Comparative Literature Department :: University at Buffalo

COL 203 - This Hard Land: The Italian-American Experience
COL 280 - City in Literature
COL 301 - Introduction to Contemporary Literary Theory
COL 315 - Signs and Representations
COL 317 - Body as Text in Modern Japan

COL 203 - THIS HARD LAND: THE ITALIAN-AMERICAN EXPERIENCE (top)

Samuele Pardini
Tue/Thur, 11:00-12:20
Room: Clemens 640
Registration Number: 107042

"We're all immigrants."
--Walter Lippman

"Well, I came to this country because I heard the streets were paved with gold. When I got here I found out three things: first, the streets weren't paved with gold; second, they weren't paved at all; and third, I was expected to pave them."
--Old Italian story

"Well now Columbus he discovered America even though he hadn't planned on it" as Bruce Springsteen sings, and maybe it would have been better if America had not been "discovered" as Mark Twain said once. But life is cruel, both things happened, and since then millions of people came to this country, many of them Italians. The outcome is particularly strong legacy between the two countries, Italy and America, that we will investigate in this course from a cultural point of view.

We will begin by reading Columbus himself and the marvelous things he "imagined", Stephen Greenblatt (excerpts from "Marvelous Possessions" and "new World Encounter") St. John de Crevecoeur ("What is an American?"), Alexis de Tocqueville (excerpts from "Democracy in America"), Frederick Jackson Turner's historical essay on the importance of the frontier in America history (written in 1893, when the main Italian immigration to America was in full progress), C. Van Woodward on American history, Werner Sollors on ethnicity ("The Invention of Ethnicity"), Paul Ginsborg on what he calls "familismo" and Jacques Derrida (excerpts from "The Policy of Friendship"). Then, we will proceed on exploring a number of issues posed by the Italian-American Experience as depicted by Italian, American, and Italian-American writers and filmmakers: Mario Puzo (The Godfather), Gay Talese (Honor the Father, Unto the Sons), Francis Ford Coppola (The Godfather I and II), and Martin Scorsese (Goodfellas) on immigration, cultural codes, and the Mafia (indeed!); Cesare Pavese 9The Moon and the Bonfire) Leonardo Sciascia (American Uncles), and John Fante (Ask the Dust) on imaging/experiencing America and the Great Depression; Henry James (Italian Hours) and Leslie Fiedler (An End to Innocence) on (re)discovering America from Italy; Mario Soldati (The American Bride) Marianna De Marco Torgovnick (Crossing Ocean Park); Camille Paglia (an interview) and the collection "Italian-American Women Folktales" on gender and religion; Frank Lentricchia (The Genealogy of Ice) and Jerry Mangione (Mount Allegro) on identity; Richard Gambino (Vendetta: New Orleans Mass Murder 1891) and Spike Lee (Do the Right Things) on ethnic conflicts; Vincent Schiavelli (Brusculinu, America, and The Sicilian Cookbook) on growing up Italian in Brooklyn and on food; Paul Oriolo (How to Say It: English, Amharic, Italian) on language; Umberto Eco (some excerpts) and Alessandro Portelli (The Death of Luigi Trastulli and Other Stories) on the Italian intellectuals in/and American.

A couple of guests from the Italian-American community in Buffalo will speak on their own experience.

Requirements: a brief (15 minutes) report on a book from a reading list I'll provide at the beginning of the semester, a short midterm paper that you can turn into a fieldwork paper (a genealogical reconstruction of your family tree if you have Italian origins, an interview of a member of your family if of Italian origins or on his/her memories of the Italian community in his/her hometown, a research on the relationship between Italians and other ethnic groups), and a final paper (7-8 pages).

COL 280 - City in Literature (top)

Francesca Muscau
Tues/Thurs, 9:30-11:10
Room: Clemens 640
Registration Number: 312961

From the "eternal city" to the "postmodern space", from Rome to Los Angeles, the metropolitan site has inspired and fascinated a great number of writers. What relation is there between an "eternal city" like Rome, with its monuments congealed in an attainable and forever lost past, and the idea of the "metropolis" as the euphoric site of modernity, synonymous with speed, alienation and expansion? It might not be a surprise that the city always implies contradictions closely confronting each other: present and past, luxury and poverty, night and day, crime and respectability. Dynamism seems to be one of the characteristics of the urban space, where the identity of the individual is constantly problematic, suspended between alienation, anonymity, and euphoria; the feeling of being at the "center of the world" and, at the same time, the sensation of being a "no one" a face in the crowd.

This course intends to explore the development of the idea of the city through a comparative and historical literary inquiry: We will draw a map that will take us on a trip through the most relevant European capitals into the American metropolis; we will visit Paris with Balzac, London with Jean Rhys, Los Angeles with Pynchon…..but that is not certainly all… Our theoretical support will include Benjamin, Marx, Canetti, Derrida.

Requirements: response papers, oral presentation,a final paper.

COL 301 - INTRODUCTION TO CONTEMPORARY LITERARY THEORY (top)

Professor Shaun Irlam
Tues, 3:30-6:40
Room: Norton 214
Registration Number: 140872

These are the days when our work has come asunder
And these are the days when we look for something other
--U2

U2 happens to sum up pretty well a pervasive sense of crisis that currently surrounds the idea of literary or cultural "work" as well as the theoretical inquiries it has occasioned. This course is designed to provide a familiarity with some defining issues, key thinkers, and theoretical texts that have shaped the critical investigation of literature and literariness in the quarter century since the publication of Michel Foucault's Order of Things (1966) and Jacques Derrida's Of Grammatology (1967).

In this course we shall encounter some of the texts and vocabularies of such thinkers as Roland Barthes, Homi Bhabha, Paul de Man, Jacques Derrida, Terry Eagleton, Michel Foucault, Julia Kristeva, Judith Butler, Fredric Jameson, Edward Said, and Gayatri Spivak.

We shall also examine some of the major trends in late twentieth-century literary theory: feminism, structuralism, post- structuralism, deconstruction, new historicism, Marxist criticism, postcolonial theory, psychoanalytic criticism, cultural studies and queer theory.

We shall attempt to understand why critical thinking has witnessed the progressive problematization and critique of all conceptual and foundational vocabularies, including such indispensable terms as "text," "sign" "writing" "meaning" "identity" "representation" "subjectivity" "self" "other" and also, why literary studies has been bedeviled by these inquiries. In addition to becoming familiar with the influential theorists and critical genealogies of the late twentieth century, we shall also try to interrogate the distinctive pathos of theory.

This course does not assume any prior knowledge with any of the authors or texts mentioned above; however, those of you familiar with the writings of some of these figures will know that this is not a course for the faint-hearted. The readings are difficult and demand close and careful reading, but if you're looking for a challenge....

Requirements: active class participation, and three papers during the semester (5-8 pages).

COL 315 - SIGNS AND REPRESENTATIONS (top)

Professor Elizabeth Grosz
Mon/Wed, 11:00-12:20
Room: Clemens 640
Registration Number: 195537

This course is designed to introduce students to many of the major theories and issues arising in contemporary critical theory, from the pioneering work of the founders of structuralism- Ferdinand de Saussure, Charles Sanders Pierce and Claude Levi-Strauss - to the recent critiques of structuralism developed by post-structuralists like Roland Barthes, Michel Foucault, Jacques Derrida and Julia Kristeva. It aims to present an overview of leading figures within twentieth century critical theory, and also a discussion of the major issues raised in his work: according to what models and criteria can one adequately analyze cultural and social life? Should theories of culture and society aspire to the ideals of the natural sciences (as sociology and psychology have tended to do) or should they emulate the models given by the social sciences, most notably linguistics (as anthropology, and some literary theory is inclined towards)? Or are there criteria necessary? If, for example, linguistics is taken to provide a model for cultural production, how adequately can it deal with non-linguistic production of the kind undertaken in the visual and preformatted arts? What are the terms and theoretical methods available to and useful for the analysis of socio-cultural life?

The course itself will be divided into three parts: in the first, basic concepts and pioneering theories will be introduced. Here we will examine the work of Saussure.

COL 317 - BODY AS TEXT IN MODERN JAPAN (top)

Professor Margherita Long
Tues/Thurs, 12:30-1:50
Room: Alumni Arena 88
Registration Number: 079945

This course explores how men and women in modern Japan have tried to understand the human body and its representation. Is the body a passive surface? Or can bodies themselves make meaning? We will examine atomic bomb sickness, discrimination against the "untouchable" caste, maternity, hysteria, fashion, prostitution, animation, and computerization. The texts are both visual and narrative: woodblock prints, papercuts, ink drawings, stories, poems, novels, films, and anime. Authors include Kuki Shuzo, Hayashi Kyoko, Nakagami Kenji and Murakami Haruki. Artists include Utamaro, Takamura Chieko, and Okamoto Taro. Films include Ichikawa Kon, Tokyo Olympiad, Imamura Shôhei, Black Rain, Jim Jarmusch, Ghost Dog Way of the Samurai, and Oshii Mamoru, Ghost in the Shell. Grading is based on class participation, two 3-page papers, and a final 8-page paper. No prior knowledge of Japan is required. All texts are in translation. The course is small seminar format.


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	:: Fall 2001 - Undergraduate Courses
Graduate Undergraduate Course Archive	COL 203 - This Hard Land: The Italian-American Experience COL 280 - City in Literature COL 301 - Introduction to Contemporary Literary Theory COL 315 - Signs and Representations COL 317 - Body as Text in Modern Japan COL 203 - THIS HARD LAND: THE ITALIAN-AMERICAN EXPERIENCE (top) Samuele Pardini Tue/Thur, 11:00-12:20 Room: Clemens 640 Registration Number: 107042 "We're all immigrants." --Walter Lippman "Well, I came to this country because I heard the streets were paved with gold. When I got here I found out three things: first, the streets weren't paved with gold; second, they weren't paved at all; and third, I was expected to pave them." --Old Italian story "Well now Columbus he discovered America even though he hadn't planned on it" as Bruce Springsteen sings, and maybe it would have been better if America had not been "discovered" as Mark Twain said once. But life is cruel, both things happened, and since then millions of people came to this country, many of them Italians. The outcome is particularly strong legacy between the two countries, Italy and America, that we will investigate in this course from a cultural point of view. We will begin by reading Columbus himself and the marvelous things he "imagined", Stephen Greenblatt (excerpts from "Marvelous Possessions" and "new World Encounter") St. John de Crevecoeur ("What is an American?"), Alexis de Tocqueville (excerpts from "Democracy in America"), Frederick Jackson Turner's historical essay on the importance of the frontier in America history (written in 1893, when the main Italian immigration to America was in full progress), C. Van Woodward on American history, Werner Sollors on ethnicity ("The Invention of Ethnicity"), Paul Ginsborg on what he calls "familismo" and Jacques Derrida (excerpts from "The Policy of Friendship"). Then, we will proceed on exploring a number of issues posed by the Italian-American Experience as depicted by Italian, American, and Italian-American writers and filmmakers: Mario Puzo (The Godfather), Gay Talese (Honor the Father, Unto the Sons), Francis Ford Coppola (The Godfather I and II), and Martin Scorsese (Goodfellas) on immigration, cultural codes, and the Mafia (indeed!); Cesare Pavese 9The Moon and the Bonfire) Leonardo Sciascia (American Uncles), and John Fante (Ask the Dust) on imaging/experiencing America and the Great Depression; Henry James (Italian Hours) and Leslie Fiedler (An End to Innocence) on (re)discovering America from Italy; Mario Soldati (The American Bride) Marianna De Marco Torgovnick (Crossing Ocean Park); Camille Paglia (an interview) and the collection "Italian-American Women Folktales" on gender and religion; Frank Lentricchia (The Genealogy of Ice) and Jerry Mangione (Mount Allegro) on identity; Richard Gambino (Vendetta: New Orleans Mass Murder 1891) and Spike Lee (Do the Right Things) on ethnic conflicts; Vincent Schiavelli (Brusculinu, America, and The Sicilian Cookbook) on growing up Italian in Brooklyn and on food; Paul Oriolo (How to Say It: English, Amharic, Italian) on language; Umberto Eco (some excerpts) and Alessandro Portelli (The Death of Luigi Trastulli and Other Stories) on the Italian intellectuals in/and American. A couple of guests from the Italian-American community in Buffalo will speak on their own experience. Requirements: a brief (15 minutes) report on a book from a reading list I'll provide at the beginning of the semester, a short midterm paper that you can turn into a fieldwork paper (a genealogical reconstruction of your family tree if you have Italian origins, an interview of a member of your family if of Italian origins or on his/her memories of the Italian community in his/her hometown, a research on the relationship between Italians and other ethnic groups), and a final paper (7-8 pages). COL 280 - City in Literature (top) Francesca Muscau Tues/Thurs, 9:30-11:10 Room: Clemens 640 Registration Number: 312961 From the "eternal city" to the "postmodern space", from Rome to Los Angeles, the metropolitan site has inspired and fascinated a great number of writers. What relation is there between an "eternal city" like Rome, with its monuments congealed in an attainable and forever lost past, and the idea of the "metropolis" as the euphoric site of modernity, synonymous with speed, alienation and expansion? It might not be a surprise that the city always implies contradictions closely confronting each other: present and past, luxury and poverty, night and day, crime and respectability. Dynamism seems to be one of the characteristics of the urban space, where the identity of the individual is constantly problematic, suspended between alienation, anonymity, and euphoria; the feeling of being at the "center of the world" and, at the same time, the sensation of being a "no one" a face in the crowd. This course intends to explore the development of the idea of the city through a comparative and historical literary inquiry: We will draw a map that will take us on a trip through the most relevant European capitals into the American metropolis; we will visit Paris with Balzac, London with Jean Rhys, Los Angeles with Pynchon…..but that is not certainly all… Our theoretical support will include Benjamin, Marx, Canetti, Derrida. Requirements: response papers, oral presentation,a final paper. COL 301 - INTRODUCTION TO CONTEMPORARY LITERARY THEORY (top) Professor Shaun Irlam Tues, 3:30-6:40 Room: Norton 214 Registration Number: 140872 These are the days when our work has come asunder And these are the days when we look for something other --U2 U2 happens to sum up pretty well a pervasive sense of crisis that currently surrounds the idea of literary or cultural "work" as well as the theoretical inquiries it has occasioned. This course is designed to provide a familiarity with some defining issues, key thinkers, and theoretical texts that have shaped the critical investigation of literature and literariness in the quarter century since the publication of Michel Foucault's Order of Things (1966) and Jacques Derrida's Of Grammatology (1967). In this course we shall encounter some of the texts and vocabularies of such thinkers as Roland Barthes, Homi Bhabha, Paul de Man, Jacques Derrida, Terry Eagleton, Michel Foucault, Julia Kristeva, Judith Butler, Fredric Jameson, Edward Said, and Gayatri Spivak. We shall also examine some of the major trends in late twentieth-century literary theory: feminism, structuralism, post- structuralism, deconstruction, new historicism, Marxist criticism, postcolonial theory, psychoanalytic criticism, cultural studies and queer theory. We shall attempt to understand why critical thinking has witnessed the progressive problematization and critique of all conceptual and foundational vocabularies, including such indispensable terms as "text," "sign" "writing" "meaning" "identity" "representation" "subjectivity" "self" "other" and also, why literary studies has been bedeviled by these inquiries. In addition to becoming familiar with the influential theorists and critical genealogies of the late twentieth century, we shall also try to interrogate the distinctive pathos of theory. This course does not assume any prior knowledge with any of the authors or texts mentioned above; however, those of you familiar with the writings of some of these figures will know that this is not a course for the faint-hearted. The readings are difficult and demand close and careful reading, but if you're looking for a challenge.... Requirements: active class participation, and three papers during the semester (5-8 pages). COL 315 - SIGNS AND REPRESENTATIONS (top) Professor Elizabeth Grosz Mon/Wed, 11:00-12:20 Room: Clemens 640 Registration Number: 195537 This course is designed to introduce students to many of the major theories and issues arising in contemporary critical theory, from the pioneering work of the founders of structuralism- Ferdinand de Saussure, Charles Sanders Pierce and Claude Levi-Strauss - to the recent critiques of structuralism developed by post-structuralists like Roland Barthes, Michel Foucault, Jacques Derrida and Julia Kristeva. It aims to present an overview of leading figures within twentieth century critical theory, and also a discussion of the major issues raised in his work: according to what models and criteria can one adequately analyze cultural and social life? Should theories of culture and society aspire to the ideals of the natural sciences (as sociology and psychology have tended to do) or should they emulate the models given by the social sciences, most notably linguistics (as anthropology, and some literary theory is inclined towards)? Or are there criteria necessary? If, for example, linguistics is taken to provide a model for cultural production, how adequately can it deal with non-linguistic production of the kind undertaken in the visual and preformatted arts? What are the terms and theoretical methods available to and useful for the analysis of socio-cultural life? The course itself will be divided into three parts: in the first, basic concepts and pioneering theories will be introduced. Here we will examine the work of Saussure. COL 317 - BODY AS TEXT IN MODERN JAPAN (top) Professor Margherita Long Tues/Thurs, 12:30-1:50 Room: Alumni Arena 88 Registration Number: 079945 This course explores how men and women in modern Japan have tried to understand the human body and its representation. Is the body a passive surface? Or can bodies themselves make meaning? We will examine atomic bomb sickness, discrimination against the "untouchable" caste, maternity, hysteria, fashion, prostitution, animation, and computerization. The texts are both visual and narrative: woodblock prints, papercuts, ink drawings, stories, poems, novels, films, and anime. Authors include Kuki Shuzo, Hayashi Kyoko, Nakagami Kenji and Murakami Haruki. Artists include Utamaro, Takamura Chieko, and Okamoto Taro. Films include Ichikawa Kon, Tokyo Olympiad, Imamura Shôhei, Black Rain, Jim Jarmusch, Ghost Dog Way of the Samurai, and Oshii Mamoru, Ghost in the Shell. Grading is based on class participation, two 3-page papers, and a final 8-page paper. No prior knowledge of Japan is required. All texts are in translation. The course is small seminar format.
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