HENB0T101U Engelsk - Valgfag 1 - Introduktion til amerikanske studier A

In this course, we will take an interdisciplinary approach to aspects of American literature, history and culture. In doing so, we will consider not only J. Hector St. John de Crevecouer’s famous question “What is an American?” (in Letters from an American Farmer from 1782) but also “What is American studies”? In other words, we will also study both the United States, and American studies itself--the methodology and history of American studies as an academic (inter)discipline from the 1940s to the present.

To help us both analyze American history and culture and reflect upon American studies methodology and practice, we will use two textbooks: the new third edition of Neil Campbell and Alasdair Kean’s American Cultural Studies: An Introduction to American Culture, and the third edition of Eric Foner’s Give Me Liberty!: An American History. These two texts, both of which are organized thematically (Campbell and Kean around various subthemes within American studies; Foner around the concept of “freedom”), will be read alongside primary texts and other American studies scholarship.

                      Like the two textbooks, the course will take a thematic approach. It will be divided into three or four sub-sections or sub-themes in which we consider aspects of American literature, history and culture through both primary texts (literature, historical documents, visual culture, etc.) and American studies scholarship. Each sub-theme will likely run between 3-4 weeks each.