Colt 303: Globalization: Culture, Change, Resistance
Professor: K. Pinkus
Taper Hall 153
Tel: 213 740 0104
Email: pinkus@usc.edu
This syllabus is tentative and is subject to change
1/14: introduction: What is Globalization and what does it have to do with Culture? Why
are we studying Globalization in Comparative Literature?
1/16: Global Cultures?
readings:
1. David Harvey, A Brief History of Neoliberalism, Introduction, chapters 1-2
1/21: Literature and globalization. What can literature teach us about globalization and
vice versa?
Readings:
1. David Harvey, chapters 3-4
2. Ben Fountain, “Near-Extinct Birds of the Central Cordillera,” from Brief Encounters
with Che Guevara
1/23: Literature and Globalization
Readings:
1. Ben Fountain: TBA
1/30: Shelter: The Culture of Living
1. David Harvey
2. Robert Neuwirth, Shadow Cities: A Billion Squatters, a New Urban World, Prologue,
“Time Present” chap. 1-4 (pp. 1-176).
2/4: Shelter: The Culture of Living (con’t)
1. Robert Neuwirth, “Time Past” chaps. 5-6 (pp. 177-240).
2/6: Shelter: architecture: slums, barrios, gated communities, detention centers
Readings:
1. Evil Paradises (selections on Ares)
2/11: Cyberspace: a place of resistance?
Readings:
1. Pierre Lévy. Collective Intelligence. Mankind’s Emerging World in Cyberspace.
Trans.Robert Bononno (selections on Ares)
2. Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri, Multitude (selections on Ares)
2/13: Immaterial labor
Readings:
1. Paolo Virno. "Labour and Language." http://www.generationonline.org/t/labourlanguage.htm
2/20: mid term exam
2/25: Is Another Production Possible?
Readings:
1. Boaventura de Sousa Santos César and A. Rodríguez-Garavito, “Introduction:
Expanding the Economic Canon and Searching for Alternatives to Neoliberal
Globalization,” from Another Production is Possible (ARES reserve)
2/27: Clothing
Readings:
1. Naomi Klein, No Logo
3/3: visit to American Apparel Factory, downtown Los Angeles
3/5: Clothing
Readings:
1. Naomi Klein, No Logo
3/10: Case studies in production and consumption: students will visit various retail outlets
in small groups and report on findings
3/12: Precarious Workers of the World
Readings:
1. Vanni, Ilaria and Marcello Tarì. “On the Life and Deeds of San Precario, Patron Saint
of Precarious Workers and Lives” Fibrecultures n. 5 (2005).
www.journal.fibreculture.org
3/24: Forms of Resistance
Readings:
Hardt, Michael and Antonio Negri. Empire (selections)
3/26: Biology and globalization
Readings:
1. Eugene Thacker, The Global Genome (selections on Ares)
2. Michael Novacek, The Biodiversity Crisis: Losing What Counts (selections on Ares)
3/31: The University in/of Globalization:
Readings:
Kamuf, Peggy. The Division of Literature: Or the University in Deconstruction
(selections on Ares)
4/2: possible field trip: TBA
4/7: Postfordism and its Cultures:
Readings:
1. Zanini, Adelio. "Introduction to the posfordist lexicon." http://www.generationonline.org/t/postfordistintro.htm
4/9: presentations
4/14: presentations
4/16: lecture by Beatriz Jaguaribe: Brazillian Cultures and Globalization
4/21: What futures for the globe?: climate change
Charles Wohlforth. The Whale and the Supercomputer: On the Northern Front of Climate
Change (selections on Ares)
4/23: the futures of the globe: climate change
Readings:
E.O. Wilson, The Future of Life (selections on Ares)
4/28: the futures of the globe: climate change.
Readings: TBA
4/30: last class: conclusion
Course requirements:
Attendance and active participation in all discussions is required. If you have to miss a
class for any reason, please inform me in advance.
Short response paper: visit to retail outlet 20 %
In-class presentation: 10 %
Short response paper: visit to American Apparel: 10 %
mid-term exam: 20%
final paper: 40%