Modern Literature and Social Ideologies

Sodobna književnost in družbene ideologije

Course credits:

8.00 ECTS / 45 (30 hours of lectures, 0 hours of exercises, 15 hours of seminars, 0 hours other forms of work)

Course holder:

izr. prof. dr. Mirt Komel

Type:

Elective expert

Language:

Slovenian

Semester:

Second semester

Study degree

2. level

Course execution:

• Postgraduate Programme of Cultural studies

Short content

The course critically examines the social forces in Europe from the 18th century onward that shaped the conditions for the emergence of modernism as a distinct stylistic formation. The autonomous creative imagination championed by the Romantic literary-cultural movement developed in the context of growing industrialization, urbanization, and national consciousness. As a result, the literary community was compelled to confront social ideologies that have dominated the public sphere in the modern Western world. Whether involving ideologies of escapism and Arcadian harmony, messianic nationalism, social Darwinism, leftist internationalism, bourgeois cosmopolitanism, anarchism, communism, fascism, or clericalism, each—often in mutual conflict—found expression in literary works, movements, and supporting spheres within the republic of letters. These ideological echoes are explored through selected representative texts, which are then analyzed in their socio-historical context, with particular emphasis on the metropolitan dimension of modern experience and its literary representation in the works of selected European authors.