First-Year Research Seminar: The Suburban Imaginary and the American Dream

(4 Credits)

The recent interest in the "suburbs" in political tweets and post-COVID19 migration patterns is part of suburbia"s historically fluctuating rise and fall in the American imaginary. In this research seminar we will critically examine the history, culture, and politics of the American suburb and its representation(s) in popular culture, the media, and the arts. The sociological and ideological origins of the suburb will be traced, as well as the growth, popularization, and changing attitudes towards "suburbia" in advertising, television, and film. Particular attention will be placed on the suburb as a utopian and dystopian motif in these various mediums. Readings will include critical texts from fields as diverse as architecture (Le Corbusier), critical race theory (Kate Baldwin, Dianne Harris), feminist theory (Dolores Hayden), queer studies (Karen Tongson), philosophy (Marc Aug?), and the social sciences (Herbert J. Gans, Kenneth T. Jackson). Film and television screenings will include Far From Heaven, American Beauty, The Truman Show, Leave it to Beaver, Desperate Housewives, and others.