• Inactive for Year: 2024/25

• Module Leader(s): Dr Laura Kirkley

• Owning School: English Lit, Language & Linguistics
• Teaching Location: Newcastle City Campus

Semesters

Your programme is made up of credits, the total differs on programme to programme.

Aims

* To study a transnational range of prose texts written at key political moments during a short but turbulent period of history (c.1788-1825);

* To examine how feminist literature and representations of gender identity and women's sexuality developed during the Revolutionary and Romantic eras, particularly as they intersected with radical and reactionary politics and attitudes to nationhood, world citizenship and empire-building;

* To analyse how representations of gender identity and women's sexuality were shaped by different writers' responses to important political, cultural and literary phenomena. Depending on the set texts, these phenomena might include: the French Revolution and the Revolutionary Wars; the Napoleonic Wars and their aftermath; the Irish Rebellion of 1798; the Italian Risorgimento; the slave trade and the abolition campaign; the celebrity of the Chevalier d'Eon; the public reaction to revelations about Mary Wollstonecraft's private life; the transnational rise of the sentimental and Gothic novel.

* To develop students' ability to analyse texts from intersectional feminist, queer, and trans theoretical perspectives;

* To communicate critical responses orally and in writing, and to consider how content and register should vary to communicate effectively with different intended readerships.

Outline Of Syllabus

The syllabus focuses primarily on the novel genre, but also includes various forms of life-writing. Content may vary but will typically include a representative sample of the following key writers active in the Revolutionary and Romantic periods: J.H. Bernardin de Saint-Pierre; Mary Wollstonecraft; William Godwin; Mary Hays; Mary Robinson; Maria Edgeworth; Amelia Opie; Mary Anne Radcliffe; Mary Shelley.

Teaching Methods

Teaching Activities

Teaching Rationale And Relationship

The lecture materials introduce students to knowledge outcomes related to the module. They address themes in the set texts, encourage students to think comparatively, and provide introductions to relevant theoretical approaches to the course material.

Seminars develop this knowledge and enable students to practise key skills, namely close textual analysis, theoretical analysis, and interpersonal communication.

Study groups enable students to consolidate knowledge learned in the lectures, exchange ideas, and practise key skills in smaller groups before the seminar.

Independent study gives students the chance to develop their research skills and prepare for seminars in terms that give them genuine ownership over the material.

Assessment Methods

The format of resits will be determined by the Board of Examiners

Other Assessment

Formative Assessments

Formative Assessment is an assessment which develops your skills in being assessed, allows for you to receive feedback, and prepares you for being assessed. However, it does not count to your final mark.

Assessment Rationale And Relationship

The mid-module formative exercise will give students the opportunity to consolidate knowledge and skill outcomes relevant to their summative assessments. This will be an in-class presentation in study groups in which students apply insights from feminist / gender / queer / trans theory to analysing the representation of one character from a module text. Students will receive verbal feedback.

The summative assessments give students a choice between an academic or public-facing piece of writing and invite them to consider how voice and content should vary according to their intended readership. The low-stakes mid-module assessment will enable students to practise the skills they need to succeed in the high-stakes end-of-module assessment.

In the 800-word mid-module assessment, students can choose between 1) a literary critical analysis that uses close reading of a passage from a set text to establish an independent critical position in relation to two quotations from secondary sources or 2) a book review designed to convince a non-specialist audience to read one of the set texts. Option 1 practises skills relevant to the final summative essay and option 2 practices skills relevant to the final summative op-ed / book review.

In the final summative assessment, students can choose between 1) a 3200-word literary critical essay responding to keyword prompts or 2) a 3000-word op-ed article or extended book review accompanied by a 200-word commentary on the aims of the piece. Option 1 encourages independent thought by inviting students to develop their own essay question and thesis. Option 2 invites students to apply the theoretical insights learned on the module to reflect on the continuing relevance of at least one module text and to consider how best to communicate their ideas to a non-specialist audience. The 200-word commentary gives them the opportunity to explain the rationale for their approach.

Reading Lists

• SEL3445's Reading List

Timetable

• Timetable Website: www.ncl.ac.uk/timetable/
• SEL3445's Timetable