The study of North American literatures and cultures is among the most under-represented disciplines in the comparative field, the direct result perhaps of the enduring premise of the exceptional nature of American national-cultural development. This seminar will ask how we might establish a vital American-comparative practice which will transcend the exceptionalist paradigm that continues to dominate Americanist inquiry. Participants may wish to address some of the following questions: How can the theoretical elaboration of transnational categories of gender, class, and race be used to identify comparative frameworks for an internationalized Americanist discipline? In what ways does recent work on transatlantic contact and/or influence lead to the elaboration of other comparative topoi? How can recent work in US minority literatures help us to situate the Americanist discipline within a global context? In general, we will address the challenges of crafting not a mirror in which the "other" culture is reflected in America's image (no matter how pluralist that image has become), but a comparatist lens for bringing into focus a truly internationalized Americanist practice.

Potential participants should contact Prof. Nancy Ruttenburg, Department of Comparative Literature, 4116 Dwinelle Hall, University of California at Berkeley, Berkeley, CA 94720 (tel: 510-642-6964; fax: 925-299-1928; email: natasha@socrates.berkeley.edu).