Spring 2008 Courses

English 341-01: 20th C British Novel: Diasporic London (Jarrin)

M/W/F 10:50-11:50am, Olin Rice 370

London. Post-imperial city shaped by Caribbean, African, and Asian diasporas, rebuilt from the Blitz, now home to over seven million Londoners. In the wake of postwar "Windrush" labor migrations, colonial independence movements, and recent arrivals of political and economic refugees – and despite severe waves of anti-immigration legislation – the cultural cartography of London has been forever transformed. From the East End to Hounslow, Brixton to Notting Hill, Thames-side metropolis to sprawling suburbs, in this course we'll consume London's diasporic fiction, film, art, and music. We'll encounter iconoclastic novels about and by Londoners (Salman Rushdie, Hanif Kureishi, Zadie Smith, among others), exploring how these texts map London's complex social, cultural, psychological, and architectural landscapes, challenging our conceptions of how a novel can look and sound. In addition to works of fiction, we'll read theory by Paul Gilroy, Kobena Mercer, Pratibha Parmar, Errol Lawrence, Hazel Carby; view films by Gurinder Chadha, Stephen Frears, Isaac Julien, Mike Leigh, and Danny Boyle; consider popular music as cultural movement (reggae, ska, two-tone, desi and bhangra music, hip-hop, fusion); and view works of contemporary visual and performance art.

A series of related questions will animate our discussion: What makes a Londoner? How do migratory histories (diasporic, imperial, refugee) and scenes of racial/ethnic/class conflict inflect the language and voices of contemporary British culture? What is the relationship between the postmodern and postcolonial as literary genres, theoretical movements, and historical frameworks? How does cosmopolitanism relate to histories of diaspora? How do representations of gender, sexuality, and youth cultures populate these texts? How have the horror, gothic, gangster, comic, and war genres shaped late-twentieth century British fiction and visual culture? How have authors, filmmakers, and artists recorded the individual and communal history of diaspora through the lens of social realism, satire, even documentary?

Likely texts: Monica Ali, Brick Lane; David Dabydeen, The Intended; Paul Gilroy, There Ain't No Black in the Union Jack; Hanif Kureishi, Buddha of Suburbia; Gautam Malkani, Londonstani; Kobena Mercer, Welcome to the Jungle: New Positions in Black Cultural Studies; Salman Rushdie, The Satanic Verses; Sam Selvon, Lonely Londoners; Zadie Smith, White Teeth; Meera Syal, Life Isn't All Ha Ha Hee Hee; Irvine Welsh, Trainspotting

Likely films: Gurinder Chadha, Bhaji on the Beach (1993); Stephen Frears, My Beautiful Laundrette (1985) OR Dirty Pretty Things (2002); Isaac Julien, Young Soul Rebels (1991); Mike Leigh, Secrets and Lies (1996); Ken Loach, It's a Free World (2007)

Requirements: Journals (25%); Papers (50%); Participation/Quizzes/Presentation (25%)

*Cross-listed with INTL 394-02* This course fulfills the College's "Internationalism" requirement and the English major requirement in diasporic literature.

Spring 2008 Course Listings