| Unit name | Writing the Atlantic World |
|---|---|
| Unit code | ENGL20059 |
| Credit points | 20 |
| Level of study | I/5 |
| Teaching block(s) |
Teaching Block 2 (weeks 13 - 24) |
| Unit director | Dr. Holberton |
| Open unit status | Not open |
| Pre-requisites |
None |
| Co-requisites |
None |
| School/department | Department of English |
| Faculty | Faculty of Arts |
This unit introduces students to the literary and cultural heritage of Britain’s Atlantic empire, 1590-1783. It looks at how diverse forms of writing became entangled with the exchanges of the Atlantic world, and with the development of Britain’s empire across that world. Students may read from a selection of novels, plays, and poetry which reflect on these developments, and also travel writing and colonial promotion tracts, captivity narratives, memoirs, diaries, a native American language phrasebook, illustrations and maps. We will consider these texts in the light of several debates about the forms and legacies of early modern empire and globalization, and in a range of historical and spatial perspectives, connecting them to colonial rivalries and developments in global trade, or reading them in the context of the ‘Black Atlantic’. We will discuss the construction of race, cultural difference and gender, and approaches drawn from postcolonial criticism and the history of material culture. Throughout, we will be asking not only how English literature contributed to the development of imperial ideology, but also how it acknowledged and probed the ways in which England was being transformed by empire and globalization.
On successful completion of this unit, students will be able to demonstrate:
(1) a detailed knowledge and understanding of Atlantic world literature over an extended period of time;
(2) a critical understanding of the historical and cultural contexts that influence this body of literature;
(3) the ability to analyse and evaluate differing critical perspectives onto the primary literature;
(4) the ability to identify and evaluate pertinent evidence in order to illustrate a cogent argument;
(5) strengthened skills in argumentation, academic writing, and evaluation of textual evidence from a variety of different genres, appropriate to level I/5.
1 x 2-hour seminar per week.
1 essay of 2000 words (40%)
1 essay of 3000 words (60%)
Both essays will assess ILOs 1-5.
Early American Writings, ed. by Carla Mulford and Angela Vietto (Oxford: OUP, 2002)
Aphra Behn, Oroonoko and Other Writings, ed. Paul Salzman (Oxford: OUP, 1994)
Kevin J. Hayes, The Oxford Handbook of Early American Literature (Oxford University Press, 2008)
The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano (online texts available)
Kate Chedgzoy. Women's Writing in the British Atlantic World: Memory, Place and History, 1550–1700 (Cambridge University Press, 2007)
Suvir Kaul, Eighteenth-Century British Literature and Postcolonial Studies (Edinburgh University Press, 2009)
