Transnational Literatures and Cinemas (2026/2027: Periode 4)

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Cursusdoel

Students explore different theoretical approaches and can apply these to texts and films from a transnational and comparative modern languages perspective. They trace the genealogy of key concepts and critically assess the relevance and applicability for the study of literary texts and films in the modern languages of their study (Dutch, German, French, Italian, and Spanish). Students broaden their scope and intercultural awareness by adopting a comparative approach through the collaboration with fellow students who focus on a different cultural, national or linguistic sphere. They learn to design, conduct, and evaluate research on a specific cultural or linguistic sphere by focusing on the locatedness of global flows and themes. Together with their language-specific skills, students expand their digital humanities skills and knowledge.

Vakinhoudelijk

The course starts from the assumption that literary and cinematic texts are best studied not as an inquiry into separate national traditions, but as the study of cultures and literatures and their interactions. A transnational perspective questions not only the notion of a national identity being rooted in one native origin, culture and mother tongue, but also enables us to go beyond methodological nationalism that is rooted in a specific discursive tradition.

The course thus focuses on the transnational dimension of conceptual change and how seemingly universal or unitary notions undergo significant changes according to the specific cultural and historical context or language community in which they are embedded. A transnational approach to key concepts of literary or cultural studies allows students to productively map how concepts travel in the humanities and are adopted to specific contexts, thus producing an international vocabulary. From a cultural-theoretical perspective, the course focuses on transnational poetics, productions and the local embeddedness and reception of global cultural flows. The global themes from which to analyze the selected works can vary each year (e.g. crisis, labor, class, migration, race, ecology, crime) and will be chosen from a comparative approach in which students of each language will act as cultural experts.

Content in 2025-2026: “Narratives of Crisis and Change”

Students will flesh out the concepts of crisis and precarity and relate them to the overarching topics of labor and migration, discussing their operationality and malleability. In mixed-language groups they will work collaboratively towards a “living handbook” on the course’s website, which will offer a transnational glossary of key concepts in contemporary critical theory, literary studies and film studies related to crisis and critique, precarity, labor and migration. Students will build on the handbooks that will be used in this course, and will collect sources in their own languages of study. This dynamic lexicon will be continually enhanced and expanded through hyperlinks.

Weeks 1-3 will be structured around cinema and weeks 4-6 around literature. Both clusters will be structured as follows: firstly, students will compose individually an annotated, selective bibliography based on language-specific resources. Secondly, they will collectively write, in mixed language groups, an entry per key concept (and its adaptations in different cultural areas) and per key work (preferably one with a transnational thematic, context of production or circulation). In the end students will have produced two key concepts and discussed two key works per group. In week 7 students will give an oral group presentation on the key work they have chosen (novel/film) on the basis of their key concept, paying special attention to the cross-linguistic and cross-cultural complexities. In week 8 students will individually prepare their paper proposal and close read or watch a work of their choice. Finally, in week 9, students will submit a short paper that integrates close-reading of a relevant film or novel in the language they study and will write a concise blogpost for the website.

Throughout the course students will receive formative and peer-based feedback.

Aanvullende informatie

Please note: the time slot shown here is not yet final and may still be modified until the 3rd Wednesday in September.

This is the fourth course of the specialisation 'Crossing Borders'.

Werkvormen

Hoor/werkcollege

Hoor/werkcollege 1

Toetsing

Paper

Verplicht | Weging 40% | Minimum cijfer 5,5 | ECTS 3

Insight into literary and theoretical debates discussed in class; ability to apply this knowledge at a comparative level and to particular language-specific cases; ability to put forward a clear argument in both oral and written form. Ability to structure the argument in a hypertext. A detailed rubric with evaluation criteria will be provided for each assignment.

Week 9

Portfolio

Verplicht | Weging 60% | ECTS 4,5

Insight into literary and theoretical debates discussed in class; ability to apply this knowledge at a comparative level and to particular language-specific cases; ability to put forward a clear argument in both oral and written form. Ability to structure the argument in a hypertext. A detailed rubric with evaluation criteria will be provided for each assignment.

Individual and group assignments (weeks 2, 3 & 5, 6)

Ingangseisen en voorkennis

Ingangseisen

Er is geen informatie over verplichte ingangseisen bekend.

Voorkennis

Command of English at exit-level of Dutch VWO (level B2 for all skills as described in the Common European Framework of Reference); Language proficiency at the level of a 2nd year student in the BA Nederlandse, Franse, Duitse, Italiaanse or Spaanse Taal en Cultuur. Language and culture-specific knowledge and skills in literature as acquired in the core profiles of the BA Nederlandse, Franse, Duitse, Italiaanse or Spaanse Taal en Cultuur.

Voertalen

  • Engels

Cursusmomenten

Tentamens

Er is geen tentamenrooster beschikbaar voor deze cursus

Verplicht materiaal

  • WNB
    To be announced.

Aanbevolen materiaal

  • LITERATUUR
    Recommended materials Maria Boletsi, Janna Houwen, and Liesbeth Minnaard, eds., Languages of Resistance, Transformation, and Futurity in Mediterranean Crisis-Scapes, Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2020. Jennifer Burns, Derek Duncan (Eds.), Transnational Modern Languages: A Handbook, Liverpool: Liverpool UP, 2022. OA. Elisa Cuter, Daniel Fairfax, Guido Kirsten and Hanna Prenzel, eds., Precarity in European Film: Depictions and Discourses, Berlin: De Gruyter, 2022. OA. Michiel Rys, ed. “The Aesthetics of Precarity. Precarious Realities and Visual Modes of Representation”, Image & Narrative 22, 3 (2021). OA. Michiel Rys, and Liesbeth François, eds. Re-Imagining Class. Leuven: Leuven UP, 2024. OA.

Coördinator

dr. M.M. Jansen m.m.jansen@uu.nl

Docenten

dr. M.M. Jansen m.m.jansen@uu.nl
dr. E.C. Soto van der Plas e.c.sotovanderplas@uu.nl

Inschrijving

Let op: deze cursus is niet toegankelijk voor studenten van andere faculteiten, bijvakkers mogen zich dus niet inschrijven.

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