ENGH 414: Folklore and the Supernatural

This course attempts to chart the uncanny—the inexplicable, the numinous, the spiritual even— in our everyday lives. We’ll think about ghosts, spirits, hauntings, visions, communion with the dead, monsters, encounters with the divine, UFOs, dream interpretation, magic, and more, not with the object of proving or disproving their existence or veracity, but rather to understand people’s lived experiences and how individuals attempt to make sense of the uncanny around them.

We’ll start by exploring the genealogy of the supernatural. We’ll interrogate the distinctions between belief/disbelief, discuss supernatural narrative genres, investigate the spaces/places where the supernatural erupts, and explore the relationships between the supernatural and technology and popular culture. We’ll end the semester by thinking about how the supernatural is made manifest within specific religious traditions.