Universität Wien

123212 VO Literatures in English (2011W)

Race in English Literature 1600-1900

5.00 ECTS (2.00 SWS), SPL 12 - Anglistik
Moodle

Details

max. 186 participants
Language: English

Examination dates

Lecturers

Classes (iCal) - next class is marked with N

  • Friday 14.10. 15:00 - 17:00 Hörsaal B UniCampus Hof 2 2C-EG-02
  • Friday 21.10. 15:00 - 17:00 Hörsaal B UniCampus Hof 2 2C-EG-02
  • Friday 28.10. 15:00 - 17:00 Hörsaal B UniCampus Hof 2 2C-EG-02
  • Friday 04.11. 15:00 - 17:00 Hörsaal B UniCampus Hof 2 2C-EG-02
  • Friday 11.11. 15:00 - 17:00 Hörsaal B UniCampus Hof 2 2C-EG-02
  • Friday 18.11. 15:00 - 17:00 Hörsaal B UniCampus Hof 2 2C-EG-02
  • Friday 25.11. 15:00 - 17:00 Hörsaal B UniCampus Hof 2 2C-EG-02
  • Friday 02.12. 15:00 - 17:00 Hörsaal B UniCampus Hof 2 2C-EG-02
  • Friday 09.12. 15:00 - 17:00 Hörsaal B UniCampus Hof 2 2C-EG-02
  • Friday 16.12. 15:00 - 17:00 Hörsaal B UniCampus Hof 2 2C-EG-02
  • Friday 13.01. 15:00 - 17:00 Hörsaal B UniCampus Hof 2 2C-EG-02
  • Friday 20.01. 15:00 - 17:00 Hörsaal B UniCampus Hof 2 2C-EG-02

Information

Aims, contents and method of the course

Issues of race and racism in canonical texts have become of increasing interest in the scholarly community. It is both problematic and challenging to read Elizabethan, Restoration, 18th century and Victorian texts from a modern postcolonial perspective, because 16th and 17th century concepts of race differed widely from our modern understanding of the issue. The lecture will survey the development of racist ideas and their possible origin and will look at a variety of literary texts (plays, poem and fiction), from the time of Shakespeare to the end of the 19th century, in which Africans (or "moors") are described. We will investigate stereotypes of representation and the way in which writers both questioned and reinforced such clichés and participated in their culture's discourse about race and the '"other".

Assessment and permitted materials

Assessment will be on the basis of a written final test. Students are expected to study all the texts on the reading list.

Minimum requirements and assessment criteria

The course will survey changing attitudes to foreign ethnicities in texts from the 17th to the end of the 19th century. We will analyze some of the stereotypes of xenophobic discourse and the stylistic means by which prejudices were mediated by means of action and characters, but also how they could be questioned and re-interpreted.

Examination topics

lecture, e-learning platform for information

Reading list

Among the texts discussed will be W. Shakespeare: Othello, A. Behn: Oroonoko, H. Beecher-Stowe: Uncle Tom's Cabin, H. Rider-Haggard: King Solomon's Mines and J. Conrad: Heart of Darkness. These texts have been ordered at Facultas bookstore on campus. In addition, a short reader with brief excerpts from various texts will be compiled.

Association in the course directory

Studium: Diplom 343, UF 344, ME 812, MA 844;
Code/Modul: Diplom 321, 326/328, 336/338, 721-723, UF 4.2.4-321, ME1, MA1;
Lehrinhalt: 12-0115

Last modified: We 09.09.2020 00:22