outsider lecture one
TRANSCRIPT
Welcome to ENGL103 – The Outsider
Dr. Nicholas WrightPhone: 3642 987 ext.: 7468. Email: [email protected] 617; Office hours: Wed 2 – 3, Thurs 3 – 4pm
Erin Harrington. Phone: 3642 987 ext.: 8231Email: [email protected] History 616 Associate Professor Paul Millar. Phone: 3642 987 ext.: 6313Email: [email protected] 503 Tutors:
Michael Potts. Office: Locke 319Phone: 3642 987 ext.: 7932Email: [email protected] Hour: Monday 2 – 4pm Kim Parrent. Office: Locke 319Phone: 3642 987 ext.: 7932Email: [email protected] Hour: Tuesday 2 – 3pm
Staff and Contact Details:
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How to do well in ENGL 103
• Tutorials are important
• Use the forum
• Switch on for lectures, be prepared, bring the texts
• Read and read …
• Make arguments and support them by referring to the texts
• Share your ideas and respect each other
Why study the Outsider?(a) Critical thinking – to debate respectfully with others, to tell a good argument from a bad one, to examine tradition and prejudice in a Socratic spirit. (b) Historical context – to pit knowledge against stereotype and, by doing so, establish a basis for mutually respectful debate
(c) The power of perspective - to imagine ourselves in the place of others.
See Martha Nussbaum’s Not for Profit: Why Democracy Needs the Humanities, Princeton University Press, 2010.
The Outsider – some examples?
What is the significance of such characters, and why do they figure so prominently in
the western imagination?Because they …• Entertain – a form of wish fulfilment?• Help us imagine difference?• Are a celebration of individual agency?• Offer a way of policing difference and behaviour that is too
individualistic?• May be used to challenge or cherish certain values or norms?• Mirror society?• Help groups and individuals define themselves – cf. the scapegoat?• Are figures of redemption – cf. the sacrifice?• Are omens or messengers?• Are figures of complexity, hybridity, and contradiction?• Expose hypocrisy, corruption, the ills of power and the experience
of suffering?