Vår 2013

ENG-3150 Literary Historical Studies: The Body in the Early Modern Imagination, 1600-1800 - 10 stp

The course is administrated by

Institutt for kultur og litteratur

Type of course

This course is intended for students in the master`s degree programme in literature, the master`s degree programme in language, and the master`s degree programme in language and social studies with integrated practical-educational training.

This course may be taken as a singular course by students who meet the admission requirements for the master`s degree programme in English language and/or the master`s degree programme in English literature. For more information, please contact the Student Advisor.

Course contents

This course explores the writing, visual expression, material and other cultural artefacts generated by Europes transforming intellectual and social environment between 1600 and 1800 in English Literature and Culture. It engages with issues such as humanism, sexuality and desire, the Wests engagement with Islam, new ideas of the body and the self, and popular culture. The course will focus on public and private images of the body and their relationship to changing concepts of identity in the personal and public life of period.

Objective of the course

Knowledge and understanding

Students will

- learn and become proficient in the primary and secondary texts assigned for the course.

- gain a comprehensive introduction to the Early Modern Period in literatures in English

- gain a theoretical understanding of how to analyze literature in various genres such as narrative fiction, drama, Utopian fantasy, and voyages of exploration from the Early Modern Period, 1600-1800

- gain knowledge of the development of genres such as the novel, Shakespearean drama, utopian fantasy and voyages of exploration as they take up the changing presentation of the human body in the period

Skills

Students will

- be able to use the theoretical and practical tools of cultural studies to analyze specific medial representations of the human body; or the body of the monarch and the State.

- be able to present and discuss the knowledge they have acquired both orally and in writing

- be able to explicate texts and develop strategies to analyze texts which focus on English Literature in both national and global settings during the period

- be able to write persuasively and effectively about the literature they have read.

Language of instruction

English.

Teaching methods

26 hours of teaching with seminars and lectures.

Assessment

Coursework requirements:

Two written assessments of texts on the reading list during the semester; One seminar and discussion of the draft of the final paper.

Assessment method:

A semester assignment (100%) of approximately 15-20 pages.