Available courses

This course will deal with .....

This course provides an in-depth knowledge on the course design aspect for which a teacher is required to have such skills for his/her effective engagement in the teaching learning process with harnessing support using available technologies and on-line resources.

This course deals with ....

The course aims to map conventions, practices and evolution of modern theatre(s) and performance(s) in post-independence India. The end of European colonialism initiated a new phase of nation-building where culture was a kernel area of democratic policy-making and national self-assertion. The interface of traditional cultural practices with the existing colonial models of cultural production and a newly emergent modern sensibility has produced some of the most canonical works of Indian theatre and performance. The complex narratives of anti-colonial struggle, the question of the nation and rising regional nationalism are intertwined with the histories of performance forms that responded to and reworked critical questions of class, caste and gender to imagine the nation and produce modern theatrical expression and performance, in both form and content. The notion of modernity itself, particularly theatrical modernity, negotiated through the regional, local and linguistic specificities of theatrical expression that did not develop evenly across India, has a paradoxical and ambiguous history that plays out into multiple spheres of theatrical life. Categories such as ‘tradition’, ‘modern’, ‘Indian’, ‘theatre’, and of course ‘performance’ their formations, transformations and challenges need to be unpacked theoretically, contextually and performatively to examine tensions that have become definitive of the postcolonial situation with respect to modern theatrical expressions.

Science and technology play important roles in our lives. However, understanding how science, technology, and society work together in shaping the world we inhabit is not easy. The attempt here is not only to disentangle the multiple relationships between science, technology, and society, but also to understand how human beings perceive, relate, receive and experience the world around them through scientific knowledge and technological artefacts. Instead of treating science and technology as a matter of impact and implementation, this course will introduce a ‘new sociology’ which assumes that scientific knowledge and technological artefacts are socially shaped, not just in their usage, but also in their design and technical content. Science and technology is contested and constructed by societies, collectivity and institutions. The course will debate, whether the production and consumption of scientific knowledge is the prerogative and proprietary of a privileged few, or else society, culture and lived experiences of people play a significant role in the process? Why do we happily retreat into the world of machines? Is the modern world so taxing that human beings sometimes prefer to reconstitute it through technology? This course will attempt to unravel the multiple ways in which science and technology, individuals and institutions mutually shape one another to the benefit and sometimes detriment of society.

Among the more fascinating themes in contemporary south Asia, has been the ‘success’ of democracy in India and its ‘failure’ in neighbouring Pakistan and Bangladesh. Yet, studies on politico-economic development of ‘democratic’ India and military dominated ‘not so democratic’ Pakistan and Bangladesh have rarely addressed, far less explained, why a common British colonial legacy led to so different politico-economic outcomes in the contemporary South Asia. This course is an attempt at introducing some such political and economic questions with relevance to broader development issues concerning mainly Pakistan, Bangladesh, India and Sri Lanka. Given the vastness of issues including different countries this course tries to introduce a thematic approach to discuss comparative performances. Not all countries will be taken up in every case. In most of the cases the regional economy of India, and not the national economy, has been considered as this can provide a more meaningful comparison.

 Brief description of modules/ Main modules:

State formation, Industrialization and development experiences in South Asia: cases of Pakistan, and Bangladesh in the context of India: import substitution vs. export promotion

Agrarian questions: reforms and technological intervention in agriculture: experiences in Pakistan, Sri Lanka and the Indian states of West Bengal and Kerala

Migration , development and gender: International migration: the experiences of Sri Lanka and the Indian state of Kerala; Internal migration : Cases of West Bengal, Tamil Nadu and Bangladesh 

The endemic poverty and the dismal state of the social sector in South Asia despite growth: A case of primary education in Bangladesh, Pakistan and the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh.

Scholarship on the late medieval and early modern periods in Europe (c. 1400 – 1750 CE) has been remarkably engaging and innovative and has made considerable impact on studies of other times and places.  Over the past seventy years historians of early modern Europe have been heavily influenced by (and have participated in) the so-called Annales School practice of ‘total history’—a methodologically rigorous manner of doing comprehensive history to bring together economic, political, social, cultural and environmental factors.  Scholars such as Norbert Elias, Carlo Ginzburg, N. Z. Davis, Peter Burke, Keith Thomas and Lyndal Roper have creatively applied anthropological, sociological and psychoanalytical insights to study of early modern Europe—attempting to explain collective behavior, manners and morality of people in (and beyond) early modern Europe.  Historians of early modern Europe have pioneered the practice of ‘micro-history’, relating the lives of often obscure, marginal or eccentric individuals to the histories of larger social groups and changes in social structure and behavior.  And most recently scholars have revised our understanding of ‘European’ events and processes--for example, the Renaissance, religious Reformation/Counter-Reformation, witchcraft/occult practices, devotional cultures--by focusing on ‘encounters’ between Europeans and people of the Americas, Asia and Africa.  This course previews key events and processes that signal a shift from pre-modernity to modernity in Europe and its early colonies while shedding light on historical methods that can be applied to study of other times and places.

This course follows Social Theory I taught in the first semester. While the earlier course deals with the classical sociologists, the present one goes beyond the confines of classical theory. The course focuses largely on contemporary theorists, but it also looks at some of the theorists of early capitalism and modernity whose rich and nuanced ideas have often been swept under much homogenizing perspectives such as functionalism or structuralism etc. However the course deems it mandatory to first familiarize the students with various theoretical perspectives before it sets out to focus on individual theorists and shows how their unique ideas help us address some of the broader issues at stake in social theory. Hence the first two modules have been devoted to theoretical perspectives.

 

This course discusses the historical evolution and contemporary situation of a variety of issues arising in the process of the attempted transformation of India’s low-income agriculture-dominated economy after independence. Problems of industrial development and the role of services, the agrarian situation, employment, poverty and inequality, etc. are discussed with reference to the changing economic policy context. The aim is to equip students to analyse the current challenges facing the Indian economy, conduct in-depth research into particular areas of concern in the Indian economy and critique development policy in India.

This course discusses the historical evolution and contemporary situation of a variety of issues arising in the process of the attempted transformation of India’s low-income agriculture-dominated economy after independence. Problems of industrial development and the role of services, the agrarian situation, employment, poverty and inequality, etc. are discussed with reference to the changing economic policy context. The aim is to equip students to analyse the current challenges facing the Indian economy, conduct in-depth research into particular areas of concern in the Indian economy and critique development policy in India.

Macroeconomics II continues from its sister course Macroeconomics I offered in the first semester of M.A. Economics at AUD. While the focus of Macro I is on understanding and modeling economic growth, Macro II will focus on modeling business cycles and other short term macroeconomic phenomena like asset pricing \& unemployment in the context of developing economies like India. Other topics include asset pricing, incomplete markets, asset pricing, and search models of labor markets. 

It is commonly assumed that the complexities of contemporary globalization are driven by scientific progress and technological innovations. Indeed technology plays a significant role in shaping our world today to the extent that scholars perceive the arrival of ‘transhumanism’, indicating the transformation that has taken place in human existence. This elective attempts to address the present surge of ‘globalism’ by disentangling the multiple and multi-layered relationships between science and technology and the way it interacts with human perception and existence. The intention is to understand how human beings perceive, relate, receive and experience the world around them through scientific knowledge and technological artifacts. Instead of treating science and technology as a matter of impact and implementation, this course intends to foreground the proposition that scientific knowledge and technological artifacts are socially shaped/ constructed, not just in their usage, but also in their design destination and technical contents. Science and technology is contested and constructed by societies, collectivities and institutions.

Protests and Social Movements are ubiquitous in the world we live. Instead of perceiving social movements as ‘crowd pathology or ‘mass hysteria’, Sociology asserts that they are diverse, creative and progressive as they carry alternative voices and ultimately reconstruct the society. While protests are the strategic manifestations of movements, social and political transformation is what they seek to achieve. This course attempts to unravel the closely knit connections between Movements, Protests with that of socio-political Transformations. The aim of this course is to make the students understand how social agents collectively strive for social change by questioning the established power structures of any society.  

Instead of inferring it as some kind of disturbance to the structural equilibrium of the society, sociology has explained social movements as important and integral part of the society that needs careful and critical observation. While the frequent recurrence of movements and protest at different historical junctures, have constantly challenged sociological explanations and theorizations, nuanced paradigms have evolved out of the constant need to engage with the practice.  The course begins with introducing the theorization of social movements and explains how they have evolved with interactions with the practice. It also attempts to make sense of various kinds of social movements, protests, and collective action that surround us in the age we live.

This is a survey course designed to introduce students to the configuration and dynamics of social policy in countries that represent different welfare models. While aimed at identifying trends and patterns, the course is intended to help students understand the distinctiveness of social policies in different contexts and the forces- both historical and cultural- shaping them. The course adopts a political economy perspective to make sense of comparative social policy. By comparing what counts as social policy (and what does not) in different contexts- both temporally and geographically, the course problematizes the concept of social policy to discern any possible 'politics of social policy'. The overarching theme that cuts across the course is exploring role of ideas, institutions, and processes in determining the shape of social policy. Country and region-specific case studies will be used to compare select social policies.

This course is envisaged as an attempt to look at the history and historiography of performancethrough a non-hegemonic perspective. In order to attain

 this vision, this course would implement
a genealogical model, breaking away from the linear model of historical studies. The attempt is
to devise a course that will cut across geographical divisions and categories of performances and
performative practices in terms of performance-based categories such as conventions, devices,
sites, genres, approaches etc. The course requires reading and viewing of documented videos of
different styles and conventions of performances.

(GIF Courtesy: https://www.robinhuffmandesigns.com/animated-gifs.html)

What is money, why do we use it, and is it essential? Which objects will (or should) play this role in equilibrium (or optimal) arrangements? How is intrinsically worthless currency valued, or more generally, how can asset prices differ from “fundamental” values? How does credit work absent commitment? How can credit and money coexist? What is the role of assets in credit arrangements? What are the roles of intermediation, and of inside and outside money? What are the effects of inflation, or monetary policy, more broadly? What is optimal policy? These are some of the classic questions in monetary theory and focus of this course is to explore answers to such questions. At a deeper level, the course envisages to understand the process of exchange in the presence of frictions, and how this process might be facilitated by institutions, including money, but also credit, intermediation, and the use of assets as payment instruments or as collateral. Topics like money creation in modern economics, informal credit markets, and cryptocurrencies will also be touched upon.

The course seeks to examine the key issues engendered by as well as informing the discourse on politics of indigeneity, underlined by the intersection between the “Indigenous” and the law/legal order. This attempt calls for an understanding of the historical context of the emergence of the problem of the “tribe/tribal” manifested brazenly in the ways how the anthropological imagery about people known as “tribes” is conceived/staged. Concurrently, the engagement also entails a reflection on how the discoursing of the “tribe/tribal” and the policies/strategies of the colonial power/state as well as post-colonial state about the “tribe/tribal” inform one another.

While the major focus of the course will be on Indian context, attempt will be made to draw and engage with the relevant examples from the other contexts such as Australia, Canada and others in order to broaden and enrich the understanding of the issues at hand.

The immediate context for this course is the ever widening socioeconomic inequalities in the world today. The last couple of decades have brought major changes in international and national industrial organization patterns, causing enormous and rapid spatial reconfigurations in the world of work in the urban and rural areas. There have been vigorous debates on the inequalities that have been thus created and the movements that have attempted to address and confront the sources of such inequalities. The role of labour movements, the rise of social movements and the relationships between them have brought a significant shift to the debates that have underscored this new global development. It is in this very context of rising global inequalities, that it becomes imperative to understand the protest discourse around the same and changes it has brought to the world of development politics.

The course will help students to critically engage with rising socioeconomic disparities and its political implications. This will also facilitate them to strengthen their creative thinking with an interdisciplinary approach to understand ongoing social, political, and economic struggles in society.

 

Reading/Decoding Performance is an important component of the Performance Studies Programme. Its primary focus is to critically and creatively investigate performances and enable students to represent these investigations in writing. The course will involve two significant activities: (i.) watching performances, and (ii.) reading analogous critical texts which will provide lenses
and methods through which these performances can be read/decoded.

The course will work with the assumption that methodologies to study performance might be as numerous as the kinds of performances themselves. Given this, the readings prescribed for the course will be selective rather than comprehensive. The readings will engage with a wide variety of disciplinary methods with an emphasis on careful study.

Student participation in class will take four key forms: Presence, Reading, Discussion, Writing. Through class discussions, one presentation, two response papers, a curated performance diary, and a term paper, students will be encouraged to hone their skills in
performance analysis which brings together attentive scrutiny of the materiality of performance with sophisticated critique.

The course is aimed at providing a critical perspective on the origins and trajectory of modern urban planning and policy in the West, and the ways in which it found expression in colonial and independent India. How were these policies and plans made, by whom, with what intent, and with what implications? Through this interrogation, the essential political nature of policy and planning processes would be unpacked. Here, the manifest shifts and continuities within city planning from colonial to neo liberal context in India would be covered at length. Thereafter, the institutions and knowledge tools that constitute the professional practice of policymaking and planning would be brought into discussion. This enquiry of how our cities have been imagined and shaped, from the historical to the contemporary, would be undertaken through an interdisciplinary scholarship, which would in effect offer a renewed lens to read urban space and urban life.

Through a focus on the discourses, location and phenomenology of marginality, the course ‘Life at the Margins’ attempts to enable students to move beyond the mainstream psychology of the ‘neuter individual’ to a critical understanding of the self-in-process-in-context, including contexts of life within real and imagined marginalities. Through ethnographic encounters with the margins and a close reading of narratives from the margins, the course will trace the shifting interstices of the psyche-in-class, -gender, -caste, -race, -displacement and other markers of otherness.

via GIPHY

Multilingualism in a classroom or in a given geographical location can be characterized not only in terms of the different linguistic groups who co-exist but also in terms of the number of languages understood and spoken by a single individual. Yet surprisingly, it is ‘multilingualism’ and not ‘monolingualism’ which, both as an educational aim as well as an approach, has required determined persuasion and a sustained movement. The current course is aimed to encourage students to engage with different contexts of multilingualism and Multilingual Education pedagogies, understand the theoretical and ideological underpinnings of the MLE models and practices, and appreciate the possibilities of MLE as a transformative pedagogy. The course will largely draw from socio-cultural theories of learning and critical pedagogy perspective to engage with MLE models and practices.

This course part 2 of the progressive course, envisaged as an attempt to look at the history and historiography of performance through a non-hegemonic perspective. In order to attain this vision, this course would implement a genealogical model, breaking away from the linear model of historical studies. The attempt is to devise a course that will cut across geographical divisions and categories of performances and performative practices in terms of performance-based categories such as conventions, devices, sites, genres, approaches etc. The course requires reading and viewing of documented videos of different styles and conventions of performances. The books and videos are available in different libraries across Delhi including Sahitya Akademi, Sangeet Natak Akademi, libraries in Max Mueller Bhavan and French Cultural Centre, apart from video documentations of performance accessible in sites such as Global Shakespeare and Hemispheric Institute. These resources as well as personal resources of faculties will be used for teaching. It is advisable that the department start building a collection of these key books and videos. 

 

ECM 2 (Archival Investigations) is a second semester core course for M.A. Visual Art which introduces students to the idea of practice based research into the processes of knowledge production and canonisation through archives. The course makes a radical move in introducing students to the idea of an archive-in-making in contrast to an archive that is already made available by establishments such as the state, institutions and other such repositories/bodies of knowledge and power. By linking research methodology to artistic practice the School of Culture and Creative Expressions hopes to reinvigorate contemporary art practice and to dislodge it from being geared solely toward a market economy and to reorient it toward critical and emancipatory practices. These concerns are seen as intimately linked with the rationale of the program and the vision of the University as a whole which lay a great emphasis on critical self reflection and contextualization of the self within larger structures and practices.

Over the years, entrepreneurship has evolved as a significant framework for understanding the process of business and its development. With enhancement in the scope of business as a form of economic action, it has become more and more important to understand business in order to make sense of the way development is shaped. Here it is important to note that while business is largely about market and that is conceptually separated from state and community, all of them tend to come together under the broad framework of entrepreneurship. The historic identification of certain communities as business communities and shared development experience of these communities around their businesses involvement indicates the old connection between community and business. In modern times, different historically marginalized groups like Dalits in caste-segregated societies, Blacks in White-dominant areas are also attempting to emulate this path by setting up their own community-based business associations and engaging with entrepreneurship as a form of political action. These developments have also brought into light how identities based on caste, race, ethnicity, and gender shapes the entrepreneurial experience. It is also interesting to observe that modern state is exploring different mechanism of using entrepreneurship as a tool to shape development experience of individuals and regions. This course attempts to examine the nature of relationship between entrepreneurship and development by engaging with the intersections among collectives, business, and state.

 

The course is intended for students who want to understand the connection between business and development in the context of modern state, community relations, and market. It is hoped that upon completion of this course, the students shall develop both conceptual and historical understanding about this relationship.

This course aims to further familiarise students with methods and results of contemporary Macroeconomics. For the current semester, focus will be on Growth Theory with the objective of introducing three (broadly classified) departures from the neo-classical growth model (already covered in Macroeconomics I).

Traditionally, profit emerging out of business was always looked at with certain suspicion. Neo-liberal economic framework has developed a strong alternative to that in recent years. However, even such a framework highlights the need for business to invest considerable part of its profit for social development. While earlier initiatives towards social development were mostly restricted to financial donations, today one can identify advocacy of a much more proactive role of business enterprises. As a result, there’s a gradual movement from philanthropy to corporate social responsibility. At the same time, social entrepreneurship is more and more becoming a popular concept. Other than providing occasional financial donations, conscientious large business in earlier days primarily considered their developmental responsibility to be restricted to the labourers who worked for them. However, today the perspective for understanding the relationship between business and social development has changed considerably. The aim of this course is to unfold before students the gradual transformation in this relationship and understand in details the current nature of such relationship. At the same time, the effort would be to critically engage with each of these concepts.

The course is intended for students who are interested in understanding and reflecting on the role of large business in social development. Upon completion of this course the students should be in a position to make sense of the trajectory of industry’s response to the moral pressure on profit and also comprehend the development of social entrepreneurship.

This course aims to impart in depth understanding to the students regarding assessment of young children’s development and learning. The students will be able to understand ‘what’ is assessment, ‘why’ do we need to ‘assess’ young children’s development and ‘what’ are the various procedures used for assessing young children appropriately. They will examine philosophical, sociological and psychological perspectives on assessment of young children in western as well as in the Indian context. The cross-cultural variations in assessment and the ethical considerations in assessing young children will be addressed. This course equips students with knowledge and skills to assess young children in a comprehensive manner using various techniques. The students will be able to appreciate as how assessment and curriculum are interrelated. They will also learn about the reforms done in the examination system in our country in recent times and critique these reforms.

This course aims to initiate students into thinking about the nature of educational inquiry and education as an area of knowledge. In doing so, the course will facilitate basic understandings and research skills. We will explore the idea of inquiry and the relation between knowledge, theory, practice and research.  Developing an appreciation for research, acquiring abilities to identify research problems and formulating research questions, will be the major concerns of the course. Throughout the course, we will reflect on the idea of research as an intellectual, ethical and social enterprise. Along with these explorations, this course will enable students to comprehend and analyse research reports, papers and studies – through a continuous engagement with actual (and significant) researches in education that introduce a variety of methodologies and perspectives for research in the area.This introductory course on research would support the field attachment component of the programme, and enable the students to conceptualise their dissertation work. . 

 

Although, concerted efforts to understand the caste system spans more than two hundred
years, caste still remains an elusive social category. Not surprisingly, caste has been one of
the central themes of Indian Sociology and Social Anthropology from its inception, yet
academic perspectives on caste have proved inadequate in capturing the complexity of the
system. The attempt of this course is to explainthese complexities in understanding the caste
system and its contemporary forms of manifestations. The course will begin with
documenting contemporary forms of manifestation of caste, and link them to the sociological
and historical perspectives that provide explanations to the ‘modernity of caste’. The course
will move beyond the disciplinary boundaries and introduce the students to the various forms
of resistance movements to the caste-based inequalities and the way these movements have
perceived the origin, emergence and dynamics of the caste system.

This course is especially designed to introduce students to the discipline of Film Studies. The course will revolve around basic questions regarding: what is cinema and how is cinema different from other art forms. The course will analyse selected clips and will undertake detailed discussions regarding the use of specific techniques by the directors. It will introduce students to some of the significant pioneers in the field of cinema, movements in cinema, a few cinematic forms as well as to the specificities of cinema as a language. Modules on various movements in cinema will be included and key cinematic concepts regarding the film form and film language will be introduced to the students.  Film shots will be screened throughout and will be discussed in detail to answer the basic questions related to film as a language. Discussions will revolve around the role of editing in cinema, the different ways in which a frame can be composed, the ways in which light can be used, the role of the camera, and the ways in which sound can be used in cinema.

Besides screening several film clips, a number of articles related to cinema will be analysed in detail. The course will also focus on how ideology gets constructed in cinema.  As the course is an introductory course, the focus will be on the pioneers in the field of cinema.  For this reason the course will mainly focus on films produced in the early half of the twentieth century. 

 The objective of the course is to inculcate the basics of film appreciation in the students, and the ability to analyse cinema.It is to help students understand the special tools required to understand the ‘double language’ of cinema. It is also to facilitate the understanding that cinema is an extremely significant art form as well as an ideological apparatus.  Therefore the aim is also to create the course participants into alert spectators who can develop the ability to question the power of the cinematic apparatus. 

 

Module 1: Origins of Cinema

This module will begin with a brief history of the origins of cinema.  It will introduce the following pioneers in the field of Cinema: Lumiere Brothers, Georges Melies, Edwin S. Porter, D. W. Griffith, G. D. Palke, Robert Flaherty,Charlie Chaplin, Alan Crosland, Sergei Eisenstein (Eisenstein will be discussed in the next module along with the concept of the Soviet Montage). 

Selected shots from films of the pioneers: LumiereBrothers, First Films; Georges Melies, Viaje a La Luna, Martin Scorsese, Hugo; Edwin S. Porter, The Great Train Robbery; Griffith, Birth of a Nation; D. G. Phalke, Raja Harishchandar, Paresh Mokashi, Harishchandrachi Factory; Robert Flaherty, Nanook of the North;Charlie Chaplin, Modern Times; Alan Crosland, The Jazz Singer will be screened in this section,

Readings to be discussed in the class:

Chris Dashiell, “The Oldest Movies”. Web. 28 March. 2012.<http://www.cinescene.com/dash/lumiere.html>

Dwyer, Rachel and Divia Patel. “Indian Cinema: Origins and Beginnings”.Cinema India: The Visual Culture of Hindi Films. London : Reaktion ; New Brunswick, N.J. : Rutgers University Press, 2002.

 

Kracauer, Siegfried. “Basic Concepts” in Theory of Film: The Redemption of Physical Reality. Princeton: Princeton University Press. 1997.

Additional Readings for reference:

Altman, Rich.  "Dickens, Griffith and Film Theory Today," The South Atlantic Quarterly, 88, 2 (Spring 1989), 321-359.

 

Bazin, Andre “Charlie Chaplin”. What is Cinema Vol.1, Berkeley, Los Angeles and London: University of California press: 1967.

Chabria, Suresh. “D.G. Phalke and the Melies Tradition in Early Indian Cinema”, Kintop 2. Frankfurt and Main, 1993.

Gunning, Tom. “The Cinema of Attractions: Early Film, Its Spectator and the Avant Garde”.  Thomas Elsaesser (ed). Early Cinema Space, Frame, Narrative. London: British Film Institute, 1990.

 

Module II:

Film Language: Key concepts: This module will discuss the evolution of the language of cinema.  It will discussdebates around significant principles of film language such as the Soviet Montage (editing), Deep Focus (camera), Mise-en-scene (staging shots), 180-degree rule, Eyeline matching, Lighting, Close-up, Sound, Music and Jump cut.  It will also discuss key cinematic concepts such as Spectatorship, Suture, Scopophilia, Voyeurism, the cinematic apparatus and counter-cinema.

To illustrate the above stated: Clips from Eisenstein’sBattleship Potemkin, Orson Welles’Citizen Kane, Dreyer’sThe Passion of Joan of Arc, Wiene’s The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari,Ritwik Ghatak’sKomal Gandhar,Godard’s Pierrot Le Fouand A bout de souffleand Guru Datt’sPayasa will be screened in this section.

Readings to be discussed in the class:

Balzacs, Bela. “The Close-Up”, in Gerald Mast, Marshall Cohen & Leo Braudy Eds. Film Theory and Criticism: Introductory Readings, New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992.

Bazin, Andre. “The Evolution of the Language of Cinema.”What is Cinema Vol.1, Berkeley, Los Angeles and London: University of California press: 1967.

Eisenstein, Pudovkin and Alexandrov.  “Statemet on Sound”. Braudy and Cohen (ed). Film Theory and Criticism: Introductory Readings.  New York: Oxford University Press. 2004.

Eisenstein, Sergei. “A Dialectic Approach to Film Form” in Film Form: Essays in Film Theory, Edited and Translated by Jay Leyda, San Diego, New York, London: A harvest/Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, Publishers: 1977.

Mulvey, Laura. “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema”.  Film and Theory: An Anthology, Robert Stam Toby Miller, (ed.) Blaeckwell Pubishers, Oxford, 2000.

Selections from:Hayward, Susan.Key Concepts in Cinema Studies. London and New York: Routledge, 2004.

 

Additional readings for reference:

 

Burch, Noel.  Theory of Film Practice.  New York: Braeger, 1973.

 

David Bordwell, “Classical Hollywood Cinema: Narrational Principles and Procedures”. Philip Rosen (ed). Narrative, Apparatus, Ideology. New York: Columbia University Press, 1986.

Dyer, R. White. London and New York: Routledge, 1997.

Eisenstein, Sergei. “Beyond the Shot (The Cinematographic Principle and the Ideogram)”. The Film Form. Harcourt: Brace & World, 1949.

Eisenstein,Sergei. “Methods of Montage” in Film Form: Essays in Film Theory, Edited and Translated by Jay Leyda, San Diego, New York, London: A harvest/Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, Publishers: 1977.

Ghatak, Ritwik.  “Sound in Cinema”.  Cinema and I.  Calcutta: Ritwik Memorial Trust, 1989.

 

Heath, Stephen.  "Notes on Suture."  Screen.  Vol. 18, No. 4 (Winter 1977), 48-76.

 

Kuntzel, J.  "The Treatement of Ideology in the Textual Analysis of Film."  Screen.  Vol. 14, No. 3 (Autumn, 1973).

 

Metz, Christian. Film Language. New York: Oxford University Press, 1976.

 

 

Module III

Movements in Cinema: This module will focus on some of the movements in cinema such as German Expressionism, Surrealism, Italian neo-realism, French New Wave Cinema/Nouvelle Vague, Indian New Wave Cinema, New German Cinema, Cinema Nova, Third Cinema and new cinema from Iran. It will also focus on the concept of the auteur in cinema.

Clips from Murnau’s Nosferatu, Bunuel and Dali’s Un Chien Andalou,De Sica’sBicycle Thieves,Agnes Varda’s La Pointe Courte, Resnais’s Hiroshima Mon Amour,Fassbinder’s In the year of Thirteen Moons, Satyajit Ray’sPather Panchali, M.S. Sathyu’s Garam Hawa,Aparna Sen’s 36 Chowringhee Lane, Glauber Rocha, Terra em Transe, Sembene’s Xala,Martha Mesoraz’sNine Months,Majid Majidi’s The Colour of Paradise, will be screened in this section.

Readings to be discussed in the class:

Graham, (ed).  “The New Wave”, first published in Ecran Francais, No. 144, 1948, 17-23.

 

Simona Monticelli, “Italian Post war Cinema and Neo Realism”. John Hill and Pamela Church Gibson, (eds). Oxford Guide to Film Studies. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press: 1998.

Selections from: Hayward, Susan. Key concepts in Cinema Studies. London and New York: Routledge, 2004.

Solanas, F. and Getino,O. “Towards a Third Cinema”. Chanan, M. (ed). Twenty Five Years of the New Latin American Cinema, London, British Film Institute publishing. 1983.

Willman, Paul and Pines, Jim., (eds).  Questions of Third Cinema.  London: British Film Institute, 1989.

 

Additional Readings for reference:

Bazin, Andre.  "De la politique des auteurs."  Cahiers du Cinema, No. 70 (April 57), 2-11.

 

Coates, P. The Gorgon’s Gaze: German Cinema, Expressionism and the Image of Horror.Cambridge: Cambridge University Press: 1991.

Corporation, National Films Division. “The Indian New Wave and Beyond 1969-95”.Indian Cinema: A Visual Voyage. 1998.

Ponzanesi, Sandra and Marguerite Waller. Ed. Postcolonial Cinema Studies. London and

New York: Routledge, 2012.

Ray, Satyajit.  Our Films Their Films.  New Delhi: Orient Longman, 1976.

 

Sarris, Andrew.  Interviews with Film Directors.  New york: Avon, 1967.

 

 

Module IV:  (For paucity of time, the fourth module will be transacted through group presentations by students)

Forms in Cinema:  Musical, Melodrama, Film Noir, Horror Movies, Westerns, Science Fiction, The Classic Hollywood Cinema, Gangster/Criminal/ Detective Thriller.

Students for their presentations will be encouraged to discuss clips from Mehboob Khan’sMother India,Mizoguchi’sOrizuru Osen, Hitchcock’sPsycho; Joseph Stein’sFiddler on the Roof, James Cameron’sAvatar,Fleming’sThe Virginian, Robert Aldrich’s Kiss Me Deadly,Fleming’s Gone With the Wind,Ramesh Sippy’s Sholay and Coppola's The Godfather, besides any other film clips that they would like to include for their presentations.

Background Readings for presentations:

A. Freeland, Cynthia. “Feminist Frameworks for Horror Films”. Braudy and Cohen (ed). Film Theory and Criticism: Introductory Readings.  New York: Oxford University Press. 2004.

Gledhill, C. (ed)Home is Where the Heart Is: Studies in Melodrama and the Women’s Film, London,British Institute Publishing. 1987.

Schartz, Thomas. “Film Genre and the Genre Film”. Braudy and Cohen (ed). Film Theory and Criticism: Introductory Readings.  New York: Oxford University Press. 2004.

 

Selections from: Hayward, Susan. Key concepts in Cinema Studies. London and New York: Routledge, 2004.

Thompson, Kristin.  The Classical Hollywood Cinema:  Film Style and Mode of Production to 1960.  London: Routledge, 1985.

 

Warshow, Robert. “Movie Chronicle: The Westerner”. Braudy and Cohen (ed). Film Theory and Criticism: Introductory Readings.  New York: Oxford University Press. 2004.

 AdditionalGeneral readings on Cinema Studies:

Benjamin, Walter, and J. A. Underwood. “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical   Reproduction”. London: Penguin, 2008.

Bresson, Robert.  Notes on the Cinematographer.  London: Quaret, 1986.

 

Deleuze, Gilles. Cinema 1: The Movement Image. Athlone Press: London, 1986.

---. Cinema 2: Time Image. London: Athlone Press, 1989.

Hutcheon, Linda. A Theory of Adaptation. New York: Routledge, 2012.

Ryan, Michael and Melissa Lenos. Film Analysis: Technique and Meaning in Narrative Film. New York, London: 2012.

Wollen, Peter. Readings & Writings: Semiotic Counter Strategies. London: Verso Publishing, 1982.

---. Signs and Meaning in the Cinema. Blumington: Indiana Univ. Press, 1972.

Vasudevan, Ravi. Making Meaning in Indian Cinema. Oxford University Press: 2000.

School of Undergraduate Studies

Ambedkar University Delhi

Course Outline

 

Time Slot: 2 Hours

 

Course Code: SUS1EN256

Title: Introduction to Literary Theory

Type of Course: Discipline (English)

Cohort for which it is compulsory: Not applicable

Cohort for which it is elective: English and all other Majors

No. of Credits: 04

Semester and Year Offered: Semester VI, Winter Semester

Course Coordinator: Dr. Kopal

Email of course coordinator: kopal@aud.ac.in

Pre-requisites: None

Course Objectives/Description:

This course will introduce students to literary theorie with a special focus on

reading, understanding, and exploring the works of select theorists. It will acquaint students to

some of the most influential thoughts and ideologies of the contemporary world and enable them

to analyse, critique and situate literature within a larger context. The course will study the

importance of literary theory and move on to its thematic study through modules designed

around Marxism, gender, self/ other, linguistics, culture studies, etc. 

This course will focus on some of the key literary theories in order to help them engage more

critically with literary texts. The course is designed to facilitate a conceptual understanding of

fundamental literary concepts which students can apply in their analysis of literature.  The course is designed around the following modules which undertake a thematic study of theory through some representative writings.

 

Course Outcomes:

On successful completion of this course students will be able to:

1) Demonstrate thorough understanding and knowledge of literary theory 

2) Show critical, reflective and analytical thinking through an examination of the verity and

validity of various ways of interpretation and analyses.

3) Reflect research related skills through familiarizing with the language of theory

Module I: Introduction

 Module II: Marxism

Gramsci, Antonio. ‘The Formation of the Intellectuals’ and ‘Hegemony and Separation of Powers’ in The Modern Prince and Other Writings. Ed. and Trans. Louis Marks. London: Lawrence and Wishart, 1957. Print.

Althusser, Louis. ‘Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuses’ in Lenin and Philosophy and Other Essays. Trans. Ben Brewster. New York: Monthly Review Press, 1971. Print.

Module III: Gender Question

 Showalter, Elaine. ‘The Female Tradition’, Introduction in A Literature of Their Own: British Women Novelists from Bronte to Lessing. New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1977. Print.

Sedgwick, Eve Kosofsky, ‘Introduction: Axiomatic’, Epistemology of the Closet, Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1990, Print

Cixous, Helene. ‘The Laugh of Medusa’ in New French Feminisms: An Anthology. Eds. Elaine Marks and Isabelle Courtivron. Trans. Keith Cohen and Paula Cohen. Hertfordshire: Harvester Wheatsheaf, 1981. Print.

 Irigaray, Luce. ‘This Sex Which is Not One’ and ‘When the Goods Get Together’ in New French Feminisms: An Anthology. Eds. Elaine Marks and Isabelle Courtivron. Trans. Keith Cohen and Paula Cohen. Hertfordshire: Harvester Wheatsheaf, 1981. Print.

Module IV: Colonialism and Post-Colonialism

 Viswanathan, Gauri. ‘The Beginnings of English Literary Study in British India’ in Literary Theory: An Introductory Reader. Ed. Saugata Bhaduri and Simi Malhotra. New Delhi: Anthem Press India, 2010. Print.

 Aijaz Ahmad, ‘“Indian Literature”: Notes towards the Definition of a Category’ in Literary Theory: An Introductory Reader. Ed. Saugata Bhaduri and Simi Malhotra. New Delhi: Anthem Press India, 2010. Print.

Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, ‘Can the Subaltern Speak?’ in The Post-Colonial Studies Reader. Eds. Bill Ashcroft, Gareth Griffiths and Helen Tiffins. New York: Routledge, 1995. Print.

Module V: Structuralism, Poststructuralism, and Deconstruction

Saussure, Ferdinand de. Excerpts from Course in General Linguistics in Postmodernism: Critical Concepts Volume I. Eds. Victor E. Taylor and Charles E. Trans. Wade Baskin. Winquist. London: Routledge, 1998. Print.

Barthes, Roland. ‘Introduction to the Structural Analysis of Narratives’ in Image, Music Text. Trans. and Ed. Stephen Heath. London: Fontana, 1977. Print.

Foucault, Michel. ‘Truth and Power’ in Selected Interviews and Other Writings, 1972- . Ed. Cohn Gordon. New York: Pantheon Books, 1980. Print.

 Derrida, Jacques. ‘Structure, Sign, and Play in the Discourse of the Human Sciences’ in Writing and Difference. Trans. A. Bass. Chicago: Chicago University Press, 1978. Print.

 Module VII: Postmodernism and Culture Studies

 Lyotard, Jean-Francois, ‘Answering the Question: What is Postmodernism? in Literary Theory: An Introductory Reader. Ed. Saugata Bhaduri and Simi Malhotra. New Delhi: Anthem Press India, 2010. Print.

Williams, Raymond. ‘Forms’ in Literary Theory: An Introductory Reader. Ed. Saugata Bhaduri and Simi Malhotra. New Delhi: Anthem Press India, 2010. Print.

Secondary Reading List:

Eagleton, Terry, Literary Theory: An Introduction, Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1983. Barry, Peter, Beginning Theory: An Introduction to Literary and Cultural Theory, Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1999

The course will be offered as an elective to third semester BA-Sustainable Urbanism (SU) students in the School of Global Affairs. It will be useful to students pursuing BA in SU, Global Studies, Social Science and Humanities, Law and Politics as colonial urban processes and policies encompassed the legal, political, social and economic aspects of the region under imperial rule. The aim of the course is to introduce students to aspects of urbanisation in modern colonial regimes.

The course seeks to introduce some of the important themes and concepts which are indispensable to the study of politics. The orientation of the course is such that it aims to escape a certain conundrum where a strict adherence to either variant of political theory -normative and critical kinds- invariably leads to a disabling engagement with the other. The course, therefore, plans to undertake a study of politics through a creative blend of both the normative and the critical aspects. The course consists of 6 modules. It starts by describing the connection between politics and political theory followed by the engagement with wide ranging themes broadly schematized under the rubrics of political ideologies, normative values, and democracy. 

The course provide for an experience for understanding multiple childhoods in India. It provides for multiple interactions and observations of children from different margins and tries to problematize the construction of single childhood of a biological perspective through field visits and observations. Through ethnographic narratives and the students ’biographical experiences it tries to make sense of cognitive, psycho-social and moral theories in psychology to make sense of the inner world of the children. It would work with themes of Nostalgia, trauma, experiencing of parenting styles, attachment, art, play and relationship to cognitive and psychoanalytic perspective of childhood. Theoretical perspectives of Jean Piaget,, Lev Vygotsky, Erikson, John Bowlby, Winnicott, Bronfenbrenner, Kholberg and Gilligan  would be engaged  with to deconstruct and reconstruct the relationship between childhood and society through  the classroom  discourse.

The experience of listening to several narratives of childhoods of classmates in the classroom will help students situate the understanding of the relevance of Universalization of the notion of childhood and the limit of its conceptualisation. It will enable students to make sense of qualitative research on children based on childhood ethnographies on education, work, violence and suffering.

 

This course contextualizes of some fundamental human concerns and the way sociology can offer us directions and pointers for them. Consciously shunning the old positivist rules that insist sociology must speak only through ‘hard’ evidence, the course of this kind puts together a series of ingredients which evoke sharp smell and vivid images from the lived reality.

This course is intended to introduce participants to different genres of academic texts and aims to develop their ability to read and respond to these texts in English in both written and oral form. They will be able to understand lecture aims, main ideas and supporting details and will thus learn to make predictions during a lecture.

 

It is expected that participants will learn to critically engage with texts and be able to express their opinion on various issues keeping in mind the formalities of academic discourse. They will be able to identify other people’s positions, arguments and conclusions by evaluating the evidence for alternative points of view thus learning how to question opinions and differentiate between fact and opinion. The course will enable participants to reflect on issues and engage with personal narratives to engage with lived experiences which can serve as a backdrop for them to engage with language at a level which moves beyond merely skill acquisition. Participants will be able to synthesize information/arguments to form their own position on a topic and present their point of view in a structured, clear, well-reasoned way.

This course is interdisciplinary in nature and discusses the background to the rise of social science and humanities, modes of enquiry used in these disciplines and the emergence of key concepts in them.

About the Course

Premised on the limits of a universal psychology, the course on Psychology for India attempts to circumscribe what passes off as the discipline of psychology into a culturally located form: it’s primarily Western origin and environ. Re-apprehending the story of global psychology as a ‘glocal’ psychology allows an opportunity for an active and affirmative understanding of other(ed) locations. Of other(ed) cultures as such locations and sites of active knowledge production. Foregrounding the need for situated knowledge, the course questions the relevance of a psychology emanating primarily from West/Europe to Non-western and Non-European cultures, experiences and psyches and attempts to look for resources for a culturally sensitive psychology. What are the conceptual and pragmatic tools needed for such an engagement? Does Psychology need to be liberated from complacent and complicit foundational biases if it is to work towards its emancipatory potential? How have practitioners of Psychology and allied fields in India understood questions of selfhood, identity and healing? Does this situated lens carry a potential to re-define critical ideas within psychological corpus? Through this bivalent critical engagement, with the received discipline of psychology and its Indian counterpart, the course attempts to create a space for the practice of a critical cultural psychology, a Psychology (relevant) for India. 

This course is designed to introduce students to the concepts of culture and identity within societies. What shapes notions in societies about “culture”? How are individual and collective identities shaped by culture and what do we understand about their interactions in societies? What are the assumptions embedded in these categories of culture and identities about people, communities, and histories? This course engages with sociological and anthropological perspectives to these notions and aims to enable students to question and de-stabilise fixed notions about culture and identity that take shape and get complicated through categories of age, race, ethnicity, gender, class, caste, nationality, diaspora, and globalisation. Since youth are often the key sites where anxieties of cultures and identities play out in societies, this course will engage with youth cultures and identities to unpack how global movements offer new meanings to notions of belonging and difference.

This is an elective for BA 6th SEM students. It is also open for students of all disciplines, without any prerequisite.

This course is meant to be an advanced level orientation and engagement with the creative practices namely visual art, literary art, performance art and cinematic art to third year undergraduate students (sixth semester) in the context of the historical evolution of cultural practices. While the course is restrained in terms of the philosophical depths to which questions about culture and creative expressions can reach, it will not just offer provocative insights into such explorations through carefully chosen exhibits, reading material and lecture, but also introduce and prepare students to understand the disciplinary underpinnings of the creative explorations. The primary aim is not only to help students re-imagine the role of creative expressions as foundational to human civilization rather than as supplementary to other areas of material progress, but also to provide advanced training in the academic pursuits of creative explorations.

The course offers windows of perspectives into the issues of representation, narration, abstraction, affect, experimentation, interpretation and subjectivity. In other words, a short map or an exposure will be provided about the academic engagement with arts in its conceptual, creative and critical dimensions. 

This course is compulsory for students of BA Hons. History and is elective for other SUS students. The course is designed to help students understand structures and dynamics of the 'medieval' and 'early modern' world (c. 500 - 1700 C.E.) by focusing on relations among societies and civilizations rather than on the evidently 'separated' aspects of those societies across time.  Attention is drawn towards phenomena such as human migration, cultural (including religious) movements, disease experiences, technological diffusions and patterns of economic activity that spanned regions or several parts of the globe.  The course focuses on the collapse of the Roman empire 300 - 500 C.E. (and its neighbor the Sasanian empire), the emergence and expansion of Christian and Islamic polities to c. 1200 C.E., environmental conditions and human environmental impacts in Eurasia between c. 800 and 1500 CE, the European colonizations of the Americas 1500 - 1700 C.E. and changing interactions between Eurasia and Africa consequent upon 'New World' colonization.  The course acquaints students with world or global history not as a sum of regional or national histories but rather as 'connected histories'.

This course will continue from its sister course in the previous semester covering the standard economic analysis of the behaviour of economic aggregates like GDP, employment and the price level in a market economy characterized by the use of money and credit, bringing in also the open economy context. 

If Enlightenment, French Revolution, and Industrial Revolution are considered as three crucial phenomena that led to the rise and advancement of Sociology as a discipline, social change may be considered as the primordial Sociological theme! With the rise of modern state and discourses around its significance in influencing the wellbeing of its citizens, development has evolved as a critical avenue for understanding transformation. Sociologists have tried to understand transformation by reflecting on its diverse components including perceived roots, patterns, processes, agents, aims, and consequences. The aspiration of this course is to orient the students towards developing an understanding of social transformation specifically focusing on the meanings and manifestations of social change and development. The course is meant for beginners in social transformation. One aim of this course is to familiarize the students with the development of significant theoretical ideas in this field. The other aim is to situate these theoretical propositions in the context of contemporary socio-economic and political setting. Upon completion of this course the students should be able to comprehend the diverse meanings of social transformation and understand their significance.

  • This course is meant to introduce the creative practices to first year undergraduate students in the context of the historical evolution of cultural practices.
  • While the course is restrained in terms of the philosophical depths to which questions about culture and creative expressions can reach, it will offer some provocative insights into such explorations through carefully chosen exhibits, reading material and lectures.
  • The primary aim is to help students re-imagine the role of creative expressions as foundational to human civilization rather than as supplementary to other areas of material progress.

Neural development during the infancy period indicates the need for planning for early stimulation —especially for this age. Infants and toddlers have abilities to learn and develop across domains, thus pointing to the need for day care supervisors to approach activities for young children in a holistic manner. In addition, linguistic, cultural and social diversity with which families approach caregiving needs to be taken into consideration by the facilitators in a day care centre. This course will focus on organizing programmes for infants and toddlers and planning for developmentally and contextually appropriate activities for older children as well. 

Children bring in diversities that are based on culture, language, caste, gender, class, ability,
etc. in the early childhood centre as they walk in. Their development and learning across the
domains need to be dynamic and engaging. It is critical for the centre providers to ensure that
not only are the physical spaces of the centre conducive to the inclusion of young children,
they are also provided opportunities in the curriculum to participate to their full capabilities.
The curriculum needs to build spaces for children to develop a sense of belonging and
enabling relationships in a safe environment. This entails that the design of the centre
settings is created with a vision of fostering inclusion keeping in mind the three key
principles of ‘access’, ‘participation’ and ‘support’.

The Internship has been conceptualized to enable students to engage with the field and connect with the theoretical constructs from the courses. Students will observe the role of various stakeholders in proving quality childcare and challenges pertaining to different settings. Also, the internship will engage students with families and communities which could be potential sites for practice. 

EPC is a compulsory course within the General Education Component of vocational programme offered in the first and second semester of B.Voc programme in AUD. This course aims to equip students to develop their English langauge skills so that they can engage in everyday conversations and share their views and ideas in a vocational or training setting as per their vocational cohort. The course primarilly focusses on improving the proficiency and specific langauge needs of students.  

By the end of this course the students will be able to :

·       Exchange information by forming and responding to simple

        questions

·       Understand basic everyday expressions and short, simple 

        texts

·       Engage in simple oral and written communication in order to

        provide and obtain information

·       Initiate conversation in group, negotiate views and work in

        collaboration

·       Critically engage with basic readings like newspaper articles,

        summarise  and paraphrase to support arguments

·       Make presentations

.       Write opinion paragraphs highlighting differences ,

        compare and contrast, add preferences using connectors and

        discourse markers

 

If working with people, products and money sounds exciting to you, explore the world of retail.  Get hands-on training in stocking pricing, cashiering, merchandising, and customer service. Come see what's in store!

You can learn...stocking, inventory and display, sales and customer service skills, Retail math and cash register operations, workplace safety, retail merchandising, how to operate a coffee/espresso maker and popcorn machine, and Virtual Business software etc!

This course aims at imparting the essential skills of operations of retail store, product display and hygiene as well as the importance of a Sales Associate in the Retail business.


This tiny course can help you get started if you are new to Moodle.

This is a survey course designed to introduce students to the theory and practice of the modern state as it operates in South Asia. The course is aimed at helping students see the modern state as a 'conceptual variable', the attributes of which may differ in different contexts.

This course is an exploration of the attempt by some of the important thinkers/figures of the colonized world and society to imagine and fashion forms of decolonization. To engage in this mode of inquiry entails not only an understanding of the larger milieu in which a thinker is situated but also an investigation into why and how a particular form of future came be to be envisaged and conceived. In undertaking this venture, the concern of the course is less about whether the attempts of the thinkers remained realized or unrealized than about foregrounding a range of political futures which could conflict or complement one another. Such exploration also points us towards the direction of the possible worlds that can be aspired for and inhabited.

 

Much of the engagement of the course will pertain to the diverse thinkers/figures from the Indian context. In addition to the popular figures such as Gandhi, Savarkar, Aurobindo, Tagore, Ambedkar, Nehru, the course will introduce Jaipal Singh, the Adivasi leader from the present-day Jharkhand, who is popularly known for his participation in Constituent Assembly debates. The assembling of these figures within a synchronous frame is less an act of merely putting them together than to underscore the tension, conflict, or equivalence between the wide-ranging positions or ‘standpoints’ on the discursively related questions of nation and nationalism, west and east, colonialism, violence and marginalization, freedom, humanism, etc. In this engagement, the course will also draw from critical voices dealing with the similar questions from African-Caribbean context in the form of negritude and Fanon

This course is an attempt to read history through some of the exceptional events in the field of artistic/cultural production, which are broadly bracketed under the category of avant-garde.