Readings for each week are determined by the co-instructors and by the visiting speakers. The first set of readings is assigned by the co-instructors and constitute the course’s prevailing questions, key terms, and distinctive examples of interdisciplinary/antidisciplinary work. The second set of readings is assigned by the visiting speakers and reflect the particular ideas and concerns animating their work in and across fields and disciplines.
September 14: introductions and preliminaries
READINGS
*Klein and Frodeman, “Interdisciplining Humanities: A Historical Overview”
*Perloff, “Presidential Address: It Must Change”
*Edwards, “The Specter Of Interdisciplinarity”
*Turkle, “Introduction: The Things That Matter”
ACTIVITY
Disciplines, departments, and divisions (at Princeton) group exercise
HOMEWORK
Write a 200-word intellectual biography that describes how you’ve navigated disciplines and/or interdisciplinary spaces up to this point in your studies. By the beginning seminar on 9/21, send the biography to CNW and KN via e-mail.
September 21: inhabited (inter)disciplines
READINGS
*MLA Forum, “Defining Interdisciplinarity”
*Griffiths, “The Comparative Method and the History of the Modern Humanities“
ACTIVITY
Read biographies out loud
VISITOR
Florian Fuchs (German) has asked us to read a chapter from his book Civic Storytelling and to watch this 15-minute film by Hito Steyerl. If time allows, you can also watch this short film by Harun Farocki called Parallel I.
September 28: cultures of the modern university
READINGS
*Veblen, from The Theory of the Leisure Class
*Snow, “The Two Cultures”
*Hare, “A Conceptual Proposal for a Department of Black Studies”
ACTIVITY
Translating academic prose
VISITOR
Lisa Davis (Anthropology) has asked us to read selections from Jeanne Favret-Saada’s ethnography Deadly Words (1977) and an excerpt from her book The Time of the Cannibals (2025), which includes a photoessay.
October 2: IHUM-sponsored event
NOTA BENE: The Theory and Practice of Taking Notes
Co-organized by Jeff Dolven and Florian Fuchs
October 5: imagined trans- and antidisciplines
READINGS
*Fuller, from Education Automation: Freeing the Scholar to Return to His Studies
*Guattari, “Transdisciplinarity Must Become Transversality”
*Harney and Moten, “A Partial Education”
VISITOR
Marshall Brown (Architecture) has asked us to read Jonathan Lethem’s essay “The Ecstasy of Influence” (2007), in conjunction with watching and/or listening to a 2022 conversation between Marshall and Lethem at the Santa Barbara Museum of Art.
HOMEWORK
Write a 50-word memo on how you might transform a research question into a fabricated object. By the beginning seminar on 10/12, send the memo to CNW and KN via e-mail.
October 12: hands-on learning
First half of class meets in Makerspace, Lewis Science Library
READING
*Edwards, “Introduction: Reparative Craft”
ACTIVITY
Reference memos during introduction to Makerspace
VISITOR
Jeff Dolven (English) has asked us to read an excerpt from his The End of the Sentence and from Zachary Horton’s The Cosmic Zoom
FALL RECESS
October 26: [REBOOT] imagined trans- and antidisciplines
READINGS
The high point of the modern research university
*Hare, “A Conceptual Proposal for a Department of Black Studies”
Trans- and antidisciplines
*Fuller, from Education Automation: Freeing the Scholar to Return to His Studies
*Guattari, “Transdisciplinarity Must Become Transversality”
*Harney and Moten, “A Partial Education”
Questions of urban development and contemporary art
*Baldwin, TBA
*Snodgrass, “Marshall Brown: Western Exhibitions”
*Als, “Under the Influence at the Whitney Biennial”
VISITOR
Javier Guerrero (Spanish and Portuguese) has asked us to read…
November 2: publics
Jeff Whetstone (Lewis Center for the Arts, Visual Arts)
November 9: preparations for final project
November 16: practices
READINGS
*Andrews, from The Academic Avant-Garde: Poetry and the American University
November 23: preparations for final project
THANKSGIVING RECESS
November 30: collaborations
DUE (Choose one of two options)
Option 1: With a partner, write a collaborative 1000-1500-word capsule history of a unit (department, program, center, etc.) in which neither of you is enrolled as a Ph.D. candidate. (You may write on a unit through which you are earning a graduate certificate.) Units may be selected from the Dean of the Faculty’s list provided in the first seminar meeting. By the beginning of 11/30, send the capsule history to CNW and KN via e-mail.
Option 2: Inspired by Princeton’s Collaborative Teaching Initiative, which allows a graduate student to co-design and co-teach a course with a professor, work with a partner to develop a course idea, department rationale, and syllabus for an advanced undergraduate course that combines your fields. The class should cohere conceptually, not simply alternate between your disciplines. In other words, the fissures separating these should not be visible to the student. By the beginning of 11/30, send the new course worksheet, department rationale, and syllabus to CNW and KN via e-mail.
ACTIVITY
Present capsule histories. Presentations must be 7-10 minutes in length and do not have a prescribed form. Followed by 5-minute Q&A.
December 7: manifestation(s)
DUE
Final project manifestation(s). Depending on the kind of project the class devises and develops, this seminar period may be used to 1) execute the project, or 2) make final preparations for the project’s manifestation (performance, publication, etc.) to be done later in the day or at a later time.
