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GERM 620 writing and enlightenment 
Writing is both the precondition and the problem of Enlightenment. For a writer like Kant, it was precisely the existence of a written public sphere that was the precondition to forming enlightened societies. For later critics of the Enlightenment, the culture of writing as it emerged in the eighteenth century came to embody a range of problems from the delusions of logocentrism to the corruptions of mass culture. In this course we will return to some of the major works of the long eighteenth century and read them within their material and media contexts. How did writing and enlightenment, discourse and diffusion, mutually interact with one another? How do the bibliographical details of these works’ production and dissemination introduce important new ways of understanding their impact and their meaning to eighteenth-century readers? Finally, what were the larger implications that the technology of writing exerted on eighteenth-century culture and what is its legacy today? |