Reading and Righting Histories of Violence

This seminar proposes “histories of violence” as a useful framework to interrogate the varied forms of violence that constitute Western liberal modernity. These forms include systems of state power and imperial practices; subjective violence through raced, gendered, and sexualized hierarchies; and narrative violence that prevents histories and voices from emerging through the erasure of archives and narrative silencing. Course readings consider ongoing local and transnational struggles to reckon with the violent histories of slavery, empire, colonialism, nationalism, and democracy. They offer interdisciplinary models for researching and narrating these histories. Class discussions with consider avenues for reckoning with histories of violence.