UCL - English literature: in-depth study of a theme

[GERM2724]

[30h] 5 credits

This course is taught in the 1st semester.

This two-yearly course is taught in 2009-2010, 2011-2012,...

Teacher(s): Véronique Bragard

Language: English

Level: Second

Aims
Main themes
Content and teaching methods
Other information (prerequisite, evaluation (assessment methods), course materials recommended readings, ...)

Aims

Students will be expected to show their ability to relate the themes that have been selected to the historical and literary contexts explored in the course. They will have to produce an analysis that demonstrates their familiarity with the issues raised in the course, and with the poetics through which those issues are articulated.

The course is also indirectly meant to increase the students' lexical skills. Their analyses will therefore have to reflect a command of the English language that corresponds to their level (Masters), as well as a good grasp of the various cultural concepts discussed in the module.

Main themes

The course traces the evolution of a particular theme in twentieth-century English literature. Through analyses of works taken from various historical and aesthetic contexts, students explore what kind of role the chosen theme(s) play in the modern imagination. The course also includes the showing and discussion of adaptations for film and television.

Content and teaching methods

In the American imagination, the road embodies ideals of freedom and the fascination with adventure and survival. It is associated with the conquest of the West, social rebellion and the pursuit of the American Dream. This course examines the characteristics and development of the road trope via the analyses of several (excerpts from) novels (Jack London, Mark Twain, Jack Kerouac, among others), poems, songs and short stories (Sherman Alexie) written by American and postcolonial authors (Caryl Phillips). What do protagonists ultimately discover at the end of the road? How have contemporary fiction and film challenged the white male tradition of the road narrative? What is the road associated with in postcolonial contemporary fiction?

In the first part of the course we will focus on the road narrative as offering insights into national, historical and cultural American identity, which relies on dislocation and movement and oscillates between the vision of a New Jerusalem and an apocalyptic struggle with natural powers. More specifically, this course will start with earlier road narratives and culminate with an examination of McCarthys Pulitzer-prize winning novel The Road (2007) as a anti-road narrative in which the road has become, not a place of escape and freedom but an imprisoning body that is haunted by traumatic and apocalyptic visions of the future. The second part of the course will examine roads in a larger postcolonial, transnational context of migration and crossing of borders. As international migration increasingly becomes a global challenge, this second part will offer a comparative examination of several creative texts by postcolonial creative writers that convey and interrogate questions related to the experience of (im)migration: from the forced migration of slavery (Fred dAguiar) to recent stowaways (Caryl Phillips) and cross-cultural experiences.

Other information (prerequisite, evaluation (assessment methods), course materials recommended readings, ...)

Prerequisites : an introductory knowledge of English literature and a good proficiency in English (advanced level, B2 + in terms of the Common European reference framework).

Evaluation : Oral and/or written exam. When the course is organised as a seminar, active participation (oral presentation, discussions, term paper) is taken into account.

Teaching material : Secondary literature linked to the topics of the course. Reading of the selected literary works and of critical studies.