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79359-01 - Seminar: American Utopian Literature (3 CP)
| Semester | fall semester 2026 |
| Course frequency | Once only |
| Lecturers | Daniel Ortiz (daniel.ortiz@unibas.ch, Assessor) |
| Content | In 1840, Ralph Waldo Emerson remarked on a new fever of radicalism sweeping the United States: “We are a little wild here with numberless projects of social reform,” he warned Thomas Carlyle, “and there is not a reading man but has a draft of a new Community in his waistcoat pocket.” By the end of the century, hundreds of waistcoat pockets had been opened and hundreds of little utopias founded. This class will be about the literary legacy of these communities. We will examine their representation in novels of the period as well as the manifestos, diaries, and memoirs produced by their members. Our survey will begin with the public controversy around Brook Farm, an agricultural commune south of Boston which tried to make Transcendentalism a social reality and then after its failure slipped backward into fiction in Nathaniel Hawthorne’s 'The Blithedale Romance'. We will then explore the intimate and haunting complexities of the Oneida Community in upstate New York, where a group of Christian communists hoped to build the Kingdom of Heaven on earth in the form of group marriage, industrial hunting trap production, and eugenics. Other groups considered will include Louisa May Alcott’s critique of her father’s unsuccessful utopia at Fruitlands, the Shaker settlements founded in the wake of Mother Ann Lee’s alleged incarnation as the female iteration of Christ, and the followers of Étienne Cabet, a French politician and science fiction novelist who set out to build his dreams of the future on the cheap and abundant land of the American frontier. Our discussions will situate these outposts of radicalism within broader 19th century discourses of reform such as abolitionism, feminism, and socialism. We will additionally ask ourselves questions about the hope for utopia and the nostalgia attendant upon its decline, the eroticism and danger of novel sexual experiments, and the competing claims of secular and religious visions for the renewal of society. Our theoretical approach will combine sympathy and criticism of these movements. In this sense, we will follow Herman Melville’s reaction to 'The Blithedale Romance': “the volume is welcome, as an antidote to the mooniness of some dreamers…Yet who the devil ain’t a dreamer?” |
| Learning objectives | Students will complete a survey of literature produced in and around American 19th century utopian communities alongside engagement with theory and scholarship related to this literature. |
| Bibliography | Please purchase the following text, available at the Labyrinth Bookstore (all other assigned texts will be made available on ADAM): 'The Blithedale Romance', Nathaniel Hawthorne (1852). |
| Weblink | ADAM |
| Admission requirements | This seminar is for BA students on the advanced level who have completed ALL three introductory modules (including the proseminar papers). |
| Course application | Please register by sending an email to daniel.ortiz@unibas.ch by 8 September. Places are limited to 20 and will be distributed on a ‘first come, first served’ basis. |
| Language of instruction | English |
| Use of digital media | Online, mandatory |
| Interval | Weekday | Time | Room |
|---|---|---|---|
| wöchentlich | Friday | 12.15-14.00 | Nadelberg 6, Raum 11 |
Dates
| Date | Time | Room |
|---|---|---|
| Friday 18.09.2026 | 12.15-14.00 | Nadelberg 6, Raum 11 |
| Friday 25.09.2026 | 12.15-14.00 | Nadelberg 6, Raum 11 |
| Friday 02.10.2026 | 12.15-14.00 | Nadelberg 6, Raum 11 |
| Friday 09.10.2026 | 12.15-14.00 | Nadelberg 6, Raum 11 |
| Friday 16.10.2026 | 12.15-14.00 | Nadelberg 6, Raum 11 |
| Friday 23.10.2026 | 12.15-14.00 | Nadelberg 6, Raum 11 |
| Friday 30.10.2026 | 12.15-14.00 | Nadelberg 6, Raum 11 |
| Friday 06.11.2026 | 12.15-14.00 | Nadelberg 6, Raum 11 |
| Friday 13.11.2026 | 12.15-14.00 | Nadelberg 6, Raum 11 |
| Friday 20.11.2026 | 12.15-14.00 | Nadelberg 6, Raum 11 |
| Friday 27.11.2026 | 12.15-14.00 | Dies Academicus |
| Friday 04.12.2026 | 12.15-14.00 | Nadelberg 6, Raum 11 |
| Friday 11.12.2026 | 12.15-14.00 | Nadelberg 6, Raum 11 |
| Friday 18.12.2026 | 12.15-14.00 | Nadelberg 6, Raum 11 |
| Modules |
Module: Advanced Anglophone Literary and Cultural Studies (Bachelor's degree subject: English) |
| Assessment format | continuous assessment |
| Assessment details | Regular attendance, active participation, and one written assignment. |
| Assessment registration/deregistration | Reg.: course registration; dereg.: not required |
| Repeat examination | no repeat examination |
| Scale | Pass / Fail |
| Repeated registration | no repetition |
| Responsible faculty | Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, studadmin-philhist@unibas.ch |
| Offered by | Fachbereich Englische Sprach- und Literaturwissenschaft |