THE HUMAN AND HUMAN RIGHTS INSTRUCTOR: JILL RICHARDSOFFICE: LC 423OFFICE HOURS: MW 3-4:30EMAIL: JILL.RICHARDS@YALE.EDU

COURSE: 115SECTION: 03CLASS TIME AND DAY: MW 9-10:15LOCATION:

COURSE DESCRIPTIONIn The Tempest, Caliban is called a “mooncalf,” a “freckled monster,” a mixture of fish and man, “not honour’d with a human shape.” Beginning with Shakespeare’s eloquent monstrosity, this course will track the literary imagination of subjects that somehow fall outside legal, cultural, or biological classifications of “the human.” Moving across a variety of genres, we will follow the paths of anthropomorphic insects, ghoulish children, terrorists, slaves, clones, zombies, and political dissidents to ask: How do these literary constructions put pressure on the legal demarcation between human and inhuman? What practices, reading strategies, and assumptions does such categorization allow? Central to this inquiry will be the historical arc of what we now call “human rights” in legal theory and practice.

COURSE OBJECTIVESThis class will focus on analyzing and writing about literary texts. We will think about the formal choices an author makes: Why write a character as flat or round? Why break the poetic line at any given point? Why use a really long sentence or a really short sentence? Why rhyme or not rhyme? What do these choices do? In class we will ask ourselves this question while moving through literary, cinematic, and historical texts. We will disagree, agree, persuade, and generally wander in and around these materials to better understand how they are put together. These conversations will provide a model for what literary arguments can look like. A portion of the class will be spent working on the writing skills you need to convey such arguments clearly and effectively in a full-length paper. This section of the course will be geared toward honing your skills to create an original, argumentative thesis, organize a paper, incorporate secondary sources, and avoid common grammatical mistakes.

REQUIRED TEXTSWilliam Shakespeare, The Tempest Oxford Shakespeare ISBN 8129173

Franz Kafka, The Metamorphosis Norton (Trans. Bernofsky) ISBN 0393347095Toni Morrison, Beloved Vintage ISBN 1400033411Art Spiegelman, The Complete Maus Penguin ISBN 9780141014081Doris Lessing, The Fifth Child Vintage ISBN 0679721827Kazuo Ishiguru, Never Let Me Go Vintage ISBN 1400078776Aimé Césaire, Notebook of a Return to the Native Land(Trans. Clayton Eshelman) Wesleyan ISBN 0819564524Graff and Birkenstein’s They Say/I Say

Films: Battle of Algiers (1966, dir. Gillo Pontecorvo); District 9 (2009, dir. Neill Blomkamp) GRADES Essay 1 10%Essay 2 15%Essay 3 20%Essay 4 40%Participation 15%

Essay 1: Close Analysis (3-4 pages)The foundational skill of literary analysis—and most other academic writing—is the ability to derive larger meanings from the smallest parts of a text. The goal of this assignment is to have students engage a literary work at the level of its language, locating a meaningful problem, articulating a claim that takes a stance on that problem, and analyzing relevant textual details in order to defend that stance. Students will write on Butler, Ovid, Mousa, or Ezzat.

Essay 2: Relating a Section to the Whole (5-6 pages)During the second unit, students will further their close analysis skills by composing an essay in which they defend a claim about how a nuanced examination of a single scene allows us to understand some larger element of a narrative as a whole. The goal of this assignment is for students to explore how understanding the whole of a literary work is often best achieved by closely analyzing textual details. This assignment will be based on The Tempest.

Essay 3: Analysis using a Critical, Theoretical, or Historical Lens (5-6 pages)The third essay serves as a transition between the first two units—which analyze a single work with no outside sources—and the final research essay. In this essay students bring a critical, theoretical, or historical text to bear on a work of literature in order to produce new knowledge at

the intersection of two interrelated texts. Students explore how the analytical framework of a single outside source to uncover new meaning(s) in a work of literature that could not have been discovered through close reading alone. More sophisticated essays will also locate evidence in the literary work that contradicts or complicates the account of the lens text and use such evidence to reflect critically on (or even revise) the account of the outside source. By giving students practice reading literary works in light of outside sources, this essay begins to develop skills used in the research essay.

Essay 4: Researched Argument (7-9 pages)The skills required by the research essay complete students’ introduction to literary analysis. Researched arguments can take several forms. Students can write essays in which they place their readings of a literary work in conversation with the accounts of a few other scholars. Or you might choose to assign a “text in context” style essay in which students develop an account that relates a literary work to the culture that produced it (e.g. reading Hound of the Baskervilles in the context of late Victorian science) or to larger philosophies about one of its themes (e.g. examining Moby Dick in light of chaos theory). Text in context style essays can be a good way to allow each student to further explore an aspect of your course theme in which they feel especially invested.

PARTICIPATION:

Attendance: While just being in the room and not participating will not earn you full credit for the class, an absence will definitely mean no credit! I will take role at every class meeting—if you are late, please see me after class that day to make sure I marked you present. You are allowed two absences during the semester (excused or not); each absence after that will lower your participation grade by 1/3 of a grade. Habitual lateness will affect your attendance grade.

Discussion: You MUST talk in class. Otherwise it will be very boring for all of us. This does not mean you have to come into class with a fully formed argument. However, it is generally good to walk in the door with a few thoughts about the texts already at hand. You can ask questions. You can point out a passage you really like or dislike. You can argue or agree with your classmates’ comments. You can say, “I don’t get it,” “this doesn’t make sense,” “I don’t see the point.” It really helps me to hear your reactions, so that I can lead the class in a direction that is helpful

for everyone. A substantial part of you participation grade will rest on your vocal participation in class.

READING RESPONSES: Throughout the semester, you’ll be writing short (300 word) response papers. I will give you handouts in advance asking you to think about a particular textual detail, effect, argument, etc. These responses are also intended to help us structure our classroom discussion, as I expect you to be prepared to talk in class about what you wrote in your response. Responses should be posted on the class website the night before class. Late responses will not be accepted. Responses are included in your participation grade.

CLASS PRESENTATIONS After the shopping period each student will sign up to give a 10-15 minute classroom presentation on the day’s reading. I will give out a more detailed handout explaining the requirements for presentations, which are meant to be somewhat informal. Think of this as your opportunity to broach some questions or opinions about the day’s materials. Presentations will be included in the presentation grade.

LATE WORK All work is due at the beginning of class on the date assigned and must be handed-in in class. Late papers will be graded down 1/3 of a grade per class day late (e.g., a B will become a B-; a C- will become a D+; etc.). Extensions must be requested as far in advance as possible.

OFFICE HOURS I strongly encourage you to use my office hours frequently, to confer with me about any aspect of the course: clarification of my expectations or your grades, comments on papers, general or specific questions about the course material, papers in progress, ideas, etc. If you cannot make my scheduled office hours, please let me know so we can schedule alternative times to meet as far in advance as possible.

EMAIL I only check my email once a day, so expect a 24-hour lag. Please do not email drafts or extensive questions about your papers. I don’t do substantial class work over email. It is much more effective for you to talk to me about your papers, grades, concerns, or questions in office hours.

PLAGIARISM Plagiarism is the practice of passing off someone else's work as your own, whether this is in the form of unacknowledged quotations or ideas. It also occurs when someone else writes any part of your paper. All work you do for this class must be your own. Please understand that you cannot use the same paper for two different courses at the university and that you must correctly cite and document your sources, whether they are library books, class textbooks, scientific/technical or other articles, Internet sites, lectures, personal interviews, etc. You will receive a handout detailing university policy on plagiarism. It is your responsibility to understand what plagiarism is and how to avoid it. If you have any questions about plagiarism or about the use and documentation of sources, please talk with me. I will not accept any papers that do not clearly and accurately show their sources.

Dat Reading Due Writing Due

e8/27 [In class screening] filmpoem—

“Born to Die” Zaher Mousa, dir. Alastair Cook http://movingpoems.com/2013/03/born-to-die-by-zaher-mousa/

8/29 “Prayer of Fear” Mahmoud Ezzat ; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vIXAFkXHHRsOctavia Butler, “Speech Sounds”

9/1 Labor Day NO CLASS9/3 Ovid, “Medea’s Incantation” from

Metamorphosis pp. 239-241Montaigne, “Of the Cannibals” pp. 227-238

9/8 Shakespeare, The Tempest pp. 97-128

9/10 Shakespeare, The Tempest pp. 128-169Introduction, pp. 30-39

Reading Response

9/ 15 Shakespeare, The Tempest pp. 170- end

9/ 17 Locke, “Of the State of Nature” (1690)Rousseau, The Social Contract Book 1 (1762)“What We Talk About When We Talk About Persons: The Language of a Legal Fiction”

Essay 1 Due 9/189/22 Morrison, Beloved pp. 3 – 75

“Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen” (1789)

9/24 Morrison, Beloved pp. 76 – 156Fugitive Slave Act (1950)

Reading Response

9/29 Morrison, Beloved pp. 157 - 235Saidiya Hartman, “Seduction and

the Ruse of Power”10/1 Morrison, Beloved pp. 236 – end Reading Response

10/6 Kafka, The Metamorphosis, pp. 19-51Stanley Corngold, “Metamorphosis of the Metaphor”

10/8 Kafka, The Metamorphosis, pp. 52-end

Essay 2 Due 10/910/13

Spiegelman, Maus pp. 1-71 Nuremberg Laws: Holocaust Memorial website assignment

10/15

Spiegelman, Maus pp. 72 – 161Hungerford, “Surviving Rego Park”

10/20

Spiegelman, Maus pp. 164 - endUDHR (1948)

10/22

October Recess NO CLASS

10/27

Césaire, Notebook pp. vii - 21Fanon “On Violence” from The Wretched of the Earth (1961)

Reading Response

10/29

Césaire, Notebook pp. 22 - end“Colonialism and Human Rights”

11/3 Lessing, The Fifth Child pp. 1-65 Reading Response

11/5 Lessing, The Fifth Child pp. 66-133Wendy Brown, “Suffering the Paradoxes of Rights”

Essay 3 Due 11/6

11/10

Film Screened Out of Class - Battle of AlgiersTorture Memos (8/1/02 Interrogation Opinion) pp. 59-71

11/12

Never Let Me Go pp. 3-89 Reading Response

11/1 Never Let Me Go pp. 90 - 183

7 “Adult Time, Adult Crime: Defining the Teenager in the American Legal System”

11/19

Never Let Me Go pp. 184 - end“Human Cloning and Human Rights”

Reading Response- Practice Thesis

11/24

November Recess NO CLASS

11/26

November Recess NO CLASS

12/1 Film Screened Out of Class – District 9Foucault, “Right of Death and Power Over Life” from History of Sexuality vol. 1

Required OH for final paper

12/3 Presentation of research /Workshop Rough Draft Due 12/3

12/8 Reading Period-NO CLASS12/10

Reading Period-NO CLASS

12/15

Essay 4 Due 12/15