From the Land of Oz to “The Florida Project”: Childhood in the Twentieth and Twenty-First Centuries. (050329-WiSe23/24)

The developing nineteenth-century consciousness that childhood was a period of innocence and protection culminated in the Geneva Declaration of the Rights of the Child in 1924. However, this view, promulgated by first-world countries, has been severely challenged and undercut by the grim realities which children of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries have faced. This seminar explores various facets of “post-modern” childhood, from the social and historical forces to which children have been subjected, such as labor, poverty, education, colonialist repression, violence and war, and globalization to the different ways literature and film represent the child’s world and how, for example, children perceive, react to, and overcome hardship. This dual historical/literary perspective will enable us to critically discuss questions such as: to what extent do literary and cinematic works exemplify the dichotomy between reality and idealistic conceptions of childhood?  How do they circumscribe and define children’s spaces? If they are lenses that present an ideal childhood sphere imagined by adults, what purposes do they serve in the era of globalization?
We will study both literary representations of childhood (excerpts from J. Joyce, M. Proust, T. Mann, R. Bradbury), as well as different genres of children’s literature. We will also critically examine Disney culture. Students will participate in reports on a social/historical topic of their choice and are encouraged to actively engage in class discussion.