SHUM 4697

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  • Schedule of Classes - June 16, 2025 11:41AM EDT
  • Course Catalog - September 10, 2024 9:48AM EDT
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SHUM 4697
Is Nature Silent?

Course information provided by the 2024-2025 Catalog. Courses of Study 2024-2025 is scheduled to publish mid-June.

Thoreau, in 1841: "Nature is always silent and unpretending as at the break of day." He had just contrasted the robin's song with "the bustle and impatience of man." Why could silence contain birdsong but not human noise? This course explores the idea and representation of nature's silence—as a positive ideal; as soundlessness; as wordlessness; and as extinction. Heeding the environmental criticism that interrogates the contrast between silent "Nature" and noisy humanity, we will remain curious about what compels us in accounts of nature's multivalent silence. Concurrently, we will examine writings that attend to natural sound. Investigating silence, we will also strive to better understand what we mean, and what could be meant, by nature.


Last 4 Terms Offered (None)

Distribution Category (ALC-AS) (CA-AG, LA-AG)

When Offered Fall.

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Syllabi: none

  •   Regular Academic Session.  Combined with: COML 4697, COML 6697, SHUM 6697

  • 3 Credits Stdnt Opt

  • 20018 SHUM 4697   SEM 101

  • Instruction Mode: In Person

    Instructor Consent Required (Add)