Comparative Literature

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The Comparative Literature department offers both a major and minor in comparative studies of literatures, cultures, and media. In addition to cross-linguistic and cross-cultural literary studies, the undergraduate program explores the social, political, and historical contexts of literature and the relation of literature to other arts, philosophy, and media.

With the benefit of studying with emergent and established scholars at the cutting-edge of their various fields and disciplines, students are not only encouraged to adopt comparative study and literary theory as integral elements of interdisciplinary work in the academy, but also as crucial tools of democratic citizenship in a global world. The traditional strengths of the department in critical theory and non-Western literatures enables students to reflect critically on the ways in which globalization affects the creation, dissemination, and consumption of contemporary popular culture and to analyze literature, arts, and media as sites of resistance and rethinking of “globalization” and “international relations.” The literatures and cultures represented in the department include: Western (European and American), Middle Eastern, East Asian, and South Asian.

Taper Hall of Humanities 161
(213) 740-0102
FAX: (213) 740-8058
Email: complit@dornsife.usc.edu
dornsife.usc.edu/colt
Chair: John Rowe, PhD

Faculty

Marion Frances Chevalier Professor of French and Professor of French and Italian and Comparative Literature: Peggy Kamuf, PhD*

Florence R. Scott Professor of English and Professor of English and Comparative Literature: Tania Modleski, PhD

USC Associates Chair in Humanities and Professor of English and American Studies & Ethnicity: John Rowe, PhD

Professors: Joseph Boone, PhD (English); Dominic C.N. Cheung, PhD (East Asian Languages and Cultures); Vincent Farenga, PhD* (Classics); Erin Graff Zivin, PhD (Spanish and Portuguese); Jack Halberstam, PhD (American Studies & Ethnicity); David E. James, PhD (Cinematic Arts); Akira Mizuta Lippit, PhD (Critical Studies); Margaret Rosenthal, PhD (Italian); Hilary M. Schor, PhD (English); David St. John, MFA (English); William G. Thalmann, PhD* (Classics); Daniel Tiffany, PhD (English); Alexander Zholkovsky, PhD (Slavic Languages and Literatures)

Associate Professors: Julian Albilla, PhD (Spanish and Portuguese); David Bialock, PhD (East Asian Languages and Cultures); Roberto Ignacio Díaz, PhD* (Spanish and Portuguese); Heather James, PhD (English); Janet Johnson, PhD (Music); Natania Meeker, PhD (French and Italian); Panivong Norindr, PhD (French and Italian); Antonia Szabari, PhD (French and Italian)

Assistant Professors: Neetu Khanna, PhD; Veli N. Yashin, PhD

Associate Professors (Teaching): Michael du Plessis, PhD; Jason Webb, PhD

Emeritus Professors: Gloria Orenstein, PhD; Albert Sonnenfeld, PhD* (French and Italian)

*Recipient of university-wide or college teaching award.

Graduate Degrees

The MA and PhD in comparative literature are offered through the Comparative Studies in Literature and Culture program, as described here .

Programs

Bachelor’s Degree

• •  Comparative Literature (BA)

Minor

• •  Comparative Literature Minor

Courses

Comparative Literature

• •  COLT 101gp Masterpieces and Masterminds: Literature and Thought
• •  COLT 102g On Location: The Place of Literature in Global Cultures
• •  COLT 250g Cultures of Latin America
• •  COLT 251g Modern Literature and Thought of the West Since 1800
• •  COLT 264gp Asian Aesthetic and Literary Traditions
• •  COLT 302 Introduction to Literary Theory
• •  COLT 303 Globalization: Culture, Change, Resistance
• •  COLT 311 Epic
• •  COLT 312 Heroes, Myths and Legends in Literature and the Arts
• •  COLT 324 Women in Medieval and Renaissance Europe
• •  COLT 335 Decadence and Modernity
• •  COLT 345 Realist Fiction
• •  COLT 346 Fictions of the First Person
• •  COLT 348 Modernist Fiction
• •  COLT 351 Modern and Contemporary Drama
• •  COLT 354 Revolutions in Theater
• •  COLT 357 The Avant-Garde
• •  COLT 365 Literature and Popular Culture
• •  COLT 370 Leaders and Communities: Classical Models
• •  COLT 373 Literature and Film
• •  COLT 374gm Women Writers in Europe and America
• •  COLT 375 Latin American Cultural and Literary Theory
• •  COLT 377 Literature, Theory, Gender
• •  COLT 379 Nationalism and Postcolonialism in Southeast Asian Cinema
• •  COLT 381 Psychoanalysis and the Arts
• •  COLT 382gw Zen and Taoism in Asian Literature
• •  COLT 385 Literature and Justice
• •  COLT 390 Special Problems
• •  COLT 391 Literary Criticism from Plato to Postmodernism
• •  COLT 420 The Fantastic
• •  COLT 426 Utopias
• •  COLT 435 Poetry and Poetics of the Everyday
• •  COLT 437 Arabic Autobiography: Writing and Interpreting the Self
• •  COLT 445 Europe and the Writing of Others
• •  COLT 447 Traveling Genres: Politics/Poetics of Modern Arabic Prose
• •  COLT 448 Multilingual Encounters
• •  COLT 449g Dante
• •  COLT 451 Opera and Cultural Theory
• •  COLT 452 Representation and Cognition in Photography
• •  COLT 453 Bildungsroman in Modern East Asia
• •  COLT 454 Aesthetic Philosophy and Theory
• •  COLT 460 Love, Self and Gender in Japanese Literature
• •  COLT 462 Soundtracks of Our Lives
• •  COLT 470 Literature and Media in Latin America
• •  COLT 471 Literature, Theory, History
• •  COLT 472 Los Angeles Crime Fiction
• •  COLT 474 Desire, Literature, Technology
• •  COLT 475 Politics and the Novel
• •  COLT 476 Narrative and the Law
• •  COLT 478 Family in Theory and Literature
• •  COLT 480 Dada and Surrealism
• •  COLT 485 The Shoah (Holocaust) in Literature and the Arts
• •  COLT 486 Deconstructive Thought
• •  COLT 487 Critical Image
• •  COLT 490x Directed Research
• •  COLT 495 Senior Honors Thesis
• •  COLT 499 Special Topics
• •  COLT 525 Studies in Literary and Cultural History
• •  COLT 545 Studies in Literature and the Other Arts
• •  COLT 555 Studies in Literatures of the Americas
• •  COLT 565 Studies in Literatures of Asia
• •  COLT 575 Studies in Literature and Ethnicity
• •  COLT 585 Studies in Literature and Gender
• •  COLT 593 Practicum in Teaching the Liberal Arts
• •  COLT 602 Seminar in Literary Theory
• •  COLT 620 Seminar in Literature, Culture, and Thought

Italian

• •  ITAL 382g Dante