An encounter with systematic thinking on language, representation, and literature, from antiquity (Aristotle's Poetics and Rhetoric, Platonic aesthetics) through the Renaissance (Sir Philip Sidney's Arcadia, George Puttenham's The Arte of English Poesie) the eighteenth century (Kant on aesthetic judgment), Victorian aestheticism (Walter Pater and Oscar Wilde) through twentieth century formalism, structuralism, anthropological linguistics (Clause Levi-Strauss), deconstruction, psychoanalysis, and philosophical reflections on language and literature (e.g. Hegel, Heidegger and Wittgenstein).

Requirements: short assignments throughout the semester; mid-term and final exams.