Criticism and Marxism
ENGL 359
Spring 2025
| Section:
01
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| Crosslisting:
GRST 259 |
| Course Cluster and Certificates: Social, Cultural, and Critical Theory Certificate |
This course introduces students to the Marxist (or historical-materialist) tradition, with an accent on its centrality to interpretative methods in literary studies and to related fields in the human sciences. We will study foundations, beginning with Marx and Engels, and our reading will carry us through the range of Marxisms that inform contemporary critical practice. We will focus on historical materialism as a style of dialectical thought, uniquely equipped to grasp both our immediate objects of study (literary texts and other cultural productions) and the social forces through which those objects are determined. In the same dialectical mode, we will reflect often on the relation between our work in the classroom and our contemporary social and historical situation. Students with an interest in literary and social theory will benefit from the course, as will students who know a little bit about Marxism but want to understand the logic of this crucial body of thought. |
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| Credit: 1 |
Gen Ed Area Dept:
HA ENGL |
| Course Format: Seminar | Grading Mode: Student Option |
| Level: UGRD |
Prerequisites: None |
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Fulfills a Requirement for: (CSCT)(ENGL)(HRAD-MN) |
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Past Enrollment Probability: 50% - 74% |
| SECTION 01 |
Major Readings: Wesleyan RJ Julia Bookstore
Robert Tucker, ed. THE MARX-ENGELS READER, second edition (W.W. Norton) ISBN 978-0-393-09040-6
Antonio Gramsci, SELECTIONS FROM THE PRISON NOTEBOOKS (International Publishers) ISBN 0-7178-0397-X
A course reader including selections from Roland Barthes, Frantz Fanon, Vladimir Lenin, Leon Trotsky, Rosa Luxemburg, Stuart Hall, Perry Anderson, Fadi Bardawil, Fredric Jameson, Kathi Weeks, Theodor Adorno, and Walter Benjamin.
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Examinations and Assignments:
Five short reading exercises; one medium-length essays. Writing assignments will deal variously with the theoretical texts and the application of historical-materialist methods of reading and critique. |
Additional Requirements and/or Comments:
This course contributes to the fulfillment of ENGL major requirements: Theory, elective.
Research option: Students wishing to fulfill the research-paper requirement for writing an Honors Thesis will write a 20-25pp. research essay and complete only some of the reading exercises.
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| Instructor(s): Garrett,Matthew Carl Times: .M.W... 02:50PM-04:10PM; Location: CRT285; |
| Total Enrollment Limit: 15 | | SR major: 5 | JR major: 5 | | |
| Seats Available: 0 | GRAD: X | SR non-major: 3 | JR non-major: 2 | SO: 0 | FR: 0 |
| Drop/Add Enrollment Requests | | | | | |
| Total Submitted Requests: 7 | 1st Ranked: 3 | 2nd Ranked: 2 | 3rd Ranked: 2 | 4th Ranked: 0 | Unranked: 0 |
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