Annotation
OBJECTIVES
To introduce students interested in theoretical thought of the latter half of the twentieth century (from Roland Barthes to New
Historicism) to selected themes of contemporary literary theory and to related problems in philosophy, linguistics, aesthetics and history. These include: 1. the status of texts: authorship and authority, text and discourse 2. structuralism and deconstruction: between literature and philosophy 4. figurative language and literature: semiotics and rhetoric, ?allegories of reading? 5. aesthetics of representation and aesthetics of intensity: mimesis and simulacrum; 6. forms of otherness and heterogeneity: the unconscious, ?literary machine?, ?minor literature?, hybridity and multiculturalism 7. relations between texts and histories: historiography and historicism 8. New Historicism: beyond the limits of deconstruction and reception theories.
ASSESSMENT
Credits will be given for regular and active participation in discussions and for the knowledge and ability to think demonstrated in the concluding debate. Students will also be asked to write one short essay (up to 2000 words).