CANTERBURY CHRIST CHURCH UNIVERSITY
ERASMUS+ COURSE CATALOGUE
SCHOOL OF HUMANITIES - English Literature
The School of Humanities brings together several exciting and dynamic disciplines, each of which offers a rich and
thriving learning community in which students will develop their skills and talents.
Incoming Erasmus+ students can choose modules from Years 2 and 3. On the following pages, you will find a list of
what is available. Please note that, in some circumstances, some optional modules may not run. If you would like
further details, make a note of the module name and code and contact the School Coordinator of International, who
will be able to answer any questions you may have.
Selection criteria for selected modules may vary. If for instance you chose modules which contain practical elements,
you will be asked to provide evidence of your practical skills to date.
English Literature
English Literature at degree level is a subject that develops your communication skills and fosters independent critical
thinking. Anybody who likes to read, who feels curious about the questions that reading raises, and who values the
opportunity to share with others the discoveries to which such questions lead, will find that the subject brings benefits
and rewards extending far beyond graduation.
Level 5 (2nd Year) Modules
Eighteenth-Century Fiction: Bunyan to Smollett
The module sets out to examine, in an organised sequence which brings out the main lines of generic
development
and yet does justice to the variety within the genre, some of the most richly rewarding and critically challenging novels
published between the 1670s and the 1770s. Through analysis of the cultural climate within which it occurred, the
module seeks to account for the rise of the novel as a historical
phenomenon. Students will closely scrutinise sepa-
rate strands in the phenomenon—and various critical views about it—in order, eventually, to be able to draw all of
these coherently together.
Seventeenth-Century Literature and Society
Designed to extend the knowledge and develop the critical practices offered at Level 4, this Level 5 module aims to encourage students to analyse key writers of the seventeenth century in their historical and cultural contexts. Engaging
with key political events of the period, and including a broad range of literature from 1604-1680 the module investigates the ways in which writers of the period engaged with the key events and debates of the period.
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The Canterbury Tales
This module aims to introduce students to Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales in the contexts of the late-fourteenth century.
Students learn to read and closely analyse the Canterbury Tales in Middle English, and to understand the literary and
cultural contexts from which the individual tales emerged. The module teaches students to consider the tales as the
product of a Classical and medieval European literary tradition, with a due awareness of their relevance to contemporary issues concerning society, politics, and gender (amongst other themes).
Ways of Reading Shakespeare
Designed to develop the analytical skills initiated at Level 4, this module encourages students to engage critically with a
range of Shakespearean texts by way of developments in modern critical theory. Students are led towards the information and independence of mind necessary for them to form their own critical judgments about the texts studied.
Emphasis is placed upon the Shakespearean canon as a site for continuous critical argument and rethinking.
American Modernism 1880-1960
The main aim of the module is to develop critical understandings of Modernism - the artistic and literary responses to
Modernity in America in a period of enormous change. The module is interdisciplinary: artistic and literary expressions,
spanning nineteenth century Realism to experimental Modernism, will be examined in the context of historical, socioeconomic, cultural and intellectual developments. Works will be explored thematically, taking into account American
identity, race, gender, region, the city, the American Dream and nature. In addition, the module aims to develop students’ critical responses to formal and stylistic innovations so that they can “read” works of art and evaluate them using appropriate art historical vocabulary or literary theoretical approaches.
British Romanticism 1785-1831
The aims of the module are to introduce students to the literature of the Romantic period in Britain, providing insight
into the ideological, historical, cultural, thematic and formal aspects of Romantic writing. A broad range of Romantic
literary material is used to show the variety and development of the period. The module also aims to introduce students to the critical debate that surrounds the work of Romantic-period writers, and to some of the available critical
approaches to Romantic-period thought, writing and culture.
‘Classic’ Ethnic American Literatures
Students will develop critical understandings of the key ideas and debates, historical contexts and formal innovations of
Native American and African American and immigrant American literatures. Term one focuses on ‘Immigrant responses to assimilation’ and on African American literary responses to Reconstruction, urban migration and civil rights, while
term two concentrates on how Native American writers engage with the legacy of Removal and the realities of assimilation policies, as well as innovations and trends in seminal immigrant texts. Taking into consideration the different
literary and political responses to varied contexts, as well as diverse immigrant negotiations between old and new
homelands, students will also engage with theoretical considerations surrounding the works and their reception, in
addition to debates about identity, ‘belonging’ and cultural memory.
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CANTERBURY CHRIST CHURCH UNIVERSITY
Literature Between the Wars 1918-39
This module aims to examine literature between the two world wars with attention to cultural, political and literary
contexts. It will engage with key Modernist texts in light of the manifestos produced by their authors and explore the
impact of the rise of totalitarian regimes, political polarisation, economic upheaval and suburbanisation on the literature of the 1930s.
The Descent of English: From Old English to Standard English
The module aims to provide an intermediate/advanced education in the history of the English Language from Old English to Standard English. Students are equipped with intermediate/advanced skills in morphology, syntax and grammatical methodologies. Register types and academic writing are taught within a developing understanding of language
change and progress. The Great Vowel Shift; Standard English in Chaucer; early paratactic writing; sixteenth-century
extravagance; seventeenth-century utility; and eighteenth-century ‘ascertainment’ all feature as stages in the movement
towards a systematised grammar.
Victorian Literature: From the Brontës to the Nineties
The aims of the module are a) to lay before students who may have little or no prior experience of Victorian literature
enough of a very rich and crowded field to spark their immediate interest and, if possible, induce further exploration
afterwards; b) to plot a path through the period which will reasonably represent its variety while at the same time constituting a single progressively unfolding year-long experience; c) to ensure that students are given access to critical
strategies which will stand them in good stead wherever they go.
Level 6 (3rd Year) Modules
Lovers and Fighters in Medieval English Literature
This module explores medieval writing concerned with love and heroism in Middle English literature, and to a lesser
degree Old English literature (the latter in translation). Students will read some of the canonical works of medieval English literature, including those by Chaucer, Langland, Malory, and the Pearl-poet, as well as some written by anonymous Old English authors. The module discusses depictions of heroism, virtue, and love (of all kinds) in English literature over the course of the medieval period. Students will consider the social and cultural movements which influenced
these shifts, and consider differences between medieval and modern conceptions of the above. They will discuss the
relationship between medieval texts that present consciously literary depictions of ‘lovers and fighters’, and those
which aim to report the experiences of historical figures. The module will draw connections between the medieval English tradition of writing about love and heroism, and broader European medieval and Classical traditions.
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Satire 1693-1759
The module aims to introduce students to a range of rich and rewarding satirical texts by a selection of early eighteenth
-century authors very different one from another yet engaged in a common enterprise. From the appreciation of these,
it seeks to build towards an appropriately ‘joined-up’ understanding of satire in the specified period, as entwined with
every branch of literature and as embodying the spirit of the age. It sets out not only to broaden each participant’s
reading base but – through the study of texts which may conceal their true subjects, whose expression is essentially
ironic, and whose energies frequently work in a dissident direction – to develop new strategies for reading.
Topics in Renaissance Literature and Culture
The content of the module will vary according to the ‘topic’ selected for study. A likely example would focus on the
current critical interest in the materiality of renaissance book culture. The module, in this case, would focus on a meaningful range of texts and authors, both canonical and non-canonical, combining critical close reading with the study of
the media in which these works were produced, circulated and read. In this way this module would engage with issues
such as the interface between the cultures of print and manuscript, patronage and coterie writing, the ‘social writing’
practices of women and provincial writers. Key case studies might include Aemelia Lanyer’s Salve Deus Rex Judaeorum,
or William Lambarde’s A Perambulation of Kent, the writings of John Donne, Thomas Nashe, or of members of the
Sidney family and other similar works which encourage engagement with the processes of and contexts for authorship.
Topics in Shakespeare and Shakespeare’s Background
Designed to extend the knowledge and develop the critical practices offered at Levels 4 and 5, this Level 6 module aims
to encourage students to analyse Shakespearean texts in their historical and cultural contexts. It seeks to bring the cutting edge of current critical theory to the study of Shakespeare’s work and to the world in and for which Shakespeare
wrote.
Contemporary American Literature and Culture
In the influential 1938 essay entitled ‘The American Century’, Henry R. Luce famously argued that the U.S. had become
“the most powerful and the most vital nation in the world”. This module focuses on the creative output and the claim
to cultural dominance of the United States at the close of the American century and in the new millennium. Adopting
an interdisciplinary approach to its subject, the module places artistic and literary works within the socio-economical
and intellectual context of late twentieth-century and contemporary western world, investigating the interrelationship
between the rise of late capitalism, the advent of globalization and the internet age, and cultural production in the
U.S.A. The module also explores artistic responses to momentous events in recent American history (for example, the
Vietnam war, or the ‘war on terror’ in the aftermath of 9/11), and the ensuing, tentative revision of the country’s foundational myths, such as the narrative of Manifest Destiny.
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Creative Writing
The module sets out to introduce students to a sufficient repertoire of techniques for them to undertake a wide variety
of writing (fiction, poetry, journalism, biography and drama for stage and the media), and it seeks to guide them in
identifying the form/s and genre/s in which they can most easily and emphatically excel. Writing freely and creatively
with the knowledge of established conventions, but without unnecessary constraint, is taught in a framework which
promotes critical evaluation by students of their own writing and that of others. A planned context of literary study
seeks to guide students towards polished work and experimental writing in whatever field/s is/are attempted and encourage them to develop high standards of accuracy and script presentation.
New Voices in Ethnic American Literatures
This module explores the vibrancy and richness of late 20th century and contemporary North American literature produced by writers from a variety of ethnic backgrounds (Native American, African American, Hispanic American, etc.).
The study of individual minority cultures is accompanied by an in-depth analysis of theoretical issues arising from the
difficult definition of, and the (often subjective) identification with, any specific ethnic group. With its specific focus on
new voices, the module investigates whether contemporary ethnic American literature has become less about protest
and assimilation, and more about individual self-expression and postmodern playfulness, shedding the ‘burden of representation’ that is often the lot of the minority writer as a spokesperson for an entire cultural community. Students
will thus reflect on whether and/or how minority writing can reconcile its initial role as ‘literature of resistance’ with its
renewed claim, in a globalized world, for a wider readership and a greater, universal resonance.
Topics in British Romanticism
This module offers an exploration of a range of Romantic writers who have inspired and challenged generations of
readers. It provides the chance to investigate some of the links and tensions among various “Romantics”, and thereby
to scrutinise in detail some of the internal dynamics of what has sometimes been called “the Romantic Movement” and
to challenge the very notion of a single British “Romanticism”. An attention to literary form, socio-historical context,
and the philosophical ideas that underpin their writing will inform the module throughout, as will a range of critical
and theoretical positions respecting both authors and concerning Romanticism generally.
Topics in Contemporary Literature
This module seeks to study imaginative writing since the 1960s in relation to a key topic, through which students will
explore the creative and ideological aspects of literature. The intention is to pursue some challenging critical considerations, approaching contemporary writing through an engagement with wider political and philosophical questions
such as the issues of truth and representation, the textuality of the real and the reality of the text, the notion of the
performativity of language, and the ethics of storytelling.
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Topics in Victorian Literature
The module examines in depth a selected topic or topics in Victorian literature enabling students to develop advanced
and specialized knowledge of a specific aspect of the period’s literature. Facilitating analyses of critical and/or theoretical responses to individual texts and to the topic(s) as a whole, the module encourages scholarly debate and promotes
understanding of apposite historical, cultural, literary and critical contexts.
For general Erasmus+ mobility enquiries, please email [email protected]