We Are All Monsters Here: Historical and Cultural Representations of Monstrosity

Catalog description

"We Are All Monsters Here" takes as its central assumption that monsters around the world and throughout history reflect societal anxieties, desires, and values. Drawing on mythology, religion, folklore, psychology, and popular culture, students explore the representation and significance of monsters in various forms of media, over various points of time, within different cultural contexts, as well as the pros and cons of embracing monstrification to assert culturally subversive or oppositional identities. By the end of the class, students will be able to describe, assess, and critique the ways the rhetoric of monstrosity is employed to reflect social fears and desires, dehumanize enemies, and grapple with problems of stigmatization and identity.