Vertiefungsseminar Feeling Political Emotions and Politics in Anglophone Fiction Mi 10:30-12:00

-Perhaps we truly encounter the political only when we feel.” (Staiger et al. 2010, 4). This seminar will examine the relevance of emotions for political contexts. Emotions, usually considered as individual, private and irrational (cf. Goodwin et al. 2011, 1ff), can also gain collective value and are thus able transcend the boundary between the private and the public/social spheres. These -structures of feeling” (Williams 1977, 128) govern groups, societies or even entire political systems. Since humans are not -Spock-like beings, devoid of passion and other emotions” (Goodwin et al. 2011, 7), feelings are omnipresent also in politics, not just in their supposedly traditional habitat, the arts. Martha Nussbaum expresses this need for emotions in political environments, claiming that -all political principles, the good as well as the bad, need emotional support to ensure their stability over time” (Nussbaum 2013, 2f). But not only are emotions relevant to stabilizing an existing political construct, they also work to raise questions about justice and human rights in given political situations. We will focus on the workings of emotions in several different contexts: colonialism, racism, xenophobia, national independence, rebellion, justice and human rights. We will be reading texts by authors of fiction who are or were also politically active, such as Arundhati Roy (India), Ngg wa Thiong’o (Kenya), Nadine Gordimer (South Africa), Jeannette Armstrong and Margaret Atwood (Canada). We will investigate how these writers incorporate political ideas into their fictional as well as non-fictional texts. We will base our readings on theories of political and collective emotions that examine those ‘structures of feeling’ that support political circumstances and explore the intricate connections between the elements of the triangle ‘emotion – politics – literature’. Primary Literature in Order of Being Read in Class: Ngugi wa Thiong'o: Devil on the Cross. Heinemann 1987. Nadine Gordimer: Burger’s Daughter. Bloomsbury 2000. Arundhati Roy: The God of Small Things. Harper Collins 1997. Copies of the novels have been ordered at Stern Verlag on campus. Secondary Literature: Will be made available via ILIAS Introductory Reading: Ahmed, Sara. The Cultural Politics of Emotion. Routledge, 2013. Goodwin, Jeff, James M. Jasper, and Francesca Polletta, eds. Passionate Politics: Emotions and Social movements. University of Chicago Press, 2009. Neuman, W. Russell. The Affect Effect: Dynamics of Emotion in Political Thinking and Behavior. University of Chicago Press, 2007. Nussbaum, Martha C. Political Emotions. Harvard University Press, 2013. Staiger, Janet, Ann Cvetkovich, and Ann Reynolds, eds. Political Emotions. Routledge, 2011. Williams, Raymond. -Structures of Feeling.- In: Marxism and Literature, 1977. 128-135 Anglistik V - Anglophone Literaturen/Literaturübersetzen Universität Düsseldorf WiSe 2015/16 Lumpe Laura