| MEMS 200-01 |
Shakespeare & Co.: Love Poems in Early Modern England
Instructor: Carol Ann Johnston
Course Description:
Cross-listed with ENGL 341-02.
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10:30 AM-11:20 AM, MWF
EASTC 301 |
| MEMS 490-01 |
The Senior Experience
Instructor: Chelsea Skalak
Course Description:
Senior Projects and Research in Medieval & Early Modern Studies. Seniors in the major will work independently with a director and a second faculty reader (representing another discipline in the major) to produce a lengthy paper or special project which focuses on an issue relevant to the cluster of courses taken previously. Under the direction of the program coordinator, students will meet collectively 2 or 3 times during the semester with the directors (and, if possible, other MEMS faculty) to share bibliographies, research data, early drafts, and the like. This group will also meet at the end of the semester to discuss and evaluate final papers and projects.Prerequisite. 200; four-course "cluster."
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| MEMS 500-02 |
Medieval History
Instructor: Peter Schadler
Course Description:
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| Courses Offered in AFST |
| AFST 220-04 |
The Atlantic Slave Trade and Africans in the Making of the Atlantic World, 1450-1850
Instructor: Robin Crigler
Course Description:
Cross-listed with HIST 272-01 and LALC 272-01. During several centuries of European colonization in the New World, a thriving slave trade forced the emigration of millions of Africans across the Atlantic-an immigration far larger than the simultaneous immigration of Europeans to the same regions. We will address not only the workings of the slave trade on both sides (and in the middle) of the Atlantic, but also the cultural communities of West and West-Central Africa and encounters and exchanges in the new slave societies of North and South America. Through examination of work processes, social orders, cultural strategies and influences, and ideas about race and geography, across time and in several regions, we will explore the crucial roles of Africans in the making of the Atlantic world
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01:30 PM-02:45 PM, MR
DENNY 103 |
| Courses Offered in ARTH |
| ARTH 102-01 |
An Introduction to the History of Art
Instructor: Ty Vanover
Course Description:
This course surveys art of the European renaissance through the contemporary period. Art will be examined within the historical context in which it was produced, with attention to contemporary social, political, religious, and intellectual movements. Students will examine the meaning and function of art within the different historical periods. In addition, students will learn to analyze and identify different artistic styles.
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03:00 PM-04:15 PM, TF
WEISS 235 |
| ARTH 216-01 |
Goddesses, Prostitutes, Wives, Saints, and Rulers: Women and European Art 1200-1680
Instructor: Melinda Schlitt
Course Description:
Cross-listed with WGSS 201-06. How has the representation of women been constructed, idealized, vilified, manipulated, sexualized, and gendered during what could be broadly called the Renaissance in Europe? How have female artists, such as Sofanisba Anguissola (1532-1625) or Artemisia Gentileschi (1593-1653), among others, represented themselves, men, and other familiar subjects differently from their male counterparts? How have female rulers, like Queen Elizabeth I of England, controlled their own political and cultural self-fashioning through portraiture? What role do the lives and writings of female mystics, like Catherine of Siena (1347-1380) or Teresa of Avila (1515-1582) play in depictions of their physical and spiritual identity? How was beauty and sexuality conceived through the imagery of mythological women, like Venus, or culturally ambivalent women, like courtesans and prostitutes? What kind of art did wealthy, aristocratic women or nuns pay for and use? Through studying primary texts, scholarly literature, and relevant theoretical sources, we will address these and other issues in art produced in Italy, France, Spain, Northern Europe, and England from 1200-1680. The course will be grounded in an understanding of historical and cultural contexts, and students will develop paper topics based on their own interests in consultation with the professor. A screening of the documentary film, A Woman Like That (2009), on the life of Artemisia Gentileschi and a trip to the National Gallery of Art, Washington D.C. will take place during the second half of the semester. Offered every year.
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03:00 PM-04:15 PM, TF
WEISS 221 |
| ARTH 300-01 |
Artists, Audience, Patrons: Art & Architecture of the Italian Renaissance
Instructor: Melinda Schlitt
Course Description:
This course examines painting, sculpture, and architecture in Italy from 1250 to 1570. The work of Giotto, Lorenzetti, Donatello, Masaccio, Brunelleschi, Ghiberti, Botticelli, Leonardo, Raphael, Titian, and Michelangelo, among others will be addressed. Students will study the significance of style, subject-matter, function, patronage, and artistic practice within historical and cultural contexts, and will also address Renaissance interpretations and responses to works of art. Discussion of art-historical theory and criticism as well as Renaissance theory and criticism based in primary texts will be an intrinsic part of the course. Students will acquire the ability to analyze and interpret works of art from the period within the framework outlined above, and will gain a working knowledge of the most significant works and the meaning(s) they have acquired over time. Analysis of primary and secondary sources will be a central focus of the research project, and students will be expected to construct a clear and well-supported interpretive argument over the course of the semester. The course includes a field trip to the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., which has the largest collection of Italian Renaissance painting outside of Europe. Prerequisite: 101 or 102 or permission of the instructor. Offered every year. This course examines painting, sculpture, and architecture in Italy from 1250 to 1570. The work of Giotto, Lorenzetti, Donatello, Masaccio, Brunelleschi, Ghiberti, Botticelli, Leonardo, Raphael, Titian, and Michelangelo, among others will be addressed. Students will study the significance of style, subject-matter, function, patronage, and artistic practice within historical and cultural contexts, and will also address Renaissance interpretations and responses to works of art. Discussion of art-historical theory and criticism as well as Renaissance theory and criticism based in primary texts will be an intrinsic part of the course. Students will acquire the ability to analyze and interpret works of art from the period within the framework outlined above, and will gain a working knowledge of the most significant works and the meaning(s) they have acquired over time. Analysis of primary and secondary sources will be a central focus of the research project, and students will be expected to construct a clear and well-supported interpretive argument over the course of the semester. The course includes a field trip to the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., which has the largest collection of Italian Renaissance painting outside of Europe. Prerequisite: 101 or 102 or permission of the instructor. Offered every year.
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09:00 AM-10:15 AM, TR
WEISS 221 |
| Courses Offered in ENGL |
| ENGL 101-01 |
Medievalism from J.R.R. Tolkien to Game of Thrones
Instructor: Chelsea Skalak
Course Description:
The novels of J.R.R. Tolkien popularized a new era of medievalism in the arts, inspiring an incredible output of novels, art, movies and television, and video and role-playing games. Yet "medievalism" is also often hurled as an insult, indicating outmoded or backwards-looking modes of thought. In this class, we will consider the ramifications of the resurgence of medievalism in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, including questions of genre, politics, history, and the individual in society. Authors include J.R.R. Tolkien, Ursula Le Guin, and G.R.R. Martin.
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09:00 AM-10:15 AM, TR
EASTC 411 |
| ENGL 221-01 |
Life Writing
Instructor: Jacob Sider Jost
Course Description:
In this course we will read texts that represent human lives, including biographies, autobiographies, diaries, memoirs and essays. We will investigate how texts organize and make sense of human lives. Students will also compose their own life-writing texts
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01:30 PM-02:45 PM, TF
EASTC 112 |
| ENGL 331-01 |
Angels and Demons on the Early English Stage
Instructor: Chelsea Skalak
Course Description:
From the soaring orations of God and the admonitions of angels to the blasphemies and deceptions of devils, the denizens of heaven and hell occupied considerable time and space on the medieval and early modern stage. In the mouths of supernatural beings, playwrights could ask challenging questions about subjects such as religion, government, free will, gendered relationships, personal identity, and the nature of literature. This class will explore these issues through the lens of early English drama, from amateur medieval guilds to the rise of professional public theaters, and will conclude with the study of these early works in performance today. Texts will include medieval cycle and morality plays, Marlowe's Doctor Faustus, Shakespeare's Othello, and Ben Jonson's The Devil is an Ass.
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01:30 PM-02:45 PM, MR
EASTC 301 |
| ENGL 341-01 |
The Fairy Way of Writing: Romance, Epic, Fantasy, and Myth in Early Modern England
Instructor: Jacob Sider Jost
Course Description:
In this course we will read texts that imagine fantastical worlds, focusing primarily on England between 1590 and 1800. Authors may include Spenser, Shakespeare, Perrault, Cavendish, Wortley Montagu, Dryden, Swift, as well as popular and children's texts. We will also encounter early modern readers and critics who explore the power of fantasy, such as Dryden, Addison, Boswell, Wordsworth, Coleridge, and Lamb, as well as contemporary scholars of myth and fantasy such as Maria Tatar and Rosemary Jackson.
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03:00 PM-04:15 PM, TF
EASTC 301 |
| ENGL 341-02 |
Shakespeare & Co.: Love Poems in Early Modern England
Instructor: Carol Ann Johnston
Course Description:
Cross-listed with MEMS 200-01. Shakespeare's _Sonnets_ (1603) were late to the party; the "sonnet craze" in the English Renaissance peaked in 1581. But Shakespeare's Sonnets were the life of the party. The narrator falls for a beautiful, wealthy young man, and a dark, enigmatic woman; Shakespeare charts the fickleness of desire and obsession in 154 dazzling poems. Still the most famous love poems in English, Shakespeare's sonnets inflected three major poetry collections: Mary Wroth's _Pamphilia to Amphilanthus_ (1621), in which the lover/speaker is a woman; John Donne's _Songs and Sonnets_ (1633), frank love poems unpublished during Donne's lifetime, and George Herbert's _The Temple_ (1633), subtle poems addressing the nexus of sexual and religious power, published after his death from his hand-written manuscript. These four collections radically revise the tradition of the Petrarchan love poem in which the male lover pines after the fragile, yet unavailable, female beloved. For context, we will begin by reading some sonnets from Petrarch's _Rime Sparse_ (1327-68) to appreciate the conventions of the love poem that Shakespeare & co. revise, trash, blow up, steal, and exploit. We hope to visit the Folger Shakespeare Library to see early printed editions (and first folios).
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10:30 AM-11:20 AM, MWF
EASTC 301 |
| Courses Offered in HIST |
| HIST 213-01 |
Fashion-Backward: Clothed Bodies since the Renaissance
Instructor: Regina Sweeney
Course Description:
Part of the Fashioning the Body, Shaping the Nation Mosaic.
This course will investigate the history of clothing and the development of fashion from the Renaissance into the twentieth century, looking mainly at Europe. Clothing has been intertwined with vital elements of society including definitions of class, gender, race, and national identities. We will explore the role apparel played in courtly consumption, how industrialization transformed how garments were produced, and the rise of fashion houses. The class will also look at representations of clothing and the body - whether in art, advertising or propaganda posters - keeping in mind that the body itself has a history of important changes, for example, in average heights and a dramatic increase in life expectancy and well-being. We will also examine what views of the ideal body were in different historical periods. This course can be taken on its own or as part of the spring 2024 mosaic, "Fashioning the Body, Shaping the Nation: Fashion through the lens of History, Culture, Gender, and Race."
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10:30 AM-11:20 AM, MWF
DENNY 303 |
| HIST 272-01 |
The Atlantic Slave Trade and Africans in the Making of the Atlantic World, 1450-1850
Instructor: Robin Crigler
Course Description:
Cross-listed with AFST 220-04 and LALC 272-01. During several centuries of European colonization in the New World, a thriving slave trade forced the emigration of millions of Africans across the Atlantic-an immigration far larger than the simultaneous immigration of Europeans to the same regions. We will address not only the workings of the slave trade on both sides (and in the middle) of the Atlantic, but also the cultural communities of West and West-Central Africa and encounters and exchanges in the new slave societies of North and South America. Through examination of work processes, social orders, cultural strategies and influences, and ideas about race and geography, across time and in several regions, we will explore the crucial roles of Africans in the making of the Atlantic world. This course is cross-listed as LALC 272. Offered every two years.
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01:30 PM-02:45 PM, MR
DENNY 103 |
| Courses Offered in ITAL |
| ITAL 400-01 |
Love, Sex and Sexuality in Boccaccio's 'Decameron'
Instructor: James McMenamin
Course Description:
This course will focus on Boccaccio's Decameron with a critical eye on the construction of the text and the stylistic complexity of the individual novelle. A special emphasis will be placed on issues and themes related to love, sex, and sexuality, addressing these topics from various perspectives such as sex within and outside marriage, medicine, reproduction, chastity, ethics, immoral behavior, law, sex work, race, religion, and sexual violence. The course will culminate in an interdisciplinary research project that reflects each students personal interests.
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01:30 PM-02:45 PM, MR
BOSLER 222 |
| Courses Offered in LALC |
| LALC 272-01 |
The Atlantic Slave Trade and Africans in the Making of the Atlantic World, 1450-1850
Instructor: Robin Crigler
Course Description:
Cross-listed with AFST 220-04 and HIST 272-01. During several centuries of European colonization in the New World, a thriving slave trade forced the emigration of millions of Africans across the Atlantic-an immigration far larger than the simultaneous immigration of Europeans to the same regions. We will address not only the workings of the slave trade on both sides (and in the middle) of the Atlantic, but also the cultural communities of West and West-Central Africa and encounters and exchanges in the new slave societies of North and South America. Through examination of work processes, social orders, cultural strategies and influences, and ideas about race and geography, across time and in several regions, we will explore the crucial roles of Africans in the making of the Atlantic world. This course is cross-listed as HIST 272. Offered every two years.
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01:30 PM-02:45 PM, MR
DENNY 103 |
| Courses Offered in PHIL |
| PHIL 180-01 |
Political Philosophy
Instructor: Harry Pohlman
Course Description:
Cross-listed with POSC 180-01. An introduction to the history of political thought, focused on such problems as the nature of justice, the meaning of freedom, the requirements of equality, the prevalence of moral dilemmas in political life, the question of whether we ought to obey the law, and the importance of power in politics. We will also discuss how these issues continue to resonate today.This course is cross-listed as POSC 180.
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03:00 PM-04:15 PM, TW
DENNY 313 |
| PHIL 202-01 |
17th and 18th Century Philosophy
Instructor: Emily Kelahan
Course Description:
This course treats the Rationalists, Empiricists and Kant, with particular emphasis on issues in epistemology and metaphysics, such as the possibility and limits of human knowledge, the role of sense perception and reason in knowledge, the nature of substance, God and reality.Prerequisite: one prior course in philosophy or permission of the instructor.
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08:30 AM-09:20 AM, MWF
EASTC 314 |
| Courses Offered in POSC |
| POSC 180-01 |
Political Philosophy
Instructor: Harry Pohlman
Course Description:
Cross-listed with PHIL 180-01. An introduction to the history of political thought, focused on such problems as the nature of justice, the meaning of freedom, the requirements of equality, the prevalence of moral dilemmas in political life, the question of whether we ought to obey the law, and the importance of power in politics. We will also discuss how these issues continue to resonate today.This course is cross-listed as PHIL 180.
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03:00 PM-04:15 PM, TW
DENNY 313 |
| Courses Offered in SPAN |
| SPAN 380-01 |
Early/Modern Crossdressing and Transgression
Instructor: Amaury Leopoldo Sosa
Course Description:
Cross-listed with WGSS 301-04. Why did crossdressing feature so prominently in the literary, theatrical , and cultural texts of the Spanish Siglo de Oro? How did these gender-bending performances captivate the imagination of writers, readers, and theatergoers? What were the aesthetic, ethical, and political consequences of this practice? In this course, we unpack the construction and function of this figure, we examine the threat this tradition poses, and we analyze these transgressions in light of early modern and contemporary theories gender and sexuality. While our primary cases are from Spain (Miguel de Cervantes, Lope de Vega, Tirso de Molina, Pedro Caldern de la Barca, Mara de Zayas y Sotomayor, and Ana Caro Malln de Soto), we compare these to examples from Spanish America (Sor Juana Ins de la Cruz), England (William Shakespeare), and contemporary television and film representations. Throughout, we consider questions of womanhood, desire, honor, vengeance, marriage, religion, nationalism, sovereignty, and resistance. This course will be taught in English with the option for FLIC.
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11:30 AM-12:20 PM, MWF
BOSLER 222 |
| Courses Offered in WGSS |
| WGSS 201-06 |
Goddesses, Prostitutes, Wives, Saints, and Rulers: Women and European Art 1200-1680
Instructor: Melinda Schlitt
Course Description:
Cross-listed with ARTH 216-01.
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03:00 PM-04:15 PM, TF
WEISS 221 |
| WGSS 301-04 |
Early/Modern Crossdressing and Transgression
Instructor: Amaury Leopoldo Sosa
Course Description:
Cross-listed with SPAN 380-01. Why did crossdressing feature so prominently in the literary, theatrical , and cultural texts of the Spanish Siglo de Oro? How did these gender-bending performances captivate the imagination of writers, readers, and theatergoers? What were the aesthetic, ethical, and political consequences of this practice? In this course, we unpack the construction and function of this figure, we examine the threat this tradition poses, and we analyze these transgressions in light of early modern and contemporary theories gender and sexuality. While our primary cases are from Spain (Miguel de Cervantes, Lope de Vega, Tirso de Molina, Pedro Caldern de la Barca, Mara de Zayas y Sotomayor, and Ana Caro Malln de Soto), we compare these to examples from Spanish America (Sor Juana Ins de la Cruz), England (William Shakespeare), and contemporary television and film representations. Throughout, we consider questions of womanhood, desire, honor, vengeance, marriage, religion, nationalism, sovereignty, and resistance. This course will be taught in English with the option for FLIC.
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11:30 AM-12:20 PM, MWF
BOSLER 222 |