FREN 6060

Literature and Mind

Course Description

Course information provided by the Courses of Study 2016-2017.

This interdisciplinary seminar would like to offer new hypotheses on the ways literature is understood and experienced by a reader's mind.  Our methodology, while non-reductionist, will take into account the current state of cognitive science, and also build on literary theory and philosophy (both "analytic" and "Continental").  Literature makes use of cognitive structures and paths - but it also alters and challenges the usual boundaries of thought.  We will identify some key problems (such as the nature of fiction, biological evolution and the literary, the role of contradictions, formal and genre expectations, computation and thinking, poetic regulations, etc.).  We'll approach such issues through innovative methodologies and on the basis of literary texts belongs to a wide range of historical or linguistic traditions.  Students from very diverse backgrounds but with an interest in mind and/or language and literary experience are welcome.

When Offered Spring.

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