Lecture (LEC)

• COLL (CASE) A&H Breadth of Inq

• COLL (CASE) A&H Breadth of Inquiry credit
• Above class meets with ENG-L 381

What is diaspora? Transnational literature? "Migrant film", or the "cinema of exile"? None of these terms adequately describes the cultural production by individuals born and raised in the place to which their parents immigrated. In this course, we will first study several well-known literary works and films that speak of the immigrant experience. We will then focus on the literary and audiovisual production of individuals who were born, or who grew up, in a country different than that of their parents and who chose to explore, through their art, the realities of belonging to multiple places and cultures. We will examine how filmmakers and writers address questions of race, nationality, gender and sexual orientation, challenging stereotypes and tackling issues of cultural integration through laughter. The study of short stories, novels, poetry, films, essays, and graphic novels that engage the issues of identity, exile, and belonging, will allow us to question the very idea of "immigrant" or "ethnic" literature/film as a genre. Selected theoretical articles about transnational literature and "accented" cinemas will help us reflect on concepts used to understand and classify transnational and multicultural experiences, such as exile, (im)migration, diaspora, ethnicity, assimilation and integration. Authors will include: Amy Tan, Jhumpa Lahiri, Michael Ondaatje, Fatou Diome, Teju Cole, Joann Sfar, Aleksandar Hemon, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Dubravka Ugresic, and others. We will study four films: Calendar (Atom Egoyan, 1993) // Voyage to Armenia (Voyage en Arménie, Robert Guédiguian, 2006) // While We Live (Medan Vi Lever, Kouyaté and Larsson Guerpillon, 2016) // Painting with Falls (Tableau avec Chutes, Claudio Pazienza,1997)