ENG INTC 1041: Spoiler Alert: Modern Storytelling Across Genres

Abstract

This class will explore modern storytelling across genres, from the novel, short story, and graphic novel to film, television, podcasts and beyond. Students will learn to engage deeply with these diverse forms as texts to be critically analyzed, and we will study the way that stories are both products of culture and determined by them. What kinds of stories are we allowed to tell, and who is allowed to tell them? What determines a “happy ending” and how can a story be controversial? What is involved in remaking a classic? How do stories help us to see ourselves? How have we moved away from endings, as a culture, and towards the serial, and what is lost and gained in this movement? What new genres of storytelling have emerged in recent decades, and how can we understand their relationship to traditional literary forms? This class is about the need for stories and how texts—literary and otherwise—generate meaning. In addition to studying the underpinnings of storytelling, we’ll pay attention to the ways we consume stories: whether by reading, watching episode by episode, or binging in one gluttonous weekend. Becoming aware of our own practices will help us think about our relationships with the stories we most connect to. The class thus aims to be as much an introduction to literary and textual study as an exploration of what it means to be human in an ever-changing world.