UCM courses
Courses at University College Maastricht
Overview of the courses
HUM1012 - Pop songs and Poetry: Theory and Analysis (5 ECTS)
September - October 2011
Coordinator
M.J.H. Meijer
Description
This course is based on the following textbook: Helen Vendler. Poems, Poets, Poetry: An Introduction and Anthology. Second edition. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2002. In three respects we shall amplify Vendler’s book: First, by reading some of the theory on the lyric by literary theorists such as Jonathan Culler, Barbara Johnson, Veronica Forrest-Thomson, Jan de Roder, and others. As an academic, you must learn to read literary theory from firsthand sources. Second, by applying all of the chapters of Vendler’s book to modern songs. Songs are also poems, although they are never considered in the conventional histories of poetry and in lyric theory. This is a strange omission, for not only do the “lyrics” of songs show all properties of poetry, the music of the song can also be seen as an exteriorization or enhancement of the musical element of language, emphasized in “regular” poetry through the use of rhyme, rhythm, structure, and images. The lack of attention to the pop song in books on poetry makes these books a bit outdated. Aim of this course is to give the theory of poetry a new life, by reconnecting it with the song. Finally we will amplify Vendler’s book by focusing on gender, ethnicity and sexuality as relevant categories of analysis in the study of poetry and song. There are significant differences in the ways in which male and female poets and singers express themselves: differences in themes, in the intertextual universes poets/singers choose to position themselves, in the use of genre, in forms of addressing the reader. We will address the question how gender, ethnicity and sexuality could be integrated into the theory of the lyric.
Goals
• To analyze pop songs and poems in depth. • To explore the theory of the lyric. • To integrate gender and diversity into the study of the lyric. • To become familiar with a number of classic Anglo-American poems and influential pop songs.
Instruction language
EN
Prerequisites
Recommended literature
• Vendler, H. (2002). Poems, Poets, Poetry: An Introduction and Anthology. (2nd ed.). Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s. • E-readers.
HUM2003 - The Making of Crucial Differences: ‘Race’, Sexuality, Gender, and Class in Historical Perspective (5 ECTS)
September October 2011
Coordinator
U. Brunotte
Description
This course offers a historical inquiry into the evolution of intersecting categories of difference: gender, sexuality, class, ‘race’, from the eighteenth century until World War II. It aims, firstly, to trace and illustrate the ways in which the Enlightenment has provided a rationale to mark gendered, classed and racialized boundaries in science which, more often than not, resulted in inequalities. These inequalities became embedded in European society in such a way that the active, dominant subject came to be seen as ‘white, male, and middle class.’ Moreover, this dominance grew beyond ‘Europe’ and helped to carry out the imperial project. The centrality of empire discursively and materially forged a ‘European-ness’ that was distinctively gendered, classed and racialized. This will introduce you to how middle class was defined in relation to the working class. Secondly, the course will problematize social divisions such as ‘race’, class, and gender as well as norms like heterosexuality, middle-class- ness etc. by looking at shifting boundaries of these divisions and norms. Thus, it will examine the dynamic processes of their formation and contradictions, which emerged out of these processes. We will heed our attention to some of the salient ways in which women and men of the different classes and ‘races’ became embedded in social relationships, thereby often transgressing taken-for-granted lines of differences. We will primarily draw on examples from ‘European’ history. This indeed urges us to look at the world of empire, through which ‘European-ness’ has come to the fore. Finally, the course aims to introduce a wide range of debates that offer the possibility to analyze the ways in which differences have intersected with one another in different periods and how they have manifested themselves in power relations.
Goals
• To acquaint students with historical configurations and intersections of ‘race’, class, gender and sexuality, and the way in which they were conceptualised and sometimes newly invented in science, philosophy and social theory; • To acquaint students with the way in which these configurations have structured cultural texts and images, individual identities and organisations; • To acquaint students with the way in which such intersecting categories of difference have constituted (and still constitute) inequalities and differences of power, resulting in invisibility, restricted access to sources etc.
Recommended literature
• Students can obtain the reader at the University Library. • Each problem is accompanied by a list of obligatory reading. References with a R are found in the reader and those with an L can be found in the University Library.
HUM2018 - Cultural Diversity in a Global Perspective (5 ECTS)
October - December 2011
Coordinator
A. Andeweg
Description
This course focuses on cultural difference and identity in an era in which the nation is losing its unifying significance in matters of personal identity and group identity formation. It seeks to analyze how globalization influences identity and culture and the ways in which these interact with social differences, gender, ethnicity, religion and nationality. Its orientation is both practical and theoretical. Students will get acquainted with different theories of globalization and culture such as Hybridization (Nederveen Pieterse), McDonaldization (Ritzer), or the Clash of Civilizations (Huntington), concepts such as Orientalism (Said) and Occidentalism (Margalit and Buruma), Fundamentalism and Multiculturalism. Throughout the course theoretical discussions are linked to real life, actual and sometimes pressing practical debates and examples such as multicultural dilemmas, national identity formation, fundamentalist terrorism, and migration. Themes: Cultural Diversity; Gender and Ethnicity; National Identity; Multiculturalism; Orientalism; Occidentalism; Fundamentalism. Disciplinary perspectives: Cultural Studies, Migration Studies, Gender and Diversity Studies, Sociology.
Goals
• To teach students to reflect upon issues of globalization and cultural diversity from several disciplinary perspectives and connect these issues with their major field of academic study.
Instruction language
EN
Prerequisites
At least one Humanities course.
Recommended literature
• E-readers. • Nederveen Pieterse, J. (2009). Globalization and Culture. Global Mélange. 2nd edition. New York [etc.]: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers.
HUM3040 Crucial Differences in the 21st Century (5 ECTS)
November – December 2011
Coordinator
Description
This course introduces contemporary perspectives on ‘race’/ethnicity, class, gender and sexuality. You will learn to examine the ways in which such crucial differences are constituted nowadays by asking questions like: how do claimants such as ‘racial’ minorities, ‘Third World’ feminists, gays and lesbians (gathered in so called identity politics movements) reshape the form and content of identities? How is our everyday life constituted and re-constituted by such politics? Does this identity claiming primarily pertain to the symbolic and cultural realms, or does it also effect material inequality? Is claim-making based on ‘difference’ leading to the deepening of the divisions or is it leaving some space for coalition and networking despite — or rather because of — its being based on ‘crucial differences’? Through critical inquiry into major texts, this course dynamically re- conceptualizes the intersections between the divisions of gender, class, ‘race’/ethnicity and sexuality; the relationship between these divisions and the nation-state in the process of globalization; and between theory and practice in ‘difference’ claim-making. Examples we draw on extend beyond Europe. Diversity is furthermore exemplified in our interdisciplinary approach. The course builds on approaches and theories from disciplines such as literature, philosophy, sociology, anthropology, economics, political economy, health science as well as from the fields of gender studies, cultural studies, development studies and migration studies. The interdisciplinary nature of this course , however, does not mean to simply add existing disciplinary strands together. Rather, it will provide you with an opportunity to critically analyze and comprehend the multi-facetedness of the world we are living in. The historical perspectives you may have become acquainted with in the course Crucial Differences A will be a foundation for the contemporary setting you are about to embark on.
Prerequisites
At least one of the following courses: HUM2003 The Making of Crucial Differences (strongly recommended) and/or HUM2011 Cultural Studies II and/or HUM1003 Cultural Studies I
Recommended literature
Each problem is accompanied by a list of obligatory reading. References with R (Reader) are found in the Reader. UCM- students will find the Reader (a folder with copies of the readings) in the Reading Room. References with L (Library) can be found in the University Library.
HUM1003 - Cultural Studies I: Doing Cultural Studies (5 ECTS)
February – April 2012
Coordinator
Description
This course introduces you in the vast and exciting world of Cultural Studies. Cultural Studies is a broad interdisciplinary field of study of the way in which contemporary culture in a broad sense operates and functions. Within Cultural Studies there is a keen attention for the way in which people produce, circulate and use culture. The main questions, which are central to this study of contemporary culture, are questions concerning the production of meaning, concerning power relations, and concerning identity. In answering these questions, the focus not only rests with great works of arts, as is often the case within Literary Studies and Art History, but popular culture is seen as an equally, valuable object of study. The pop star Madonna, fans of David Bowie, advertisements for beauty products, or artifacts like the walk-man or the I-phone, are all seen as part of our culture and their cultural meanings are studied within Cultural Studies. In this course you will be introduced to ways to analyze these and other phenomena from a Cultural Studies perspective. Themes: popular culture; gender and diversity; the circuit of culture (identity, consumption, production, regulation, representation); media-archaeology. Disciplinary perspectives: Cultural Studies, Gender and Diversity Studies, Media Studies, Sociology.
Goals
• To introduce students to the field of Cultural Studies. • To learn what culture and cultural artifacts are within Cultural Studies and how they can be analyzed.
Recommended literature
• E-reader. • Paul du Gay, Stuart Hall, Linda Janes, Hugh Mackay and Keith Negus (1997) Doing Cultural Studies The story-Sony Walkman. Londen/Thousand Oaks/New Delhi: Sage Publication, in ass. with The Open University.
HUM2011 - Cultural Studies II: Reading Contemporary Culture (5 ECTS)
Coordinator
Description
This is a further exploration of the exciting world of cultural studies. In this course the focus is on culturalo representations. Cultural Studies II immerses you in the interdisciplinary theories and practices of (textual and visual) representation, which is basic for the critical analysis of contemporary culture. The connection between ‘representation’ and ‘culture’ is language, for it is through language that we construct, convey, share and communicate meanings. In cultural studies language is broadly defined as ‘a signifying practice’. Language is not just a system of words and their meanings, but also a ‘system of representation’ in which signs and symbols represent concepts and meanings, each ‘language’ consisting of its own signs. Spoken language uses sounds, written language words, in musical language the signs are notes on a scale, and in ‘body language’ the signs are gestures. In themselves such signs are meaningless; they become meaningful practices for what they do in a specific ‘system of representation’. In this course you will study the poetics and politics of cultural phenomena. The poetics of representation refers to a semiotic reading of (textual and visual signs) as developed by linguistic theorists and philosophers as Ferdinand de Saussure and Roland Barthes. The politics of representation deals with the discursive reading of language, which emphasizes the way in which discourses are always involved in power relations, according to Michel Foucault. Throughout this course you will analyze texts, visual materials, phenomena and artifacts from contemporary culture, such as striking pictures and ads of male and female models, pictures of black athletes, television series as the West Wing, TV-cooks as Jamie Oliver and museum exhibitions. The central themes in this course are: gender, ethnicity, and identity; popular culture; representations; semiotics; discourse analysis. The disciplinary perspectives central in this course are: Cultural Studies, Gender and Diversity Studies, Media Studies, Sociology.
Goals
• To analyze texts and images of contemporary culture from a critical perspective. • To study interdisciplinary theories of representation.
Prerequisites
At least one course in the concentration Humanities.
Recommended literature
Hall, S. (1997). Representation. Cultural Representations and Signifying Practices. London: Sage/The Open University .
HUM2053 Gothic Literature: The Dark Side of Modernity (5 ECTS)
April – June 2012
Coordinator
A. Andeweg
Description
The Gothic novel arose in Britain when the increasing preoccupation with individual consciousness that began in the early 18th century collided with the unique cultural anxieties of the late 18th century. It is a response to the tensions and instabilities caused by the innovations of Enlightenment rationalism, political upheaval at home and abroad (the French Revolution) and the transformation of the family from a socio- economic into an affective unit, which introduced new psycho-sexual realities. The Gothic novel has a connection to the invention of the new aesthetic theory of the Sublime (Kant) and the later psychoanalitic discussion of the Uncanny (Freud). The Gothic novel is devoted to an exploration of illegitimate forms of sexuality that subvert the social order, of supernatural phenomena that cannot be accounted for empirically, of experiences and sensations beyond rationality, and of social inequities that are at odds with progressive, emancipatory ideals. One could say that the Gothic novel expresses an ambivalent wavering or double pull between modernity and anti-modernity, and as such, it has accompanied the complex process of modernization ever since, up to this very day. The Gothic has proved to be a prolific cultural strategy, manifesting itself in other countries and other forms of cultural expression such as (pop) music, film, games and fashion. Although the main focus of the course will be on historical Gothic fictions, there will be ample room to discuss contemporary examples.
Goals
• To provide insight into the complex ways in which the arts (in this case, Gothic fictions) respond to the increasing rationalization, disenchantment and individualization of modern Western culture. • To equip students with research skills that will enable them to make an original contribution to comparative inquiries into gothic fictions.
HUM1003 Cultural Studies I or HUM1011 Introduction to Art.
Recommended literature
• Horace Walpole. (1764). The Castle of Otranto. • Immanuel Kant (1790): The Critique of Judgement (excerpt). • Mary Shelley. (1818). Frankenstein or the modern Prometheus. • E.A. Poe. (1838). The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym. and E.A.Poe. (1839). The Fall of the House of Usher, the Tell-tale Heart, The Man of the Crowd, etc. • E.T. A. Hoffmann: The Sand-Man (1816). • Sigmund Freud: The Uncanny (1919). • Robert Louis Stevenson: Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. (1890). • Botting, F. (1996). Gothic. London: Routledge. • Three Gothic Novels. (1986). London etc: Penguin Classics OR: Four Gothic Novels. (1994). Oxford: Oxford Paperbacks. • Edgar E. Poe: Short Stories; The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym (Penguin). • Reading Room, UM Library, e-readers.
E-mail: ucm-info@maastrichtuniversity.nl
Website: www.ucm.nl
