Film, Literature, and the Radical Histories of the Present

Catalog description

What does it mean for culture to be politically engaged? What are the social forms of radical culture, such as anti-Fascism or the Black Panther movement? How might we write a history of such radical cultures that lets us understand the political problems of our own time? Focusing mainly on literature and film, this course investigates these vital questions about the history of protest. With our sights set on the history of the present, we explore a series of diverse flashpoints of radical culture including anti-Fascist movements during WWII, the Black Panther and student radicalisms of the 1960s, and Punk, Hip-Hop, and other popular forms of music from the 1980s onward.