Welcome to SPACE, our adult continuing education program which offers interactive monthly courses for personal enrichment! Learn more here.
Mixed Lecture/Discussion
•
Medium intensity
This class needs 1 more vote by February 1 to get confirmed.
This module is a standing candidate which means it will be ready to launch as soon as it gets enough interest. Token holders can set aside a Token to reserve their seat for this candidate and help it get confirmed.
Last Seen Wearing (1952) by Hillary Waugh is hailed by genre scholars as the first acclaimed “police procedural” novel, a pioneering work of crime fiction that shifted the focus from the lone single detective to investigative team members and their process. Paving the way for modern police procedural novels – not to mention television phenomena such as Law and Order, CSI, Criminal Minds, and other series – is distinction enough, but Last Seen Wearing is also of literary interest for other reasons. The novel uses a real-life true crime case as a springboard for its fictional investigation, and, in its exploration of a missing student at an elite women’s college, it also builds on the tradition of the campus mystery, employs ingredients of the New England Gothic, and anticipates the rise of dark academia.
In this module we will consider how Last Seen Wearing serves as both a pioneering novel and a window into its moment in time. What does Last Seen Wearing tell us about the intersection of fiction and true crime? Gender and the Gothic? What has “aged well” in the story and what hasn’t, and what does this tell us about the evolution of mystery-related storytelling? And what can we learn about the blending and blurring of genres from this fictional solution to a real-life cold case?
The module will follow an 8-session structure as shown below:
In this module we will consider how Last Seen Wearing serves as both a pioneering novel and a window into its moment in time. What does Last Seen Wearing tell us about the intersection of fiction and true crime? Gender and the Gothic? What has “aged well” in the story and what hasn’t, and what does this tell us about the evolution of mystery-related storytelling? And what can we learn about the blending and blurring of genres from this fictional solution to a real-life cold case?
The module will follow an 8-session structure as shown below:
| Outline | 8-Session Structure |
|---|---|
| Week 1 | Lecture 1: Crime Fiction and Its Evolution |
| Discussion 1: Part 1 of Last Seen Wearing | |
| Week 2 | Lecture 2: True Crime, Campus Mystery, and the Imagination |
| Discussion 2: Part 2 of Last Seen Wearing | |
| Week 3 | Lecture 3: The Police and the Process |
| Discussion 3: Part 3 of Last Seen Wearing | |
| Week 4 | Lecture 4: The Meaning and Legacy of Last Seen Wearing |
| Discussion 4: Themes and Takeaways |
Required Texts
Last Seen Wearing by Hillary Waugh (any edition - there is an excellent, inexpensive new edition from the Library of Congress Crime Classics series in both print and ebook form)
Check out Current and Upcoming offerings from:
This will be a Hybrid class (4 lectures & 4 discussion sessions). Each week will consist of 1 hour of recorded lecture and 1 hour of live discussion (not recorded) for a total of 8 class hours over the course of the month.
Delivery Plan
1. The first session each week will be a pre-recorded lecture sent to students at least 2 days before the live discussion session.
2. The second session each week will be a live discussion session (not recorded).
Delivery Plan
1. The first session each week will be a pre-recorded lecture sent to students at least 2 days before the live discussion session.
2. The second session each week will be a live discussion session (not recorded).
Days and Times
As soon as we obtain enough interest in this class we will be in touch to work out a meeting time that works for the group. Thank you for keeping your March 2026 availability up to date!