“Walk This Way.” Exploring the cultural history of walking

Special guest William Chapman Sharpe is a Professor of English at Barnard College of Columbia University, where he teaches British and American literature. His most popular course is called “Walk This Way.” The class looks at the cultural history of walking from ancient times to the current pandemic, including such topics as peripatetic philosophers, courtly walking, Romantic poetry rambles, and Jane Austen promenades, flaneurs and psychogeographers, civil rights marches, walkathons, and perennial issues about who can walk where–access, disability, racial prejudice, etc.