Universität Wien
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130106 PS Social History of Literature (PS): Postcolonial Con-Texts. Writing Back to the Canon (2014S)

5.00 ECTS (2.00 SWS), SPL 13 - Europäische und Vergleichende Sprach- und Literaturwissenschaft
Continuous assessment of course work

Registration/Deregistration

Note: The time of your registration within the registration period has no effect on the allocation of places (no first come, first served).

Details

max. 30 participants
Language: English

Lecturers

Classes (iCal) - next class is marked with N

  • Tuesday 04.03. 12:30 - 14:00 Seminarraum 2 Sensengasse 3a 1.OG
  • Tuesday 11.03. 12:30 - 14:00 Seminarraum 2 Sensengasse 3a 1.OG
  • Tuesday 18.03. 12:30 - 14:00 Seminarraum 2 Sensengasse 3a 1.OG
  • Tuesday 25.03. 12:30 - 14:00 Seminarraum 2 Sensengasse 3a 1.OG
  • Tuesday 01.04. 12:30 - 14:00 Seminarraum 2 Sensengasse 3a 1.OG
  • Tuesday 08.04. 12:30 - 14:00 Seminarraum 2 Sensengasse 3a 1.OG
  • Tuesday 29.04. 12:30 - 14:00 Seminarraum 2 Sensengasse 3a 1.OG
  • Tuesday 06.05. 12:30 - 14:00 Seminarraum 2 Sensengasse 3a 1.OG
  • Tuesday 13.05. 12:30 - 14:00 Seminarraum 2 Sensengasse 3a 1.OG
  • Tuesday 20.05. 12:30 - 14:00 Seminarraum 2 Sensengasse 3a 1.OG
  • Tuesday 27.05. 12:30 - 14:00 Seminarraum 2 Sensengasse 3a 1.OG
  • Tuesday 03.06. 12:30 - 14:00 Seminarraum 2 Sensengasse 3a 1.OG
  • Tuesday 17.06. 12:30 - 14:00 Seminarraum 2 Sensengasse 3a 1.OG
  • Tuesday 24.06. 12:30 - 14:00 Seminarraum 2 Sensengasse 3a 1.OG

Information

Aims, contents and method of the course

The re-reading and re-writing of the English "classic" texts in the 20th century became a way for the formerly colonized to resist or challenge a Eurocentric vision of the world that represented colonized peoples and cultures as marginal, inferior and dependent on the European cultures. This "writing back", "counter-discourse" or "con-texts" contest the authority of the English canon as well as the whole discursive field within which these texts operated and continue to operate in the postcolonial world. It involves the abrogation of the imperial centre within the text and the active appropriation of the language and culture of that centre. Hence, dominated literatures are characterized by subversion, hybridity and syncreticity: the language and culture of the colonizer are appropriated and used against the colonizer as an instrument of subversion and resistance to assert the value of own culture and identity.
Over the last 20 years, the study of postcolonial rewritings of the English canon has attracted considerable attention. This course will focus on the most famous examples, attempting to survey some of the distinctive characteristics of such writing.

Assessment and permitted materials

Participation (20%), oral presentation (20%), argumentative essay, 10-12 pages (60%)

Minimum requirements and assessment criteria

- identify, analyse and understand key philosophical, historical, social and aesthetic issues of postcolonial literature
- analyse key postcolonial works in terms of their social, historical, philosophical, and aesthetic significance
- apply close reading skills to a variety of literary texts
- reflect critically on the relations between primary texts and relevant secondary texts
- discriminate between ideas and and justify personal positions
- produce well-structured, relevant arguments with an appropriate intellectual framework

Examination topics

Reading list

Primary literature:
Daniel Defoe, Robinson Crusoe (1719)
Charlotte Brönte, Jane Eyre (1847)
Joseph Conrad, Heart of Darkness (1899)
William Shakespeare, The Tempest (1610-1611)
J. M. Coetzee, Foe (1986)
Jean Rhys, Wide Sargasso Sea (1966)
Chinua Achebe, Things Fall Apart (1958)
Aimé Césaire, Une Tempête (1968)

Association in the course directory

BA M5

Last modified: Th 04.07.2024 00:13