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Module Description: What is the place of memory in contemporary culture? What is the relationship between memory and history, individual and collective memory, memory and literature/media/place, memory and forgetting? To what extent is globalisation – from migration to mediatisation – a central factor in today's memory cultures? This module examines theories and cultural practices associated with memory work with topics that may include:ÌýÌýÌý

Building Sites, Breaking Sites: collective memory in a globalizing worldÌý

Initial seminars introduce students to theories, sources, acts and sites of memory with a particular attention to the function of collective cultural memories – and forgetting – as they relate to place and identity. We will explore invented traditions, rituals, monuments and sites of national memory, but also their forgetting – or their iconoclastic destruction and remaking.ÌýÌý

Global post-traumatic memoriesÌý

Another strand will introduce students to memory cultures across geographical, linguistic and cultural borders by introducing students to conceptions of ‘cosmopolitan memories’ (Levy and Sznaider), in the context of Holocaust studies, and the genre of witness literature. Ìý

Climate trauma and memories of the futureÌý

An emerging preoccupation in both Memory Studies and Environmental Humanities is the interdisciplinary study of climate change and memory cultures. This strand will put previously studied conceptions of ‘collective memories’, ‘cosmopolitan memories’ and ‘post-traumatic memories’ into dialogue with literary, documentary or photographic works that have taken climate catastrophes as their subject.ÌýÌý

Aims and Learning Outcomes:Ìý

The module aims to:Ìý

• Provide insight to specific aspects of the comparative study of literature and other cultural expressions in relation to their exemplification and exploration of mediality and collective memories;Ìý
• Encourage students to question the relationship between critical traditions and literary history from the perspective of memory studies in relation to artistic productions and cultural expressions;Ìý
• Provide students with knowledge of the relationship between globalising phenomena, collective memories and cultural expressions;Ìý
• Foreground the significance of study of aspects of modern and contemporary literature as a means of engaging with wider questions within the BA Comparative Literature and SELCS curriculum;Ìý
• Cultivate skills and aptitudes of close con/textual and comparative analysis in oral presentation and in formative written work;Ìý
• Facilitate critical engagement with an internationalised, cross-cultural curriculum;Ìý
• Hone student skills in the practice of academic writing as a mode of assessment.Ìý