ENG505.001
Writing, Race, and the English Nation
Prof. Eileen Joy

Fall 2007

Mondays 6:00-8:45 (Peck Hall 2410)

Figure 1. Medieval manuscript illustration of Christians fighting Muslims

"As part of our medieval inheritance we often speak as if groups such as the Normans, Britons and English persisted from time immemorial, continuous and unchanged. Typically, however, the peoples in question were heterogeneous solidarities that changed radically over time, both in composition and self-definition. Such mutable groups possess no stable or core essence. They are not reducible to genetic inheritance or biological descent. Their enduring status as a collective belongs to the realm of fantasy, where it nonetheless demonstrates a powerful ability to give substance and historical stability to what is ultimately impalpable. Community has to be imagined, to use Benedict Anderson's useful phrase, because it never arrives preformed. Such communalization is typically a process of sorting difference, establishing boundaries, and separating the world's disorder into peoples held to be patently discrete." [Jeffrey Jerome Cohen, Hybridity, Identity and Monstrosity in Medieval Britain: On Difficult Middles, p. 4]

"It is in the emergence of the interstices -- the overlap and displacement of domains of difference -- that the intersubjective and collective experiences of nationess, community interest, or cultural value are negotiated. How are subjects formed 'in-between,' or in excess of, the sum of the 'parts' of difference (usually intoned as race/class/gender, etc.)? How do strategies of representation or empowerment come to be formulated in the competing claims of communities where, despite shared histories of deprivation and discrimination, the exchange of values, meanings and priorities may not always be collaborative and dialogical, but may be profoundly antagonistic, conflictual, and even incommensurable?" [Homi Bhaba, The Location of Culture, p. 2]

"What difference do it make if the thing you scared of is real or not?" [Toni Morrison, Song of Solomon]

COURSE DESCRIPTION

In this course, we are going to explore how race belongs, in medieval England but also today, to what Jeffrey Jerome Cohen has termed the "realm of fantasy, where it demonstrates a powerful ability to give substance to what is ultimately insubstantial." We will further explore (again, following Cohen) how race is also, paradoxically (given its phantasmic character), "an identity system that anchors difference to the flesh" of real, material persons. We will be interested, therefore, in investigating together, through medieval and more modern texts (literary, historical, and theoretical), the ways in which race is the result of systems of power that purposefully intertwine cultural identity and embodiment--embodiment, moreover, which is always more than simply the shape and color of bodies, for as Cohen also writes, "race is not some lifeless residuum, some essence discernable through the observation of faces and skin. Writing about race -- medieval and modern -- tends to be obsessed with race in action, race as performance. . . . Race is therefore evinced in such highly visible actions as the choice, preparation and consumption of food; patterns of speech and use of language; customs and ritual; the practice of sexuality." Our investigation of race in going to be grounded in a study of how a supposedly homogeneous nation called "England" emerged in the Middle Ages out of a long struggle to define itself (through myth, the law, war, education, and other means) against a variety of Others: the Romans, Irish, Scots, Welsh, Picts, Danes, Jews, Normans, and Saracens (Muslims), and also against the "barbarian," the "monstrous," the "local," the "feminine," and the "queer." By way of crafting a conjuncture and inter-temporal leap between the medieval and the modern, we will conclude the course with a reading of Toni Morrison's novel Paradise.

As this is a graduate seminar-style course, preparing for and participating in class are vitally important to your ultimate success, and therefore, your contribution to in-class discussions as well as your attendance record will be factored into your final grade. Although I will provide much guidance and commentary, the students are essentially the discussion leaders of this course. As this is also a reading-intensive course, not keeping up with the reading could be extremely detrimental to your progress and final evaluation.

REQUIRED TEXTS (available at University Bookstore in Morris University Center)

Beowulf: A New Verse Translation. Trans. R.M. Liuzza. Broadview Press, 2000.

Gerald of Wales. The History and Topography of Ireland. Trans. John J. O'Meara. Penguin Classics, 1982.

The Book of Margery Kempe. Trans. Barry Windeatt. Penguin Classics, 2000.

Toni Morrison. Paradise. Plume, 1999.

The Song of Roland. Trans. W.S. Merwin. Modern Library Classics, 2001.

SUGGESTED TEXT (available at University Bookstore in Morris University Center)

The Travels of Sir John Mandeville. Trans. C.W.R.D. Moseley. Penguin Classics, 2005.

*MANY of the readings for the course are literary texts and articles that have been placed on Electronic Course Reserve (these are indicated on "Schedule of Events" below)

COURSE REQUIREMENTS

1 CRITICAL PAPER, 15-20 pages (60%)

A two-part project: an annotated bibliography [due by mid-November] and a critical research paper. You are expected to develop your own topic and approaches; introduction of secondary texts, critics, media, and ideas is encouraged. This critical essay should deliver an original critical perspective and argument that takes up a question of "race" or "national identity" in relation to one or more of the primary texts we will have read this semester. Ideally, this paper should draw inspiration from the context of intellectual ideas encountered in course readings and class discussion, supplemented by additional secondary research. If you are interested in taking up a comparative approach that would entail analyzing a medieval text alongside a modern one, that is allowed (and even encouraged). To help you get started, go here for a working bibliography of sources relevant to the subjects under discussion in this course [and also check out here my short bibliography for primers on critical theory].

SHORT READING RESPONSES (30%)

To facilitate class discussion, you will write short responses (roughly in the neighborhood of 2 typed pages) to weekly readings. It is up to you to decide which reading (or readings) to respond to, and in what manner. These short reading responses don't begin until after we've acclimated ourselves (typically in the third or fourth week of the course--see Schedule of Events below), and they are not due in the last few weeks of the course, in order to give you more time for your paper research and writing. For more detailed guidelines on these short papers, go here.

RESEARCH PROJECT CONFERENCE (10%)

Each student is responsible for making an appointment with me before the annotated bibliography is due [ideally in early November] is order to discuss possible ideas and research avenues for the critical paper due at the end of the term. I expect each student to come to this conference already having perused and skimmed secondary readings included in this course's working bibliography in order to generate ideas for the paper. Some notion of a topic and focus should also be in hand [these could be formulated in the shape of interesting questions you would like to pursue relative to primary and secondary readings encountered in class], and the ultimate purpose of this conference will be for me to help you craft a research agenda and map based on your interests and questions.

LATE ASSIGNMENT POLICY

I do not accept late assignments. Period. If there is an extraordinarily good reason for needing an extension on a due date, let me know in advance, and we will work it out.

ATTENDANCE POLICY

Attendance, promptness, and participation are essential to success in college courses. Faculty members recognize that unexpected occasions may arise when a student must be absent from class, but my general attendance policy is that if you are absent more than the number of required class sessions per week (in this case, that would be more than 1 session), I have the option of lowering your final course grade by one letter grade for each additional session missed. Furthermore, if absences become excessive (more than two weeks' worth of sessions), the SIUE Registrar, at my request, reserves the right to withdraw you administratively. For more information on this, please consult the following: SIUE Class Attendance Policy. Failure to attend class in a responsible and committed manner may thus be grounds for failure in or administrative withdrawal from the course.