GERST 3610 - Fables of Capitalism

(crosslisted) COML 3542, GOVT 3606
(CA-AS)

Fall. 4 credits. Student option grading.

Taught in English.

P. Fleming.

This course examines the stories, literary examples, and metaphors at work in elaborating the modern economic subject, the so-called “homo oeconomicus.” We will examine material from Locke, Smith, Defoe, and Mill through Marx, Nietzsche, Brecht, and Weber, up to current the neoliberal subject and its critiques (Foucault, Bataille). The course focuses on narrative and figurative moments in theoretical texts as well as crucial literary sources (novels, novellas, and plays) as they collectively develop the modern economic paradigms of industry, exchange, credit-debt, and interest. The course thus addresses both literary and theoretical sources, particularly the stories and examples told to justify the liberal order as well as its guiding metaphors such as the invisible hand; Schuld as both debt and guilt; investment (in oneself, in one’s future); and the intersection of religious and secular economies.