How have artists, philosophers, and writers of fiction imagined the relation between humans and animals? Have they imagined humans as a species of animal, or as belonging to a realm of being that exceeds the lives of animals? What, if anything, distinguishes us from animals: language, clothing, reason, or something else? In this course we will examine some of the ways these questions have been explored in art, advertising, philosophy, and literature. Students will consider how we look at animals, read the views of influential philosophers, and immerse themselves in literary texts that imagine animals. The course will conclude with an examination of a provocative text by the novelist J. M. Coetzee, who stages a confrontation between philosophy and literature on the question of imagining animals.
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