EN1WKT-What Kind of Text is This?
Module Provider: English
Number of credits: 20 [10ECTS credits]
Level:
4
Terms in which taught: Autumn and Spring
Module Convenor: Mrs
PM
Hardman
Pre-requisites:
Co-requisites:
Modules excluded:
Module version for: 2009/0
Email: p.m.hardman@reading.ac.uk
Aims:
This module aims to promote an analytical approach to the concept of literary genre. It is designed to introduce students to a range of texts from the three basic formal categories already familiar to them (drama, poetry, prose), and to equip them to identify conventions and expectations proper to some of the genres they will meet in further study of English literature (e.g.: tragedy, comedy, the epic, the lyric, satire, the novel, the essay).
Assessable learning outcomes:
By the end of the module students will be expected to:
Additional outcomes:
Skills of oral communication and effective participation in group work will be encouraged, and students will develop their IT competence through the word-processing of assessed work and the use of relevant web resources.
Outline content:
The module explores the concept of literary genre through a range of texts drawn from The Norton Anthology of English Literature (Chaucer's Nun's Priest's Tale; Pope's Rape of the Lock; Swift's A Modest Proposal; Lanyer's 'Description of Cooke-ham' and Jonson's 'To Penshurst'; Beckett's Endgame), together with Shakespeare's Winter's Tale and Emily Bronte's Wuthering Heights. The selection of materials enables students to consider the resistance of literary practice to prescriptive theory, and to investigate the often complex ways in which genre and mode interact in constructing the meaning of texts. The nominated works are not taught in chronological order, but are grouped to encourage comparative study, to disrupt simple expectations about progression, and to emphasize generic links. Lectures will introduce appropriate aspects of genre criticism and theory in relation to the set texts, and students will encounter different and sometimes contesting critical approaches to individual texts and ideas of genre.
Brief description of teaching and learning methods:
Normally one lecture per week, with weekly seminars consisting of structured group discussion for which students will be expected to do preparatory reading.
Contact hours:
| Autumn | Spring | Summer | |
| Lectures | 10 | 10 | 1 |
| Tutorials/seminars | 10 | 10 | 1 |
| Practicals | |||
| Other contact (eg study visits) | |||
| Total hours | 20 | 20 | 2 |
| Number of essays or assignments | 1 | 1 | 1 |
| Other (eg major seminar paper) |
Assessment:
Coursework:
Students submit two pieces of non-assessed work - a short exercise in the Autumn term (1000 words) and an essay of up to 1500 words in the Spring term). They also submit a further essay of 1500 words for formal assessment in the Summer term.
Relative percentage of coursework : Assessed Essay 50%
Penalties for late submission:
Ten marks (out of 100 on the normal University conventional scale) will be deducted from a piece of work submitted up to one calendar week after the original deadlines ( or any formally agreed extension of that deadline). Once this period has elapsed a mark of zero will be recorded.
Examinations:
One two-hour examination paper, requiring two answers. The exam accounts for 50% of the total mark of the module.
Requirements for a pass:
A mark of at least 40% for the module
Reassessment arrangements:
Re-examination in September. Coursework will be carried forward if it bears a confirmed mark of 40% or more. Otherwise it must be resubmitted by 1 September.
Last updated: 7 December 2009