Timetable
Tuesday, 13-16 hr.
De Vrieshof 4, room 004a (Attention!)
Method of Instruction
Seminar
Description
This course provides an overview of the different approaches and theories in literary studies from Classical Antiquity until today. The subjects treated include classical poetics, hermeneutics, formalism, structuralism, empirical literary studies, psychoanalysis, semiotics, deconstruction, feminist literary studies, New Historicism and post-colonial literary studies
Course objectives
In this course students are made familiar with the most important theoretical approaches to literature, each of which embodies a different aproache to the literary object. In addition, students gain insight into the historical development of these different approaches and the ways in which they relate to one another. The reading material is entirely made up of texts written by the theorists themselves and comprises a number of classics. Students are encouraged to engage with these texts in a personal way, exploring their strengths and limitations by applying them to literary texts as well as film.
Required reading
Vincent Leitch (ed.). The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism. Oklahoma: University of Oklahoma, 2001.
Jamaica Kincaid. The Autobiography of My Mother. New York: Farrar, Straus, Giroux, 1996
Examination
Oral presentation, paper, active participation
Information
Dr. Madeleine Kasten
Or: Secretary’s office of Pallas, Institute for Art-Historical and Literary Studies, P.N. van Eyckhof 3, room 104a. Tel. +31 (0)71 527 2166. E-mail: pallas@hum.leidenuniv.nl
Students are requested to register at the Pallas office.