Soc 345: Cultural Studies
![Cultural Studies | SOC 345-B1
Winter 2010 | HC L3 | MWF 9-9:50
Department of Sociology | University of Alberta
Instructor: Ondine Park
Office hours: Weds 10am-noon | Tory 15-5 | or by appointment
On all emails, please include SOC 345 in subject heading and allow 72 hours for a response
Until further notice, the Department of Sociology main office has relocated to
North Power Plant, Room 201 (West Side)
Description
Cultural Studies is a relatively new 'discipline'. It is an engaged, critical and political orientation to culture more than a set of methods, theories or canonical figures. In particular, Cultural Studies is deeply inter-/multi-/transdisciplinary. Although these are trendy words in the university (and farther afield) and may appear to be losing meaning, the disciplinary structure of the academy, as also the classificatory way of organizing and thinking in modern societies, still lend these approaches salience and even radical potential. Cultural Studies' hybridity offers it great potential to be an incisive, passionate, and at times devastating perspective from which to consider and act in the worlds we share. However, it also means that it is often easily dismissed as useless, irrelevant or meaningless because many understand culture to be simple, obvious, insignificant, or not a serious or worthy subject of study. Unfortunately, there are many examples of Cultural Studies work that tend to affirm or reproduce this perspective, at times tending towards self-indulgence, superficiality, or lacking rigour. In this course, we will use Cultural Studies to consider Cultural Studies itself.
This course will address the beginnings of the discipline of Cultural Studies, delve into some of its precursors, become acquainted with lively strands of thought that are mobilised in the study of culture, address some conceptual and substantive themes that currently are being worked through in Cultural Studies, paying particular attention to theoretical paradigms, and end with an evaluation of where Cultural Studies is today and is heading tomorrow.
Throughout the process, you will engage with primary texts and do cultural studies work yourself. That is, this course is not only learning about cultural studies, but thinking with Cultural Studies. As cultural practitioners and participants, you are not excluded from the frame. We will collectively engage in the difficult practices of thinking 'otherwise', of imagining alternative and liberatory ways of being in the world, and of engaging in our everyday world. These are hallmarks of Cultural Studies.
Objectives
In this course, you will develop and practice your skills in critical and careful
¬ reading and analysis of both theoretical and popular texts; unpacking meanings and arguments; recognizing theoretical paradigms; and thinking through implications.
¬ engaging with, exploring, and taking seriously (at times controversial) ideas;
¬ writing and theorizing.
Prerequisite
One of SOC 100 or 300.
Course material
This course does not use a textbook. Instead, it is structured around: in-class lectures, activities, and group discussions; students' reading of (at times difficult) primary texts that have been published in academic journals and other fora; and may also include additional audio/video material and/or guest lectures. (These activities and materials will be announced ahead of time.) The various components are intended to complement each other. Given this structure and the difficulty of the readings, it is imperative that students attend and engage with each class. Lecture material (notes, media presentations, etc.) will be not made available elsewhere or by request. It is your responsibility to catch up on any missed classes by contacting classmates for notes, not the instructor. Recording lectures is not permitted unless prior written consent of the professor is obtained or when recording is part of an approved accommodation plan.
Required text
Articles in academic journals available through UofA library internet access plus other publicly accessible material. Course material can be accessed via WebCT/Blackboard.
Supplementary texts
TBD.
Course schedule
This is a tentative outline; it may change in response to the needs, interests, and pace of the class.
Introduction to Cultural Studies
Week 1 (Jan 6, 8) -
Readings:
• Stuart Hall. 1997. Cultural Revolutions, trans Martin Jacques. New Statesman 126(4363): 24-26.
• Stuart Hall. 1980. Cultural studies: two paradigms. Media, Culture & Society 2: 57-72.
• Cornel West. 1992. The Legacy of Raymond Williams. Social Text 30: 6-8.
Week 2 (Jan 11, 13, 15) -
Readings:
• Theodor Adorno. 1975. Culture Industry Reconsidered. New German Critique 6: 12-19.
• Walter Benjamin. 1969. Paris: Capital of the Nineteenth Century. Perspecta 12: 165-172.
Theme 1: The City & Everyday Life
Week 3 (Jan 18, 20, 22) -
Readings:
• Michel De Certeau. 1984. Chapter 7, Walking in the City, in The Practice of Everyday Life, trans. Steven Rendall. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984.
• Georg Simmel. 1903. Metropolis and Mental Life. http://www.blackwellpublishing.com/content/BPL_Images/Content_store/Sample_chapter/0631225137/Bridge.pdf.
Week 4 (Jan 25, 27, 29) -
Readings:
• Henri Lefebvre. 1987. The Everyday and Everydayness, trans. Christine Levich. Yale French Studies 73: 7-11.
• Maurice Blanchot. 1987. Everyday Speech, trans. Susan Hanson. Yale French Studies 73: 12-20.
• Michael Taussig. 1991. Tactility and Distraction. Cultural Anthropology 6(2): 147-153.
• Gregory J. Seigworth & Michael E. Gardiner. 2004. Rethinking Everyday Life: And then nothing turns itself inside out. Cultural Studies 18(2/3): 139–159.
Week 5 (Feb 1, 3, 5) -
Readings:
• Gordon MacLeod and Kevin Ward. 2002. Spaces of Utopia and Dystopia: Landscaping the Contemporary City. Geografiska Annaler 84B(3-4): 153-170.
• Vilém Flusser. 2005. City as Wave-Trough in the Image-Flood, trans. Phil Gochenour. Critical Inquiry 31: 320-328.
• Doreen Massey. 2004. The Responsibilities of Place. Local Economy 19(2): 97–101.
Theme 2: The City's Other
Week 6 (Feb 8, 10, 12) -
Readings:
• Roswitha Mueller. 2002. The City and its Other. Discourse 24(2): 30–49.
• Susan Saegert. 1980. Masculine Cities and Feminine Suburbs: Polarized Ideas, Contradictory Realities. Signs 5(3): S96-S111.
Reading Week (week of Feb 15)
Week 7 (Feb 22, 24, 26) -
Readings:
• F.L. Olmstead. 2002-2003. Public Parks and the Enlargement of Towns. Ciudades 7: 179-185.
• Leo Marx. 2008. The idea of nature in America. 2008. Daedalus 137(2): 8-21. http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/pdf/10.1162/daed.2008.137.2.8
• James S. Duncan & Nancy G. Duncan. 2001. The Aestheticization of the Politics of Landscape Preservation. Annals of the Association of American Geographers 91(2): 387-409.
Week 8 (Mar 1, 3, 5)
Readings:
• Kate Soper. 2005. Thinking the unnatural. Capitalism Nature Socialism 16(1): 129-134.
• John O'Neill. 2002. Wilderness, cultivation and appropriation. Philosophy & Geography 5(1): 35-50.
• Doreen Massey. 2006. Landscape as a Provocation: Reflections on Moving Mountains. Journal of Material Culture 11(1/2): 33–48
Theme 3: Othering the City
Week 9 (Mar 8, 10, 12)
Readings:
• Mike Davis. 2006. Fear and Money in Dubai. New Left Review 41: 47-68.
• Bülent Diken. 2004. From Refugee Camps to Gated Communities: Biopolitics and the End of the City. Citizenship Studioes 8(1): 83-106.
Week 10 (Mar 15, 17, 19)
Readings:
• Robert Fishman. 1987. Chapter 1, Bourgeois Utopias: Visions of Suburbia in Bourgeois Utopias: The Rise and Fall of Suburbia, Basic Books, NY: 3-17. http://www.blackwellpublishing.com/content/BPL_Images/Content_store/Sample_chapter/0631223444/fainstein.pdf
• Ted Gournelos. 2009. Othering the Self: Dissonant Visual Culture and Quotidian Trauma in United States Suburbs. Cultural Studies ↔ Critical Methodologies 9(4): 509-532.
• Paul Knox. 2005. Vulgaria: The Re-enchantment of Suburbia (Commentary). Opolis 1(2): 33-46. http://cssd.ucr.edu/Activities/PDFs/Vulgaria.pdf
Theme 4: Hope in the City
Week 11 (Mar 22, 24, 26)
Readings:
• Congress for the New Urbanism. 1996. Charter of the New Urbanism. www.cnu.org/charter.
• David Harvey. 1997. The New Urbanism and the Communitarian trap. Harvard Design Magazine 1: 1-3.
• Richard Florida. 2003. Cities and the Creative Class. City & Community 2(1): 3-19.
• Wilson & Kiel. The real creative class. 7pp.
Week 12 (Mar 29, 31, Apr 2)
Readings:
• Georg Simmel. The Stranger. [From Kurt Wolff (Trans.) The Sociology of Georg Simmel. New York: Free Press, 1950: 402 - 408] http://www.infoamerica.org/documentos_pdf/simmel01.pdf
• Ash Amin and Stephen Graham. 1997. The ordinary city. Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers, New Series 22(4): 411-429.
• Margaret Kohn. Homo spectator: Public space in the age of the spectacle. Philosophy & Social Criticism 34(5): 467–486
Conclusion
Week 13 (Apr 5, 7, 9)
Readings:
• Cornel West. 1990. The New Politics of Difference. October 53: 93-109.
• Henry Giroux. 2004. Cultural Studies and the Politics of Public Pedagogy: Making the Political More Pedagogical. Parallax 10(2): 73–89.
Last day of class (Apr 12)
Course requirements and grading
Evaluation
Précis: 40% (7.5% each x 4 = 30% + 10% for submission, see below)
Discussion panel: 20% (5% overall group performance + 15% written assignment)
Discussion response: 5%
Final paper: 35%
Description of Assignments
Précis
A précis is a concise summary and evaluation of the reading. Given how short it is (around 200-400 words each), you cannot expect to summarise the entire article in detail. Rather, highlight concepts, themes, examples, arguments, ideas, etc., that you think are important, insightful, compelling, striking, or problematic, careless, even wrong ... and explain your reading. Write coherently and in full sentences. Even though the assignments are short, they should still evidence care in thought and writing. Provide 2 or 3 well-considered questions or comments that you would like to bring to discussion in class. This assignment is intended to help you reflect upon the readings and prepare you for class discussions as well the final paper. It is not expected that you will be able to demonstrate mastery of the articles; the précis is your opportunity to grapple with the readings and write with your struggles.
Every week, submit a précis for at least one of the articles assigned (there is about 3 articles per week). You must submit a minimum of 10 précis (this can include the four that you choose to have graded.) Précis is due within 10 days of the date assigned for the relevant reading -- I will not accept précis beyond this. I will not grade every précis, but will review them all to get a sense of your overall progress and your engagement with course material. You will receive the full 10% for submitting a précis (as described above) for 12 or more of the articles we read (see below for further breakdown). You will not receive credit for submissions that appear to have just been thrown together. Note that these are not bonus marks but form part of the core requirements for this course.
If you submit 14 or more, you will receive 10%
12 - 13 8%
10 - 11 5%
9 or fewer 0%
5 or fewer fail course
I will hold on to your submitted précis throughout term. At the end of Week 6 (i.e. before the Reading Week break), choose two of your best précis to be evaluated--there will be a sheet in class where you may indicate which ones you have selected. At the end of Week 13, choose another two (from the 2nd half of term) to be evaluated.
Discussion Panel
There will be a sheet in class to sign up. Unless otherwise noted, discussion panels will be Fridays.
You will participate in one discussion panel of approximately 5 students (depending on final enrolment numbers). Your group will be responsible for providing a critical summary of all the relevant assigned readings and engaging each other in a discussion in front of the rest of the class about the readings and considering other relevant course material. Please begin the session with an agreement on how you will be preceding. It is the responsibility of the group that everyone in the group has a fair chance to speak (be mindful of time). You may open up the conversation to the rest of the class after the first 30 minutes if you wish. Your performance as a group will be evaluated according to the quality of your discussion. The primary intention of this panel discussion is to practice reading and discussing with others. You are not expected to 'teach' the class, but rather share the challenge of working through close readings and applied readings with colleagues.
On the day of your discussion panel, submit a 1250-1800 word essay discussing the readings, lectures and other course material that you hope to talk about during the panel. Provide a critical response to the readings and raise difficulties, insights or challenges that you would like to discuss further with your colleagues. This paper should prepare you for your discussion panel. This paper should be a coherent, well-written essay. However, it is not intended to display expertise or mastery of material but rather demonstrate a capacity for close reading, identifying and evaluating arguments, applying insights to other texts (e.g. perhaps audio or visual material in class), exploring ideas, and writing carefully.
Discussion Response
You will be responsible for writing a 1-2 page response to the discussion panel the week following your own panel. Your written response is due no later than 10 days after the discussion panel. Keep in mind your response will be given to the group. Please provide an evaluation of the group's discussion along these lines:
1. What was productive about the discussion? E.g. did it help you consider in a new way, understand or think differently about something? Did it open up a new way to interrogate the readings for you?
2. What did you feel was missing? E.g. did you feel that the discussion could have been more rigorous or challenging? Could the discussion have included more close reading or more applied reading?
3. Other questions or comments. This may include a reflection upon your own experience being a panel discussant.
This assignment is intended to help you to engage critically and actively with discussions even when you might only consider yourself an on-looker. It is also a way to provide feedback to and receive feedback from your colleagues, build a community of scholars, and to recognise that discussions and interpretations are contingent, contested and on-going. This assignment will be evaluated according to the quality of insight and responsiveness to the panel discussion as well as quality of writing. Provide enough copies to give one to each of the panel discussants and one for marking.
Final Paper
This course has no final examination. Instead, there is a final paper that is due Thursday, April 22 at 4:30pm. As such, there is no option for a deferred examination for this course. No assignment will be accepted after Tuesday, April 27. Please note that your final paper will not be returned to you, it will be held on file in the Department of Sociology for at least one year.
Final papers should be approximately 2750-3600 words in length. We will discuss this assignment further in class. Note that I cannot read drafts of your papers, but am happy to discuss your assignments with you.
Technical requirements for all written assignments: See separate sheet on WebCT.
Grading
To pass this course, you must submit every assignment as described.
Any late assignment will be penalized 10% per day including any holiday or weekend day. No assignment will be accepted beyond 5 days after the deadline.
Conversion of marks to grades
The following scale will be used to convert raw marks into final grades at the end of the course. Grades will not be 'curved' nor will they be rounded up (e.g. 81.9% will not be rounded up to 82%). However, student's overall performance over the course of the term will be taken into consideration in assigning a final grade.
Letter Grade = Percentage
A+= 90-100
A = 86-89
A- = 82-85
B+ = 78-81
B = 74-77
B- = 70-73
C+ = 66-69
C = 62-65
C- = 58-61
D+ = 54-57
D = 50-53
F = 0-49
Re-grading
If you feel that your assignment did not receive the grade you believe it deserved, you may appeal the grade and apply to the instructor to have the assignment re-marked. In order to apply for a re-marking, you must provide a coherent, compelling and well-reasoned written statement (approximately 1 page) explaining why the paper should be re-graded. A new copy of the original assignment must be submitted with no changes made. In re-marking, the grade will not simply be adjusted. Rather, the assignment will be entirely re-marked. This re-marking may result in a lower grade than the original grade given, or the same or a higher grade. The grade given as a result of the re-mark will stand (i.e. you do not have the option of choosing which grade you prefer).
Accessing on-line material
Journal articles. In order to access journal articles, go to http://www.library.ualberta.ca, click on "Journals" in the menu at the top of the page. Enter the name of the journal in the Ejournal Titles search box. You will be prompted to enter your campus id and password and will be re-directed to a journal database. There you can search by article title, keyword, etc. (We can discuss this further in class.)
Additional administrative information
Student support
Students who require accommodations in this class due to a disability affecting mobility, vision, hearing, learning or mental or physical health must contact Specialized Support and Disability Services, 2-8000 Students’ Union Building, 492-3381 or 492-7269 (TTY) to discuss their needs.
It is recommended that all students make themselves familiar with the services available to them through the University. In particular, the Centre for Writers at 1-42 Assiniboia Hall (www.c4w.arts.ualberta.ca) offers free writing support for all students.
Scholarships & Awards
The Sociology Undergraduate Essay Award 2009/2010 is open to all undergraduate students enrolled in Sociology courses requiring essays or term papers (not including Soc 401, 403, 407 and 408).
The nominated paper must have been prepared during the academic year 2009/10 (2010 Spring and Summer Session included) and should be submitted, without alteration, in the form originally submitted (no comments / marks) to meet the course requirements. Please check papers to make sure there are no missing pages.
Each instructor may nominate up to three essays annually. Students may self nominate their own essays. Nominated essays can be brought in any time, but must be received in the Office of Undergraduate Studies (Tory 5-27) by August 31, 2010 at the latest.
You may be eligible for other scholarships or awards, too. Check out www.registrar.ualberta.ca ('Scholarships and Awards' on left-hand menu) to see what's available.
Academic Governance
"Policy about course outlines can be found in 23.4(2) of the University Calendar" (GFC 29 SEP 2003)
Academic Integrity
The University of Alberta is committed to the highest standards of academic integrity and honesty. Students are expected to be familiar with these standards regarding academic honesty and to uphold the policies of the University in this respect. Students are particularly urged to familiarize themselves with the provisions of the Code of Student Behaviour (online at www.ualberta.ca/governance/studentappeals.cfm) and avoid any behaviour which could potentially result in suspicions of cheating, plagiarism, misrepresentation of facts and/or participation in an offence. Academic dishonesty is a serious offence and can result in suspension or expulsion from the University." (GFC 29 SEP 2003)
The Code of Student Behaviour is published in the Calendar (pp759-780) and should be reviewed since ignorance is not acceptable as a defence in cases of academic offences. When cheating and/or plagiarism occurs, a number of sanctions can be imposed, such as lowering a grade or expulsion from the University (outlined in Section 30.4.2 of the Code).
In particular, please note the following sections from the University’s Code of Student Behaviour:
30.3.2(1) Plagiarism
No Student shall submit the words, ideas, images or data of another person as the Student’s own in any academic writing, essay, thesis, project, assignment, presentation or poster in a course or program of study.
30.3.2(2) Cheating
30.3.2(2)c No Student shall represent another’s substantial editorial or compositional assistance on an assignment as the Student’s own work.
30.3.2(2)d No Student shall submit in any course or program of study, without the written approval of the course Instructor, all or a substantial portion of any academic writing, essay, thesis, research report, project, assignment, presentation or poster for which credit has previously been obtained by the Student or which has been or is being submitted by the Student in another course or program of study in the University or elsewhere.
30.3.2(2)e No Student shall submit in any course or program of study any academic writing, essay, thesis, report, project, assignment, presentation or poster containing a statement of fact known by the Student to be false or a reference to a source the Student knows to contain fabricated claims (unless acknowledged by the Student), or a fabricated reference to a source.
30.3.6(4) Misrepresentation of Facts
No Student shall misrepresent pertinent facts to any member of the University community for the purpose of obtaining academic or other advantage. See also 30.3.2(2) b, c, d and e.
30.3.6(5) Participation in an Offence
No Student shall counsel or encourage or knowingly aid or assist, directly or indirectly, another person in the commission of any offence under this Code.
'The Truth In Education (T*I*E) project is a campus wide educational campaign on Academic Honesty. This program was created to let people know the limits and consequences of inappropriate academic behaviour. There are helpful tips for Instructors and Students. Please take the time to visit the website at: http://www.ualberta.ca/tie'
Code of Student Behaviour is available on-line at www.uofaweb.ualberta.ca/gfcpolicymanual/content.cfm?ID_page=37633](345_files/shapeimage_2.png)
