Middlebury

ENGL 0248

Human Rights &World Literature

Human Rights and World Literature
In this course we will explore the idiom of human rights in law, literature, and political culture. We will place literary representations of human rights violations (genocide, torture, detention and forced labor, environmental devastation, police violence) in dialogue with official human rights treaties and declarations in order to historicize and critique the assumptions of human rights discourse. Who qualifies as a “human” deserving of humanitarian intervention? How do human rights rehearse a colonial dynamic based on racial and geo-political privilege? To answer these questions we will turn to some of the most controversial voices in global fiction and poetry. 3 hrs. lect. (not open to students who have taken ENAM 0230)
(Race, Empire, and Colonialism) (Formerly ENAM 0248)
Subject:
English
Department:
English
Division:
Literature
Requirements Fulfilled:
CMP LIT SOC
Equivalent Courses:
ENAM 0248
CMLT 0248
ENAM 0230

Sections in Spring 2021