LT204-5-FY-CO:
Criticism: Practice and Theory
2023/24
Literature, Film, and Theatre Studies
Colchester Campus
Full Year
Undergraduate: Level 5
Current
Thursday 05 October 2023
Friday 28 June 2024
30
09 May 2023
Requisites for this module
(none)
(none)
(none)
(none)
(none)
BA QT37 English and United States Literature (Including Year Abroad),
BA T720 English and United States Literature,
BA T723 English and United States Literature (Including Placement Year),
BA T728 English and United States Literature (Including Foundation Year),
BA Q300 English Literature,
BA Q303 English Literature (Including Placement Year),
BA Q320 English Literature (Including Foundation Year),
BA Q321 English Literature (Including Year Abroad),
BA PQ32 Film Studies and Literature (Including Year Abroad),
BA PQ38 Film Studies and Literature (Including Foundation Year),
BA QW26 Film Studies and Literature,
BA QW27 Film Studies and Literature (Including Placement Year),
MLITQ391 Literature,
BA LQ32 Literature and Sociology,
BA LQ33 Literature and Sociology (Including Placement Year),
BA LQ38 Literature and Sociology (Including Foundation Year),
BA QL23 Literature and Sociology (Including Year Abroad),
BA QW30 Literature and Creative Writing,
BA QW31 Literature and Creative Writing (Including Year Abroad),
BA QW33 Literature and Creative Writing (Including Placement Year),
BA QW38 Literature and Creative Writing (Including Foundation Year),
MLITQ393 Literature and Creative Writing,
BA Q210 English and Comparative Literature,
BA Q211 English and Comparative Literature (Including Year Abroad),
BA Q212 English and Comparative Literature (Including Placement Year),
BA Q218 English and Comparative Literature (Including Foundation Year),
BA P530 Journalism and Literature,
BA P531 Journalism and Literature (Including Placement Year),
BA P532 Journalism and Literature (Including Year Abroad)
The module is intended to familiarise students with how we think about and analyse artworks and human identity in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries.
Our primary texts on this module are not works of fiction by novelists, filmmakers or dramatists, but the writings of theorists and cultural thinkers. We examine how these thinkers have addressed the changing world we live in, and its impact on who we are and how we write, read, envisage, and imagine.
We explore how theories of class, gender, race, sexuality and the unconscious have altered not only our conceptions of identity, but also how we analyze texts and images. We ask how technology, migration, and environmental disaster have changed not only our representations in literature, film, or theatre, but also our ways of interpreting.
The aims of this module are:
1. To equip students with a broad array of conceptual tools which they can apply to their own critical and creative work
2. To introduce students to the thinkers and thinking behind such key concepts, showing the links between them
3. To provide students with the conceptual and analytical tools to explore how particular theories can help us to analyse artworks in novel and unexpected ways.
After successful completion of the module, students should be able to:
1. demonstrate a thorough knowledge and understanding of a wide variety of approaches to works of literature and art
2. critically evaluate and apply theoretical frameworks in practice
3. analyse and interpret artistic and cultural works.
No additional information available.
Anticipated teaching delivery: Weekly 1-hour lecture and 1-hour class
-
Malpas, S. and Wake, P. (2013) The Routledge companion to critical and cultural theory. Second edition. Abingdon: Routledge.
-
Poe, E.A. (1953) ‘The Purloined Letter’, in
The greatest American short stories: twenty classics of our heritage. New York: Webster Div., McGraw-Hill Book Co. Available at:
https://poestories.com/read/purloined.
-
-
-
-
Poe, E.A. (2000) ‘The Purloined Letter’, in
The Works of Edgar Allan Poe. Project Gutenberg. Available at:
https://www.gutenberg.org/files/2148/2148-h/2148-h.htm#chap2.1.
-
Rimmon-Kenan, S. (2002a) ‘Narration: Levels and Voices’, in
Narrative fiction: contemporary poetics. 2nd ed. London: Routledge, pp. 89–108. Available at:
https://doi-org.uniessexlib.idm.oclc.org/10.4324/9780203426111.
-
Barthes, R. (1968) ‘The Death of the Author’, in N. Badmington and J. Thomas (eds) The Routledge critical and cultural theory reader. Abingdon: Routledge.
-
Fish, S.E. (1980) ‘What Makes an Interpretation Acceptable?’, in Is there a text in this class?: The authority of interpretive communities. Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press.
-
Freud, S. (1953)
A Note on the Unconscious in Psycho-Analysis,
The Standard Edition of the Complete Psychological Works of Sigmund Freud. London: Hogarth Press. Available at:
https://pep-web-org.uniessexlib.idm.oclc.org/browse/document/SE.012.0255A.
-
Freud, S. (1976) ‘The Dream-Work’, in
The interpretation of dreams. Harmondsworth: Penguin Books. Available at:
https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&scope=site&db=nlebk&db=nlabk&AN=1154033.
-
-
Beauvoir, S. de (1997) The Second Sex. London: Vintage.
-
Cixous, H. (2009) ‘The Laugh of the Medusa’, in R.R. Warhol and D. Price Herndl (eds) Feminisms redux: an anthology of literary theory and criticism. New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press, pp. 416–431.
-
Reeser, T. (2010) ‘Theorizing Masculinity’, in Masculinities in theory: an introduction. Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell, pp. 17–54.
-
hooks, bell (2004) ‘Don’t make me hurt you: Black male violence’, in We real cool: Black men and masculinity. New York: Routledge, pp. 44–62.
The above list is indicative of the essential reading for the course.
The library makes provision for all reading list items, with digital provision where possible, and these resources are shared between students.
Further reading can be obtained from this module's
reading list.
Assessment items, weightings and deadlines
Coursework / exam |
Description |
Deadline |
Coursework weighting |
Coursework |
Online portfolio (Weekly submissions to Moodle) |
|
25% |
Coursework |
Essay 1 (2,000 words) |
|
35% |
Coursework |
Essay 2 (2,000 words) |
|
35% |
Practical |
Participation |
|
5% |
Exam |
Main exam: In-Person, Open Book, 120 minutes during Summer (Main Period)
|
Exam |
Reassessment Main exam: In-Person, Open Book, 120 minutes during September (Reassessment Period)
|
Exam format definitions
- Remote, open book: Your exam will take place remotely via an online learning platform. You may refer to any physical or electronic materials during the exam.
- In-person, open book: Your exam will take place on campus under invigilation. You may refer to any physical materials such as paper study notes or a textbook during the exam. Electronic devices may not be used in the exam.
- In-person, open book (restricted): The exam will take place on campus under invigilation. You may refer only to specific physical materials such as a named textbook during the exam. Permitted materials will be specified by your department. Electronic devices may not be used in the exam.
- In-person, closed book: The exam will take place on campus under invigilation. You may not refer to any physical materials or electronic devices during the exam. There may be times when a paper dictionary,
for example, may be permitted in an otherwise closed book exam. Any exceptions will be specified by your department.
Your department will provide further guidance before your exams.
Overall assessment
Reassessment
Module supervisor and teaching staff
Dr Christopher Bundock, email: christopher.bundock@essex.ac.uk.
Dr Chris Bundock (AU), Professor Susan Oliver (SP)
LiFTS General Office - email liftstt@essex.ac.uk.
Telephone 01206 872626
No
No
Yes
Dr Doug Haynes
University of Sussex
Reader in American Literature and Visual Culture
Available via Moodle
Of 58 hours, 55 (94.8%) hours available to students:
0 hours not recorded due to service coverage or fault;
3 hours not recorded due to opt-out by lecturer(s), module, or event type.
Disclaimer: The University makes every effort to ensure that this information on its Module Directory is accurate and up-to-date. Exceptionally it can
be necessary to make changes, for example to programmes, modules, facilities or fees. Examples of such reasons might include a change of law or regulatory requirements,
industrial action, lack of demand, departure of key personnel, change in government policy, or withdrawal/reduction of funding. Changes to modules may for example consist
of variations to the content and method of delivery or assessment of modules and other services, to discontinue modules and other services and to merge or combine modules.
The University will endeavour to keep such changes to a minimum, and will also keep students informed appropriately by updating our programme specifications and module directory.
The full Procedures, Rules and Regulations of the University governing how it operates are set out in the Charter, Statutes and Ordinances and in the University Regulations, Policy and Procedures.