Critical Theory: Language and Culture

Like the other Critical Theory courses, this class encourages students to ask how we know what we think we know and, in addition, how we might usefully engage with ambiguity and uncertainty as starting rather than ending points for analysis. Throughout the year, we track key theoretical ideas of perspectivism and panopticism as they apply across multiple texts. We also pay close attention to form, from word choice all the way through genre, as intrinsic to content and meaning. Through an intensive study of genres of nonfiction—including articles, poems, plays, graphic novels, and multi-genre works—students explore anti-foundationalist approaches to knowledge and investigate what kinds of questions this approach helps us ask and answer not only about literature but also about the world around us. In attending to these questions, students also refine their own distinctive and ethical writing voice.