Introduction to Literature and the Environment (283-0-1)

Instructors

Laurie Shannon
847 4913643
University Hall Room 214

Meeting Info

Parkes Hall 223: Tues, Thurs 11:00AM - 12:20PM

Overview of class

Nature is one of humanity's most elastic concepts. Sometimes it seems to offer a healing refuge, but sometimes it seems to threaten -- or even contradict -- human survival. Are we part of nature, or do we encounter it? Is human society as natural as the pack or pod, or a defense against "the laws of nature"? Both human and literary history have been defined by the stories we tell about the environment; our common future will be shaped the same way. What new forms of attention might address the destabilized ecologies on which we now know we depend?

Tracking environmental writing from the ancient Greeks to the Anthropocene, this course offers a deep dive into the storied concept of "nature" and the rise of ecological thought and environmental literature. Philosophical reflection began by wondering whether something dystopian separates humanity from the rest of the cosmos. Longstanding ideas of a utopian "green world" have offered an escape from the greyness of everyday life and a corrective to the corruptions of the (so-called) "real world." Meanwhile, industrial and technoscientific attempts to "master" the earth have scorched it instead, extinguishing countless species and toxifying land, water, air, and our bodies too - proving once and for all that we are a continuous part of the world. Classic literary concerns like close observation, perception, point-of-view, justice, ethics, belonging, and the wild or unknown frontier invariably draw on environmental content. And the way we represent the natural world, in turn, can be as consequential as scientific advances in the great project of preserving our planet.

Teaching Method

Lecture and discussion, plus required section meetings.

Evaluation Method

Lecture attendance and participation in discussion; two quizzes, one short paper, an in-class midterm, a short review, and an in-class final exam.

Class Materials (Required)

Along with popular images and scholarly essays on nature and the Anthropocene, we'll read a very broad historical range of literary-environmental texts, including: passages from origin myths (Plato, Ovid, and Genesis), classical natural history, and pastoral verse; Shakespeare's As You Like It; Romantic poetry; journal selections from the great 19th-century naturalists, Dorothy Wordsworth and Henry David Thoreau; a novel from a nonhuman perspective (Virginia Woolf's Flush); Rachel Carson's absolute landmark text in both literary and environmental history, Silent Spring); and the award-winning 2024 animated film, Flow. Interspersed with these primary materials, we will draw on the writings of literary and environmental commentators like Raymond Williams, William Cronon, Ursula Le Guin, Giorgio Agamben, Amitav Ghosh, Donna Haraway, and Dipesh Chakrabarty as frameworks for reading.

Class Attributes

Literature and Arts Foundational Discipline
Literature & Fine Arts Distro Area

Enrollment Requirements

Enrollment Requirements: Pre-registration is reserved for Environmental Policy students.

Associated Classes

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