CMLT201

Description

This course will introduce students to the Kittacuck or Mishkittakooksepe (Blackstone River), the Blackstone Watershed and the Narragansett Estuary. It will consider all the life with which it is connected. It will consider different forms of mapping. It will consider how this great tidal river has changed over time. And through this history it will consider differing conceptualizations of rivers or different ways of relating to rivers. Are rivers alive? Do/should rivers have legal personhood? What creatures rely on rivers? How have they been used as transportation systems? For their energy (mills, dams, etc.)? As dumpsites for corporations? As bikeways? How do they figure in history? In literature? By combining these considerations, students will come away from the course with a more robust understand of rivers in general and the Blackstone River in particular. By combining these considerations with an analysis of how rivers figure in literature and film, students will come away from the course with a more robust understand of rivers in general and the Blackstone River in particular.