Seminar, three hours. What is it we do when we try to understand words, habits, gestures, and beliefs not our own? Do we understand something foreign to us by immersing ourselves in it or by standing apart? Does ability to understand something foreign imply taking universal standpoint? Can we make judgments about beliefs other than our own? Questions of cultural interpretation have long history in both Western and non-Western cultures. Discussion of history of questions about cross-cultural interpretation and comparative interpretation of cultures in both comparative literature and cultural anthropology. Reading of some very complex and influential works by such writers as Claude Lévi-Strauss, Amitav Ghosh, James Clifford, Edward Said, Gayatri Spivak, and Erich Auerbach. Concurrently scheduled with course C287. P/NP or letter grading.