Major Problems of American Literary and Cultural History: Witchcraft, Escapology, Elevation, Pain and How to do Cultural Studies - Detailseite

Moodle: https://moodle.hu-berlin.de/course/view.php?id=135505

This class takes a look at seven historical practices from the course of American Cultural History. Every single one could be a topic for an entire seminar. What we want to do here is to discuss how cultural studies work, i.e. we will take the seven practices as examples for cultural studies methodologies and theories. We will explore terms and concepts to describe the practices and discuss how we can talk about them, what we can learn from them, and how we can productively study them. The seven practices are theoretically timeless – but I have chosen material in a way so that it covers the periods from the 17^th to the 21^st. centuries. The practices are: 1) witchcraft 2) self-making 3) exhibitions 4) photographies of pain 5) Escapology 6) Elevation 7) Live/Work/Pose. Master students who need a more concise introduction to American literary and cultural history are more than welcome to participate in the lecture for the BA students (Mondays, 4-6 PM, room ????: https://moodle.hu-berlin.de/course/view.php?id=135499  - please ask me for the Moodle course key).

Registration: You should register for the class through Agnes so that I can send you the Moodle key. If you cannot register for some reason, please send me an email (martin.klepper@hu-berlin.de).

Reading:

• The texts for the class will be up-loaded onto the Moodle platform. The key to Moodle will be announced through Agnes.

Course Requirements:

As a preparation for the module exam students have to hand in a 4 page essay on one topic from the course syllabus (announced by the instructor) by Christmas. As a Modul examination (in February) students will write a take-home exam with essay questions from this class and the class "Theories of American Studies". For this exam you are expected to prepare one topic from the syllabus (you will be given a choice) in depth. You can only do the Module Exam once you have taken both of these classes (This class and the Theories-class).