26028 - Women's Travel Literature

Learning outcomes

The student acquires literary-historical knowledge about popular women's literature, in particular women's travel literature and the themes of critical utopia.

Course contents

At the end of the course, students: - are able to investigate the specificity of gender as “travelling concept” from the perspective of race, ethicity and class in the literary dimension by acquiring critical knowledge of the principal questions on gender studies and queer theories in international debates; - have the methodological tools to analyze different forms of literary and audio-visual texts where issues of gender, sexualities, subjectivities and bodies are at stake, with special focus on authoriality, corpo-realities and temporalities; - - understand the notion of "performativity", "androginy", "parody", "technology of gender", "camp", “transmedia adaptation” in relation to how texts written in the past literary scenario change thanks to the interaction with contemporary visual technologies.

The course aims at exploring the notion of “travel” through the analysis of the novel Orlando: A Biography (1928) by Virginia Woolf, a fictional biography of a journey through history and particularly through bodies and genders, by adopting a critical perspective on both narrative and non-fictional literary genres. The first week of the course will be devoted to familiarizing students with key theoretical concepts such as “performativity”; “androgyny”; “discourses”; “technology of sex and technology of gender”; “corporeality”, and “gender display”. Then, we will be introduced to the historical and literary context of Modernism, the Bloomsbury group and Virginia Woolf, with a special focus on Woolf’s literary trajectory and aesthetics. In the third part of the course, we will explore the compositional history of Orlando and the novel as a parodic narrative of gender roles; then we will adopt a close reading methodology to investigate key issues of the text carefully analyzing passages’ language, content, structure, and means. In the following section of the course, we will adopt some critical tools of feminist film theory and trans* perspective to read some of the transmedia adaptations, with particular reference to Sally Potter's film adaptation (1992), and the most recent interpretation by Paul B. Preciado (2023).

In the final week, students are requested to have group presentation on specific case-studies.

Students with SLDs or temporary or permanent disabilities: we suggest that you contact the relevant university office ( https://site.unibo.it/studenti-con-disabilita-e-dsa/en ) and your teacher immediately to work together to find the most effective strategies for attending classes and/or preparing for exams.
Any requests for exam accommodations must be made at least 15 days before the date of the exam, by sending an email to the teacher and copying (Cc) the email address disabilita@unibo.it (in case of disability) or dsa@unibo.it (for students with Specific Learning Difficulties).

AI: the use of AI is prohibited to summarise novels and essays (students should develop a personal and independent critical thinking and ability in argumentation), as well as during oral exams. Any use constitutes a breach of academic integrity.

Readings/Bibliography

Primary sources:

Virginia Woolf, Orlando: A Biography (1928)

Virginia Woolf (1929), A Room of One's Own, any edition.

Virginia Woolf, “A Sketch of the Pastˮ, in Schulkind, J. (ed.), Moments of Being: Autobiographical Writings. Edited by Jeanne Schulkind, New York: Harcourt, 1985.

Sally Potter, Orlando (1992), movie

Paul B. Preciado, Orlando. My Political Biography (2023), documentary

Bibliography of critical texts (essays, articles, volumes). Lessons will make reference to the following critical sources:

- Jessica Berman (ed.), A Companion to Virginia Woolf, Wiley-Blackwell, 2016. Selected chapters.

- Judith Butler, Gender Trouble. Feminism and the Subversion of Identity, Routledge, New York - London, 1990.

- Judith Butler, Who's afraid of gender?, Allen Lane, London, 2024.

- Michel Foucault, The History of Sexuality: The Will to Knowledge [1970], Penguin, London, 2008.

- Jack Halberstam, Female Masculinity, Duke University Press, Durham, 1998.

- Jack Halberstam, Trans*: A Quick and Quirky Account of Gender Variability, University of California Press, Berkeley, 2017.

- Linda Hutcheon, A Theory of Adaptation, Routledge, New York-London, 2006.

- Earl G. Ingersoll, Screening Woolf: Virginia Woolf on/and/in Film, Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 2016. (In particular: Chapter Three: "Orlando Sally Potter’s Success Story (1992)", pp. 55-82). (available online).

- Jane Marcus, New Feminist Essays on Virginia Woolf, Macmillan, London-Basingstoke, 1981. Selected Chapters.

- Melanie Micir, "Queer Woolf", in Jessica Berman (ed.), A Companion to Virginia Woolf, Wiley-Blackwell, 2016, pp. 347-58 (available online).

- Toril Moi, “Who's afraid of Virginia Woolf? Feminist Readings of Woolf” in Sextual/Textual Politics. Feminist Literary Theory, Routledge, London – New York, 1985.

- Rita Monticelli, The Politics of the Body in Women's Literatures, Bologna, I Libri di Emil - Odoya, 2012.

- Laura Mulvey, "Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema", in Screen, 16 (3), pp. 6–18 (available online).

- Deborah Parsons, Theorists of the Modernist Novel. James Joyce, Dorothy Richardson, Virginia Woolf, Routledge, London - New York, 2007 (In particular the following chapter: "Gender and the Novel") (available online).

- Paul B. Preciado, An Apartment on Uranus, Chronicles of Crossing, Semiotext(e), South Pasadena, CA, 2019. (In particular the following chapters: "Introduction. An Apartment on Uranus", "Chronicles of the Crossing", "The Courage To Be Yourself", "Trans Catalonia", "Orlando on the Road"). (available online).

- Paul B. Preciado, Can the Monster Speak?, Fitzcarraldo Editions, London, e-book.

- Adrienne Rich (1980), Compulsory Heterosexuality and Lesbian Existence, Journal of Women's History, Volume 15, Number 3, Autumn 2003, pp. 11-48. (available online).

- Susan Sellers, The Cambridge Companion to Virginia Woolf, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2010 (In particular Chapter 8: Laura Marcus, "Woolf's Feminism and Feminism's Woolf", pp. 142-179). 

- Susan Sontag (1964), "Notes on "Camp"", in Against Interpretation and other essays (1966), any edition (available online).

- Virginia Woolf, Granite and Rainbow, Hogarth Press, London, 1960.

Teaching methods

Lessons, seminars and discussions. Course attendance is highly recommended and students will be required to actively participate in class discussion.

Language: English

Assessment methods

Final oral exam. Attendance and class partecipation will also be assessed as a component of the final overall mark. Students are requested to analyse the 3 primary sources and articles/essays/chapters (about 150 pages not from a single volume) from the Reading list of the Secondary sources.

Please do check this web page for further notice and information

Teaching tools

Literary and critical texts; power point presentations; movies and videos.

Office hours

See the website of Cristina Gamberi