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Emily Balch Seminars Course Descriptions Fall 2025
 

Sec. 001 Sense and Nonsense
Instructor: Jen Callaghan (Writing Program)
MW 1:10-2:30

“I like nonsense, it wakes up the brain cells…,” said children’s author Dr. Seuss. “It’s a way of looking at life through the wrong end of a telescope.” In this seminar, we will think deeply about the playful illogic of absurdity, poppycock, and gibberish to tease out their whys, hows, and what-fors. What is nonsense? Is it possible to make sense of nonsense? What purposes beyond entertainment can nonsense serve? To help us critically examine nonsense, we’ll consider ways in which humans try to make sense of the world and what role our senses—sight, smell, touch, taste, hearing—play in our understanding of it. Our inquiry will draw on texts from literature, philosophy, visual art, and science. Topics will include the literary nonsense of Lewis Carroll and Edward Gorey; the wisdom of InspiroBot; the avant-garde art movement Dada; political satire; and indigenous logics. Through frequent short writing assignments that lead to longer analytical and argumentative essays, students will learn strategies for generating and organizing ideas, drafting, and revising.
 

Sec. 002 The Alps, Italy, and the Emergence of European Modernism
Instructor: Federico Sessolo (Italian Studies)
TTh 11:40-1:00

After the Industrial Revolution, Europeans developed a deep fascination with the Alps. Books, paintings, and newspapers promoted the image of a remote, sublime landscape, a place where one might escape urban life and reconnect with a purer, more elemental nature. But this romantic vision did not last. Tourism, scientific expeditions, and the devastation of the Great War radically transformed the perception of the highest and largest mountain range in Europe. By 1918, the Alps had become sites of loss, fragmentation, and even horror. How did a space of spiritual clarity become a landscape of existential crisis?

In this seminar, we will hike through the works of authors, philosophers, and painters to retrace the emergence of Modernism thanks to one of its most unexpected protagonists: the Alps. While offering a transnational context and introducing ecocritical approaches, the course will focus primarily on Italian literature, including works by Luigi Pirandello, G.A. Borgese, Mario Rigoni Stern, Italo Svevo, Scipio Slataper, and others. Students will complete a series of writing assignments that interrogate the complex relations among humans, landscapes, and art.

Sec. 003 The American Short Story
Instructor: Daniel Torday (Creative Writing)
TTh 11:40-1:00

Readers love the American short story because it has developed into as uniquely an American art form as, say, jazz or hip hop. Since the middle of the 19th century, when Melville, Hawthorne and Poe helped push the form forward, to the present day, when writers as diverse as George Saunders, Edward P. Jones and Karen Russell put out some of the most exciting work in the land, the American short story has been full of invention and verve. By looking at stories by these writers and many more, we’ll tackle the American short story and discover its unique ambitions, experiments and artistic successes. This attention to the craft of writing will carry over into students’ own work as they draft, revise, and edit several assignments over the course of the semester.

Sec. 004 Human & Post-Human
Instructor: Stephanie Harper (Writing Program)
TTh 11:40-1:00

What is it to be human? Beginning with Ursula Le Guin’s premise that science fiction is not predictive, but descriptive, that science fiction teaches us about ourselves rather than about the future, this seminar will explore the moral complexity of varied lived experiences and trouble our conceptions of what it is to be human. Reading excerpts from a number of short fictional works, including Ursula Le Guin’s “Nine Lives,” Ted Chiang’s “Exhalation,” Octavia Butler’s “Blood Child,” and Nalo Hopkinson’s “Message in a Bottle,” we will test the boundaries of what distinguishes humans from animals, clones, aliens, or artificial intelligence. In our discussions, we will explore how fictional representations of other forms of conscious life, natural or artificial, reflect and/or critique the society they were written in. As the answer to “what is it to be human?” is so crucial to our social structure, our readings will not be limited to fiction and will also include a few select excerpts from critical theorists that can be used as lenses for the writing developed over the course of the semester. Writing will begin with informal responses to the literature, films, and works of art we examine closely in our discussions. As writing is a recursive journey, the informal responses will be developed over the course of the semester into a smaller number of polished essays.

Sec. 005 Ecofeminism
Instructor: Alex Alston (Literatures in English)
TTh 11:40-1:00

This course will introduce students to a handful of key texts and debates exploring historical and philosophical questions that fall under the broad rubric of “Ecofeminism.” Bringing together non-fiction essays, philosophy, literary theory, and film, the course will offer a humanities-centered approach to ecofeminist critiques of foundational Western ideas and practices which privilege certain humans above other humans as well as the ecological world and its inhabitants.

As an Emily Balch Seminar, this course involves critical close reading, in-class discussion, and short as well as long-form writing. Students will be introduced to and practice strategies for generating, drafting, and revising longer essays as they produce a rhetorical analysis, a critical review, and a response essay over the course of the semester. Peer review and one-on-one conferences will support the student in developing writing skills and gaining a firm grasp of the writing process at the university level.

Sec. 006 Writing the Nation
Instructor: George Perez (Literatures in English)
TTh 11:40-1:00

In some ways, the nation is the defining ideological apparatus of our lives. But what is the nation? How do we know where a nation begins and where it ends? Who is included in the nation? Who is excluded? What are the supports and structures of the nation? The meaning of the nation is the central, animating question of the course. It serves as our guide through various readings, including political philosophy, poetry, the novel, and the news. This course is an opportunity to think through the strategies various writers—from scientists to playwrights—use to invoke, address, contest, and claim the nation. This seminar also encourages students to think about how they respond to these claims and their histories. Through a mix of formal writing and creative responses, students will interrogate conflicting understandings of the nation while carving out space for their own theories of the nation. Authors and filmmakers may include Edward Said, Gloria Anzaldúa, Jordan Peele, Zadie Smith, Francis Bacon, Virginia Woolf, and Salman Rushdie.

Sec. 007: Boo!: Ghost stories, ancient Mesopotamia to modern America
Instructor: Carman Romano (Classics)
TTh 11:40 a.m.-1:00

Much may separate us from our ancient human counterparts, but one thing is for sure: like Assyrians, Greeks, and Romans, we are all going to die! But where do we go? And what happens if we stick around? Enter the ghost story, a cultural idiom that Syriac-speaking Christians and Victorian Americans alike used to explore the many uncertainties that surround the only certain thing in life. In this seminar, you’ll read, among other texts: the Akkadian Atra-Hasis, Aeschylean tragedy, Platonic philosophy, The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, and Poe’s short stories. You’ll also think with contemporary theorists about what makes a ghost story believable, and about how and why storytellers make use of supernatural elements. Throughout the course, we’ll lean into the certitude of death and the eternal questions surrounding it and use them to connect ourselves to ancient peoples.

Sec. 008 Global Shakespeare(s)
Instructor: George Perez (Literatures in English)
TTh 1:10-2:30

This is a course about adaptation. From Cold War classics like Orson Welles’ Chimes at Midnight to Bollywood hits like Vishal Bhardwaj’s Maqbool, this course explores Shakespeare’s enduring sprawl. In particular, this course investigates the critical possibilities of Shakespeare in transit; what happens when Shakespeare crosses borders, centuries, and linguistic communities? When the executive producer of HBO's House of the Dragon was asked to compare it to Game of Thrones, he said: "It's more of a King Lear story than it is a sprawling epic." But what exactly is a King Lear story? To answer this question, should we turn to Lear’s earliest editors or to Akira Kurosawa’s magisterial samurai epic, Ran? Likewise, what happens to the “Othello story” when Iqbal Khan, in a celebrated 2015 stage performance, offers viewers a Black Iago? In the wake of the 2016 election, the eminent critic Steven Greenblatt published Tyrant: Shakespeare on Politics. The message was straightforward: Shakespeare remains relevant to interrogating the forms, roots, and social causes of tyranny. But the message was far from novel. Joseph Mankiewicz’ 1953 film adaptation of Julius Caesar stared down McCarthyism with verve and a young Marlon Brando. This course considers four of Shakespeare’s plays alongside a sampling of their cinematic and prose afterlives. No previous experience with Shakespeare or cinema is necessary. This course couples a variety of brief research assignments with short essays and a longer final project.

Sec. 009 Good Girls, Bad Girls
Instructor: Edwige Crucifix (French)
TTh 11:40-1:00

What makes a girl good or bad? How do such tropes get disseminated through time and cultures? What effects do they have on literature, society, and individuals? In this course, we’ll look at the ways girl characters are depicted in a variety of media and question what the word “girl” describes and how it can be problematic.

Throughout the semester, we will study some complete works (including, but not limited to Little Women, Gone Girl, European and African fairytales, and LGBTQ+ graphic novels) but also look at shorter excerpts and examples from classic literature (like Dickens, Brontë, Eliot and Choderlos de Laclos), popular media (including social media, video games, and pop songs) and your own culture and background (books, movies, shows you grew up with). Whether they belong to “high” or “low” culture, we’ll discuss these examples critically and write about them in a variety of academic styles. All readings will be available in their original language and in their English translation.

Sec. 010 Telling a Story Through Music
Instructor: Ben Krakauer (Ethnomusicology)
TTh 11:40-1:00

Music often tells a story. Songs give voice to our experiences, aspirations, and personal mythologies. Instrumental music takes us on a journey, offering solace, exploration, magic, and more. Music also assists in other forms of storytelling, including film, spoken word, theater, radio, and advertising. This class asks: What makes music so effective in conveying a story? How do writers, including historians, critics, and essayists, use music as a gateway to exploring broader ideas about the human experience?

Assignments include reading album reviews, short stories about music, and essays on music history, cognition, and industry; close listening to both recorded music and natural sounds; listening to podcasts about music; and paying attention to the sound design and musical scoring of films. In addition, students will write and revise several essays about music to explore their own ideas related to human perception, expression, and transformation.

Sec. 11 Queer Auto/Biography
Instructor: Jess Shollenberger (Literatures in English)
TTh 11:40-1:00

How do writers use autobiography to forge identity, community, and history? How do experimental works of autobiography, memoir, and biography trouble the line between imagination and fact, dream and reality? In this seminar, you will study texts that reconstruct the stories of queer and marginalized figures and communities, sometimes by thinking through what might have happened or what we can only imagine. You will interpret these texts in essays designed to help you acquire the skills that are essential for college writing. Throughout the course, we will approach close reading and analytical writing as creative endeavors that involve collaboration and discussion. Our course readings will include Saidiya Hartman’s Wayward Lives, Beautiful Experiments, Audre Lorde’s Zami: A New Spelling of My Name, Jenn Shapland’s My Autobiography of Carson McCullers, and Virginia Woolf’s A Room of One’s Own.

Sec. 12 Asian American Popular Culture
Instructor: Sophia J. Mao (Literatures in English)
TTh 11:40-1:00

From Hollywood blockbusters like Crazy Rich Asians (2018) and Everything Everywhere All At Once (2022), to authors whose novels have shot to the top of the New York Times bestseller list like R.F. Kuang’s Yellowface (2023) and Celeste Ng’s Everything I Never Told You (2014), there has never been a more exciting time to see Asian American narratives woven into the popular cultural imagination. This course focuses on Asian American cultural works (including prose, plays, graphic novels, and films) that have gained mainstream attention from the 20^th through the 21^st century. What is “Asian America,” a term that was coined in the late sixties? What features and themes define Asian American stories, and what makes a work “popular”? Finally, how do artists navigate longstanding issues around racial stereotype and representation? Throughout the semester, we will ask how Asian American cultural works have utilized, contested, and expanded conventions around both artistic forms and racial forms. Readings may include works like David Henry Hwang’s M. Butterfly (1988), Amy Tan’s The Joy Luck Club (1989), Ling Ma’s Severance (2018), and Hua Hsu’s Stay True (2022), among others.

Sec. 13 The Urban Gothic
Instructor: Chloe Flower (Literatures in English)
TTh 11:40-1:00

Since the late nineteenth century, the city has been a symbol of fear and aspiration, of ruin and regeneration, and authors, artists, and filmmakers have figured it as a site synonymous with modernity. This class will focus on the particular genre known as the “urban gothic,” posing the question of how writers and artists have used modes of the fantastic or supernatural to examine the emergent, real, though often unspoken, anxieties about the conditions of city living. The new arrival’s anonymity amidst the urban crowds offered thrilling opportunities for romantic and economic possibility. Why, then, did the gothic--a genre long associated with foreign travel and desolate country houses--move into cities in the twentieth century? How does the urban gothic register new cultural anxieties about race, sexual mores and class mobility? How do the emerging discourses of imperialism and degeneration, contagion, occultism and psychoanalysis register the fears and desires associated with urban life? We will consider early hallmarks of the genre such as Robert Louis Stevenson’s The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde and Bram Stoker’s Dracula. Other texts for the course may include works by N.K. Jemisin, Neil Gaiman, Carmen Maria Machado, and selected theoretical pieces. We may also discuss examples from film noir by Jules Dassin, Fritz Lang, and Howard Hawks. This class will focus on literary analysis, critical writing, engaged class discussion and argument formation. Through a series of short writing assignments, students will become familiar with the processes of analysis and revision.

Sec. 014 Family Secrets
Instructor: Kate Thomas (Literatures in English)
MW 2:40-4:00

Why does every family have a secret? It might be as sweet as a recipe for walnut cake or as cruel as a stolen birthright. It might be as tiny as a buried doll or as heavy as a murder. It might—like Thomas Jefferson’s secret—unmask both a family and a nation. But whatever it is, however important or horrible or humorous, every single family has one. From slavery to sexuality, from crime families to royal families, we will look at the power of family secrets and ask what “family” means when it is founded on that which must remain unspeakable. We will cover topics such as the concept of family values, slavery, illegitimacy, sexuality, and inheritance. We will approach writing as a way to communicate and persuade, done best when you engage your creativity and curiosity. Texts will range from Shakespeare to The Sopranos. You don’t have to come to class with answers—only questions, an interest in what makes families tick, and a nose for a good secret!

Sec. 15 Dance Decoded: What’s the Meaning of Movement?
Instructor: Tammy Carrasco (Dance)
TTh 11:40-1:00

Imagine you are lying outside staring up at the sky, watching the clouds take shape. At first glance, the clouds are formless, but soon your mind brings meaning to what you see, organizing nebulous shapes into recognizable objects or scenes. As viewers, we want to make sense of what we see. How does this sense-making impulse translate to how we make meaning of dance as an artform that uses movement over language to tell stories? How does meaning live in the imagination of the dance performer; how is meaning inscribed upon the dancer’s body by the viewer; and how does story reside in the embodied histories of the movement, itself?

In this course, students will acquire tools of analysis and writing by practicing the ability to see, interpret, and articulate dances. Students will come to understand how their personal perspectives and values inform how they locate meaning in dance. We will watch dances by Martha Graham, Jawole Willa Jo Zollar, Anna Theresa De Keersmaker, Trisha Brown, and Kyle Abraham, among others, and read analytical texts and pieces of dance criticism, ranging from traditional scholarship to Instagram posts. Incremental writing assignments will build toward larger pieces of writing throughout the semester, offering ample opportunities for students to practice decoding dance as a modality of poetic narrative, cultural artifact, and expression of our shared humanity. This seminar is for anyone curious about the possibilities of movement and open to discovery; no previous experience dancing or watching dance is necessary.

Sec. 16 Plagues, Pathogens, and People: How Pandemics Have Transformed Our Lives
Instructor: Arnav Bhattacharya (Health Studies)
TTh 11:40-1:00

Having collectively lived through the COVID-19 pandemic, we know that pandemics can be testing and transformative times for society. Pandemics are unique moments in history as social fault lines which are otherwise overlooked become starkly visible. In this course, we will examine pandemics that have proven to be consequential in the past and in contemporary times, ranging from the Justinian plague of the 6th century CE to COVID-19.

We will ask questions regarding disease, health, and well-being from the points of view of healers, patients, physicians, and caregivers, and we will explore how public health measures devised to control pandemics have been the basis for designing broader techniques to manage populations more broadly. Our inquiry will be global in scope, examining how pathogens and people have traveled across the world, having varying impacts on different societies. We will employ an interdisciplinary perspective that includes approaches from medicine and public health, along with the humanities and the social sciences. In addition, we will move beyond conventional thinking on pandemics and pay attention to the burgeoning but often ignored issues of mental health and disabilities. While pathogens are crucial agents in the outbreak of pandemics, this course will demonstrate that it is their entanglements with people and social and cultural factors that ultimately determine the trajectory of pandemics.

Assignments for this course will range from short written responses to a more substantial final project due at the end of the semester. Students will get an opportunity to work on their final project throughout the semester. Classes will be framed around brief lectures and extensive discussions. The course aims to empower students to acquire the essential skills of persuasive and impactful writing, mindful reading and critical thinking.

Sec. 17 Unsilencing the History of the MOVE Bombing
Instructor: Julien Suaudeau (French)
MW 1:10-2:30

On May 13, 1985, a Pennsylvania State Police helicopter dropped two 1.5-pound bombs, combined with FBI-supplied C-4, on the roof of a rowhouse located at 6221 Osage Avenue, in the Cobbs Creek section of West Philadelphia. The house had been occupied since 1981 by MOVE, a Black liberation organization. The subsequent fire killed 11 people in the house, six adults and five children, and destroyed 61 neighboring homes, leaving 250 people homeless. Who made the decision to bomb MOVE? Why? How was it presented by the authorities as a logical course of action, both in the media and in the courtroom? Beyond the known chain of events, the long line of causes and consequences from the early 1970's through the mid-1980's, what really happened between the powers that be and a radical group that claimed to exist outside of the common law? What impact did the MOVE bombing leave on local communities and across the city? Forty years after, we will analyze this episode of local and U.S. history through a transdisciplinary lens (history, urban studies, sociology, critical race theory, and anthropology), and we will attempt to understand how its erasure from collective memory was engineered. Primary sources will include a novel, a documentary, and a podcast that was released for the 40th anniversary of the bombing. Through frequent, short, peer-reviewed writing assignments that lead to analytical and argumentative essays, students will develop as readers and writers and learn strategies for generating and organizing ideas, drafting, and revising.

Sec. 18 Seeing Nature Through Culture
Instructor: Emily Leifer (History of Art)
TTh 11:40-1:00

When we take the time to hike through the woods or enjoy the view from a mountain peak, what do we see? How do our cultural assumptions shape what we consider to be “nature” and how we perceive it? In this seminar we will interrogate the seemingly straightforward experience of nature, revealing its complex entanglement with art, culture, and history. We will critically examine a diverse range of visual representations – including botanical illustrations, landscape paintings, nature photography, garden design, and outdoor sculpture – to uncover how cultural lenses shape our understanding of the natural world. We will read texts such as environmental historian William Cronon’s “The Trouble with Wilderness,” artist Robert Smithson’s “A Sedimentation of the Mind: Earth Projects,” and art historian De-nin D. Lee’s “Chinese Landscape: Representations and Environmental Realities.” Through this analysis, we will explore how concepts such as power and knowledge, as well as appropriate land use, private property, and resource availability, are encoded in depictions of the landscape. Tracing the influence of political, economic, philosophical, and religious shifts across various cultures and time periods, this course emphasizes the dynamic interplay between culture and visions of nature. This seminar will cultivate skills in visual observation and analysis, close reading, and persuasive argumentation. By the end of this course students will understand that there is no separating nature from culture and that a walk in the park is not as simple as it may seem.  

Sec. 19 Tastemakers
Instructor: Mary Alcaro (Literatures in English)
TTh 11:40-1:00

Who moves the needle on culture? Who decides what separates popular culture from highbrow art? Who creates trends and moves culture forward—and who gets credit for making those shifts? In this seminar, we will explore film, literature, music, fashion, language, current events, and other cultural trends with an eye toward class consciousness and identity politics. We will engage with criticism from queer studies, feminist theory, and Marxist philosophies to consider topics such as: how young women’s slang shapes mainstream language; how the co-opting of Black musicians' work led to the popularization of rock and roll; why some popular movies will never be considered classic film; and how Shakespearean theater was transformed from popular to highbrow entertainment. Informal weekly journaling, short in-class presentations, and reflection papers based on close reading of multimedia sources will form the basis for longer writing assignments.

Sec. 20 Margins to Center: Black Narratives, Gender, and Identity in European Spaces
Instructor: Monica Martinelli (Italian Studies)
TTh 11:40-1:00

John Lennon and Yoko Ono’s quote, “Don’t hate what you don’t understand,” is especially relevant today in how we view race, gender, and religion. Often, what we fail to understand stems from what we don't know—this course aims to change that.

Focusing on Europe, and especially Italy, as a key point of arrival for Mediterranean asylum seekers, the course explores identity, belonging, culture, language, and free will through the voices of people whose roots lie elsewhere. You'll examine the history and experiences of people of African descent in Europe—covering issues like legislation, daily micro-racism, colonial legacies in media, stereotypes, and stories of resilience and success, especially among women. Through fiction, nonfiction, music, film, and documentaries by first to third-generation migrants, you’ll gain a deeper understanding of diverse perspectives. A vital part of this course is outreach: you’ll engage with your local community, listen to real-life stories, and reflect on inclusion and solidarity. These activities are designed to build empathy and inspire critical thinking as you connect classroom learning with the world around you.

Sec. 021 Tragedy and Rebellion
Instructor: Brian Kilgour (Russian)
TTh 11:40-1:00

When you think of the word “tragedy,” what comes to mind? Do you think of dusty tomes in the library, antiquated poetry, and, perhaps, some overly expressive stage acting? Does it make you think of the historical events of the last century, decades of war, pandemic, and ecological disaster? Or does “tragedy” call to mind personal loss and sadness? Many of us have adopted the term “tragedy” to describe historical and personal events. However, tragedy is unique as a classic genre in that, from its earliest description by Aristotle, it is defined by a mysterious term that connects the action on stage to the experience of the viewer: catharsis. The idea that tragedy incites pity and fear in its audience and then cleanses those feelings has been debated for millennia.

In this class, we will discuss tragedy and catharsis politically: does tragedy inspire us to change the world around us, or does it insist upon the futility of individual action? Is tragedy unique to the ancient world, or can we find tragedy in the art and politics of today? In this class, we will discuss plays, essays, short stories, and movies to discover how definitions of tragedy have evolved since the term’s appearance in Ancient Greece and how we can connect it to our world today. Our readings will focus on tragedies of rebellion and isolation, including Antigone, Boris Godunov, and The Seagull, films by directors such as Sofia Coppola and the Coen brothers, and short excerpts of essays that will help guide our discussions on art and political activism. Over the course of the semester, students will develop their writing through essays on course readings, peer editing, and one-on-one conferences.

Sec. 22 Writing a Way out of the Chamber: Gender, Power, Identity, and the Fairy Tale Tradition
Instructor: Stephanie Harper (Writing Program)
TTh 1:10-2:30

What do fairy tales reveal about the ways we understand gender, power, and identity? Beginning with Maria Tatar’s The Classic Fairy Tales, this seminar will explore how familiar stories—of lost girls, enchanted beasts, cruel stepmothers, and transformative magic—both reflect and shape cultural values. We will examine how traditional literary fairy tales encode norms about gender roles, moral behavior, and social order, and consider how contemporary authors challenge or reimagine these scripts. Considering the work of writers such as Angela Carter, Emma Donoghue, and Helen Oyeyemi, alongside poetry, works of art, and select film adaptations, we will investigate what happens when fairy tales are retold from the margins: whose voices emerge, what kinds of power come into view. While our primary focus will be literary, we will also read selected works of feminist theory and cultural criticism.  This will deepen our analyses and offer students ample opportunity to critically consider and properly integrate scholarly work into their essays. As writing is a recursive journey, assignments in this course will begin with informal reflections on the readings and evolve through revision into a series of carefully crafted analytical essays.

Sec. 23 Mapping the American Gothic
Instructor: Mary Alcaro (Literatures in English)
MW 2:40-4:00

Full of decaying buildings populated by those in socioeconomic decline, beset by tempestuous weather and bedeviled by madness that borders on the monstrous: America’s response to Europe's Romantic Gothic movement has been broadly called the “Southern Gothic.” But how do individual regions of the United States put their own twist on the gothic genre? This seminar takes a multimedia approach to “mapping” different regional elements of Gothic narrative in America. We’ll trace the legacy of the European Gothic tradition through time, space, and medium. Course texts will include short stories of Edgar Allan Poe, Flannery O’Connor, Nathaniel Hawthorne, and Shirley Jackson; music by singer songwriters like Bruce Springsteen and Ethel Cain; and movies from David Lynch and Sophia Coppola. Along the way, we will consider: How is Puritan New England like the Antebellum South? Are there more ghosts in the mountains of Appalachia or the bayous of Louisiana? And where do greater horrors lurk-- in the abandoned factories of the Rust Belt, or the persistent fogs of the Oregon coast? Informal reflection papers, short in-class presentations, and close readings will form the basis for longer writing assignments.

Sec. 24/25 Creative Cities
Instructor: Colin McLaughlin-Alcock (Anthropology)
Sec. 24 TTh 11:40-1:00
Sec. 25 TTh 2:40-4:00

The “Creative City” is a strategy of urban planning in which civic leaders invest in the arts to achieve wider goals of urban development and governance. Since their introduction in the late 1990s and early 2000s, creative city strategies such as murals, museum districts, public concerts, and graffiti art festivals have been adopted by municipal governments around the world. From the perspective of urban planners, art improves cities: it can raise the tax base, help with municipal branding, attract tourists, reduce crime, and spur innovation. Yet for critics, creative city planning is marked by divestment from public services and growing inequalities of race and class. In this course, we will study the strategy of creative city urban planning and its implementation by municipal governments around the world. We will learn to analyze how art impacts urban life and engage with both proponents and critiques of arts-led urban planning. To observe course concepts in the real world, we’ll take at least one class trip to nearby Philadelphia. Through a combination of short writing assignments, engaged discussion, and the development of longer critical and analytical essays, students will build skills in academic writing and argumentation. 

Sec. 26/27 Fantastic Fiction and the Environment
Instructor: Willow DiPasquale (Writing Program)
Sec. 026 TTh 11:40-1:00
Sec. 027 TTh 1:10-2:30

Despite dragons, spaceships, and alien encounters, fantasy and science fiction stories are “a means of understanding,” claims author Ursula K. Le Guin, and “a mirror of the real.” How, then, do we reconcile the imaginary landscapes presented in these stories with our actual and pressing environmental crises? What value does fantasy have, if not as simply “escapist” or “untrue” stories? In this seminar, we will explore current environmental concerns through the dual lens of news media coverage of environmental issues and genre fiction, specifically science fiction and fantasy literature and film. We will investigate how the alternate views of the environment presented in works of fantasy encourage us to rethink our assumptions regarding the human-made problems affecting our environment today. We will also use these works to examine our personal relationship towards the environment and consider what duty we have, if any, to help preserve and protect the world around us. Can fantastic stories spur real world action? We attempt to answer this question by applying several different eco-critical themes—deep ecology, feminist ecology, ecological utopias/dystopias, environmental racism—and reading excerpts from news media, eco-critical scholars, and fantastic fiction (The Lord of the Rings and works by Ursula K. Le Guin, Paolo Bacigalupi, and Ray Bradbury, among others). We will also watch films, including Soylent Green and Hayao Miyazaki's Princess Mononoke. Students will complete a series of analytical writing assignments, reflections on course readings, and student-led discussions.

Sec. 028/029 Writing the Future
Instructor: Devin Daniels (Literatures in English)
Sec. 028 TTh 11:40-1:00
Sec. 029 TTh 1:10-2:30

How do we write about a future that hasn't happened yet? Why do we try to predict the future if our predictions always seem to fail? And how do debates about the future affect the present, or even the past? In this seminar, we'll explore potential answers to these and related questions by reading and responding to writers from a wide range of disciplines, all of whom have tried to predict just what the future might look like and to play a role in actualizing (or preventing!) the future they foresee. We will explore the role the future plays in discussions of politics, economics, climate change, and AI, and we will read the work of journalists, statisticians, and biologists alongside novelists, poets, and filmmakers. Likely texts include the science fiction of Ursula K. Le Guin and Ted Chiang, the political forecasts of Nate Silver, and the environmental writing of Rachel Carson and Paul N. Edwards.

Students will engage with and critique the sort of futures these texts can imagine and learn to expose the limits of what they cannot imagine. With frequent short writing assignments, we will learn to think of writing as an ongoing process through which we can explore, predict, and debate the possibilities of a future that always remains unwritten.

Sec. 030/031 Poverty, Affluence, and American Culture
Instructor: Matt Ruben (Cities)
Sec. 030  TTh 11:40-1:00
Sec. 031  TTh 1:10-2:30

Poverty and economic inequality are among the most persistent and controversial problems in the United States. They have a wide range of political and cultural meanings in addition to their economic aspects. This seminar will explore poverty, wealth, and the American Dream from the 1700s to the present, through a critical examination of scholarly works, journalism, novels, movies, and electronic texts and videos. We will look at how poverty, poor people, and class mobility have been discussed and represented, and how these representations have shaped the meaning and perception of America. As an Emily Balch Seminar, this course involves critical reading, in-class discussion, and cogent, idea-driven academic essay writing with one-on-one meetings outside of class. Students will write and revise papers in which they actively engage the course texts to join the ongoing public conversation about this topic.