CMLT 265 - Freedom and Constraint

This Honors course is an inter-disciplinary study of the way freedom and constraint are defined and represented in various types of literature, film, and art from different cultures with particular emphasis on Asia, Arab, European, and American cultures. The many connotations of freedom and the ways in which people feel constrained as well as resist such constraint will be drawn out through an examination of historical, cultural, political, religious, and gendered contexts. We will be discussing slavery, colonialism, genocide, female sexual oppression, and how people have fought against such atrocities. We will read both fiction and non-fiction. Works may include Chinhua Achebe’s When Things Fall Apart, John Okada’s No-No Boy, Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin, Ayaan Hirsi Ali’s Infidel, and Ishmael Beah’s A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier. (Group III) (Honors, Writing Option)