Critical Approaches to Literature

Course Coordinator: Dr. Garfield Lau BA, MPhil (CUHK); PhD (HKBU)

Course Developers: Dr Jerry Czarnecki, Consultant (Units 1–5) and Dr Bobo Wong, Consultant (Units 6–10)

ENGL A337 Critical Approaches to Literature introduces students to the historical development and practical uses of literary theory. The course will provide you with a grasp of fundamental and recurring problems and concepts in Western literary theory, and with an ability to apply these concepts in the contemporary practice of criticism.

Aims
The course aims to help you understand the complex ways in which the Western tradition has attempted to understand the meaning and the purpose of literature, and to expose you to the various types of literary criticism as they are applied in contemporary academia.

Contents

• Introduction to critical literature theory
• Classical theory I: Plato and Aristotle
• Classical theory II: Horace and Longinus
• The Enlightenment and modern subjectivity: Burke and Kant
• Arguing about progress: Hegel, Rousseau, Marx and Nietzsche
• New Criticism and reader-response theory
• Structuralism, deconstruction and psychoanalytic criticism
• New Historicism and cultural criticism
• Feminist theory and postcolonial theory
• A summary of theories and looking to the future

Learning support
There will be regular two-hour tutorials and two day-schools.

Assessment
There are four assignments and a final examination. Students are required to submit assignments via the Online Learning Environment (OLE).

Equipment
You will need access to a computer with a broadband connection to the Internet.

Set book(s)
There is no set textbook for this course. Students are required to obtain and read all of the set texts studied in the course.