Honors College Preview Lecture to Focus on Harry Potter Canon

The Harry Potter world is rife with trivia that you'll never see mentioned within its published pages. Did you know, for example, that Nagini isn't an actual snake? How about that Hagrid can't produce a Patronus? J.K. Rowling's seemingly endless list of revelations, introduced on Twitter, on her official Harry Potter website Pottermore, or in interviews, are generally accepted by fans, but where do the boundaries of the Harry Potter universe lie? 

The dizzyingly complex expansion of Rowling's wizarding world is the subject of Chelsea Hodge's lecture "Harry Potter and the Story that Never Seems to End," which will preview her fall 2019 Honors College Retro Readings course "Harry Potter."

The lecture will be at 5:15 pm on Wednesday, March 13, in the Gearhart Hall auditorium (GEAR 26). All on campus and in the community are invited to attend this free event. Metered parking is available in the Harmon Street Parking Garage and along Arkansas Avenue.

"I want to stress that I love these books, but it's important to be able to take a step back" and engage in cultural and literary critique, said Hodge. For example, Rowling has been criticized by fans who saw her post-series revelations as an attempt to retroactively introduce diverse characters into an otherwise very un-diverse cast. Hodge says this is a very legitimate concern.

"Many issues of canon are wrapped up in issues of diversity," she said. "The story is very white, very heterosexual, and confirms many Western cultural norms in a lot of ways. What does it mean that every principle character is white, with only passing mentions of diversity?"

The course itself will go beyond canon to discuss the ways race, class and gender are represented in the series, and place the books within the context of British literature and British colonialism. Students will analyze the series' more literary elements, its cultural impact across the globe and the effects of franchising on the story's reception.

The course and lecture will be an opportunity to explore Harry Potter from a critical standpoint…and also to make a case for your own head canon. 

"There are big morals we're supposed to take away from the book, embedded in Harry's storyline, in Voldemort's motivations and purpose - but these things have different meanings for different people," Hodge explained. "What is more important: my interpretation or the author's intention?"

Students must apply to participate in Honors College Retro Readings courses, and applications for all fall honors seminars are due at 11:59 pm on Friday, March 29.

Hodge works with both prospective and current honors students as associate director of recruitment and grants management in the Honors College. Her teaching credits include honors sections of University Perspectives and small-group lab sections of the Honors Humanities Program. In addition, Hodge has organized the very popular annual Honors College School of Witchcraft and Wizardry Tournament since 2014, and last December she single-handedly won a Harry Potter trivia tournament on a cruise, which she considers to be her most significant achievement to date.