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Apr 30, 2024
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RLST 150 AF - The Eye of God: Race and Empires of the Sun
In mythic cycles from the “Western Tradition,” there has been a sustained intrigue over the relationship between the human eye and the heavenly sun. From the Cyclops of Homer’s Odyssey to its refiguring in D.W. Griffith’s The Birth of a Nation, the powers of the eye get equated with those of its celestial counterpart. This intrigue has been reshaped—but not lost—with the advent of modern visual surveillance techniques, like optical scanners in voting machines, weather-imaging satellites, and battlefield-embedded observational media. In this course, we will examine a range of manifestations of the solar eye, paying particular attention to the relationship(s) it bears to reality and the ways in which the solar eye operates in schemes both great and small of confidence and illusion. We will consider works by Plato, Foucault, Ellison, and Morrison; documents in government policy; and movies like “The Fly,” “Cube,” “9,” and “The Lord of the Rings” trilogy. PRT I.
Course Credit: 1.0
Please refer to the course schedule on the Scripps Portal for current course offerings and details.
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