Caren Irr
Kevy and Hortense Kaiserman Professor in the Humanities
Head of the Humanities Division (as of July 2023)
PhD, Duke University
Pronouns: she / her / hers
Pronunciation: Irr as in "irregular" or "irritable"
Research Interests
Theory, film and media studies, contemporaneity, environmental humanities, the novel
Selected Publications
- Editor of "Environmental Futures: An International Literary Anthology." Brandeis University Press. (2024)
- Co-editor of the Journal of Modern Literature (2022-present)
- "Adorno's 'Minima Moralia' in the 21st Century: Fascism, Work, and Ecology." Bloomsbury. (2021)
- "Life in Plastic: Artistic Responses to Petromodernity." U of Minnesota P. (2021)
- Life in Plastic podcasts (U of Minnesota Press):
"Petrochemical Fantasies and Synthetic Sensibilities"
"Plastic's Capitalism" - "Ecostoicism, or Notes on Franzen."
- "Climate Fiction in English." Open access piece in the Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Literature.
- "The Space of Genre in the New Green Novel." Routledge, 2014. Free access for up to 50 readers.
- "Toward the Geopolitical Novel: U.S Fiction in the 21st Century." Columbia University Press, 2013. Read the first chapter for free.
- "Pink Pirates: Contemporary American Women Writers and Copyright." University of Iowa Press, 2010.
- "On Jameson: From Postmodernism to Globalization," co-editor, State University of New York Press, 2005.
- "Rethinking the Frankfurt School: Alternative Legacies of Cultural Critique," co-editor, State University of New York Press, 2002.
- "The Suburb of Dissent: Cultural Politics in the United States and Canada during the 1930s." Durham: Duke University Press, 1998.
Selected Courses Taught
- Environmental Film, Environmental Justice (COML/ENG 70b)
- Environmental Aesthetics (COML/ENG 191a)
- Contemporary Environmental Writing (ENG 28a)
- American Independent Film (ENG 50b)
- Contemporary Global Dystopias (ENG 66b)
- Capitalism and the American Novel (ENG 238a)