CUL 610: INTERCULTURAL STUDIES: HISTORY AND THEORY

Instructor: Wimal Dissanayake

Tel: 262-4539

Email: ddissa@yahoo.com

Course Meets: W 1:30-4:20 in Burns 2121/2125

COURSE DESCRIPTION:

This course provides an introduction to the history and theory of cultural studies, an interdisciplinary field that explores the meanings and functions of “culture” from diverse perspectives. Raymond Williams focuses on three definitions within cultural analysis – ideal, documentary and social. We will examine the interplay among these three intersecting conceptions. Rather than seeing culture as something that is fixed and inherent in particular nations or collectivities, cultural studies perceives culture as something that is constructed and evolves through specific historical, political, economic, and social processes. Therefore, cultural studies analyzes culture not only through formal or aesthetic perspectives but more in the context of material conditions in which it is produced, disseminated, controlled an practiced. We will read and discuss various frameworks and methods employed in such investigations.

The intellectual roots of cultural studies can be seen in the writings of various European thinkers of the twentieth century. The course will focus on some of the most influential theories that have broad relevance to many areas of inquiry. At the same time, we will examine – and sometimes challenge – the relevance of these theories to the production of ‘situated knowledge” within our own distinct contexts of interest. In other words, we will discuss how the specific conditions of the modern world – i.e. the increasing flows of culture, capital, people in the age of globalization – and also our location in the Pacific – with the history of (neo)colonialism, immigration, and cultural hybridity – both necessitates and enable re-thinking of the conceptual issues and theoretical questions generated by cultural studies. The way the social imaginary is inflected by popular culture and media and how cultural theorists think about it will form an important part of our collective investigation.

REQUIRED TEXT:

Simon During – The Cultural Studies Reader

EVALUATION

Class participation 30%

Short paper 30%

Final paper 40%

READING SCHEDULE

Week 1

Introduction to course

What is cultural studies?

John Storey, What is Cultural Studies (London: Arnold, 1996)

Graham Turner, British Cultural Studies ( London: Routledge, 2002)

Week 2

The Idea of culture: Clifford Geertz – Raymond Williams

Clifford Geertz – The Interpretation of Cultures (New York: Basic Books, 1973)

Raymond Williams, Marxism and Literature (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1977)

Sherry B. Ortner, The Fate of Culture (Berkley: University of California Press, 1999)

Week 3

Questions of representation: Roland Barthes – Jean Baudrillard -Stuart Hall

Roland Barthes, Image-Music-Text (New York: Noonday, 1977)

Jean Baudrillard, Simulations (New York: Semiotext(e), 1983)

Stuart Hall, Representation and the Media (DVD)

Week 4

Power and cultural production: Michel Foucault – Michel de Certeau – Pierre Bourdieu

Michel Foucault, Discipline and Punish (London: Allen Lane, 1977)

Michel de Certeau, The Practice of Everyday Life (Berkley: University of California Press,1984)

Pierre Bourdieu, Distinction (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1984)

Week 5

Ideology and cultural texts: Louis Althusser – Antonio Gramsci

Louis Althusser, For Marx (London: Allen Lane,1969)

Antonio Gramsci, Selections from Prison Notebooks (London: Lawrence and Wishart, 1971)

Week 6

Globalization and media: Fredric Jameson – Arjun Appadurai

Fredric Jameson, The Geopolitical Aesthetic (London: BFI Publishing, 1992)

Arjun Appadurai, Modernity at Large (Minneapolis: Minnesota University Press, 1996)

Rob Wilson and Wimal Dissanayake, Global/Local: Cultural Production and the Transnational Imaginary (Durham: Duke University Press, 1996)

Week 7

Postcolonial theory and cultural studies: Edward Said – Gaytri Spivak – Homi Bhabha

Edward Said, Orientalism (London: Routledge, 1978)

Gayatri Spivak, In Other Worlds (New York: Routledge, 1987)

Homi Bhabha, The Location of Culture (NewYork: Routledge, 1994)

Week 8

Feminism and cultural studies: Meaghan Morris – Rey Chow

Meaghan Morris, The Pirate’s Fiancee (London: Verso, 1988)

Rey Chow, Sentimental Fabulations ( New York: Columbia University Press, 2007)