Summer Quarter 2024
- For day, time, room, and TA information
- For all courses not described here, please refer to the General Catalog course descriptions: https://catalog.ucdavis.edu/courses-subject-code/com
Summer Session I
Lower-Division
COM 004—Major Works of the Contemporary World
Jala Alarja
This course will explore narratives centered around the landscape, with the aim of unpacking the ways in which the environment impacts our reconciliation with the past, our understanding of the present, and our construction of an uncertain future. The course will utilize novels, short stories, graphic novels, and films in order to examine the subject and its various representations across mediums. The first section of the course will focus on the past and the correlation between natural landscapes and our understanding of history; the second section seeks to tackle the present, examining the relationship between daily interactions and their surroundings; lastly, the third section looks forward to multiple representations of a possible future that seems difficult to imagine under current circumstances, specifically through science fiction. The course takes several landscapes into consideration, ranging from the nostalgic romanticism of rural life to the anxiety entangled in representing urban spaces. Moreover, this course seeks to challenge these traditional ways of understanding our relationship to the landscape.
COM 010L—Master Authors in World Literature - Global Mythology and Folkloric Films
Note: This course has no writing assignments, is lecture/discussion based, and mandatory S/U or P/NP. In a society where Marvel’s Thor projects Norse mythology onto the screens and Percy Jackson introduces young readers to Greek mythology, we have become accustomed to encountering myths of heroes and (demi)gods and fantastic creatures. But how much do these ancient tales transform as they integrate into our popular culture? What is it about myths that collectively draws us back to them time and time again, as though we are stuck in a siren’s trance? This course will explore ancient mythology and its influence on modern media. We will read stories from Japanese, Polynesian, Celtic, Kurdish, and Persian myths alongside their respective film adaptations. This course challenges the notion that myths are mere stories. By reading the myths contextually, we can understand them as complex epistemologies. These epistemologies, in turn, offer new perspectives on our contemporary moment.
Summer Session II
COM 003—Major Works of the Modern World