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Our topic: Economic Criticism 

“It’s the economy, stupid” – the famous slogan of Bill Clinton’s election campaign in the 1990s suggested that economic concerns were at the centre of the voters’ decision making. Since then, economic disasters such as the financial crisis of 2007-2008 and the crash connected with the ongoing corona pandemic have drawn further attention to the precarious state of Western economies and the close interconnection between economic and socio-political issues. It therefore seems only appropriate that literary and cultural studies have in recent years also become more interested in economic concerns. In this course, we will look at the emerging field of “economic criticism”. We will read some of its central texts, and we will ask how literature both reflects on economic questions and is itself part of economic formations. We will apply the economic lens to a variety of texts (in a broad sense, including plays, films and songs). Students will be encouraged to develop their own small research projects, which at the end of the semester (July 8-9) will be presented in a small online conference. This conference will be a collaboration with an analogous course held by Prof. Dr. Gerold Sedlmayr at the university of Dortmund. Participants of both courses will already be in contact during the course of the semester to exchange ideas.

TBA 

Recommended introductory reading:

Grünkemeier, Ellen, Nora Pleßke, and Joanna Rostek. “The Value of Economic Criticism Reconsidered: Approaching Literature and Culture through the Lens of Economics”. Proceedings Anglistentag 2017, edited by Anne-Julia Zwierlein et al., Trier: WVT, 2018, pp. 117-125.

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