British Literature and its Contexts from the 18th century to the Present - MA Seminar 1

Master's seminars

The seminar is devoted to modern British literature, with particular emphasis on the ideas and historical contexts shaping subsequent historical and literary eras: the Enlightenment, Romanticism, the Victorian era, aestheticism and modernism, postmodernism. By discussing the history of British literature and culture in the broader context of the emergence of phenomena characteristic of broadly understood modernity (e.g. capitalism, colonialism, industrialization, globalization, social inequalities – including class and gender inequalities, emancipation movements, democracy), the seminar introduces students to the important role of British literature in the formation of influential ideas and currents of thought, and shows the possibility of reading a literary text when outlining a broader context of the political and social realities of a given period.

First semester.

The seminar is devoted to modern British literature, with particular emphasis on the ideas and historical contexts shaping subsequent historical and literary eras: the Enlightenment, Romanticism, the Victorian era, aestheticism and modernism, postmodernism. By discussing the history of British literature and culture in the broader context of the emergence of phenomena characteristic of broadly understood modernity (e.g. capitalism, colonialism, industrialization, globalization, social inequalities – including class and gender inequalities, emancipation movements, democratization), the seminar introduces students to the important role of British literature in the formation of influential ideas and currents of thought, and shows the possibility of reading a literary text when outlining a broader context of the political and social realities of a given period. The seminar encourages students to study British literature in the context of, inter alia: social change, relations of power and domination, social movements and visions of social justice, the history of colonialism and capitalism, relations between aesthetics and ideology, approaches to nature and technology. Applying tools of literary criticism as well as the interdisciplinary perspectives of critical theory and the critique of ideology the seminar will cover in particular the selected key aspects of the following thematic areas:

1) Social issues in eighteenth-century English satire;

2) The ideas of the Enlightenment and their revaluation in the Romantic period;

3) The English novel and its development: the picaresque novel, the sentimental novel, the novel of ideas, polyphony, satire and realism in the Victorian novel, the industrial novel, experiments in modernist and postmodernist prose;

4) City and urbanity in British literature;

5) Landscape, nature, travel and tourism;

6) Technology and literature: utopias and dystopias in British literature;

7) Power and violence in literature: subjectivity and society;

8) Gender and queer theories: body, biopolitics, social norms and sexuality;

9) Postcolonial theories and the history of British colonialism and imperialism;

10) Critique of ideology: critical theory, deconstruction and psychoanalysis in literary criticism and the analysis of literary discourse.

Dictionary of Literary Terms and Literary Theory. Ed. J. A. Cuddon. Penguin, 2014.

A Short History of English Literature. Liliana Sikorska. Wydawnictwo Poznańskie, 2007.

The Norton Anthology of English Literature. Abrams, Meyer Howard. New York, NY: Norton, 2000.

The Cambridge Companion to British Romanticism. Ed. Stuart Curran. Cambridge U Press, 2006.

A Concise Companion to the Victorian Novel. Ed. Francis O’Gorman. Blackwell Publishing, 2005

Modern Criticism and Theory. A Reader. Edited by David Lodge. Revised and expanded by Nigel Wood. Pearson Education, 2000.

Modern Literary Theory. Edited by Philip Rice and Patricia Waugh. London: Arnold, 2005.

The Foucault Reader. Edited by Paul Rabinow. Pantheon Books, 1984.

Eagleton, Terry. Literary Theory. An Introduction. Oxford: Blackwell, 1990.

Eagleton, Terry. The Ideology of the Aesthetic. Oxford: Blackwell, 1993.

Hawkes, David. Ideology. The New Critical Idiom. London and New York: Routledge, 2003.

Williams, Raymond. The Country and the City. New York: Oxford University Press, 1975.

Knowledge:

The student:

- knows the terminology applied in literary studies and cultural studies, in particular within the Anglophone context;

- has deeper understanding and awareness of the role of symbols in interpreting the texts of culture and cultural practices;

- becomes familiar with the major trends in contemporary literary and cultural studies and their impact on English studies;

Skills:

The student:

- is able to present the acquired knowledge in a clear and well-organized manner, both in speaking and writing;

- knows how to interpret, analyze, evaluate and synthesize the content and problems in their cultural, social, historical and economic dimensions;

- can appreciate the diversity of opinions included in the studied texts and materials as well as see the plurality of opinions in terms of opportunity and inspiration, not as a threat to his or her worldview;

In class discussions students acquire skills of expressing their thoughts in a clear, coherent, logical and precise manner, with the use of language which is correct grammatically, lexically and phonetically.

Social Competence:

The student:

- becomes aware of the importance of his or her knowledge in social and cultural context;

- recognizes the nature of problems, issues and conflicts and strives to find for them the most beneficial solutions;

- is willing and prepared to express his or her views in a coherent and clear way to ensure understanding and cooperation with other persons.