New literatures in English (2015/2016)

Learning outcomes

The module aims at making the students familiar with the main themes and theoretical issues characterizing colonial and postcolonial literatures in English. This is done through an in-depth analysis of representative texts that are studied in their textual dynamics through a wide diachronic view but with a special care for their specific contexts.
The module will be taught in English.

Title:"The English Novel and the Postcolonial Différend"

The students will be involved in an in-depth analysis of the ways in which two highly reprentative novels of the English literary canon have been made into a territory of contestation and varied performance by postcolonial re-writings that have questioned and thrown light on their cultural and ideological assumptions.

Primary Bibliography:
-D. DEFOE, "Robinson Crusoe" (1719)
-J.M. COETZEE, "Foe" (1986)
-C. DICKENS, "Great Expectations" (1861)
-P. CAREY, "Jack Maggs" (1997)

Critical bibliography:
-H. Tiffin, “Postcolonial Literatures and Counter-Discourse”, Kunapipi, 9. 3 (1987), pp. 17-34.
-Ashcroft, Griffiths, Tiffin (eds.), "The Empire Writes Back. Theory and Practice in Post-colonial Literatures", Routledge, 1989: 1-13 (Introduction); ch. 2, 37-59( "Replacing language: textual strategies in post-colonial writing"); Ch.5, 181-194.
-R. Phillips, "The geography of Robinson Crusoe" in "Mapping Men and Empire: A Geography of Adventure" (1997), pp.29-35;
reperibile anche in P. Childs (ed.), "Postcolonial Theory and English Literature"1999.
-D. Head, "The maze of doubting: Foe", ch.6, in "J.M. Coetzee, 1997, pp.112-128.
-J. Thieme, “Turned upside down? Dickens’s Australia and Peter Carey’s Jack Maggs” (pp. 102-126) in J. Thieme (ed.), Postcolonial Con-texts. Writing Back to the Canon. Continuum, 2001
-E. Ho, “Peter Carey’s Jack Maggs and the Trauma of Convictism” (pp. 124-132), Antipodes, 17, n. 2, Dec. 2003

Non-attending students are expected to integrate the above bibliography with the following:
-E. Boehmer, "Colonial and Postcolonial Literature, 1995: chs.1,2,5.
- S.Gallagher VanZanten, "A Story of South Africa: J.M. Coetzee's Fiction in Context" (1991): ch.1 (History and the South African writer, 1-22), ch.2 (Writing in South Africa, 41-49), ch.7 (Writing for the Other: Foe, 166-192)
-A. Gaile (ed.), Fabulating Beauty. Perspectives on the Fiction of Peter Carey. Rodopi, 2005: “Introduction” (pp. xix-xxxv); A. Maack “Peter Carey’s Jack Maggs: An Aussie Story?” (pp. 229-244).
-L. E. Savu, “The Crooked Business” of Storytelling: Authorship and Cultural Revisionism in Peter Carey’s Jack Maggs”, ARIEL, vol. 36, n. 3-4 (2005), pp. 127-163 http://ariel.ucalgary.ca/ariel/index.php/ariel/article/view/334/331

General reference handbook (optional): Ashcroft, Griffith, Tiffin (eds.): "Key Concepts in Post-Colonial Studies", Routledge, 1998.

All the critical sources given above can be consulted at Frinzi Library. At the beginning of the course the students will be provided with detailed bibliographical information.

Assessment at the end of the course, through oral examination.

STUDENT MODULE EVALUATION - 2015/2016