Division of Humanities
Course Syllabus
Course Code:
HUMA 2200
Course Title:
Masterpieces of World Literature
Course Offered in:
Fall 2016
Course Instructor:
Dr. Heidi HUANG ([email protected] )
Teaching assistant:
Mr. YUE Huanyu ([email protected] )
Time:
Tuesday & Thursday 12:00 – 13:20
Venue:
1104
Course Description:
This course will introduce the basic concepts and approaches in world literature studies and
explore the production, translation, and circulation of representative pieces of world literature.
It will focus on the dialogues across diverse linguistic, cultural and national contexts and
encourage the students to develop emotional and activity-based relationship with the texts in
their reading.
Course Intended Learning Outcomes (ILOs):
Upon completion of this course, students are expected to be able to:
1
identify two or three fundamental concepts of world literature;
2
demonstrate working knowledge of two or three approaches of world literature
studies;
3
apply these approaches of world literature studies to the appreciation of
representative texts in a comparative context;
4
develop emotional and activity-based with texts as part of their reading;
5
argue, in a convincing and persuasive analysis, an original finding about an
assigned research topic not less than five pages in length.
Course outline (weekly meetings and readings)
Week
Dates and readings
Sept. 1st - Introduction: What is world literature?
1
Reading: Damrosch, What is World Literature? (excerpts)
Division of Humanities
Course Syllabus
Sept. 6th and 8th - Introduction (ctd.): various approaches in world literature studies
Holquist, Michael. Dialogism: Bakhtin and His World. London and New York:
2
Routledge, 1990. 13-37.
Huang Yu, “Constellating World Literature”
Unit One:
Transnational and translational exchanges
Sept. 13th & 15th
Lu Xun, “Diary of a Madman” (1918), trans. Julia Lovell
3
Supplementary materials: two English translations of “Kuangrenriji” by Gladys Yang
and William A. Lyell respectively
Sept. 20th & 22nd
4
5
Nikolai Gogol, “Diary of a Madman” (1835), trans. Claud Field
Sept. 27th & 29th
Edgar Allan Poe, “The Man of the Crowd” (1840)
Oct. 4th & 6th
Selected poems from Baudelaire, The Flowers of Evil (1857), trans. & ed. Marthiel and
6
Jackson Mathews. (“Benediction”, “To the Reader”, “Beauty”, & “A Carrion”,
http://fleursdumal.org/poem/126 )
Oct. 11th & 13th
Li Bai, Selected poems & Ezra Pound, Cathay (1915)( “Yujieyuan/玉階怨” & “The
7
Jewel Stair’s Grievance”； “Chang’ganxian/長干行” & “The River-Merchant's Wife: A
Letter”); Selected poems of Pound (“In a Station of Metro”, “A girl”)
Oct. 18th (Tuesday) - Experiential learning activity
8
Oct. 20th (Thursday) - Mid-term quiz
Unit Two: Cross-cultural and cross-media circulation
Oct. 25th & Oct. 27th
Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray (1891) (excerpts)
9
Supplementary material: (Self)-portraits in Western painting (Rembrandt, Van Gogh,
&Picasso)
Nov. 1st & 3rd
10
Virginia Woolf, Mrs. Dalloway (1925)(excerpts)
Supplementary material: The Hours (A film by Stephen Daldry, 2002)
Division of Humanities
Course Syllabus
Nov. 8th & 10th
11
Marcel Proust, Swann’s Way (1913), trans. Lydia Davis. (excerpts)
Supplementary material: Modern music of Debussy, “Prelude to the Afternoon of A
Faun”
Nov. 15th & 17th
12
Liu Yichang, “Intersection” (short story), trans. Nancy Li
Supplementary material: In the Mood for Love (A film by Wong Kar-wai, 2000)
Nov. 22nd & 24th
13
Group presentation of ELA outcome: – “Local intersections”
Nov. 29th (Tuesday)
14
Revision and conclusion: toward a world literary dialogism
Notes:
*This syllabus is subject to change based on the needs of the class.
*Subject to copyright restrictions, the course reading materials will be uploaded to the online
learning space and distributed to the students in class.
Planned Assessment Tasks:
Type of
CILOS to be
Assessment
Weighting
addressed
Participation
10%
1,2,3,4,5
Description of Assessment Tasks
Based on the student’s participation in
in-class activities such as discussion.
Group
10%
1,2,3
presentation
Students will make a short presentation
on assigned literary texts, in which they
analyse the work in terms of its
structure, style, function and
significance.
Experiential
10%
3,4
Each group of students will conduct a
Division of Humanities
Course Syllabus
Learning
trip to selected sites of cultural interests
Activity
and produce a multi-media video clip
that features the cross-cultural dialogues
in the local cultural space.
Mid-term quiz
30%
1,2,3,4,5
Answer TEN (2 points for each
question) questions about the facts,
information issues about the selected
literary works, and answer ONE short
essay question (10 points) that aims to
encourage students’ imaginative and
critical reading.
Final
examination
40%
1,2,3,4,5
Answer TWO essay questions (20 points
for each question) to test students’
knowledge of world literature studies,
and their ability to analyze the literary
texts.