ENGLISH 337 - Studies in British Culture

Institution:

Reed College

Subject:

Description:

British Literature, Colonialism, and Slavery, 1680-1830 Full course for one semester. In this class we will read a series of texts that focus on the nature of national and imperial identity in an age of exploration, conquest, and colonization. Most of the works are British, along with some French, American, and Caribbean texts, and range from canonical texts by writers such as Daniel Defoe, Jonathan Swift, and Jane Austen to journals, letters, autobiographies, and poetry by less well-known authors from the social periphery or margins of empire. Through these readings we will explore two kinds of questions: First, in close readings of the varied forms of these texts (satire, fiction, the memoir and journal, and poetry) we will trace the impact of various literary genres on political arguments and vice versa. Second, we will investigate what national identity is, what it means to be an imperial power, and what the nature of the non-European "other" is in a literary culture fascinated by the possibilities of colonial domination and confronted with the fact of slavery. Associated topics such as the development of a culture of ethnographic and cultural tourism in this period will also be examined. There will also be substantial secondary reading in recent criticism and theory on the questions raised by the readings. Prerequisite: two English courses at the 200 level or above, or consent of the instructor. Conference. Not offered 2009-10. The Bloomsbury Group This course examines the works and cultural impact of the Bloomsbury set, one of the most important of all English cultural movements and one that had an enormous impact on British cultural and social thought in the first half of the 20th century. The course will stress the group's debt to the philosophies of G.E. Moore that emphasized the pleasures of human friendship and aesthetic appreciation, as well as its rejection of the restrictions of Victorian society. Primary attention will be given to the writings of Virginia Woolf, the preeminent figure of the group, but we will also look at the fiction of E.M. Forster and Leonard Woolf; the criticism of Clive Bell and John Maynard Keynes; the art of Roger Fry, Vanessa Bell, and Duncan Grant; and the biographical writings of Lytton Strachey. Prerequisite: two English courses at the 200 level or above, or consent of the instructor. Conference. Not offered 2009-10.

Credits:

3.00

Credit Hours:

Prerequisites:

Corequisites:

Exclusions:

Level:

Instructional Type:

Lecture

Notes:

Additional Information:

Historical Version(s):

Institution Website:

www.reed.edu

Phone Number:

(503) 771-1112

Regional Accreditation:

Northwest Commission on Colleges and Universities

Calendar System:

Semester

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