Instructor: C. Silva
Prerequisites: Permission of the instructor. (Seminar). This seminar asks us to consider what a literary history of early America looks like if we pay as close attention to the bodies and pathogens that bound Native American, African, and European communities as we do to their writings. In doing so, we will inquire into the specific relations between immunology and theology, science and exploration, liberty and violence, all with an eye to theorizing the narrative forms and conventions that gave voice to American and Creole identities in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. The class will necessarily be transatlantic and interdisciplinary in scope, so we will build a critical framework to guide our readings, while attending to the rigors and rewards of such work.
We will read a range of texts, including exploration narratives, journals, diaries, pamphlets, poems, and novels focusing on continental North America and the Caribbean. Writers may include William Bradford, Anne Bradstreet, Aphra Behn, Cotton Mather, James Grainger, Phillis Wheatley, Olaudah Equiano, and Charles Brockden Brown, among others. Application Instructions: E-mail Professor Silva (cs2889@columbia.edu) by noon on Wednesday, April 11th, with the subject heading, “Contagion seminar.” In your message, include basic information: your name, school, major, year of study, and relevant courses taken, along with a brief statement about why you are interested in taking the course.
