123044 PS Literary Studies / Proseminar Literature (2020S)

This course will familiarize students with core-terms of poststructuralist theory such as: discursive practice/constructions and deconstruction in regard to historically-specific patriarchal and feminist discourses on femininity, gender, and the body of the 19th and 20th centuries. Considering aspects of theories by Beauvoir, Gilbert & Gubar, Foucault, Kristeva, Butler, Riot Grrrl Feminism., we will explore how these can be applied to an analysis of dialectical constructions of femininity produced by master-discourses of Romanticism and Victorianism; how this dialectics was challenged by 19th cent female literary & poetic imagination and significantly subverted in modernist and postmodernist deconstructions.
Special focus will be put on the meaning of the texts in the historical, cultural and social contexts of the respective literary period. This analysis will be embedded in a discussion of related stylistic devices and narrative strategies such as: dramatic monologue, metaficiton, intertextuality, rewriting, deconstruction. Literature will be read in context of responding to changing historical, social and cultural conditions wherein literary devices become discursive tools for critical comment and reflection.
Secondary & partly primary texts will be provided on MOODLE.
There will be Topic-Sheets for oral-presentation & weekly mails with info on reading-assignments and class-organization

CONCEPT FOR DISTANCE-TEACHING/LEARNING
for the period 11.3. – 3.4. 2020 of University closure due to Corona Virus
Concerns Classes: Unit 2 (19.3.) Unit 3 (26.3.) Unit 4 (2.3.)
Methods:
- Lecturer provides for background info PPTs with accompanying AUDIO-lectures.
- “Interactive” written reflections (300-500 words) for Units 2, 3 & 4 – topic-sheets for orientation on moodle
Lecturer responds to students & provides summary with explanations
- Alternative for oral presentations: PPT as usual but with presentation-notes (optional: audio-commenting)
A detailed info-file on this concept is available on Moodle.