Course Details

“Language, of course, is constantly being redefined, not just by demagogues, but by people who employ it. Language is we realized. Each word has passed mouth by mouth over the centuries, changed by intonation and accent, changed by wit and utility.” 

—  Solmaz Sharif, “A Poetry of Proximity” (Kenyon Review 2022).

This Honors Seminar will explore post-1988 literary and cultural works about the imperial geographies and spatial imaginaries of the United States. The year 1968 marked a turning point in struggles to transform existing world orders, with the U.S. as one central site of contestation over radical redistributions of space, wealth and power. Fast-forward to 1988: the closing of the Cold War once again promised global transformations in distributions of space, wealth and power.  What was the role of the U.S. in this post-1988 period?  How did longer-standing practices of U.S. settler colonialism, racial capitalism, and imperialism relate to the emerging realities of the approaching millenium?  And why might we turn to literary and cultural works to explore the complex and still-unfinished answers to these questions?

This course proposes that literary and cultural works offer a rich archive for exploring some of the key questions of this period. These works draw attention to the changing ways space, wealth and power are imagined, symbolized, narrated, and materialized, often allowing their audiences to perceive and conceive reality in new ways.  Together we will read a series of critical, literary and cultural works that focus in particular on the “poesis of place,” or how place is seemingly brought into being, in relation to the post-1988 U.S.  Through our readings and discussions, we will explore how language conjures and contests the proximities through which “we” enacts place.

Our reading is not decided yet, will likely select from works by Rabih Alameddine, Zaina Alsous, Billy-Ray Belcourt, Lawrence Chua, Louise Erdrich, Renee Gladman, Kazuo Ishiguro, N.K. Jemisin, Jamaica Kincaid, Solmaz Sharif, Colson Whitehead, Karen Tei Yamashita.

Assignments for the class will focus on engaging these works in class discussion and in weekly short written reflections.  A final project will offer critical and creative options.