LIT 308 Printing Dissent: Protest on the Page
From the pamphlet wars of the eighteenth century to the suffragette newspapers and ephemera of the nineteenth century, from the Irish revolutionaries who printed the Proclamation of the Irish Republic in 1916 to the anti-apartheid activists at South Africa’s Drum magazine, printing and publishing has long been associated with protest and activism. In this course students will examine print as a tool of dissent.
Through looking at key examples of protest in print culture, students will study how print has been
used to document, explain, and disseminate dissatisfaction with the status quo and to
push for change.
The course will focus on historical moments where technological developments in print culture
coincided with (or, indeed, enabled) the growth of dissenting ideas. As well as studying the material and social contexts of publishing, students will read fictional works where protesting on the page is a key theme, and, finally, will also have the opportunity to practice various aspects of the craft of printing in small practical workshops.
Prerequisite
LC 100 and (LC 110 or COM 201 )