Global Intertextualities

This course provides exposure to a wide array of contemporary global writing from sites as various as Turkey, Japan, the former Yugoslavia, France, Israel, Brazil, Canada, India, South Africa, Morocco, and the United States. Readings consist of literary texts written in the last decade, originally in English and in translation, though students able to read these texts in their original languages will be encouraged to do so. Primary attention will be directed to the particular stylistic, formal, and thematic features of the individual works, as we keep in mind the dynamic relation between local contexts and transnational space—the complex circuits by which languages and cultures circulate and exchange in a global economy. Thus, we will interrogate such notions as “cosmopolitan,” “world,” “global,” and “postcolonial” as modes of intertextuality and consider what “comparative literature” means today.