Utopian Fiction for Optimists, Dreamers, Revolutionaries and Skeptics - Einzelansicht

This course will introduce participants to the utopian genre, to fiction that served authors to plan and discuss wholesale outlines for a better state (or even: world) order.

Participants will read excerpts from texts from the 16th to the 20th century. We will engage with questions such as:

• what is a utopia?
• is planning a better society a useful endeavor? Why was the utopian genre 'en vogue' in different historical periods?
• how are utopianism and colonialism related?
• aren't dystopias more realistic and thus more useful to society?
• Why did 1984 reappear as a bestseller when Trump was elected?

Materials will be provided via moodle; the course will meet biweekly via zoom.

Preliminary reading list (these will be excerpts)

16th century: Thomas More, Utopia

17th century: Margarete Cavendish, The Blazing World

19th century: Edward Bellamy, Looking Backward; Pauline Hopkins, Of One Blood

20th century: Aldous Huxley, Brave New World; George Orwell, 1984; Ernest Callenbach, Ecotopia; Suzanne Collins, The Hunger Games

Students will prepare short presentations (ideally a short video/prezi/podcast), to be uploaded towards the end of the term, and be asked to submit a peer review on the uploaded materials. Both, academic and didactic merit of these presentations will be evaluated.