Introduction to Comparative Literature Course

This graduate course is an introduction to comparative literature, as well as very recent developments in literary criticism, including ecocriticism, sexuality studies and queer time, affect theory, neoliberalism, digital humanities, surface reading, and necropolitics. We will start by moving chronologically through seminal articles in comparative literary studies and then conclude with new developments in literary theory. The class will not embrace a mastery posture toward theory, but an instrumental one, aiming to assist graduate students in conceptualizing their particular projects within and against current debates. Many of the readings are from an anthology on comparative literature, others are proposed by our comparative literature faculty as articles every comparative literature graduate student should have read.

  • Princeton Sourcebook in Comparative Literature (2009) by David Damrosch, Natalie Melas & Mbongiseni Buthelezi
  • Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism (2010) by Vincent B. Leitch et al.