and creative writing.
Timetable
The timetables are available through MyTimetable
Mode of instruction
Seminar
Assessment method
Assessment
Oral Presentation
- (Co-)chairing a session including selection of reading material/cultural object, presenting materials for discussion;
Final research paper proposal
Final research paper
Creative Assignment (Complete/Incomplete)
A work of visual art, (fiction) writing, or performance.
A 300-word artist statement
Completion is mandatory to successfully complete the course.
Weighing
Oral Presentation (30%)
Final research paper proposal (10%)
Final research paper (60%)
Creative Assignment (Complete/Incomplete)
To complete the course successfully, students need to score a 5,5 or higher on the Final research paper, have a weighted average of at least 5.5 for the entire course, and complete the creative assignment.
Resit
Should the weighted average yield an insufficient grade or should the Final research paper result in an insufficient grade, then the student will be offered an opportunity for revising the final research paper (60% of the grade) as the resit.
Inspection and feedback
How and when a paper review will take place will be disclosed together with the publication of the paper results at the latest. If a student requests a review within 30 days after publication of the paper results, an paper review will have to be organised.
Reading list
The reading list will be made available up to a few weeks before the start of classes. Most assigned texts will be available online via the Leiden University Library. Texts that are not available online will be made available via a reading shelf in the library.
The following literature should be purchased or gathered by the student:
Claudia Rankine, Citizen: An American Lyric. Minneapolis: Grey Wolf Press, 2014.
Marie Darrieussecq, Pig Tales: A Novel of Lust and Transformation. Croydon, UK: Faber and Faber, 1997.
Juliet Jacques, Trans: A Memoir. London: Verso, 2015.
Registration
Enrolment through My Studymap is mandatory.
General information about course and exam enrolment is available on the website.
Registration À la carte education, Contract teaching and Exchange
For the registration of exchange students contact Humanities International Office. À la carte education and Contract teaching not applicable.
Contact
For substantive questions, contact the lecturer listed in the right information bar.
For questions about enrolment, admission, etc, contact the Education Administration Office: Arsenaal.
Remarks
Not applicable