English Literature
A.Y. 2019/2020
Learning objectives
The course, addressing a variety of programmes within the frame of the Faculty of Studi Umanistici, is meant to propose a specific learning pathway, connecting it to narratological, philosophical, cultural and historical competences, with a specific focus on contaminations and hybridisations between the Anglophone context and the Italian one within the wider European context. The course also aims at facilitating the access to texts in the original version through the occasional mediation of their translation in Italian.
Expected learning outcomes
Knowledge: Within the cultural and critical horizon of English Literature, openly referring to the chosen historical period focussed on each year, students will prove able to read and understand the chosen texts, locating them in their context. They are expected to frame the text with reference to its author (biography and works), its genre (analogies and divergences), its publishing context (culture and history). They are also required to be able to compare the given text with other texts belonging to the English and/or the international context.
Skills: Students are expected to understand a literary text in English (novel, poem or play) and to be able to identify its main thematic guidelines, though they are not required to translate it. Moreover the students are expected to develop the basic skills of textual analysis and show the ability to select and point out the texts' stylistic guidelines in terms of rhetorical choices and analogies/deviations in comparison with the genre they belong to.
Skills: Students are expected to understand a literary text in English (novel, poem or play) and to be able to identify its main thematic guidelines, though they are not required to translate it. Moreover the students are expected to develop the basic skills of textual analysis and show the ability to select and point out the texts' stylistic guidelines in terms of rhetorical choices and analogies/deviations in comparison with the genre they belong to.
Lesson period: First semester
Assessment methods: Esame
Assessment result: voto verbalizzato in trentesimi
Single course
This course cannot be attended as a single course. Please check our list of single courses to find the ones available for enrolment.
Course syllabus and organization
Single session
Responsible
Lesson period
First semester
Course syllabus
The course syllabus includes a first part that is basically institutional and aims at providing the students with an essential awareness of the historical, cultural and literary background framing the authors and texts that are approached in the following units.
Unit B is entirely focussed on Virginia Woolf (To the Lighthouse; A Room of One's Own, Orlando), while Unit C approaches authors that somehow follow in her path, inheriting her poetics, political stance and themes (Angela Carter, The Bloody Chamber; Margaret Atwood, The Handmaid's Tale; Jeanette Winterson, The Passion and Lighthousekeeping)
The critical apparatus is aimed at encouraging an analytic reading and close analysis of the selected texts, with a specific focus on interdisciplinary connections.
Unit B is entirely focussed on Virginia Woolf (To the Lighthouse; A Room of One's Own, Orlando), while Unit C approaches authors that somehow follow in her path, inheriting her poetics, political stance and themes (Angela Carter, The Bloody Chamber; Margaret Atwood, The Handmaid's Tale; Jeanette Winterson, The Passion and Lighthousekeeping)
The critical apparatus is aimed at encouraging an analytic reading and close analysis of the selected texts, with a specific focus on interdisciplinary connections.
Prerequisites for admission
Students are required to be able to read and understand literary texts in English and the critical essays included in the syllabus.
Teaching methods
Classes develop through lessons in the traditional lecture-format, trying - whenever possible - to encourage the students to participate mostly when analysing the texts. Guest speakers are invited in connections with the themes and topic of the course. The Ariel platform is very much used to share materials and upload slide presentations summarising the topics approached in classroom practice.
Teaching Resources
Unit A:
Marco Canani, Francesca Chiappini e Sara Sullam (ed.by), Introduzione allo studio della letteratura inglese, Roma, Carocci, 2017.
Nicoletta Vallorani (ed. by) Introduzione ai Cultural Studies. UK, USA e paesi anglofoni, Roma, Carocci, 2016
Gayatri Spivak, "Can The Subaltern Speak?" (1988 - https://archive.org/stream/CanTheSubalternSpeak/Can_the_subaltern_speak_djvu.txt)
Unit B:
Sara Sullam, Leggere Woolf, Roma, Carocci, 2019
Caroline Patey, Al faro. Circumnavigazioni, Mimesis 2016
Sara Sullam, "La performance del genere: Orlando di Virginia Woolf", in Scritture del corpo. Atti del XVIII Convegno Internazionale della MOD. 22-24 giugno 2016, a cura di Marina Paino e Maria Rizzarelli, ETS, Pisa, pp. 434-459
Laura Marcus, "Woolf's feminism and feminism's Woolf." In S. Sellers (Ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Virginia Woolf, pp. 142-179.
Unit C:
C.L. Burns, "Fantastic Language: Jeanette Winterson's recovery of the Postmodern Word"
Linda Hutcheon, A Theory of Adaptation (2006; excerpts)
Jean-Francois Lyotard, The Postmodern Condition: A Report on Knowledge (1984; excerpts)
Additional references (non-attending students)
Paolo Bertinetti, Breve storia della letteratura inglese (ad eccezione del capitolo I "La letteratura medievale")
S. Sellers (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Virginia Woolf, Cambridge University Press
L. Sage, Angela Carter (1994)
C.A. Howells, Margaret Atwood (1996)
Anna Pasolini, Bodies that Bleed. Metamorphosis in Angela Carter Fairy Tales (2016)
Marco Canani, Francesca Chiappini e Sara Sullam (ed.by), Introduzione allo studio della letteratura inglese, Roma, Carocci, 2017.
Nicoletta Vallorani (ed. by) Introduzione ai Cultural Studies. UK, USA e paesi anglofoni, Roma, Carocci, 2016
Gayatri Spivak, "Can The Subaltern Speak?" (1988 - https://archive.org/stream/CanTheSubalternSpeak/Can_the_subaltern_speak_djvu.txt)
Unit B:
Sara Sullam, Leggere Woolf, Roma, Carocci, 2019
Caroline Patey, Al faro. Circumnavigazioni, Mimesis 2016
Sara Sullam, "La performance del genere: Orlando di Virginia Woolf", in Scritture del corpo. Atti del XVIII Convegno Internazionale della MOD. 22-24 giugno 2016, a cura di Marina Paino e Maria Rizzarelli, ETS, Pisa, pp. 434-459
Laura Marcus, "Woolf's feminism and feminism's Woolf." In S. Sellers (Ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Virginia Woolf, pp. 142-179.
Unit C:
C.L. Burns, "Fantastic Language: Jeanette Winterson's recovery of the Postmodern Word"
Linda Hutcheon, A Theory of Adaptation (2006; excerpts)
Jean-Francois Lyotard, The Postmodern Condition: A Report on Knowledge (1984; excerpts)
Additional references (non-attending students)
Paolo Bertinetti, Breve storia della letteratura inglese (ad eccezione del capitolo I "La letteratura medievale")
S. Sellers (ed.), The Cambridge Companion to Virginia Woolf, Cambridge University Press
L. Sage, Angela Carter (1994)
C.A. Howells, Margaret Atwood (1996)
Anna Pasolini, Bodies that Bleed. Metamorphosis in Angela Carter Fairy Tales (2016)
Assessment methods and Criteria
The exam consists in an oral interview, traditionally graded on a 30/30 system. Students are required to take their texts with them when sitting for the exam
As to be graded, the students must:
Show a thorough knowledge of all the works included in the syllabus
Prove able to understand and comment texts in English
Prove able to frame each work and author in their respective context
Organize their knowledge within a critical frame
Prove able to answer to the question in good Italian. They can, if they want, be interviewed in English.
Attending students will be given the possibility to take two written midterms (Unit A and Unit C). If they pass them, their oral interviews will be focused on Unit B only. A mock-test will be uploaded on the Ariel platform in due time and the modes and modalities of the midterms will be explained in class. The evaluation of the written midterms - graded as A: excellent; B: good; C: sufficient; D: FAIL) - will be uploaded on the same platform. The final grade, after the oral interview, will be given according to the usual grading system (30/30).
As to be graded, the students must:
Show a thorough knowledge of all the works included in the syllabus
Prove able to understand and comment texts in English
Prove able to frame each work and author in their respective context
Organize their knowledge within a critical frame
Prove able to answer to the question in good Italian. They can, if they want, be interviewed in English.
Attending students will be given the possibility to take two written midterms (Unit A and Unit C). If they pass them, their oral interviews will be focused on Unit B only. A mock-test will be uploaded on the Ariel platform in due time and the modes and modalities of the midterms will be explained in class. The evaluation of the written midterms - graded as A: excellent; B: good; C: sufficient; D: FAIL) - will be uploaded on the same platform. The final grade, after the oral interview, will be given according to the usual grading system (30/30).
Unita' didattica A
L-LIN/10 - ENGLISH LITERATURE - University credits: 3
Lessons: 20 hours
Professor:
Vallorani Nicoletta
Shifts:
-
Professor:
Vallorani Nicoletta
Unita' didattica B
L-LIN/10 - ENGLISH LITERATURE - University credits: 3
Lessons: 20 hours
Professor:
Sullam Sara
Shifts:
-
Professor:
Sullam Sara
Unita' didattica C
L-LIN/10 - ENGLISH LITERATURE - University credits: 3
Lessons: 20 hours
Professor:
Sullam Sara
Shifts:
-
Professor:
Sullam SaraProfessor(s)