BTAN22002BA; BTAN22030MA
Introduction to Literature and Visual Culture
Autumn semester, 2015
Seminar, 2hrs, graded
2nd year BA;
MA in English Teacher Training
Tue 12.00-13.40, Rm 109
Instructor: Gula Marianna
Office: 108
Office hours:
Tue 14.00-15.00
Wed 13.00-14.00
E-mail address:
[email protected]
Course Description
The aim of the coure is to help students acquire the basic skills and terms needed for
analysing literary texts and visual images as well as to introduce students into some crucial
critical approaches to texts and images. Seminars will discuss key literary terms (narrative,
plot, point-of-view, character, setting, figures of speech), particular cultural phenomena
(literature, film, advertising, music video), and critical directions always on the basis of
analysing concrete texts or images.
Requirements:
1. In-class participation: the class format will be discussion, so students are expected to read
the assignment(s) for each class and contribute to the discussion.
2. Minor plot/terminology tests: short (written/oral) tests at the beginning of the class to check
whether students are familiar with the assigned texts and basic terminology.
NB! If a student does not show familiarity with the texts and basic terms assigned for a
particular class, despite the fact that (s)he is present, it will count as an absence.
3. In-class essay: an essay of 300-400 words written in class based on the material covered in
the first half of the semester.
4. End-term test: short essay questions to be answered in 5-6 sentences, based on all the
literary texts, advertisments, films, music videos discussed in class. The test must be written
at the time scheduled in the syllabus. Failing to do so or not achieving 50% of the total score
will count as course failure, and only one re-sit test will be scheduled to make up for the
failure.
NB! If you fail both the in-class essay and the end-term test, the grade is one as it is
possible to rewrite only one of these.
5. Class attendance: more than three absences will result in failing the entire course.
Grading:
The final grade for the course will consist in the following:
1. In-class participation 10%
2. Plot/terminology tests: 10%
3. In-class essay: 40%
4. End-term test: 40%
Schedule
1
15 Sept
2
22 Sept
3
29 Sept
Orientation: Viewing at class: Monty Python: “The Working Class
Playwright”
Literature and Culture
Read Judy Giles and Tim Middleton: “What is Culture?”
Reading fiction/Plot and Story & Introduction to gender criticism:
Read John Updike, A&P* (plot test)
4
6 Oct
5
13 Oct
6
20 Oct
7
8
9
27 Oct
3 Nov
10 Nov
10
17 Nov
11
24 Nov
12
1 Dec
13
14
8 Dec
15 Dec
Janice Galloway, “Blood” (plot test) &
Fiona Tolan, “Feminisms”
Terminology test: Elements of plot structure (Bényei Tamás lecture notes)
Reading fiction/Point of view and Irony & Introduction to psychoanalytical
criticism:
Read E. A. Poe, “The Tell-Tale Heart”* (plot test)
Flann O’Brien, “Two in One” * (plot test)
Gleanings from Sigmund Freud’s “The Uncanny”
Terminology test: Kinds of narrators and focalisers & Irony (Bényei Tamás
lecture notes)
Reading fiction/Setting and Characterisation & Introduction to postcolonial
criticism:
Read James Joyce, “Araby” * (plot test)
Kathrine Mansfield, “The Garden Party” *(plot test) &
Gleanings from the “Introduction” of Edward Said’s Orientalism
Terminology test: Setting & Character and Characterisation (Bényei Tamás
lecture notes)
Reading poetry/Figures of Speech & Introduction to the idea of the
rhetorical nature of being and knowledge:
Read Shakespeare sonnets (handout)
Watch The Art of Metaphor by Jane Hirshfield (available at
http://ed.ted.com/lessons/jane-hirshfield-the-art-of-the-metaphor) at home
Terminology test: Rhetoric, Tropes, Figures of Speech, except allegory and
symbol (Bényei Tamás lecture notes)
CONSULTATION WEEK (no class)
In-class essay
Reading films I: Symbolism in film: Analysing a short film from Ten Minutes
Older: The Trumpet (2002)
Watch Victor Erice: “Lifeline” at home &
Read “Glossary of Film Terms” from Karen Gocsik’s Writing about Film
Terminology test: Allegory and symbol (Bényei Tamás lecture notes)
Reading advertisements:
Read excerpts from Raymond Williams, “Advertising: The Magic System” &
from Judith Williamson, “Decoding Advertisements” &
Watch the following advertisements on YouTube at home: “Heist” (coca-cola
ad); “Surfer” (Guinness ad); “Chanel no 5” ads with Catherine Deneuve, Nicole
Kidman and Audrey Taotou; Sony Bravia ad “Bouncing Balls” & Tango’s
Sony Bravia spoof ad.
Reading music videos & Introduction to Postmodernism:
Anne Kaplan, “MTV: Advertising and Production”
Peter Wollen, “Ways of Thinking about Music Video (and Post-modernism)”
Watch on YouTube at home: Direstraits, “Money for Nothing”; Radiohead,
“Fake Plastic Trees” & “Street Spirit”; Eminem “Without Me”; Foo Fighters,
“Everlong”; Celine Dion, “A New Day has Come”; Gotye, “Somebody that I
Used to Know”
Reading films II:
Watch The Truman Show (Dir. Peter Weir 1998) at home
End term-test
Evaluation
The assigned readings marked with a * will be available in the collection “Kennedy, Fiction”
(ask Teri). The items not accompanied by an * will be uploaded on the institute homepage
(under the instructor’s name, current courses, “Introduction to Literature and Visual
Culture”). Victor Erice’s “Lifeline” and The Truman Show will be available from Rm101.