ENGL1747 · Complex Problems and Enduring Questions

From Loneliness to Connection: The Literature of Human Connection

Morrissey College of Arts & Sciences

This is an Enduring Question course and is open to FRESHMEN only. You must take both ENGL1747 and ENGL1748. How can we learn to overcome loneliness and foster connection? In recent years a number of government officials have recognized loneliness as a public health crisis, with U.S. Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy describing loneliness as an epidemic, and the U.K. appointing an official Minister of Loneliness. Media has followed suit, with articles entitled "Why is the Loneliness Epidemic so Hard to Cure?" (New York Times) and "How We Learned to Be Lonely" (The Atlantic). These paired courses will explore the causes, experience, and consequences of loneliness by thinking through its relationship to reading and writing. Further, it will explore how norms around literacy (reading and writing) have alienated certain populations while providing a mode of expression for others, and how reading, writing, and discussing literature may both elucidate and ameliorate the experience of loneliness.