Content Warning: In 1993 David Foster Wallace declared: "The next real literary "rebels" in this country might well emerge as some weird bunch of "anti-rebels," born oglers who dare to back away from ironic watching, who have the childish gall actually to endorse single-entendre values. Who treat old untrendy human troubles and emotions in U.S. life with reverence and conviction. Who eschew self-consciousness and fatigue. These anti-rebels would be outdated, of course, before they even started. Too sincere. Clearly repressed. Backward, quaint, naive, anachronistic. Maybe that'll be the point, why they'll be the next real rebels. Real rebels, as far as I can see, risk things. Risk disapproval. The old postmodern insurgents risked the gasp and squeal: shock, disgust, outrage, censorship, accusations of socialism, anarchism, nihilism. The new rebels might be the ones willing to risk the yawn, the rolled eyes, the cool smile, the nudged ribs, the parody of gifted ironists, the "How banal." Accusations of sentimentality, melodrama. Credulity. Willingness to be suckered by a world of lurkers and starers who fear gaze and ridicule above imprisonment without law. Who knows." (E Unibus Pluram). This class will attempt to unpack this claim through an analysis of art made in the last 20 years. The three day class will provide an introduction into new sincerity or metamodernism and will consider the possibility of creating sincere art in a post-postmodern age through theory, music, literature, and film.

On the first day, we will start with an overview of the intellectual lead up to metamodernism focusing on Kafka, Duchamp, Camus, Derrida, Lou Reed, David Lynch, and ending on David Foster Wallace. With this set up in mind, we will apply the basic theoretical structures established in the opening part of the class onto relevant music. In this latter section we will listen to/discuss Nico's "I'll Keep it with Mine", Bowie's "Rock and Roll Suicide", Fatlip's "What's up Fatlip", Sturgill Simpson's "Turtles all the Way Down", and Swift's "Anti-hero".

The second day will be spent discussing David Foster Wallace's Good Old Neon. This day will be mainly spent grappling with the question of the possibility for an author to create a sincere text given the formal bounds of literature and language. As a warning, this day will discuss mental health, depression, and suicide. Furthermore, while the short story discusses suicide at length we will avoid speculation around Wallace's own death as a basic show of respect. The short story will be distributed to the class as a PDF and audiobook.

Our introduction will close with a discussion of Spike Jonze and Charlie Kaufman's Adaptation. In this conclusion, we will discuss how to learn to accept the world as it is without a need to impose or strip away narrative meaning from events. There will be a screening of the film the night before conference.