Studies in 20th- and 21st-Century Literature (368-0-21)

Topic

Running Late: Literatures of Driving

Instructors

Govind Ponnuchamy

Meeting Info

Harris Hall L28: Tues, Thurs 12:30PM - 1:50PM

Overview of class

Road trips are fun; they allow us to escape the mundane rhythm of everyday life. But most of the time we spend on the road is anything but enjoyable or relaxing. Being stuck in traffic while being late for work, for example, is frustrating, anxiety inducing, and puts most people in a bad mood. The novels and films we will examine in this course challenge the assumption that driving equals freedom. Instead, their literary representations of delays, frustrations, and the many other dysfunctions of driving help them articulate important insights about what being "on the road" means to different individuals and societies. These literary experiments with the delays of driving, set in locales including the United States, England, Nigeria, and the Caribbean seem strangely to highlight larger problems like resource extraction, environmental degradation, income inequality, and geopolitical violence that are inextricably tied to a lifestyle built around driving. Studying novels like Cormac McCarthy's apocalyptic The Road (2006) and films like Mad Max: Fury Road (2015) alongside critical insights from the environmental humanities and science and technology studies, we will parse the complex ensemble of roads, traffic lights, laws, cooperating drivers, and fuel supply that both sustain and thwart experiences of driving.

Evaluation Method

Oral presentations, short writing assignments, final essay, group project on Northwestern's roads (in collaboration with the transportation library).

Class Materials (Required)

Cormac McCarthy, The Road (2006) ISBN: 978-0307387899
Aravind Adiga, The White Tiger (2008) ISBN: 978-1416562603
Chibundu Onuzo Welcome to Lagos (2017) ISBN: 978-0571268955
Other readings and films will be made available on Canvas

Class Attributes

Advanced Expression
Literature and Arts Foundational Discipline
SoC Humanities and Fine Arts Distro