ENGL 20610 - From Work to Text: Representing Labor in Twentieth-Century America

Institution:

University of Notre Dame

Subject:

English

Description:

This course is designed to introduce you to the ways in which American novelists, poets, artists, musicians, and filmmakers have attempted to represent labor and labor issues throughout the twentieth century. In traditional approaches to literary studies, labor is often subsumed within broader discussions of class or literature's general engagement with political or social questions. This course, on the other hand, will focus as much as possible on direct representations of actual laboring bodies and the labor movement and their evolution throughout the twentieth century. Our engagement with these issues will focus specifically on the relationship between labor and American identity and the ways in which representations of labor raise questions about the literary treatment of race and gender throughout the same time period. Although the primary objective of the class will be to get you to bring these issues to bear on literary interpretation, the course will also have to include a very basic introduction to American labor history. This will include a discussion of recent phenomena, such as the WGA strike, which bring the relationship between labor and culture into sharp relief, as well as the cultural repercussions of labor in its current form under globalization. The texts we will look at will include novels by Upton Sinclair, John Steinbeck, Jack London, and Richard Wright; labor songs by Joe Hill, Woody Guthrie, and Pete Seeger; films such as Harlan County U.S.A. and Modern Times; and poetry by Langston Hughes and Tillie Olsen.

Credits:

3.00

Credit Hours:

Prerequisites:

Corequisites:

Exclusions:

Level:

Instructional Type:

Lecture

Notes:

Additional Information:

Historical Version(s):

Institution Website:

www.nd.edu

Phone Number:

(574) 631-5000

Regional Accreditation:

North Central Association of Colleges and Schools

Calendar System:

Semester

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