Continuing Education

In this course monsters, mutants and aliens will be at the center of our cultural and visual analysis. We will consider these figures in unforgettable and massively popular works like Bram Stoker's Dracula and Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, as well as contemporary appearances like the X-Men, Alien and Godzilla, exploring together the many political and sociological uses of monsters in the contemporary era. We will consider together questions like: What is a monster? What does "otherness'' mean? Why do we need monsters in our collective imagination? The aim of this course is to explore how the lack of alliances between humans and monsters is part of a political discourse built around biopolitics, white supremacy and heteronormativity, and how media play an important role in showing those bodies in a certain way. Using a feminist and critical theory approach-reading works by Foucault, Butler and Preciado alongside literary texts, movies and comics-we will investigate how these bodies become a territory of fear and frustration, and whether or not they can potentially be the revolution we need.
Note: This course is held on campus at SVA.