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WiSe 20/21: PS-Introduction to Cultural Studies: Culture vs the Canon

Eike Kronshage

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Culture, according to Matthew Arnold’s seminal book Culture and Anarchy, “is a study of perfection […] which seeks […] to make the best that has been thought and known in the world current everywhere.” The place for this alleged “best” is the canon. What exactly this “best” is, however, is subject of a still ongoing debate in both literary, and cultural studies. The debate culminated in the fierce battles of the 80’s and 90’s, which came to be known as “the canon wars.” For in the twentieth century, Raymond Williams had argued against Arnold that “Culture is ordinary,” that it is, in other words, common, everyday life rather than perfection and "the best." Against this background, the seminar investigates the process of canon formation from a cultural studies perspective, interrogating the use of concepts like “the classic,” “the masterpiece,” “highbrow culture,” and “the must-read.” We will be studying a variety of texts by, among others, Virginia Woolf, Linda Nochlin, T.S. Eliot, J.M. Coetzee, Harold Bloom, Robert Pfaller, Walter Benjamin, Friedrich Nietzsche, and Franco Moretti.

The course consists of both synchronous (video conferences) and asynchronous elements (for which we will be using the social reading platform Perusall: https://app.perusall.com/).