ECOLOGY AND LITERATURE

The course is part of:
- the Interdisciplinary activities [C] for the the English Studies curriculum of the Master's Degree Programme in European, American and Postcolonial Languages and Literatures (LLEAP) degree and the Joint European Master Degree in English and American Literary and Cultural Studies.
- the Interdisciplinary activities [C] for the Master’s Degree in Environmental Humanities (EH).
- the Core educational activities [B] of the Master's Degree Programme in Language and Civilisation of Asia and Mediterranean Africa (LICAAM - South Asian Curriculum)

The main objective of the course is to enable students to address the relationship between literary/cultural texts and ecological issues from a theoretical perspective in a largely self-directed or autonomous manner.

Advanced reading, speaking and writing knowledge of English. Compliance to the low-tech rule explained in the course description.

CALIBAN’S BOOKS, MIRANDA’S BOOKS This course explores the multiple ways in which literature represents, illuminates, mediates the relationship between the human and the more-than-human, or, in more conventional terms, ‘nature’ and ‘culture’. We will be guided by the international scientific consensus warning of a planetary environmental crisis and by Amitav Ghosh’s fundamental observation that “The climate crisis is also a crisis of culture, and thus of the imagination.” We will be focusing on a single, famous play by William Shakespeare, The Tempest, to show how a classic author – continuously adapted and reinvented by every time and culture in multiple cultural forms (theatre, film, poetry, fiction, visual arts, dance, memes, etc.) – can become our in an age of environmental crisis.
The Tempest is a text full of reference to books, to the love, hate, seizing, kissing, and burning of books. They are a symbol of knowledge and power. We will follow this lead by pretending that we are, like the character of the plauy, on a desert island in the company of books. Accordingly, no computers or other devices will be allowed to the class and students will be required to have their own copy of The Tempest and to annotate it with notes and personal observations. In addition to that, students will be expected to join a group of four or five members (numbers will be determined on the basis of class attendance), in an mandatory mix of Italian and international students. Each group will have to produce a collective book, a physical object that will contain a variety of written, visual, and material contents reflecting the themes of the course and the group’s discussions. Each book will be linked to one or more characters. At the end of the course we will gather on an island of the Venice lagoon to display and discuss our collection of books, with music and performance. We will be helped by professional actors, who will introduce us to the art of acting Shakespeare.
Giving up digital technology in the classroom should not be felt as a punitive, pseudo-Luddite, patronizing measure as much as an experiment in becoming more alert to our bodily connection to literature and its ecological implications.
We will explore Shakespeare looking for memory and vision, fear and hope, diagnosis and transformation, community and activism. We will discuss modern ecocritical interpretations of tragedies and comedies and strategies used by modern directors and actors to bring environmental concerns on the Shakespearean stage.

Primary text:
W. Shakespeare, *The Tempest*, Arden Shakespeare Third series, eds. Alden T. Vaughan and Virginia Mason Vaughan, 2014.

Please note that Shakespeare editions are many and very different from one another, with different lengths and line numbers. So while you are certainly welcome to use additional versions (even with parallel texts and translations in your language of choice), it is indispensable that students are all equipped with this version. Additional critical materials will be made available on the Moodle page.

The final exam will be based on group-based continuous assessment system and an individual final written exam. Students unable to attend and engage in team work will have a more extensive final written exam based on supplementary readings.

Lectures, class discussion and participatory creative work. Students are expected to attend regularly and to complete assigned readings before each class.

English

written

This subject deals with topics related to the macro-area "Climate change and energy" and contributes to the achievement of one or more goals of U. N. Agenda for Sustainable Development