Description and Goals:
The course is designed to give students an overview of the sociology of literature as an important theoretical approach often underrepresented in theory surveys or introductions but not only historically important to the study of literature, but currently resurgent as a principle approach. Starting with selections from Karl Marx (on Balzac, Shakespeare, etc.) we will review briefly the rise of sociology in general and then read some highlights in the specific sociology of literature, including selections from Goldmann, Williams, Adorno, Lowenthal, Macherey, Eagleton, Jameson, Bourdieu, Zima, and Moretti. While we will grapple with certain key programmatic texts of theory (Goldmann, Jameson, Moretti, Bourdieu), we will also try to link these somewhat abstract discussions to specific texts, to which end we will be reading a few highlights of the Anglo-French novel, including works by Flaubert, Hardy, Conrad, Joyce, and Robbe-Grillet.

Keywords:
Sociology of the Novel, Goldmann, Jameson, Bourdieu, Moretti