Module Code - Title:
CU6051
-
LITERARY AND CULTURAL THEORY
Year Last Offered:
2023/4
Hours Per Week:
Grading Type:
Prerequisite Modules:
Rationale and Purpose of the Module:
This module is designed to prepare students taking the MA in Comparative Literature and Cultural studies, and the proposed new MA in English, for advanced criticism in literary and cultural studies, and to prepare them for PhD-level research. It provides an advanced survey of literary and cultural theories; students will be encouraged to compare and contrast the various modes and models of literary criticism and theory presented during the course, and to think about how different models might be applied in their own graduate work.
Syllabus:
This module provides an advanced survey of (primarily, though not exclusively) twentieth-century literary and cultural theories. The aim of this course is to give students a keener, holistic awareness of the ways in which all research and criticism can be theoretically inflected. We will study the epistemological possibilities and limitation of 'pure' empiricism, and will relate empiricist problematics to larger questions of perspective, method, context and ideology. Students will be required to discuss and research concepts in formalism, biographical and historicist empiricism, semiotics, Marxism, post-Marxism, psychoanalysis, structuralism, post-structuralism, deconstruction, feminism, cultural materialism, and new historicism.
Learning Outcomes:
Cognitive (Knowledge, Understanding, Application, Analysis, Evaluation, Synthesis)
Theoretical and epistemological issues involving the literary archive.
The theoretical relationships which exist between texts, and between text and context.
Key movements in literary theory.
Affective (Attitudes and Values)
How to produce theoretically nuanced readings of literary texts.
How to classify different theoretical positions and to apply them to research.
Ways to compare, contrast and combine different theoretical positions.
Psychomotor (Physical Skills)
N/A
How the Module will be Taught and what will be the Learning Experiences of the Students:
This module will be taught through a combination of lecture and seminar discussion of theoretical materials. Students will be encouraged to think about applicability of different theoretical positions to a variety of literary and cultural texts.
Research Findings Incorporated in to the Syllabus (If Relevant):
Prime Texts:
V. Leitch et al, eds (2001)
The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism
, New York: Norton
Other Relevant Texts:
Belsey, C. (1980)
Critical Practice
, London: Routledge
Lodge, D. and N. Wood, eds (2008)
Modern Criticism and Theory: A Reader. 3rd edn
, London: Longman.
Norris, C (1991)
Deconstruction: Theory and Practice
, London: Routledge
Programme(s) in which this Module is Offered:
Semester - Year to be First Offered:
Module Leader:
Michael.J.Griffin@ul.ie