This seminar is designed to provide English majors with intensive and closely supervised work in critical reading and writing. Although sections of the course may address any literary question, period, or genre, they all provide an introduction to critical and methodological problems in literary studies.

The perceived divide between humans and the natural world has been defined as one of the most important frameworks under which our thoughts and behaviors are constructed. This has unquestionably been the case with the United States, whose landscapes and all they contain, from the country’s foundation to the 21st century, have been primarily framed and utilized politically and economically as raw resources for human enterprises. Yet American literature—from its earliest examples to today’s offerings—is filled with a rich diversity of depictions of the natural world and human-nature interactions. From white whales that encapsulate the awesome terror of the nonhuman world (and all the paradoxical human sentiments such terror inspires) to explicit love for parasitic insects that exemplify nature’s violent yet wondrous diversity, the United States has witnessed not only a wildly manifold and changing landscape, but a wildly diverse body of writings on the natural world. In this course, we will examine some of the ways in which relationships between humans and nature are represented in American literature; what histories, perceptions, and biases inform such representations; and what the real-world consequences of particular representations may be. We will gain a sense of how writing can influence feelings about nature, open up a space to interrogate ingrained assumptions about nature, and even shape major political decisions regarding the natural world. A few broad questions we will consider during this class include: What precisely is nature? How have particular American cultures (or even particular individuals) opposed or embraced it, and why? And how have certain human identities and behaviors been elevated “above” nature, stigmatized as “unnatural,” or even denigrated because of their supposed closeness to nature?

Book List:

The Norton Book of Nature Writing, College Edition, Ed. Robert Finch & John Elder

Repeat Rules

Requirements class fulfills