Syllabus 2026-27
This year's module will be taught by 5 different staff members, allowing students to benefit from a variety of critical approaches and interests (see below for details). The module Convenor is Daniel Katz, so please contact Dan if you have any immediate questions or problems (d.katz@warwick.ac.uk). Note: the information below is provisional, and subject to minor modification.
WEEK ONE: GENERAL INTRODUCTION and PSYCHOANALYSIS AND REVOLUTION (Daniel Katz)
Ian Parker and David Pav贸n-Cu茅llar, Preface and Introduction, Psychoanalysis and Revolution, 1968 Press, 2021 (handout)
David Pav贸n-Cu茅llar, "Metapsychology on the Battlefield," in Samo Tomsic and Andreja Zevnik, reds, Jacques Lacan: Between Psychoanalysis and Politics, Routledge, 2016 (available as e-text through library portal).
WEEK TWO: SEMIOCAPITALISM, LANGUAGE, DEBT (DK)
Franco "Bifo" Berardi, The Uprising: On Poetry and Finance, Semiotexte, 2012, pp. 7-70 (handout).
Alex McPhee-Browne, Los Angeles Review of Books, July 12, 2026.
WEEK THREE: RETRO (Michael Gardiner)
Mark Fisher, 鈥楾he metaphysics of crackle鈥� (2011)
Fran莽ois J. Bonnett, Apr猫s la mort / (2021/ 2017), 11-22
Katy Shaw, (2018), 1-23, 105-110
Grafton Tanner, (2024), 17-28, 63-76
WEEK FOUR: SHANZHAI (MG)
Byung-Chul Han, Shanzhai: Dekonstruktion auf Chinesisch (2011)/ (2017), 60-78
Anna Greenspan, (2023), 116-149
Xin Wang, 鈥楳achine Envy鈥� (2025)
WEEK 5: THEOLOGY AND THEORY (I) (Emma Mason)
Hildegard of Bingen, Scivias (1142-1151), extracts (via email)
Foucault, 鈥楾he Subject and Power鈥�, Critical Inquiry, 8. 4 (1982), 777-795 [online in library]
Julia Kristeva, 鈥楢pproaching Abjection鈥�, in Powers of Horror: An Essay on Abjection (Columbia University Press, 1982/2024), 1-32 [online in library]
Michael Marder, 鈥楶relude鈥�, in Green Mass: The Ecological Theology of St Hildegard of Bingen (Stanford University Press, 2021), 3-8 [online in library]
Further reading: Clayton Crockett and Catherine Keller, eds., Political Theology on Edge: Ruptures of Justice and Belief in the Anthropocene (Fordham University Press, 2022); and Ilia Delio, 鈥楾ranshumanism and Transcendence鈥�, in Beth Singler and Fraser Watts, The Cambridge Companion to Religion and Artificial Intelligence (Cambridge University Press, 2024)
WEEK 6: THEOLOGY AND THEORY (II) (EM)
Raymond Carver, (1981)
John 9, 鈥楯esus Heals a Man Born Blind鈥� (NIV Bible) [online, Bible Gateway]
Maurice Merleau-Ponty, 鈥楾he Spatiality of One鈥檚 Own Body and Motility鈥� and 鈥楾he Body as Expression and Speech鈥�, in Phenomenology of Perception (Routledge, 1945), part I, chapters 3 and 6 [online in library]
Emmanuel Levinas, 鈥楨xteriority and the Face鈥�, Totality and Infinity: An Essay on Exteriority (Springer, 1961), section III [online in library]
Further reading: D. H. Lawrence, 鈥楾he Blind Man鈥� (1922); Jacques Derrida, Memoirs of the Blind: The Self-Portrait and Other Ruins(University of Chicago Press, 1993)
WEEK SEVEN: ECOCRITICAL THEORY (Emily McGiffin)
Annie Proulx, 鈥�.鈥�
J. Drew Lanham, 鈥溾��
William Cronin, 鈥溾��
Jordan Abel, Un/inhabited (excerpts--available on Teams)
WEEK EIGHT: POSTCOLONIAL ECOCRITICISM (EMc)
Kathryn Yusoff, A Billion Black Anthropocenes or None.
WEEK NINE: QUEER THEORY: SEMINAL WORKS (Ross Forman)
Foucault, Michel. 鈥淭he Repressive Hypothesis.鈥� The History of Sexuality, vol. 1: An Introduction. Pantheon Books, 1978. pp.16-35. [library or online at ]
Sedgwick, Eve Kosofsky. 鈥淨ueer and Now.鈥� Tendencies. Duke UP, 1999. pp.1-22. [online in library]
Susan Stryker, 鈥淢y Words to Victor Frankenstein above the Village of Chamounix: Performing Transgender Rage,鈥� When Monsters Speak: A Susan Stryker Reader. Duke UP, 2004. p.134-150. [online in library]
Recommended:
Halberstam, Jack. "Making Trans Bodies," Trans: A Quick and Quirky Account of Gender Variability*. University of California Press, 2018. pp. 22-44.
Rubin, Gayle. 鈥淭hinking Sex,鈥� Deviations: A Gayle Rubin Reader. Duke UP, 2011. pp. 137-181.
WEEK 10: THE USES OF THE QUEER ARCHIVE (RF)
Rodriquez, Jesusa, and Liliane Felipe, 鈥淛uana la larga,鈥� [online video]
Taylor, Diana 鈥淲e Have Always Been Queer,鈥� GLQ, vol 22, no 2, 2006, pp.205鈥�214. [online in library]
Mar铆a Elena Mart铆nez, 鈥淎rchives, Bodies, and Imagination: The Case of Juana Aguilar and Queer Approaches to History, Sexuality, and Politics,鈥� Radical History Review, vol. 120, 2014, pp.159-182 [online in library]
Recommended:
Martinez, Juliana. 鈥淒ressed Like a Man? Of Language, Bodies, and Monsters in the Trial of Enrique/Enriqueta Favez and Its Contemporary Accounts,鈥� Journal of the History of Sexuality, vol. 26, no. 2, 2017, pp.188-206. [online in library]
Manion, Jen. 鈥淚ntroduction: Extraordinary Lives,鈥� Female Husbands: A Trans History. pp. 1-14.