ENGL 529A -- Winter Quarter 2013

Literature & Religion in the Age of Darwin LaPorte MW 1:30-3:20 13755

Secularization and evangelical religion are among the most crucial legacies of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries: their consequences for modern culture cannot easily be overstated. This course will explore the literary and cultural implications of nineteenth-century religious conflict, focusing chiefly upon the period surrounding Darwin's The Origin of Species. We will investigate a surprising new scholarly consensus about the relative vigor of nineteenth-century religion. And we will consider a newly-emerging model of secularization best expressed by the philosopher Charles Taylor, who writes of secularization as a condition of modern life that helps to constitute modern selfhood and that (at least historically) brings about both the destabilization and recomposition of religious forms. Readings will be drawn chiefly from a British context, though American and European parallels will be unmistakable and frequent. Expect readings to range widely from nineteenth-century science to philosophy, fiction, and poetry.

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