The course, being taught next spring by Professor Wendy Belcher, is offered through the Comparative Literature and African-American Studies departments. Its full title is "Model Memoirs: The Life Stories of International Fashion Models." And yes, there will be in-class visits:

Explores the life-writing of American, African, and Asian women in the fashion industry as a launching point for thinking about race, gender, and class. How do ethnicity and femininity intersect? How are authenticity and difference commodified? How do women construct identities through narrative and negotiate their relationships to their bodies, families, and nations? This course will include guest lectures by fashion editors and models; discussions of contemporary television programs, global fashion, and cultural studies; and student self-narratives about their relationships with cultural standards of beauty, whether vexed or not.

How much I would pay to be a fly on the wall the day the class asks Vogue's Candy Pratts Price how she commodifies authenticity and difference.

Far be it from windbag me to suggest that modeling is lacking in meat for young people's intellectual delectation. (Besides, it's my limited experience of these things that the professors behind the fluffiest-sounding courses team the material with theory from from only the most punishing and willfully obtuse of the French deconstructionists. Either that or my Advanced Topics In Popular Culture: "Breakin' II, Electric Boogaloo" course was just totally hard.) But I can't help but notice that Prof. Belcher hasn't yet fleshed out her reading list. It includes a mere three items: Alek Wek's memoir, Alek: From Sudanese Refugee to International Supermodel, Irina Pantaeva's Siberian Dream, and Jillian Shanebrook's Model: Life Behind the Makeup. Clearly this needs some work.

Given my (onetime) profession and my (eternal) predilection for reading, I have kind of a Thing for books written by models. Often, they're unintentionally hilarious — even before Naomi Campbell came out and admitted she had writer Caroline Upcher to thank for her novel Swan, did anyone actually believe she'd written it? Others can be strangely affecting: Susan Moncur's They Still Shoot Models My Age is awesomely written, if kind of insane. (Among other things, it taught me that notorious gaping asshole photographer David Bailey called his models "ratface.") Shoot is now out of print, but there's no reason the Comp Lit whippersnappers couldn't scour Amazon for second-hand copies. I'd put Crystal Renn's recently released memoir, Hungry — written with Marjorie Ingall — on the list, too. If Belcher is interested in models as women who are permitted, by virtue of their physical aspect, to move frictionlessly across cultures and classes, you could do worse than to consider the experience of a 14-year-old girl from small-town Mississippi thrust into the Manhattan fashion industry.

I have not read Cheryl Diamond's Model: A Memoir, but other sources have said it accurately portrays the realities of modeling. For something with pep and honesty and humor, assign Elyse Sewell's LiveJournal. And definitely make 'em read Waris Dirie's Desert Flower. If they can handle the genital mutilation.

If it were up to me, I'd have the students read all of the above, and then watch Sara Ziff and Ole Schell's documentary, Picture Me. And Frederick Wiseman's Model.

And then, we'd all eat cupcakes and never look at fashion magazines or catalogs or billboards or JC Penney's fliers the same way again.

Image via British Vogue

Princeton's Next Top Model (Class) [The Ink]
Course Details For Model Memoirs: The Life Stories of International Fashion Models [Princeton Registrar]

• Who will win the Council of Fashion Designers of America's Womenswear Designer of the Year award, the "Best Picture" of fashion? The nominees are: Marc Jacobs, Francisco Costa of Calvin Klein, and Lazaro Hernandez and Jack McCollough of Proenza Schouler (who tied last year with Oscar de la Renta.) Bets? [WWD, sub req'd]
  
• Oooh and Fran Lebowitz will emcee the awards themselves on June 2. [Fashion Week Daily]
  
• Ok, so now Waris Dirie is saying she was abducted and assaulted while she was missing in Brussels. And treated like "prostitute" by police. She originally said she was just, like, lost. Her manager says she was in shock. [Telegraph, Yahoo]
  
• And what is Erin Fetherston's latest short film about? "Zooey [Deschanel] plays a tramp who eats a magic mushroom and finds herself with a group of fairies." Of course she does. [Fashion Week Daily]
  
• Whoah is Posh going to guest-design for Roland Mouret? Whoah. [Fashionista]

• Model Erin O'Connor sprained her ankle! Why God created blogs: "The thought of not being able to wear teetering heels for a sustainable period fills me with dread! Think of a vicar without a dog collar...a bus driver without a bus??? Eek, you know elevation and a well-turned ankle are all essential requirements in this job. I suppose, to look on the bright side one doesn't need one's heels to write one's blog on the laptop." [Vogue UK]
• Another woman takes the reigns at a fashion design house: Hannah MacGibbon, 38, will debut her first collection as lead designer for Chloe this October in Paris. [WWD]
• ELLE's creative director Joe Zee is getting his own column in the ladymag, entitled "Style A to Zee." Ha ha ha how terribly clever! But yet, also familiar! Oh, right. [Fashion Week Daily]
• Victoria Beckham: Frowns on skinny jeans for men. [DNR]
• Helena Christensen is going to be "designing" for Tocca. And by that they mean she's going to "recreate" an old design of theirs and put her name on it. [WWD, sub req'd]
• What did Donna Karan give her daughter Gaby for her birthday? A bicycle! How...Donna Karan of her! [Fashion Week Daily]
• This month Madonna is styled as a boxer for the cover of the new, improved Interview magazine...and she's also styled as a boxer for the cover of Dazed & Confused. Huh. [Chic Report]
• Victoria's Secret latest beauty line seems to be aimed at teens. Um, as opposed to everything else they sell? [BellaSugar]
• Ksubi denim founder George Gorrow thinks the internet is "kind of a crock." Cosign. [Sassybella]

• Former Chanel model and activist Waris Dirie has gone missing; this is particularly concerning following the discovery of the body of fellow African model Katoucha Niane's body last week. Both models campaigned against female genital mutilation, a standard practice in many African countries (and elsewhere). Update: She's been found, thankfully alive. [CNN]
  
• "I would never put my health at risk. Obviously, working out is important. Well, I don't. What do you wear on the running machine? I can't bring myself to wear flat shoes." Why I love Victoria Beckham: No way is she not in on the joke. [WWD, 2nd item]
  
• And, says Posh's new bff, Project Runway Christian Siriano: "This was a really hard season to beat, and I'm kinda worried about next season, because I feel like it'll be compared to our season. I'm thinking they need to change it up, but I don't want them to change it for the better 'cause then I'll be jealous....The line I showed at fashion week, I don't know if it's for the Bluefly customer — I would rather have it at Bergdorf and Barneys...that is, unless Victoria [Beckham] buys the whole collection, which she very well might." [WWD, 3rd item]

• "I'm a stockholder, not just the face," says Catherine Zeta-Jones on her involvement with Elizabeth Arden. Defensive much? [WWD, sub req'd]
• Dolce & Gabbana has been fined for tax evasion. [WWD, 1st item]
• Also, Bryan Adams is playing an invite-only show for the label on Saturday. Why is Bryan Adams back? [WWD, 1st item]
• Oh, and Mr. Dolce and Mr. Gabbana are buying a monastery. Somehow, I suspect these three items are all connected in some sort of Da Vinci Code kinda way. [WWD, 1st item]
• Whoah we want some no-wedgie undies! [UPI]
• Is a Rem Koolhaas-designed Prada art gallery in the works? Eh, probs. [WWD, 3rd item]
• Jellies are back! [Chic Report]
• Vera Wang's Pam Beach home can be yours for $19 million. [WSJ]
• H&M has bought Cheap Monday denim. But we doubt Cheap Monday will be any cheaper now. [Sassybella]