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Critical Theory in the Global South

Northwestern's Comparative Literary Studies Program faculty participate in Andrew W. Mellon Foundation grant, Critical Theory in the Global South.

In December 2016, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation awarded a three-and-a-half year, $1,525,000 grant to the University of California, Berkeley and $1,020,000 to Northwestern University to establish the International Consortium of Critical Theory Programs (ICCTP). The Consortium rests on the view that critical theory is not only an important interdisciplinary field of research and teaching within the university, but it also crucially informs the university ‘s task of promoting critical thought.

Northwestern’s new $1 million Mellon-funded project is among the new collaborative partnerships of the ICCTP. Through partnerships with a group of North American, Latin American, and South African institutions, a number of Inter-University Teaching Cooperations will receive funding to develop new courses on critical theory in the Global South, a new program of international faculty and graduate exchanges, and a series of inter-university doctoral workshops, conferences and translations.

The Critical Theory in the Global South Project, an initiative of the International Consortium of Critical Theory Programs, has as its mission the development of new critical theory curricula integrating intellectual traditions from the Global South. It pursues this mission through faculty collaborations, graduate student exchanges, book and article translations, workshops, and conferences. It comprises ten sub-projects, or "Inter-University Teaching Cooperations," that bring together critical theory scholars in North America, South Africa, and Latin America. Seven of these sub-projects are based at Northwestern; three, designated as "Linked Inter-University Teaching Cooperations," are based at Yale, Rutgers, and Fordham.

Please visit the project's website to find more information about these projects, their topics, and their participants. You will also find links to detailed pages for each project, featuring in-depth descriptions of their themes, methods, and projected outcomes, bios of their participating scholars, project syllabi and resource lists, and news and events.

The Comparative Literary Studies Faculty involved in the project include: