Studies in Literature and the Environment (384-0-20)

Topic

Voices of Environmental Justice

Instructors

Sarah Beth Dimick

Meeting Info

University Hall 218: Mon, Wed 12:30PM - 1:50PM

Overview of class

This course considers the relationships between systems of human injustice and environmental issues—including industrial disasters, ocean acidification, and resource extraction. We examine environmental justice writing and artwork with a transnational, interconnected approach. For example, we ask how the Cameroonian-American writer Imbolo Mbue's depiction of pipeline spills in the fictional town of Kosawa connects to Native American resistance to the Dakota Access Pipeline. We link a poem documenting silicosis in the lungs of West Virginian coal miners to a novel portraying the aftermath of the Union Carbide gas leak in Bhopal, India. We compare a nonfiction account of Kenyan women resisting deforestation and an iPhone app reclaiming public access along the Malibu coast. We explore questions of voice, genre, and narrative, cataloguing the strategies writers and artists use to reach a global audience.

Class Attributes

Literature and Arts Foundational Discipline
Literature & Fine Arts Distro Area