Gateway course to the major that introduces students to the demands and pleasures of university-level investigation of English literature. Develops the tools necessary for advanced criticism: close-reading skills, knowledge of generic conventions, mastery of critical terminology, and skill at a variety of modes of analysis, from the formal to the historical. Also emphasizes frequent writing.
This course will study a variety of texts written at particular times in the history of London. The aims of the course are to encourage the student to think historically, in terms of the way London and representations of the city have changed and developed over time; and theoretically, in terms of the way the city is mediated through different forms and genres (e.g. poetry, novels, essays, film; satire, detective and crime fiction), and the interrelationship of literary and material spaces. We will also examine the significance of gender, the definition of the modern metropolis as a labyrinthine city of Babylon, the influence of metropolitan culture on Modernism and Modernity, assimilation versus multiculturalism, immigration, and the effects of new modern spaces on individuals.
An overview of important developments in French philosophy from the 16th century to the 1950s. We will look at the epistemological and metaphysical debates that followed the rediscovery of Ancient philosophy and the Copernican revolution, with Montaigne’s skepticism, Descartes’ rationalist theory of knowledge, and Condillac’s empiricism. We will then focus on developments in French political philosophy in the 18th and 19th centuries, closely intertwined with political events. We will read Rousseau, an important influence on the French revolutionaries, before turning to 19th-century debates about equality, with Proudhon’s anarchist criticism of property rights, and Tocqueville’s cautious liberal perspective on the political consequences of equality. Finally, we will look at two key movements in French philosophy in the first half of the 20th century, Bergson’s attempt at understanding the temporal duration conscious beings inhabit, and Sartre and de Beauvoir’s distinctive development of existentialism, a philosophy that grapples with the consequences of human freedom.
Is there a point or significance to life as a whole? That is the question about the “meaning of life.” Though this question is notoriously hard to make precise, in one form or another it has animated much literature and art, and also much philosophy. Some philosophers have provided disheartening answers: life is suffering, and then it ends; life is absurd and never gains any meaning. But other philosophers have provided more uplifting answers that support the quest for personal significance. Bot h kinds of answers deserve scrutiny. After reviewing various pessimistic and more optimistic approaches to the meaning of life, we will turn to the subject of death. We will all die eventually. We normally encounter the death of our family and friend s before we must deal with our own. These themes too are the subject of philosophical reflection. We finish the semester with a discussion of the connection between individual significance and the future of humanity. This class will integrate references to art and literature as well as to science where appropriate, but its main focus is on contributions by recent thinkers in the analytical tradition of philosophy.
This course will survey literature produced at various points in the tumult of modern Chinese history, from the late Qing through to the present day. While the time period will be broad, we will hope to engage in close, critical readings of significant works of fiction from a selection major authors primarily from Mainland China. How do certain concerns of modernity arise in different texts, at different times, and for different writers? What different relationships do we see being shaped between literature, life, and politics, and how does fiction negotiate certain tensions and anxieties about modern and contemporary life? By exploring a variety of engaging novels and short stories, we will hope to gain a more nuanced understanding of modern China and the role that fiction has played as both an agent of modernity and a reflection of modern Chinese life.
This course provides an introduction to the dramatic work of Shakespeare and his contemporaries. Students read and attend representative comedies, tragedies, and histories, their selection to be determined by the plays actually in production in and around London, particularly at the Barbican, New Globe, and Stratford to which at least one excursion will be made. Special attention will be given to the playhouses and the influence they had on the art of the theatre, actors’ companies, and modes of production and performance. Lectures and discussions will focus on the aesthetic quality of the plays, their relationship with the audiences (then and now), the application of the diverse attitudes and assumptions of modern critical theory to the Elizabethan stage, the contrasting structures of Shakespearean and non-Shakespearean drama, the new emphasis on selfhood and individuality, and the major themes of hierarchy, order, and justice, the conflict of Nature and Fortune, the role of Providence, the ideals of love, and the norms of social accord. Opportunities will be given to investigate the interrelations of the plays and other arts, including film, opera, and ballet.
Investigates religious developments in India within their historical context. Familiarizes students with the religions of the subcontinent—including Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism, Islam, Sikhism, Christianity, and Judaism—through secondary source readings and English translations of primary source materials. Rather than survey religious traditions as closed systems divorced from time or place, students grapple with the central theories and historiographical challenges pertaining to religion in India, especially those that impact our ability to understand everyday religious experience, both past and present.
The course serves as an introduction to the thought and legacy of Karl Marx. Marx’s theory of capitalism centers on the concept of value. Value is the interface between culture and commerce, the hinge on which Marx’s theory and Marxism turn. Although Marx sometimes distinguished between an economic “base” and a legal-cultural “superstructure,” he managed to depict the culture of capitalism as a whole. This method forms one of his crucial legacies, which we will explore in and after Marx. Organized around a slow reading of Capital, Volume 1, the course will also feature short readings from those who inspired Marx (David Ricardo, G. W. F. Hegel, Charles Babbage and Ada Lovelace) and those his work influenced (Rosa Luxemburg, Theodor W. Adorno, Stuart Hall, Donna Haraway). We will follow the trajectory that Capital itself takes, from the commodity and the concept of value to machinery, cooperation, and accumulation.
Key questions: Does living well require acquiring knowledge and wisdom? What is the place of moral responsibility in the good life? Is the good life a happy life, or does it require sacrificing happiness? Does religion lead to living well or does it hinder it? What is friendship and how does it contribute to the good life? Study of primary texts by Plato, Aristotle, Seneca, Avot, Maimonides, Spinoza, and Hermann Cohen.
What does it mean to say that Jesus Christ was both human and divine? How can the Christian divinity be one yet three? How are the sacraments such as baptism effective? Do we have freewill? These were some of the pressing questions the Church Fathers addressed in the early centuries of Christian history and their answers contributed to the Christian theological tradition for centuries to come. In this course we will examine some of the classic works of early Christian theology. Despite the often highly rhetorical and polemical character of their writings the Church Fathers nevertheless developed an intellectually rigorous field of knowledge, one that has had a significant intellectual historical as well as socio-political impact in the history of the Church. This is not a theological course but rather an introduction to some of the key texts in a historically significant mode of theological inquiry.
The course is focused on exploring Franz Kafka’s work – stories, novels, diaries and letters – in the context of fin de siècle Prague and the birth of modernism. We will take a closer look at the cultural and social context of Central Europe (literature and the arts, but also the Modernist architecture of Adolf Loos, Simmel’s sociology of the metropolitan life, Freud’s analysis of the unconscious, Brentano’s psychology, the resonance of Nietzsche’s philosophy, or the emergence of new media like phonograph and silent film) in the first two decades of the 20th century. In addition, we will discuss the adaptations of Kafka’s work and its impact on later art, fiction and film (Borges, Welles, Kundera, Roth, Švankmajer). The topics discussed through Kafka’s writings and other related works include: man and metropolis, family, estrangement, authorship, time, writing and media, travelling, territories and identities, languages, animals, art and pain. We will be especially interested in how these phenomena transform when represented in and through the medium of literary fiction.
Basic introduction to the writings of Confucius, his adversaries, and his successors, followed by a reading of several novels regarded as national classics.
This course is an introduction to the problems and methods of contemporary philosophy. Topics may include: 1. What is the relationship between mind and body? 2. Can belief in the existence of the external world be justified? 3. Are there any good arguments for the existence of God? 4. Can we act freely if everything that we do is determined by laws of nature? 5. Is there a theory of how we ought to live? Prerequisite: None. Fulfillment: Humanities Foundational/Introductory Courses (18-19: Critical Concepts).
Over the past few decades, many readers have come to a fuller appreciation of the emotional and imaginative power of the Bible?s narratives, which still speak with remarkable clarity to our own sensibilities, leading one critic to characterize the Bible as a ?full-fledged kindred spirit? of modernism. The course pursues this ?kindred spirit,? using a broadly literary approach as its guide. While the focus is on narrative?the Pentateuch (Genesis?Deuteronomy) and the Former Prophets (Joshua?Kings), as well as shorter narrative books (Ruth, Jonah, and Esther)?it also studies Ecclesiastes and Job as ancient precursors to modern skepticism. Finally, it studies one modernist engagement with the Bible: Kafka?s Amerika.
Survey of Greek and Roman narrative fiction in antiquity, its origins and development as a literary genre, and its influence on the tradition of the novel in Western literature. Readings include Chariton?s Chaereas and Callirrhoe, Longus?s Daphnis and Chloe, Heliodorus?s Ethiopian Tale, Lucian?s True History, Petronius?s Satyricon, and Apuleius?s Golden Ass. Concludes with the Gesta Romanorum and the influence of this tradition on later prose, such as Elizabethan prose romance.
This interdisciplinary course examines the works of Marx, Nietzsche, and Freud, three German speaking writers who pioneered radically different and influential interpretations of modern life, which continue to shape our contemporary understanding of society and individuality. The seminar not only delves into the origins of these prominent traditions of modern Western thought, but also underscores their relevance in modern social theories and poetics. Hence, the course will also include references to the writings of their contemporaries, as well as explications of the direct and indirect influences of Marx, Nietzsche, and Freud on other writers.
Survey of English literature from its origins in the Anglo-Saxon epic through Milton. Close reading of representative works, with attention to the historical, intellectual, and social contexts of the period.
Focussed each time by genre (comedies, tragedies, romances, histories), or by theme or topic (theatricality, gender, race, politics, religion, etc.), this course explores the works of Shakespeare as text and performance – on stage or on film. Various critical methodologies, including biographical and cultural analysis, are used to reveal the continuing vitality of these plays and their relevance to the theatre of our time. (THEATRE STUDIES C)
In a 1959 lecture titled “The Two Cultures,” C. P. Snow famously declared, “the intellectual life of the whole of western society is increasingly being split into two polar groups,” with “literary intellectuals at one pole—at the other scientists.” Snow asserted that the two are separated by “a gulf of mutual incomprehension,” even “hostility and dislike.” Snow’s view of a fundamental antagonism between science and literature has its roots in the nineteenth-century; his concept of “two cultures” remains influential today. But was he right? This course addresses that question, seeking to deepen our understanding of the relationship between science and literature. Our readings will pair literary and scientific texts: we may consider Ted Chiang’s short fiction and the laws of thermodynamics; Michael Frayn’s play Copenhagen and quantum physics; Amitav Ghosh’s novel The Calcutta Chromosome and sociological theories of scientific knowledge; and the poetry of ecologist Madhur Anand; and Robin Wall Kimmerer’s interdisciplinary meditations on the environment in Braiding Sweetgrass. The class is a discussion-based seminar; assignments will include short response papers, brief contributions to a class blog, and formal essays.
The nineteenth century was the great age of the English novel. This course charts the evolution of the form during this period, exploring texts by major authors including Jane Austen, Charles Dickens, George Eliot and Thomas Hardy. Close attention to narrative, questions of mimesis and publishing practices will combine with the exploration of a range of significant contemporary discourses relating to shifting conceptions of gender, sexuality, religion, science, class, and race. These varied contexts will help us to consider formal, stylistic and thematic continuities as well as discontinuities and innovations. Taking advantage of our local surroundings, we will also explore changing representations of London and trace the enduring legacy of this period in the twenty-first-century city.
An introduction to philosophy through the study of selected moral, social, and political issues. Topics may include criminal justice and punishment; political authority and civil disobedience; toleration and free speech; racial justice.
Major texts in critical theory from Plato to Derrida, considered in relation to literary practice. The first half of the course focuses on four major types of critical theory: mimetic, ethical, expressive, and formalist. The second half turns to 20th-century critical schools, such as Russian and American formalism, archetypal criticism, structuralism, psychoanalytic criticism, feminism, reader theory, deconstruction, and historicism.
This course explores Greek, Christian and Jewish responses to the problem: How does one create a good society? Central questions to be explored include: What is the best form of government? What economic system is ideal? Should the government actively promote a vision of the good life or leave it to individual to decide the good for themselves? Should the government prioritize the freedom, equality, or happiness of its inhabitants? What role should religion and nationhood play in society? What models of education should the government promote? How does gender inform these considerations? The course will focus on careful analysis of primary texts. Thinkers to be studied include: Plato, Maimonides, Hobbes, Locke, Rousseau, Wollstonecraft, Mendelssohn, Marx, Hess. Having first taken the course: Living a Good Life: Greek and Jewish Perspectives is highly desirable.
An introductory course designed to acquaint students with the great works of the ancient Indian literary tradition, a major part of which was written in Sanskrit. The earliest form of that language, called Vedic Sanskrit, is the language of the Vedic hymns, especially those of the Rig Veda. Sanskrit has had an unbroken literary tradition for over 3,000 years. This rich and vast literary, religious, and philosophical heritage is introduced in this course. In addition, students work with excerpts from the Jain and Buddhist canons written in Prakrits and examples of Tamil poetry. Selections from the Vedic literature, classical drama, epics, story literature, and lyric poetry are studied in English translation.
This course introduces students to the intertwined histories of philosophy and the digital, from cybernetics and German Idealism to postmodernism, Machine Learning, and the platform economy. We will read Claude Shannon, George Boole, and Immanuel Kant; John von Neumann, Karl Marx, and Ada Lovelace. While the seminar aspect of the course builds this theoretical-historical understanding of the digital, the lab component will serve as ompetenceoriented illustrations and live engagements with the theoretical materials. To live in the digital world is to engage both practically and theoretically with the processes and effects of ubiquitous computing. This course thematizes both and cultivates digital citizenry.
An introduction to philosophy through the study of issues in cognitive science. Topics may include the conflict between computational and biological approaches to the mind; whether a machine could think; the reduction of the mind to the brain; connectionism and neural nets. Gives training in philosophical argument and writing.
Explores the subject of desire in modern media and culture. Freud’s ideas have had a profound influence on everything from the earliest manuals on public relations to the struggles of modern feminism. We will read a range of psychoanalytic theorists while studying how their insights have been put to work by both the culture industry and its critics.
A site for IMA NY Students to find equivalent courses outside of IMA NY
For most students joining IMA in Fall 2022 and beyond, there is a new program structure that affects the categorization of courses on this site:
Any class in any IMA major elective category (ie "Art & Design") refers to the IMA program structure previous to those entering in Fall 2022. If you are in the class of 2026 (most entering Fall 2022 or later), any course in an IMA elective category are generic IMA electives in the new structure.