The Reading Effect and the Persistence of Form

This course examines the "reading effect" as it emerges in work on the question of form and contemporaneous scholarship on the problematics of reading. We will trace the ways in which these related but distinct critical idioms negotiate concepts of mutual concern (interpretation, representation, the reading subject/reading brain). Topics include "new formalism," cognitive studies, symptomatic reading. Theorists from Althusser and deMan to Marcus, Wolfson and Zunshine. Enrollment limited to 15 graduate students; undergraduate seniors may enroll with instructor permission.