At the Limit: Violence in Contemporary Representation

Calendar and Readings

Required Texts

[BE] = Ellis, Bret Easton. American Psycho. Vintage, 1991. ISBN: 978067973577.

[CP] = Palahniuk, Chuck. Fight Club: A Novel. W. W. Norton & Company, 1996. ISBN: 9780393039764.

[DC] = Cooper, Dennis. Frisk. Grove Weidenfeld, 1991.

[SS] = Sontag, Susan. Regarding the Pain of Others. Picador, 2004. ISBN: 9780312422196. [Preview with Google Books]

SES #	TOPICS & Notes	READINGS & SCREENINGS
1	A Brief History of Violence Syllabus & Introduction Violence - Terms, Concepts, and Etymology (PDF) How to Watch a Film (PDF) Arizona→ Boston (+ Rolling Stone) Ultraviolence and the Squib: Bonnie and Clyde Violence as critique: Salò Sanctioned Violence: the War Film On Style and Metaphor Lecture Notes for Session 1 - A Brief History of Violence (PDF)
2	America the Violent Guide to Scholarly Writing (PDF) Paper One Topics (PDF) Lecture Notes for Session 2 - America the Violent (PDF)	Fargo. Directed by Joel and Ethan Coen. Color, 98 min. 1996. American History X. Directed by Tony Kaye. Black and White, and Color, 119 min. 1998. Slotkin, Richard. “Myth and Literature in a New World.” In Regeneration Through Violence: The Mythology of the American Frontier, 1600–1860. Wesleyan, 1973. ISBN: 9780819560346. [Preview with Google Books] Benjamin, Walter. “Critique of Violence.” In Reflections: Essays, Aphorisms, Autobiographical Writings. Edited by Peter Demetz. Translated by Edmund Jephcott. Schocken, 1986. ISBN: 9780805208023.
3	Serial Killers I: Repetition & Commodities Lecture Notes for Session 3 - Serial Killers I – Repetition & Commodities (PDF)	[BE] pp. 1–226. Tanner, Laura E. “American Psycho and the American Psyche.” In Intimate Violence: Reading Rape and Torture in Twentieth-Century Fiction. Indiana University Press, 1994. ISBN: 9780253356482. [Preview with Google Books] Newitz, Annalee. “Serial Killers: Murder Can be Work.” In Pretend We’re Dead: Capitalist Monsters in American Pop Culture. Duke University Press Books, 2006. ISBN: 9780822337454. [Preview with Google Books]
4	Serial Killers II: Boredom & Blankness Lecture Notes for Session 4 -Serial Killers II – Boredom & Blankness (PDF)	American Psycho. Directed by Mary Harron. Color, 102 min. 2000. [BE] pp. 266-end. Young, Barbara. “The Beast in the Jungle: Henry James 1843–1916.” International Journal of Applied Psychoanalytic Studies 5, no. 4 (2008): 225–37. Optional / Supplemental Manson, Charles. “I’m Nobody.” June 7, 2008. Youtube. Interview quotation. 1989. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tqrqaPThCmI&feature=related Interview with Charles Manson; consider in relation to Bateman’s reiterations that he does not exist. Padgett, Kelsey, and Brenna Farrell. “Lethal Weapons.” Radiolab Blogland, August 1, 2013. American Psycho 2000 Emails. Archived ephemera. Series of emails from Bateman to his psychiatrist (not written by Ellis but approved by him), send to subscriber’s to Harron’s film’s official site in the months leading up to the film (i.e. the marketing for the film as a commodity-object to be desired, purchased and consumed)… Singer, Jesse. “American Psycho by Jesse Singer.” Kickstarter.com. 2013._ Fundraising page for American Psycho, the Musical_.
5	Serial Killers III: Portraits & Signs Paper One Due Lecture Notes for Session 5 - Serial Killers III – Portraits & Signs (PDF)	Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer. Directed by John McNaughton. Color, 83 min. 1986. Se7en. Directed by David Fincher. Color, 127 min. 1995. Seltzer, Mark. “The Serial Killer as a Type of Person.” In Serial Killers: Death and Life in America’s Wound Culture. Routledge, 1998. ISBN: 9780415914819. [Preview with Google Books] Freeland, Cynthia A. “Realist Horror.” In Philosophy and Film. Edited by Cynthia A. Freeland, and Thomas E. Wartenberg. Routledge, 1995. ISBN: 9780415909211. Optional / Supplemental Brottman, Mikita. “Neo-Mondo – Recarnivalizing the Taboo.” In Offensive Films: Towards an Anthropology of Cinema Vomitif. Praeger, 1997. ISBN: 9780313300332.
6	White Masculinity at the End of the Century Paper Two Topics (PDF) Lecture Notes for Session 6 - White Masculinity at the End of the Century (PDF)	Fight Club. Directed by David Fincher. Color, 139 min. 1999. [CP]
7	The Underclass & The Marginalized Lecture Notes for Session 7 - The Underclass and the Marginalized (PDF)	La Haine. Directed by Mathieu Kassovitz. Black and White, 98 min. 1995. Seul contre tous. Directed by Gaspar Noé. Color, 93 min. 1998.
8	Girls, Women, & Psychic Assault Lecture Notes for Session 8 - Girls, Women, & Psychic Assault (PDF)	Ôdishon. Directed by Takashi Miike. Color, 115 min. 1999. À ma soeur. Directed by Catherine Breillat. Color, 86 min. 2001. de Lauretis, Teresa. “The Violence of Rhetoric.” In Technologies of Gender: Essays on Theory, Film, and Fiction. Indiana University Press, 1987. ISBN: 9780253204417. [Preview with Google Books]
9	Sex, Desire, & Fragmentation Paper Two Due Lecture Notes for Session 9 - Sex, Desire, & Fragmentation (PDF)	[DC] Young, Elizabeth. “Death in Disneyland.” In Shopping in Space: Essays on America’s Blank Generation Fiction. Grove Press, 1994. ISBN: 9780802133946.
10	Television, Reality, Culpability Final Paper Topics (PDF) Lecture Notes for Session 10 - Television, Reality, Culpability (PDF)	C’est arrivé près de chez vous. Directed by Rémy Belvaux, André Bonzel, and Benoît Poelvoorde. Black and White, 95 min. 1992. Natural Born Killers. Directed by Oliver Stone. Black and White, and Color, 118 min. 1994. Bazin, André. “Death Every Afternoon.” (PDF) In Rites of Realism. Edited by Ivone Margulies. Duke University Press Books, 2003. ISBN: 9780822330660. [Preview with Google Books]
11	Postmodern Graphic: Gore, Humor, Cartoons Lecture Notes for Session 11 - Postmodern Graphic - Gore, Humor, Cartoons (PDF)	Reservoir Dogs. Directed by Quentin Tarantino. Color, 99 min. 1992. Oldeuboi. Direct by Chan-wook Park. Color, 120 min. 2003. Optional / Supplemental Hawkins, Joan. “Culture Wars: Some New Trends in Art Horror.” Jump Cut, no. 51 (2009). Hopper, Dennis, and Quentin Tarantino. “Blood Lust Snicker Snicker in Wide Screen.” Grand Street 13, no. 1 (1994): 10–22. Dennis Hopper’s wide-ranging interview with Quentin Tarantino during the editing of “Pulp Fiction” in which Tarantino discusses, among many other films and topics, “Man Bites Dog.” McKinney, Devin. “Violence: The Strong and the Weak.” Film Quarterly 46, no. 4 (1993): 16–22. This is a quick read and very useful conceptual distinction between “strong” violence and “weak” violence.
12	Regarding The Pain of Others Lecture Notes for Session 12 - Regarding the Pain of Others (PDF)	Funny Games. Directed by Michael Haneke. Color, 108 min. 1997. Scarry, Elaine. “Introduction.” In The Body in Pain: The Making and Unmaking of the World. Oxford University Press, 1987. ISBN: 9780195049961. [Preview with Google Books] [SS] Optional / Supplemental Brinkema, Eugenie. “‘Not to Scream Before or About, but to Scream at Death’: Haneke’s Horrible Funny Games.” In Caligari’s Heirs: the German Cinema of Fear after 1945. Edited by Steffen Hantke. Scarecrow Press, 2006. ISBN: 9780810858787. ———. “Grief and the Undialectical Image.” In The Forms of the Affects. Duke University Press Books, 2014. ISBN: 9780822356561.
13	Is It The Case That We Are What We Watch? Final Paper Due Lecture Notes for Session 13 - Is it the Case that We Are What We Watch (PDF)	Benny’s Video. Directed by Michael Haneke. Color, 105 min. 1992. Tesis. Directed by Alejandro Amenábar. Color, 125 min. 1996. Optional / Supplemental Brinkema, Eugenie. “How to Do Things with Violences.” In A Companion to Michael Haneke. Edited by Roy Grandmann. Wiley-Blackwell, 2010. ISBN: 9781405188005. [Preview with Google Books]