Howard Sklar, PhD

Department of Modern Languages (English Philology)

University of Helsinki

Disability Studies and Literature

The emergence over the last several decades of the cluster of research emphases known as “Disability Studies” has given unprecedented visibility to the concerns of disabled individuals, both within and outside of the academic world.  Scholars have examined a broad spectrum of concerns, ranging from the discussion of specific disabilities (visual impairment, physical impairment, hearing impairment, cognitive impairment), to the theoretical underpinnings of disability studies generally, to the difficulty of establishing consistent programs within the academy that emphasize disability concerns.

 

Within the humanities, considerable scholarly attention has been given to the content of, motives behind, and social effects of the ways in which disabled individuals are represented in literature, film, visual arts and other artistic forms.  The aim of this course is to provide a general introduction to disability studies as they apply to the study of literature, particularly fictional narratives.  The course will be divided into two sections, with the first focusing on several prominent theoretical streams within disability studies and the second applying these and other theories to the reading of specific fictional narratives.  While the second section primarily emphasizes representations of cognitive impairment (in this case, developmental disability and autism), some attention also will be given to works that portray visual impairment (blindness) and physical impairment (cerebral palsy).

 

 

Theoretical readings for the course will be taken primarily from the following essay collections and journals:

 

Disability Studies: Enabling the Humanities. Sharon L. Snyder, Brenda Jo Brueggemann and Rosemarie Garland-Thomson, eds.  Modern Language Association, 2002.

The Disability Studies Reader.  Lennard J. Davis, ed.  Routledge, 2006.

Embodied Rhetorics: Disability in Language and Culture. James Wilson and Cynthia Lewiecki-Wilson, eds.  Southern Illinois University Press, 2001.

Journal of Literary and Cultural Disability Studies

Disability Studies Quarterly

 

The fictional narratives that will be the focus of the second section of the course (primarily short stories, but also selections from novels and graphic novels) will be announced at the first meeting.

 

 

Course Syllabus

 

(subject to change)

 

 

A few clarifications:

 

Unless indicated otherwise, all readings are available in my pigeonhole in the Department of Comparative Literature.  You may copy these articles, but please take only one article at a time, and be sure to return the master copy (with the pages in order) to the pigeonholes so that the articles will be available for others!  When possible, I also will provide links to online articles on my website.

 

All required readings must be read before the date of the session in which they are listed.  You’ll find them in the green folder in my pigeonhole.

 

All “supplementary readings” are optional…but highly recommended!  They also may be used as materials for the longer paper.  I will list these extra readings on the website at the “Supplementary Readings” link.  You’ll find these articles in the orange folders.

 

Paper assignments are explained on the “Course Assignments” page of my website as well as on a handout that will be distributed during the first class session.

 

“Journal” assignments are also explained on the “Course Assignments” page.  Journal topics will be listed on the website version of the syllabus by the second session.

 

 

Course Requirements:

 

One short paper (2-3 pages) researching a particular disability (20%)

One longer paper (7-9 pages) analyzing a work of literature and applying a supplementary theoretical text (60%)

     Weekly Journals on course blog (10%)

     Attendance and participation (10%)

 

 

 

22.1

 

Session 1 – Introduction: Disability Studies – What It is and How It Relates

to Literary Studies

 

 

29.1

 

Session 2– Intellectual Disability in Literature: From the Outside In, Part I

            

             Primary Literature: Excerpts from Carson McCullers’s The Heart is a

                          Lonely Hunter

             Secondary Literature: Heidi Krumland, “A Big Deaf-Mute Moron:

                          Eugenic Traces in Carson McCullers’s The Heart is a Lonely

                          Hunter”

 

5.2

 

Session 3 - Intellectual Disability in Literature: From the Outside In,

Part II

 

Primary Literature: Excerpts from Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird

             Secondary Literature: David T. Mitchell and Sharon L. Snyder,

excerpts from Narrative Prosthesis: Disability and the

Dependencies of Discourse

 

             OR

 

Primary Literature: Toni Morrison, “Recitatif”

             Secondary Literature:

Howard Sklar, “‘What the Hell Happened to Maggie?’:

Stereotype, Sympathy and Disability in Toni

Morrison’s ‘Recitatif’”

David T. Mitchell, “Narrative Prosthesis and the

             Materiality of Metaphor”

             Film excerpt: “To Kill a Mockingbird” (Robert Mulligan, dir., 1962)

 

 

12.2

 

Session 4 – Intellectual Disability in Literature: From the Outside In,

Part III

 

             Primary Literature: John Steinbeck, Of Mice and Men

             Secondary Literature: Martin Halliwell, “Of Mice and Men (John

                          Steinbeck and Lewis Milestone” (chapter from Images of

                          Idiocy: The Idiot Figure in Modern Fiction and Film)

             Film excerpt: “Of Mice and Men” (Lewis Milestone, dir., 1939; or

                          Gary Sinese, dir., 1992) 

 

19.2

 

*** HUOM!  Short paper due!***

 

Session 5 – Intellectual Disability in Literature: From the Inside Out,

Part I

 

             Primary Literature: Excerpts from William Faulkner’s The Sound and

                          the Fury

             Secondary Literature: Martin Halliwell, excerpts from Images of

                          Idiocy: The Idiot Figure in Modern Fiction and Film

 

OR

 

Primary Literature: Tarjei Vesaas’s The Birds

Secondary Literature: Merete Sæbø Torvanger, “Vesaas's The Birds

and a patient's history elucidated by means of the theory of

object relations and the death instinct”

 

 

***HUOM!  No class on 26.2!***

 

 

5.3

 

Session 6 – Intellectual Disability in Literature: From the Inside Out,

Part I

 

             Primary Literature: Daniel Keyes, “Flowers for Algernon” (story), or

                          excerpts from Daniel Keyes, Flowers for Algernon (novel)

             Secondary Literature: G. Thomas Couser, “Making, Taking and Faking

                          Lives: Ethical Problems in Collaborative Life Writing,” or

                          Couser, “Signifying Bodies: Life Writing and Disability Studies”

             Film excerpt: “Charly” (Ralph Nelson, dir., 1968)

 

 

***HUOM! No class on 12.3 (väliviikko)!*

 

 

19.3

 

Session 7 – Representing Autism: The Search for an Authentic Voice

 

Primary Literature: Mark Haddon, excerpts from The Curious

Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time

             Secondary Literature: Stuart Murray, “On Autistic Presence”

 

 

26.3

 

***HUOM!  Longer paper due!***

 

Session 8  Cerebral Palsy: The Challenge of Telling One’s Own Story

 

Primary Literature: Christy Brown, excerpts from My Left Foot

Secondary Literature: Ellen L. Barton, “Textual Practices of

             Erasure: Representations of Disability and the Founding

             Of the United Way”

Film excerpt: “My Left Foot: The Story of Christy Brown” (Jim

             Sheridan, dir., 1989)

 

 

 

***HUOM!  No class on 2.4 (Good Friday/Pitkäperjantai)!***

 

 

9.4

 

Session 9 – “The Planet of the Blind”

 

Primary Literature:

Stephen Kuusisto, excerpts from Planet of the Blind

(memoir)

                          Stephen Kuusisto, poetry

             Secondary Literature: Michael L. Melancon, “‘A River that No

                          One Can See’: Body, Text and Environment in the Poetry

                          of Stephen Kuusisto” (link to follow)

             Audio excerpt: Interview with Stephen Kuusisto

 

 

16.4

 

Session 10 – Resistance to the Movement: The Case of Deafness

 

Primary Literature: Carson McCullers, excerpt from The Heart

             is a Lonely Hunter

Secondary Literature:

             Harlan Lane, “Construction of Deafness”

                          OR

                          Carol Padden and Tom Humphries, “Deaf People: A

                                       Different Center”

Course Description (spring 2010)

Howard Sklar Homepage

Sklar - Research

Ethics - Course Description

Ethics - Syllabus

Ethics - Extra Readings

Ethics - Papers

Ethics - Lit Texts

Emotions - Course Description

Emotions - Syllabus

Emotions - Papers

Disability Studies and Lit

Sklar - Bio

Sklar - C.V.