552.305 (17S) Focus on Literature: American Border Fictions

Sommersemester 2017

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Erster Termin der LV
01.03.2017 14:00 - 16:00 N.0.27 On Campus
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Überblick

Lehrende/r
LV-Titel englisch Focus on Literature: American Border Fictions
LV-Art Seminar (prüfungsimmanente LV )
Semesterstunde/n 2.0
ECTS-Anrechnungspunkte 6.0
Anmeldungen 16 (25 max.)
Organisationseinheit
Unterrichtssprache Englisch
LV-Beginn 01.03.2017
eLearning zum Moodle-Kurs
Anmerkungen

Attendance of the first session on March 8 is MANDATORY

Zeit und Ort

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LV-Beschreibung

Intendierte Lernergebnisse

Students will learn how to read American border fictions from a variety of authors and ethnic perspectives critically, historically, and contextually. They will get a better understanding of the current social and political conflicts around American immigration policies and learn how literary texts can speak to such conflicts despite or because of their fictionality. They will learn why themes like identity formation, assimilation, cultural hybridity and multiculturalism are of central importance to discourses around American border fictions and realities. 

Lehrmethodik inkl. Einsatz von eLearning-Tools

Short lecture inputs, close analysis and discussion of assigned texts.

Inhalt/e

U.S. borders have always been both porous and heavily policed. This is especially true for the country’s 1,989 mile-long border with Mexico, which over the centuries has been the site of countless conflicts and crossings, both real and imagined. In this seminar, we will start out with a look at the contemporary media coverage of the Trump administration’s border wall project and the broad public resistance to its immigration policies. We will complement and complicate these readings with the first chapter of Gloria Anzaldúa’s Borderlands/La Frontera. Next we will turn to T.C. Boyle’s Tortilla Curtain, a novel that explores illegal immigration against a background of xenophobia, poverty, and environmental destruction. Helena Maria Viramontes’s novella Under the Feet of Jesus will help us imagine the strenuous lives of migrant workers in the orchards of California. Our last novel is Karen Tei Yamashita’s Tropic of Orange, a daringly postmodern text that confronts readers with a multitude of divergent voices from both sides of the border.  We will then conclude the semester with Steven Soderbergh’s crime drama film Traffic, which offers a very different perspective on the US-Mexican border, and with a guest lecture by the capital mitigation specialist Patricia VanSandt, who has worked on several gang-violence related death penalty cases in the U.S. Throughout the semester, we will explore border fictions and realities and discuss how they are shaped by notions of gender, religion, nationality, and ethnic identity.

Literatur

T.C. Boyle. Tortilla Curtain. (any edition)

Maria Helena Viramontes. Under the Feet of Jesus. (any edition)

Karen Tei Yamashita. Tropic of Orange. (any edition)

All other texts will be provided by the instructor. 

Prüfungsinformationen

Im Fall von online durchgeführten Prüfungen sind die Standards zu beachten, die die technischen Geräte der Studierenden erfüllen müssen, um an diesen Prüfungen teilnehmen zu können.

Prüfungsmethode/n

Mid-term test

Final test

SE-paper (3,500 words)

Prüfungsinhalt/e

The two tests will cover the assigned literary texts. Free choice of topic by students for the final paper, as long as there is a focus on American literature that focuses on border and immigration issues.

Beurteilungskriterien/-maßstäbe

30% participation 

30% - tests (midterm & final test) 

40% - SE-paper 

Beurteilungsschema

Note Benotungsschema

Position im Curriculum

  • Diplom-Lehramtsstudium Unterrichtsfach Englisch (SKZ: 344, Version: 04W.7)
    • 2.Abschnitt
      • Fach: Advanced Culture Studies (Pflichtfach)
        • SE zu Topics in American Culture Studies ( 2.0h SE / 5.0 ECTS)
          • 552.305 Focus on Literature: American Border Fictions (2.0h SE / 5.0 ECTS)
  • Bachelorstudium Anglistik und Amerikanistik (SKZ: 612, Version: 15W.3)
    • Fach: Fachliches Vertiefungsstudium (Pflichtfach)
      • 7.2 (b) Focus on Literature ( 0.0h SE / 6.0 ECTS)
        • 552.305 Focus on Literature: American Border Fictions (2.0h SE / 6.0 ECTS)
          Absolvierung im 4., 5. Semester empfohlen
  • Bachelorstudium Anglistik und Amerikanistik (SKZ: 612, Version: 15W.3)
    • Fach: Freie Kombination (Wahlfach)
      • 10.1 Freie Kombination ( 0.0h SE / 12.0 ECTS)
        • 552.305 Focus on Literature: American Border Fictions (2.0h SE / 6.0 ECTS)
          Absolvierung im 5., 6. Semester empfohlen
  • Bachelorstudium Anglistik und Amerikanistik (SKZ: 612, Version: 10W.3)
    • Fach: Fachliches Vertiefungsstudium (Pflichtfach)
      • Focus on Literature ( 2.0h SE / 7.0 ECTS)
        • 552.305 Focus on Literature: American Border Fictions (2.0h SE / 7.0 ECTS)
  • Bachelorstudium Anglistik und Amerikanistik (SKZ: 612, Version: 10W.3)
    • Fach: Freie Kombination (Wahlfach)
      • Freie Kombination ( 0.0h XX / 11.0 ECTS)
        • 552.305 Focus on Literature: American Border Fictions (2.0h SE / 7.0 ECTS)

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