Artificial Intelligence in Literature and Culture
Examines the discourse on artificial life, sentience, and thinking machines through philosophy and literature from the 18th century to the present, focusing on AI's capacity for thought and consciousness.
Summary
What you’ll be able to do
Understand an array of theoretical and literary explorations of the artificial intelligence and robotics.
Write original, coherent, and compelling arguments that push beyond summary to analysis and independent and critical thinking in clear prose.
Recognize how writers deploy various literary and narrative devices to marshal arguments about key concepts, problems, and questions related to the course topic.
Source: UW Guide
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Prerequisites
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- Junior standing
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- Junior standing
Professors
Spring 2027No instructors recorded for this selection.
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Student experience
the class
Covers the discourse around artificial life and sentience from the eighteenth century to our present. Considers how philosophy and literature both seek to understand and explore what it might mean to have machines that think. Discusses issues around the creation and implementation of Artificial Intelligence and poses some of the key questions about Artificial Intelligence including their capacity for thought, consciousness and intentionality. Considers how these texts work through the questions posed by theorists and raise their own.
difficulty & workload
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Topics
- Artificial life and sentience discourse from the 18th century to present
- Philosophical and literary exploration of thinking machines
- Issues of AI creation, implementation, thought, consciousness, and intentionality
Skills
- Analyze theoretical and literary explorations of AI, robotics, and machine sentience.
- Compose analytical arguments with independent critical thinking.
- Identify literary and narrative devices used to construct arguments about AI concepts.
Grades
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Explore recorded gradesRecorded 2026-10-14
Model outputs & technical records
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Model & dataset provenance
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"model": "Qwen/Qwen3.8-27B",
"model_revision": "1d4bf0f2ff6012fd82039f2fa52739d0dd7c60c0",
"task_version": "17",
"output_id": "5984f00d2c41fcec1443bd12542a914448199b134458fd8778bd536d832764c7",
"requirements_status": "valid",
"dataset_revision": "fc1811fa52e581ea57a35c0cf3343f8740a8ffbf",
"observed_at": "2026-10-14 17:50:09.728220+00:00"
}