Division of Literatures, Cultures, and Languages
Contacts
Office: Building 260, Rooms 114-119
Mail Code: 94305-2005
Phone: (650) 724-1333; Fax: (650) 725-9306
Email: dlcl@stanford.edu
Web Site: http://dlcl.stanford.edu
Courses offered by the Division of Literatures, Cultures, and Languages are listed under the subject code DLCL on the Stanford Bulletin's ExploreCourses web site.
The Division of Literatures, Cultures, and Languages consists of five academic departments (Comparative Literature, French and Italian, German Studies, Iberian and Latin American Cultures, and Slavic Languages and Literatures), five focal groups (Humanities Education, Performance, Philosophy and Literature, Poetics, and Renaissances) as well as the Language Center, which oversees language instruction at Stanford. All the departments of the division offer academic programs leading to B.A., M.A., and Ph.D. degrees. The division brings together scholars and teachers dedicated to the study of literatures, cultures, and languages from humanistic and interdisciplinary perspectives. The departments in the division are distinguished by the quality and versatility of their faculty, a wide variety of approaches to cultural traditions and expressions, and the intense focus on the mastery of languages. This wealth of academic resources, together with small classes and the emphasis on individual advising, creates a superior opportunity for students who wish to be introduced to or develop a deeper understanding of non-English speaking cultures.
The division's departments and the Language Center offer instruction at all levels, including introductory and general courses that do not require knowledge of a language other than English. These courses satisfy a variety of undergraduate requirements and can serve as a basis for developing a minor or a major program in the member departments. The more advanced and specialized courses requiring skills in a particular language are listed under the relevant departments, as are descriptions of the minor and major programs.
The DLCL itself offers one undergraduate minor program, an undergraduate multimedia laboratory course, and several graduate courses focused on the teaching of second languages, the teaching of literature, and academic professionalization.
Focal Groups
While the five departments in the Division of Literatures, Cultures, and Languages serve common interests in literary and cultural traditions and their languages, the DLCL's Focal Groups bring together faculty members and graduate students who share topics and approaches that range across languages and national literatures. These groups are designed to respond directly to the research interests of the faculty as a community, and reflect long-term commitments by the participants. They are conceived as portals that open from the Division outward to the wider community of literary and humanities scholars at Stanford. The membership may include any member of the Stanford faculty or any Ph.D. student with an interest in the topic. Most Focal Groups include participants from several humanities departments outside the DLCL.
Thus the DLCL is characterized by two axes of intellectual inquiry:
- the departmental axis, which is organized by language, nation, and culture
- the focal axis, which may be organized by genre, period, methodology, or other criteria.
The convergence of the two axes, departments and Focal Groups, locates faculty members and graduate students in at least two intersecting communities. The DLCL believes that this convergence gives institutional form to the intellectual conditions under which many scholars of literature and culture presently work.
Each Focal Group maintains a standing research workshop at which both faculty and graduate student members discuss their work. Some Focal Groups offer formal courses; and all groups are responsible for overseeing research-oriented activities and extracurricular events in the relevant area, including sponsoring conferences, publications, podcasts, and other activities that disseminate the outcomes of their research.
Humanities Education
Chair: Russell A. Berman (Comparative Literature, German Studies)
Faculty Members: Elizabeth Bernhardt (German Studies, Language Center), Eamonn Callan (School of Education), Adrian Daub (German Studies), Marisa Galvez (French and Italian), Orrin Robinson (German Studies), Gabriella Safran (Slavic Languages and Literatures), Mitchell Stevens (School of Education), Jennifer Summit (English), Guadalupe Valdés (School of Education)
Web Site: http://dlcl.stanford.edu/groups/humanities-education
The Focal Group on Humanities Education explores issues concerning teaching and learning in the humanities, including research on student learning, innovation in pedagogy, the role of new technologies in humanities instruction, and professional issues for humanities teachers at all educational levels.
Performance
Chairs: Monika Greenleaf (Comparative Literature, Slavic Languages and Literatures), Peggy Phelan (Drama, English)
Faculty Members: Julie Draskoczy (Slavic Languages and Literatures), Jean Ha (History), Branislav Jakovljevic (Drama), Indra Levy (East Asian Languages and Cultures), Marília Librandi Rocha (Iberian and Latin American Cultures), Gabriella Safran (Slavic Languages and Literatures), Lisa Surwillo (Iberian and Latin American Cultures)
Web Site: http://dlcl.stanford.edu/groups/performance
The Performance group brings together departments of the DLCL with other disciplines, such as Drama, to achieve a cross-pollination and to reinvigorate performance theory through consciously re-mediated research interests, methodologies, and forms of scholarly expression. Each year of a three-year program focuses on a distinct goal:
1. Discussion of seminal texts and topics with key guests, extended through a blog on Arcade <http://arcade.stanford.edu/> .
2. A writing colloquium culminating in a conference and guest performances by invited artists at the Bing Concert Hall opening (2012).
3. Joint publication.
Philosophy and Literature
Chairs: R. Lanier Anderson (Philosophy), Joshua Landy (French and Italian)
Faculty Members: Keith Baker (History), Russell Berman (Comparative Literature, German Studies), Alexis Burgess (Philosophy), Martón Dornbach (German Studies), Jean-Pierre Dupuy (French and Italian), Amir Eshel (Comparative Literature, German Studies), Gregory Freidin (Slavic Languages and Literatures), Robert Harrison (French and Italian), David Hills (Philosophy), Héctor Hoyos (Iberian and Latin American Cultures), Michelle Karnes (English), Marília Librandi Rocha (Iberian and Latin American Cultures), Joan Ramon Resina (Iberian and Latin American Cultures, Comparative Literature), Nariman Skakov (Slavic Languages and Literatures), Blakey Vermeule (English), Laura Wittman (French and Italian), Lee Yearley (Religious Studies)
Web Site: http://dlcl.stanford.edu/groups/philosophy-literature
The Focal Group on Philosophy and Literature brings together faculty and students from nine departments to investigate questions in aesthetics and literary theory, philosophically-inflected literary texts, and the form of philosophical writings. Fields of interest include both continental and analytic philosophy, as well as cognitive science, political philosophy, rational choice theory, and related fields. The group offers undergraduate tracks within eight majors, a graduate workshop, and a lecture series.
Workshop in Poetics
Chairs: Roland Greene (Comparative Literature, English), Nicholas Jenkins (English)
Faculty Members: Marisa Galvez (French and Italian), Michael Predmore (Iberian and Latin American Cultures)
Web Site: http://dlcl.stanford.edu/groups/workshop-poetics
The Workshop in Poetics Focal Group is concerned with the theoretical and practical dimensions of the reading and criticism of poetry. During the four years of its existence, the Workshop has become a central venue at Stanford enabling participants to share their individual projects in a general conversation outside of disciplinary and national confinements. The two dimensions that the workshop sees as urgent are:
• poetics in its specificity as an arena for theory and interpretive practice.
• historical poetics as a particular set of challenges for the reader and scholar.
The core mission is to offer Stanford graduate students a space to develop and critique their current projects.
Renaissances
Chair: Roland Greene (Comparative Literature, English)
Faculty Members: Cécile Alduy (French and Italian), Shahzad Bashir (Religious Studies), Paula Findlen (History), Tamar Herzog (History), Bissera Pentcheva (Art and Art History), Morten Steen Hansen (Art and Art History), Jennifer Summit (English)
Web Site: http://dlcl.stanford.edu/groups/renaissances
The Renaissances Focal Group discusses the present and future of early modern studies, drawing different fields of literature into conversation. In addition to sponsoring lectures and seminars focused primarily on methods and modes of research in the field, the group organizes the Renaissance/Early Modern seminar and is developing a web-based project on the Renaissance.
Ph.D. Minor in Humanities
The Ph.D. minor in Humanities is a sequence of interdisciplinary seminars covering the following five periods: Antiquity, Medieval, Early-Modern, Enlightenment, and Modern. A framing seminar that leads students to reflect on what it means to teach and study the humanities in the 21st century will also be required. The Program is designed to provide students with broad historical knowledge and skills for conducting interdisciplinary research; to prepare students to teach beyond their area of expertise; and to create communities of students and faculty from different departments working on similar periods.
This degree is declared using the Graduate Program Authorization Petition, students must submit a PhD minor form by the end of winter quarter, during their first year of studies. At this point, they must have taken at least one GPiH core seminar, and must enroll in a second one during the spring quarter of that year. If their application is successful, students will be admitted into the program during spring quarter. By spring quarter of their second year, students must have taken at least two more GPiH seminars, including the framing course (the other may be either a core seminar, or the extra-departmental course in their field). If students have not completed these requirements by this time, their participation in the program may be terminated. Students must finish coursework for the GPiH minor in their third year. Students who wish to enroll in the program after winter quarter of their first year must demonstrate that their participation will not delay their time to TGR.
To pursue the PhD Minor in Interdisciplinary Humanities, students must fulfill the following requirements, for a minimum of 20 units.
| Units | ||
|---|---|---|
| DLCL 320 | Humanities Education in the Changing University | 3 |
| Complete three of the five core seminars | ||
| Classical Seminar: Rethinking Classics | ||
| Medieval Seminar | ||
| Early Modern Seminar | ||
| Enlightenment Seminar | ||
| Modern Seminar | ||
| Take one additional graduate course (numbered 200 or above) on one of these periods (usually corresponding to the student's area of specialization) in a department other than the student's home department. | ||
| Demonstrate the ability to use at least one foreign language for scholarly work (for instance, by engaging with a primary or secondary source in a seminar paper for any class). Students may petition to have this requirement waived, if it is deemed to be irrelevant to the student’s course of study. | ||
Minor in Modern Languages
The Division of Literatures, Cultures, and Languages offers an undergraduate minor that draws upon courses in literature and language within the division's departments and elsewhere in the University. The minor in Modern Languages is offered to students who want to supplement the course work in their major with course work in modern languages and literatures. The minor must be approved by the chairs of undergraduate studies of the respective language departments. Students in any field qualify for the minor by meeting the following requirements:
| Units | ||
|---|---|---|
| A minimum of 20 units (10 units per language) at the intermediate level (second year) or beyond, not including conversation, in two languages other than English offered by the DLCL. | 20 | |
| At least one additional course, at the 100 level or above, in each modern language being studied in the minor. These courses must be taught by DLCL Academic Council members or other senior members of the faculty. | 6-10 | |
Students are recommended to study, work, or intern abroad for at least eight weeks at a location where one of the languages is spoken. Course work in this minor may not duplicate work counted toward other majors or minors. Advanced Placement credit and transfer credit do not apply to this minor. All courses must be taken for a letter grade. By University policy, no more than 36 units may be awarded in this minor. Students declare the minor in Modern Languages through Axess.
Minor in Middle Eastern Languages, Literatures, and Cultures
The African and Middle Eastern (AME) program is part of the Stanford Language Center and is affiliated with The Center for African Studies, the Abbasi Program in Islamic Studies, and the program in Jewish Studies. The program offers beginning, intermediate and advanced classes in Arabic, Hebrew, Swahili, and other African languages as well as classes in AME literatures and cultures. Additional languages such as Hausa, Chichewa, Amharic, Tigrigna, Igbo, Zulu, Kinyarwanda, and Twi are offered upon request, providing funding is available. Students can also request an AME language course by applying online. For further information check our FAQ page or contact the coordinator Khalid Obeid (kyobeid@stanford.edu).
The undergraduate minor in Middle Eastern Languages, Literatures, and Cultures has been designed to give students majoring in other departments an opportunity to gain a substantial introduction to the Arabic and Hebrew languages, as well as an introduction to the cultures and civilizations of the Middle East. Students declaring a minor must do so no later than the last day of the Spring quarter of their junior year, or four quarters before degree conferred. If a student is not able to meet this deadline, he or she may petition the Language Center director and request a revised declaration date, which may be granted at the director’s discretion. Requirements for the degree can be found in the Language Center section of this bulletin.
Courses
DLCL 1. History and Theory of Novel Group. 1 Unitss.
For undergraduates in English, the DLCL, and East Asian literatures interested in the novel and the events sponsored by the Center for the Study of the Novel (CSN) and to prepare them to attend CSN events with some understanding of the material presented. Each CSN event¿the New Book Events, the Ian Watt Lecture on the History and/or Theory of the Novel, and the Center's annual conference¿will either be preceded or followed by a colloquium, led by a member of the graduate student staff. In these colloquia, students will engage with the material under discussion, usually written by the speaker(s) on whose work the events are based. Participation at 75% of events and colloquia is mandatory for course credit. Precirculated readings will be made available for all colloquia preceding an event, and often for those held after the event, to enable students to develop a familiarity with issues pertaining to the theoretical and historical study of the novel.
Same as: ENGLISH 1.
DLCL 189A. Honors Thesis Seminar. 5 Units.
For undergraduate majors in DLCL departments; required for honors students. Planning, researching, and writing an honors thesis. Oral presentations and peer workshops. Research and writing methodologies, and larger critical issues in literary studies.
DLCL 189B. Honors Thesis Seminar. 5 Units.
For undergraduate majors in DLCL departments; required for honors students. Planning, researching, and writing an honors thesis. Oral presentations and peer workshops. Research and writing methodologies, and larger critical issues in literary studies.
DLCL 189C. Honors Thesis Seminar. 2-4 Units.
For undergraduate majors in DLCL departments; required for honors students. Planning, researching, and writing an honors thesis. Oral presentations and peer workshops. Research and writing methodologies, and larger critical issues in literary studies.
DLCL 199. Honors Thesis Oral Presentation. 1 Unitss.
For undergraduate majors in DLCL departments; required for honors students. Oral presentations and peer workshops. Regular advisory meetings required.
DLCL 209. Paleography of Medieval and Early Modern Manuscripts. 3-5 Units.
Introductory course in the history of writing and of the book, from the late antique period until the advent of printing. Opportunity to learn to read and interpret medieval manuscripts through hands-on examination of original materials in Special Collections of Stanford Libraries as well as through digital images. Offers critical training in the reading of manuscripts for students from departments as diverse as Classics, History, Philosophy, Religious Studies, English, and the Division of Languages Cultures and Literatures.
Same as: CLASSGEN 311, ENGLISH 209, HISTORY 309G, RELIGST 204.
DLCL 220. Humanities Education. 1 Unitss.
Humanities Education explores issues concerning teaching and learning in the humanities, including research on student learning, innovation in pedagogy, the role of new technologies in humanities instruction, and professional issues for humanities teachers at all educational levels.
DLCL 221. Performance. 1 Unitss.
The Performance Group brings together diverse departments within the DLCL with other disciplines, such as Drama, to achieve a cross-pollination: to reinvigorate performance theory through our own consciously re-mediated research interests, methodologies, and forms of scholarly expression. Drawn to topics involving space, temporality, and embodiment, we still want to ¿do things with words.¿.
DLCL 222. Philosophy and Literature. 1 Unitss.
The Focal Group in Philosophy and Literature brings together scholars and students from eight departments to investigate questions in aesthetics and literary theory, philosophically-inflected literary texts, and the form of philosophical writings. Fields of interest include both continental and analytic philosophy, as well as cognitive science, political philosophy, rational choice theory, and related fields.
DLCL 223. Renaissances. 1 Unitss.
The Renaissances Group brings together faculty members and students from over a dozen departments at Stanford to consider the present and future of early modern studies (provisionally framed as a period spanning the fourteenth through the seventeenth centuries) within the humanities. Taking seriously the plural form of the group's name, we seek to explore the early modern period from the widest range of disciplinary, cultural, linguistic, and geographical perspectives possible.
DLCL 224. Workshop in Poetics. 1 Unitss.
The Workshop in Poetics is concerned with the theoretical and practical dimensions of the reading and criticism of poetry. During the three years of its existence, the Workshop has become a central venue at Stanford enabling participants to share their individual projects in a general conversation outside of disciplinary and national confinements. The two dimensions that the workshop sees as urgent are: poetics in its specificity as an arena for theory and interpretive practice, and historical poetics as a particular set of challenges for the reader and scholar.
DLCL 293. Literary Translation. 3-5 Units.
An overview of translation theories and practices over time. The aesthetic, ethical, and political questions raised by the act and art of translation and how these pertain to the translator's tasks. Discussion of particular translation challenges and the decision processes taken to address these issues. Coursework includes assigned theoretical readings, comparative translations, and the undertaking of an individual translation project.
Same as: ENGLISH 293.
DLCL 301. The Learning and Teaching of Second Languages. 3 Units.
"Formally known as DLCL 201" Learning perspective rather than traditional teaching methods. Focus is on instructional decision making within the context of student intellectual and linguistic development in university settings to different populations. Readings in second-language acquisition.
DLCL 302. The Learning and Teaching of Second-Language Literatures. 1-3 Units.
Focuses on the research on advanced level reading and writing in second language contexts with a special focus on upper-level cultural texts. Discussion of second language writing and reading assessment including a writing familiarization workshop. Participants will focus on their cognizant language and literature for the completion of their assignments.
DLCL 311. Professional Workshop. 1-2 Units.
Meets regularly throughout the year to discuss issues in the professional study of literature. Topics include the academic job market and the challenges of research and teaching at different types of institutions. Supervised by the graduate affairs committee of the DLCL. May be repeated for credit.
DLCL 320. Humanities Education in the Changing University. 3 Units.
Advanced study in the humanities faces changes within fields, the university and the wider culture. Considers the debate over the status of the humanities with regard to historical genealogies and current innovations. Particular attention on changes in doctoral education. Topics include: origins of the research university; disciplines and specialization; liberal education in conflict with professionalization; literature and literacy education; interdisciplinarity as a challenge to departments; education policy; digital humanities; accountability in education, assessment and student-centered pedagogies.
Same as: COMPLIT 275, GERMAN 250.
DLCL 321. Classical Seminar: Rethinking Classics. 4-5 Units.
Literary and philosophical texts from Antiquity (including Homer, the Greek tragedians, Plato, Aristotle, Virgil, and Augustine). In each case, we will examine the cultural contexts in which each text was composed (e.g. political regimes and ideologies; attitudes towards gender and sexuality; hierarchies of class and status; discourses on "barbarians" and resident aliens). We will study various theoretical approaches to these books in an effort to "rethink" these texts in the 21st century.
Same as: CLASSGEN 321, HUMNTIES 321.
DLCL 322. Medieval Seminar. 3-5 Units.
The cultural,literary, and artistic evolution of the Middle Ages. The barbarian invasions and the Germanic ethos, the Celtic heritage,and the monastic tradition. Romanesque art and architecture,pilgrimages,and the Crusades. Gothic aesthetics, chivalry and courtly love, scholasticism, and the rise of universities. The late Middle Ages, humanism, and the threshold of the Renaissance. Texts include: Beowulf, Mabinogion, Song of Roland, Chretien de Troyes' Lancelot and Yvain, Dante's Divine Comedy, Boccaccio's Decameron, and Chaucer's Canterbury Tales. 3-5 units.
DLCL 323. Early Modern Seminar. 3-5 Units.
Explores some of the key texts of European early modernity and the critical paradigms according to which the idea of the "Renaissance" has been formed, analyzed, and questioned since the 19th century. Will aim to provide a broad introduction to Early Modern studies from the point of view of the Italian Renaissance and its reception in different European contexts. Taught in English.
Same as: ITALIAN 220.
DLCL 324. Enlightenment Seminar. 3-5 Units.
The Enlightenment as a philosophical, literary, and political movement. Themes include the nature and limits of philosophy, the grounds for critical intellectual engagement, the institution of society and the public, and freedom, equality and human progress. Authors include Voltaire, Montesquieu, Rousseau, Hume, Diderot, and Condorcet.
Same as: HISTORY 234, HISTORY 334, HISTORY 432A, HUMNTIES 324.
DLCL 325. Modern Seminar. 3-5 Units.
The postmodern condition as post-WWII rupture in Western tradition; moral, political, cultural, and aesthetical dimensions. Sources include literature, philosophy, essays, films, and painting. Authors and artists include: Primo Levi, Hannah Arendt, Alain Resnais, Samuel Beckett, Georges Bataille, Michel Foucault, Theodor Adorno, David Riesman, Georges Perec, Juliet Mitchell, and Francis Bacon.
DLCL 369. Introduction to Graduate Studies: Criticism as Profession. 5 Units.
A number of faculty will present published work and discuss their research and composition process. We will read critical, theoretical, and literary texts that address, in different ways, "What is a World?" Taught in English.
Same as: COMPLIT 369, FRENCH 369, GERMAN 369, ITALIAN 369.