HISTORY OF ENGLISH CULTURE

The main objective of this course is to provide students with advanced knowledge in the fields of English-speaking literatures and cultures (critical theories and methodologies, textual analysis, and cultural-historical context). The course is part of the syllabus of EUROPEAN JOINT DEGREE IN ENGLISH AND AMERICAN STUDIES, and the competence achieved will be tested in the foreign universities where Joint Degree students spend a semester as part of the programme, in interaction with international students.

During this course, students will develop proficiency in nineteenth-century English literature and culture focusing in particular on the Gothic genre, while also acquiring competences in contemporary theoretical approaches to literary works including monster theory, queer and gender studies, and interdisciplinary studies. Students are encouraged to actively participate in classroom discussions in order to articulate and defend arguments, consider different viewpoints and textual interpretations, and evaluate evidence.
The analytic skills students have learnt to use in their BA course will be further developed to include knowledge of literary and cultural history, critical methodology, theory, and interdisciplinary studies. In addition, students will broaden their experience in autonomous work and in discussing the results of their own research.
The learning outcomes of the course are 1. development of knowledge and understanding of the literary texts and the historical period; 2. the skills to apply this knowledge and understanding to a variety of texts; 3. the ability to formulate judgements in analysing literary and cultural phenomena; 4. the development of advanced communication skills in English; 5. the development of learning skills

Students must be fluent in both written and spoken English. They will be required to read nineteenth-century texts, understand lectures, participate in classroom discussions, and take a final oral exam. Students are also expected to have a broad familiarity with 19th-century English literature and culture and their historical contexts.

Title: NINETEENTH-CENTURY MONSTERS: DUALITY, SEXUALITY, MADNESS

This course will investigate representations of monstrosity in 19th-century English literature and culture, focusing especially on Gothic novels and novellas. The 19th century saw the emergence of numerous literary monsters which reflected contemporaneous preoccupations with the theme of the ‘Other’. This Otherness was interpreted as something alien and abnormal to Western (and in particular English) culture, transgressing acceptable aesthetic, moral, and social norms, and was portrayed in literature as physically and/or psychologically monstrous. Exploring the various forms of Otherness in the 19th century, this course will begin with a discussion of the interplay between inner (moral/psychological) and outer monstrosity embodied by monsters such as (Victor) Frankenstein and (Dr Jekyll and) Mr Hyde, alongside the literary motif of duality and the double. The course will then analyse the role of gender, sexual, and racial Otherness in the characterisation of the female monstrosity of the Creole 'madwoman' Bertha Mason Rochester, described by some scholars as Jane Eyre's double, and of the lustful lesbian vampire Carmilla. These texts will be studied within the theoretical framework of monster theory and queer and gender studies.

The articles and volumes indicated below as 'primary sources' and 'context and criticism' are MANDATORY readings, including the critical introductions to the primary sources, and will be discussed during the final exam.

PRIMARY SOURCES (mandatory readings)
Mary Shelley, FRANKENSTEIN; OR, THE MODERN PROMETHEUS (edited with an introduction by M. K. Joseph, OUP, 2008)
Robert Louis Stevenson, STRANGE CASE OF DR JEKYLL AND MR HYDE (edited with an introduction by Roger Luckhurst, OUP, 2006, including the three appendices on contemporaneous psychology and personality disorders)
Charlotte Brontë, JANE EYRE (edited by Margaret Smith, with an introduction by Juliette Atkinson, OUP, 2019)
Sheridan Le Fanu, CARMILLA, in IN A GLASS DARKLY, edited with an introduction by Robert Tracy, OUP, 2008

CONTEXT AND CRITICISM (mandatory readings)
Please read, in addition to the introductions to the above primary sources:
Jeffrey Jerome Cohen, ‘Monster Culture (Seven Theses)’, in "Monster Theory: Reading Culture", edited by Jeffrey Jerome Cohen, University of Minnesota Press, 1996, pp. 3-25
Ruth Waterhouse, ‘Beowulf as Palimpsest’, in "Monster Theory: Reading Culture", edited by Jeffrey Jerome Cohen, University of Minnesota Press, 1996, pp. 26-31
Sandra M. Gilbert and Susan Gubar, ‘A Dialogue of Self and Soul: Plain Jane’s Progress’, in "The Madwoman in the Attic: The Woman Writer and the Nineteenth-Century Literary Imagination", Yale University Press, 2000 [1979], pp. 336-371

IMPORTANT: Students are advised to buy the above editions of the texts. In addition to the texts (primary sources, context and criticism) listed in this syllabus, students are required to download and study articles and slides that will be made available on Moodle. On some occasions, students will be required to download materials IN ADVANCE and bring them to class. Non-attending students are required to contact Dr Cabiati at least 2 months before the date of the exam in order to be assigned additional reading.

Oral exam at the end of the course. The final oral exam will cover all issues included in assigned reading, lectures, and texts downloaded from the Moodle Platform. In the oral exam students will have to show that they have become proficient in understanding and analysing the above Gothic novels and novellas, and relating literary texts to their historical and cultural contexts. In the first part of the exam, students will have to read and comment on certain passages of the above texts. In the second part of the exam, students will discuss issues covered in the course. Levels of linguistic knowledge and of the ability to communicate will also be assessed.

Front lectures and class discussions.

English

Class attendance is highly recommended. Students are warmly invited to read FRANKENSTEIN before the beginning of the course. Non-attending students are required to contact Dr Cabiati at least 2 months before the date of the exam in order to be assigned additional reading.

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