| Unit name | The Politics of Form in 20th and 21st-century Women's Writing |
|---|---|
| Unit code | ENGL30059 |
| Credit points | 20 |
| Level of study | H/6 |
| Teaching block(s) |
Teaching Block 1 (weeks 1 - 12) |
| Unit director | Dr. Matthews |
| Open unit status | Not open |
| Pre-requisites |
None |
| Co-requisites |
None |
| School/department | Department of English |
| Faculty | Faculty of Arts |
This unit explores the ways that 20th- and 21st-century women writers assert sexual subjectivity, critique war and nationalism, and represent radical political thought through experimental and revisionist forms. Using Susan Stanford Friedman’s notion of ‘cultural parataxis,’ we will read across nation, genre, and period, looking at works through a comparative lens. We will pay close attention to the political implications of formal structures and movements -- from the modernist long poem to the post-modern novel -- and to the political moments in which the texts were written -- the 20th-century wars, the women’s and civil rights movements, the cold war. We will also consider how literary reception, criticism, and publishing practices shape our access to and reading of modern women writers. Interrelated lines of inquiry include: women’s changing political, sexual, and cultural roles; how different genres have been inscribed with gender; and the political and literary implications of transgressing those boundaries.
On successful completion of this unit students will have (1) developed a detailed knowledge of the relationships between politics and aesthetics in 20th- and 21st-century writing by women; (2) developed a critical understanding of women’s writing and feminist literary analysis; (3) acquired an understanding of major critical approaches to feminist, transnational, and 20th-century literary studies; (4) demonstrated their ability to analyse and compare texts across genres and time periods; and (5) strengthened their skills in academic writing, argumentation, and evaluation of evidence from primary texts and critical literature.
1 x 2-hour seminar per week
One short essay of 2000 words (33.3%) and one long essay of 4000 words (66.7%). Both summative elements will assess (1) knowledge and understanding of the relationships between politics and form in 20th/21st-C writing by women; and (2) understanding of the cultural context of the creation and publication of the material, and critical approaches to it. The long essay will also involve (3) comparative analysis. Both essays will also test (4, 5, and 6) students’ ability to analyse and assess competing accounts of the primary texts; their ability to adduce pertinent textual material in support of their argument and their ability to present that argument lucidly and in accordance with academic conventions.
Gloria Anzaldúa, Borderlands/La Frontera: Towards the New Mestiza, 4th edn (San Francisco: Aunt Lute Books, 2012) H.D., Trilogy, ed. by Aliki Barnstone (Manchester: Carcanet, 1997) Myung Mi Kim, Commons (Berkeley: UC Press, 2002) Doris Lessing, The Golden Notebook (London: Fourth Estate, 2013) Audre Lorde, Zami: A New Spelling of My Name (Crossing Press Feminist Series, 1982) Alice Notley, The Descent of Alette (London: Penguin, 1996) Arundhati Roy, Walking with the Comrades (London: Penguin 2011)
