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Course Info for ENGL - 447 - 01, Spring 2024
Class number: 3078 Title: New Troy Department: English
Career: Undergraduate Component: Seminar Session: Regular
Instructor's Permission Required: No Grading Basis: Regular Units: 1.00
Enrollment limited to 5 Current enrollment: 4 Available seats: 1
Start date: Monday, January 22, 2024 End date: Friday, May 10, 2024 Mode of Instruction: In Person
Schedule: R: 6:30PM-9:00PM, 115V - 103 Instructor(s): Staples, James
Prerequisite(s): None
Distribution Requirement: Meets Humanities Requirement
Note: For English majors, this course satisfies the requirement of a course emphasizing literature written before 1700.
Course Description:
After the ancient city of Troy fell-so the story goes-Trojans arrived on the island of Albion, a paradise far in the westernmost reaches of their known world. After slaughtering the indigenous giants, the Trojans claimed the island, renamed it Britain, and thus established a New Troy. Troy captivated the medieval imagination, representing the highest realization of "civilization." Medieval poets, however, also brought attention to the supremacist violence of this civilizing process by focusing on the women, the giants, and others who met tragic ends as a result. We will consider medieval accounts of Troy-such as Chaucer's Troilus and Criseyde and Troy's Arthurian afterlives-alongside postcolonial theory, Critical Race and Indigenous studies, queer and feminist theory, and ecocriticism to develop this critique.