Selected Readings of Literary Theories on
the Mind, Power and Society

Date Theories and Texts References

I. Psychoanalysis

1. 9/21
  • General Introduction
  • example: "Mindscape"
 1, 2
2. 9/28 Holiday  
3. 10/5 Sigmund Freud (Norton 931-955) 
The Interpretation of Dreams Chaps V & VI (excerpts);
'The "Uncanny"

;

ref. full text
4. 10/12
  • Critical Terms and Topics (2): Trauma --Beyond the Pleasure Principle (excerpt)*2
ref. Caruth "Traumatic Departures"*3
 1, 2
5. 10/19
  • Interpretation & Application (1) Using Lacan, Reading Fiction*4 "Introduction"

ref. Lacan, Jacques

 ;
6. 10/26

J. Lacan (Norton 1278-1310)
Ref. "The Mirror Stage"*5
"The Agency of the Letter in the Unconscious"
"The Signification of the Phallus" Paul Chen

 1 ; 2
7. 11/2

J. Kristeva (Norton 2165-78); 
"The Semiotic and the Symbolic" Andrew

1, 2
8. 11/9
  • Interpretation & Application (2): the uncanny and the abject -- "Language and the Flesh"*6 and other examples
1, 2

2. Marxism, Foucault, New Historicism and Cultural Materialism

9. 11/16

General Introduction
& Karl Marx (Norton 759-787) 
From  Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844,
From The German Ideology,
From Capital

  • Critical Terms and Topics (3): Class*1 Lynn
1, 2
10. 11/23

Louis Althusser (Norton 1476 - 1509)
"Ideology and State Apparatus" --­s«~

  • Critical Terms and Topics (4): Ideology *1 Charity
1, 2
11. 11/30

Fredric Jameson (Norton 1932 -1959 )
The Political Unconscious Preface and Chapter I Josephine

 1, 2
12. 12/7

Terry Eagleton 
Criticism and Ideology chaps 2-3 (Handout)*7 Sylvia

ref. Interpretation & Application (3): Eagleton chap 5

 1, 2
13. 12/14

Michel Foucault (Norton 1622- 1647) --Discourse and Power
"What is an Author?" ­§ÄÉ
"The Carceral" (from Discipline and Punish) 

ref.

1, 2
14. 12/21

mid-term week
Michel Foucault (Norton 1648 - 1666)
The History of Sexuality (first two chapters) Daphne

  • Interpretation & Application (4): Judith Butler Gender Trouble (excerpt) (Norton 2485-)
 1, 2
15. 12/28

Stephen Greenblatt (Norton 2250 - )
Intro. to The Power of Forms Hui Ju

Louise A. Montrose "The Poetics and Politics of Culture"*8 Miriam

 1, 2, 3
16. 1/4 Scott Wilson "Cultural Materialism"*9 and another article on Trauma  

3. Interpretation & Application

17. 1/11
 paper presentation  
18. 1/18
 paper presentation  

* Sources

  1. Critical Terms for Literary Study. Eds. Lentricchia, Frank and Thomas McLaughlin. 2d edition. 496 p. 6-3/4 x 9-1/4 1990, 1995
  2. The Freud Reader. Freud, Sigmund. Ed. Peter Gay. Reissue. Norton: 1995.
  3. Unclaimed Experience: Trauma, Narrative, and History. Cathy Caruth. Johns Hopkins University Press; March 1, 1996.
  4. Using Lacan, Reading Fiction. Mellard, James M. U of Illinois P, 1991.
  5. Literary Theory: an Anthology. Ed. Julie Rivkin & Michael Ryan. Blackwell Publishers, 1998.
  6. Language and the Flesh: Psychoanalysis and the Limits of Discourse. By: Hook, Derek W.. Pretexts, Jul2003, Vol. 12 Issue 1, p43, 21p; (AN 10917422)
  7. Eagleton, Terry. Criticism and Ideology. London: New Left Books, 1976.
  8. THE NEW HISTORICISM. H. Aram Veeser, Ed. New York: Routledge, 1989.
  9. Cultural Materialism: Theory and Practice. Scott Wilson. Blackwell Publishers, 1995.