Monsters Among us

Why do literature and the visual arts like to represent monsters? Monsters are a way in which cultures determine what may be intellectually conceived and physically exist. Delimiting what we deem to be normal and organizing our aesthetic reactions, monsters have something to tell and a lot to teach us about the cultures that engendered them. The seminar will cover a wide array of primary texts from antiquity to the present, all populated by excessive creatures, abnormal human beings, and aberrant behaviors. Screenings and discussions of classical and popular horror films complement the course.