Paper Proposal 1 (of Possible 3)
Seminar Paper Proposals Here
1st of 2 Conference Paper Proposals Here
Short Text-Paper Proposals Here
1st of 2 Conference Paper Proposals Here
Short Text-Paper Proposals Here
posted by Michael | 2/01/2007 05:06:00 PM
10 Comments:
Field: 20th Century Cultural Studies
Topic: Literature as a (Badiouian) Fidelity
Subtopic: Vietnam and America
Limiters: 1964-1984
Text 1: Dispatches by Michael Herr
Text 2: Undecided Artifact from period (not well known to discuss interplay of
discourses)
Problem:
1. To what extent does the fidelity produced in this era serve to portray the web of discourses in which the event is represented contribute to the cultural rupture responsible for the re-shaping of America post-Vietnam?
2. To what extent do the literatures that compose this fidelity manipulate perspective of the event opposed to representation thereof; and what implications of the event itself are made by the fidelity given? Present day America reflects the changes in culture and cultural ideology and the post-Vietnam generations are in fact still reacting in respect to this fidelity, what does the strength of the fidelity imply about the strength of the event itself?
3. Although Vietnam is a well known event (but not always recognized in the Badiouian sense), to what extent is the cultural phenomena (fidelity) that follows a developing reaction throughout the selected time period? When can it be said that (if at all) that a rupture occurred? That is to say, is there a single rupture in perceptions or was it a gradually growing “tear” in the fabric of cultural knowledge and experience during this period?
Field: Cultural Studies in 20th Century Society
Topic: Neo-Liberalism
Subtopic: Protest, anti-globalization and anti-capitalism
Limiter 1: Black Bloc and Anarchists
Limiter 2: 1999-Present
Interest: Vandalism of pro-capalist centers and centers of commerce
Problem: Have anarchist groups such as the Black Bloc really helped their movement through forceful tactics like vandalism and direct confrontation?
Question: Are vandalism and direct confrontation ultimately productive or counter-productive tactics in combating globalization?
Paper one
Field: 20th Century American Fiction
Topic: Modernist Fiction
Subtopic: Feminism in African American Literature
Limiters:
Period: 1940-1960
Text: Their Eyes Were Watching God
Interest: Domesticity; Sexuality in ‘Jim Crow’ South
Questions:
How did Jim Crow laws affect the literature of that time?
To what extent was the book written in a feminist lens? How?
Paper two
Field: 20th Century American Fiction
Topic: Sexuality in the 20th Century
Subtopic: Social Influences on African American Writing
Limiters:
Period: 1940-1960
Text: Giovanni’s Room
Interest: Homosexuality
Questions:
What did it mean to have a ‘normal’ sexuality?
How was someone who was interested in the same sex treated?
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Field – 20th Century English Literature
Topic – Post-Colonialism
Subtopic – British Literature
Limiters – 1939-1958
Text – The Once and Future King by T.H. White
Interest – Politics of Post WW I, Pre WW II Europe
Questions –
1 – To what extent does The Once and Future King critique the inability of European Imperialist states to coexist peacefully?
2 – In what ways does the representation of “the other” hint at latent British Imperialism?
3 – How does White’s Arthur revise the role of the aristocracy in the context of the political philosophy of John Locke?
This is all tentative, of course.
Field: 20th Century Cultural Studies
Topic: Queer Theory
Subtopic: Sexual migration in beat studies
Limiters:
Text: On the Road
Period: 1945-1965
Motivation: Explore the use of sexual migration in Kerouac’s novel On the Road.
Problem:
What are the motivations for the travels of the characters in On the Road?
What role does the car play in sexual migration?
What role does positionality play in On the Road?
Proposal 1
Nina DeJong
Field: 20th Century Cultural Studies
Topic: Postmodern Fiction
Subtopic: The Role of Technology in Modern Life
Limitors: 1. Text: Click by John Barth
2. 1990-Present
Interest: The emergence and development of new technology, specifically the Internet, in the late 20th and early 21st centuries, and how this technology has emerged as a function of everyday life
Problem: What role does the Internet play in the everyday lives of individuals, and is the Internet itself a fidelity for everyday life?
Field: 20th Century American Literature
Topic: Chicano Literature in the 20th Century
Subtopic: The Chicano movement, fidelity, and heteroglossia
Limiters:
Text: Oscar Zeta Acosta’s Revolt of the Cockroach People
Lens: Chicano and postcolonial theory
Interests: Postmodernist coding, revolution possibility, territorialization
Problems: To what events as represented in Acosta’s Revolt of the Cockroach People is the Chicano movement a fidelity?
In the text, where are the revolutionary possibilities begin and where do they end?
In what ways, if any, was the Chicano movement a push towards a independent society in the Southwestern United States and/or a struggle for acceptance and understanding of identity?
Field: Cultural Studies
Topic: New Media Studies – Video Games
Subtopic: Comparative Studies: Video Games and Film
Limiters: 2000-Present
Interests: Violence in Entertainment, Censorship, Biopower
Problem:
1)In the future, what ways will the growing practice of censorship come to reflect and/or produce or help to produce the regulation of social life in a controlled society by the state apparatus?
2)Why are certain sects of neo-liberals trying to regulate/obstruct the market?
3)To what extent does censorship in this country reflect tension and contradiction in neoliberalism?
4)To what extent does new technology and forms of media provide a link to violence in youth as exposed in suburban delinquent activity and school shootings?
Pam Staik
AML4242
1. Field: 20th century media coverage
2. Topic: 20th century media coverage of American politics
Subtopic: New Journalism/ Literary Journalism versus traditional print news reporting
3. Lens Limiters
1. Watergate Scandal and articles relating to the aftermath – Woodward and Bernstein
2. Impeachment process of President Nixon
3. Pentagon Papers – as published in the New York Times – and the government’s attempt to silence the press
4. Liberal versus conservative writings – Rolling Stone’s coverage by Hunter S. Thompson versus the Washington Post’s coverage by Woodward and Bernstein
4. Interests
1. Problem of representation
2. Problem of reception/ reader response theory
3. Media studies
4. Poststructuralism
5. Questions
1. How did the presentation of the news content affect societal reactions to the politics of the early 1970s? For example, I would like to compare a piece written by Hunter S. Thompson for the Rolling Stone Magazine regarding the impending impeachment of Nixon to the traditional pieces written by Bernstein and Woodward in the Washington Post.
2. How was the media able to overcome the governmental pressures to conform (silencing of the press by banning of the Pentagon Papers and news regarding foreign and domestic affairs)?
3. What has been the affect on the media since the 1970s? In essence, the 1970s served as a turning point in the way news was covered and how the media began to be interpreted by the public. For example, are the media scientists, are reporters objective or subjective, does the media represent the people, etc.?
6. Texts
1. All the President’s Men by Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein
2. “The Scum Also Rises” by Hunter S. Thompson
3. Excerpts from Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail by Hunter S. Thompson
4. Excerpted articles from the Washington Post
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