Department of English

This seminar will be a broad survey of Marx and Freud, with attention to each thinker as well as to how their theories supplement one another. In our section on Marx, we will explore they ways his theories of value, the commodity, and ideology speak to and have influenced ideas about desire and social psychology in a capitalist world system. Respecting the specificity of Marx's own writings, we will also read 20th and 21-century theorists who elaborate and extend his work. In our section on Freud, we will explore many of Freud's well-known theories on meta-psychology, but we will also investigate some of his lesser-known writings. We will attempt to respect the specificity of Freud's thought, while also reading a number of his commentators in order to situate psychoanalysis in a historical context as well as contemporary social frame.

Submat M.A. students should request permission from instructors to enroll and should submit a permit request via Path@Penn.