ENGL 009W. First-Year Seminar: U.S. War Culture

The current moment in the U.S.-in some corners described as a “new Civil War”-has been traced to U.S. wars abroad-most notoriously, the Vietnam War-that, it is said, are finally coming home. As indicated by the metaphor the “new Civil War,” however, the conflicts coming to a head in the present point not only to the return of war to the homeland but also to the ways in which home, to begin with, is a place of war. This course charts the history of U.S. wars through literary and cultural texts to study not only the wages of armed conflict but also the constitutive role of organized violence in American culture. This “war culture” is often attributed to the American Revolution, but in fact the most enduring texts of the time emphasize ideas over violence while tackling the complexity of independence. We will follow the persistence of this intellectual and critical spirit in accounts of U.S. wars-from the Civil War to the two World Wars to the Korean War to the Vietnam War to the War on Terror-to study not only war itself but also the culture of which it is an index: the war beyond/before the war. In reading about war, we will also consider how it has been countered through writing to learn how to be better writers ourselves, in hopes that persuasive argumentation is an antidote to war. Readings may include “The Declaration of Independence,” “What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?” The Unvanquished, Company K, “Hiroshima,” The Surrendered, Apocalypse Now, Night Sky with Exit Wounds, The Forever War, The Undertow: Scenes from a Slow Civil War, and poetry from the American Revolution, the Civil War, and the Vietnam War.
Humanities
Writing Course.
1 credit.
Eligible for GLBL-paired, PEAC, ASAM
Fall 2024. Ku.
Spring 2025. Ku.
Fall 2025. Ku.
Catalog chapter: English Literature
Department website: http://www.swarthmore.edu/english-literature

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