COML 2040 - Global Fictions

(CA-AS)

The primitive has always been an object of fascination as well as of fear or contempt. As savage cannibal or mysterious shaman, pristine nature or unruly wilderness, it has never ceased to inspire Western culture. Primitive passions are global fictions in two ways. They play an important role in the construction of cultural difference and thus lie at the basis of global inequality and yet, they also express desire to think differently about the globe, to conceive of alternatives to societal pressures and environmental exploitation. Through analyses of “primitive passions” in a range of media and from different cultural contexts, this course will investigate primitivism as a global phenomenon that continues to shape much of our contemporary imaginary of culture.