Module Sign-up Brochure 2021-22 - Newcastle University
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Module Sign-up Brochure 2021-22
Q306: English Literature
Stage 2 going into Stage 3
1. Do your research
Read through the information on the SELLL website carefully, and make sure to watch our online video which has
detailed instructions on how to choose your modules, and navigate this brochure.
2. Sign up Online: Tuesday 18th May, from 9am
Have the rules for your programme, from this brochure, with you when you log onto S3P:
https://s3p.ncl.ac.uk/login/index.aspx
Compulsory modules will already be selected and optional modules will be listed for you to choose.
The portal will close on 26th May at 8:00pm.
Further guidance and screenshots are available here:
http://www.ncl.ac.uk/students/progress/assets/documents/S3PHelp-screenshots-modules-
March20.pdf
FAQs
How do I take an outside module?
Modules not listed on your degree regulations will not appear in this brochure, and will not be available to you in
S3P. Instead you will need to select ‘HSS dummy module(s)’. Then you will need to fill in a module change form at
the beginning of Semester 1 to change from the dummy module to your chosen outside module.
How long will module selection take?
A few minutes.
What if I suffer technical problems?
Please don’t panic. You can call IT on 0191 208 5559 to log the issue. Alternatively you can email english@ncl.ac.uk
and we will try to assist you.
Will I get my first choice of modules?
Not necessarily. We recommend that you login and submit your choices as soon as possible. We’d also recommend
having back-up modules in mind, in case your first choices are full. This is why it’s important to read the module
descriptions and make your decisions before the portal opens.
I need further advice and guidance. Who should I ask?
If your question is in regards to a specific module, please contact the module leader listed in the module
descriptions, via email. If the module leader is to be confirmed (TBC), the head of subject is listed and will also be
able to answer your questions. If you don’t understand your programme regulations please contact your Degree
Programme Director (DPD): hannah.durkin@ncl.ac.uk. If, after reading the module descriptions, you’re struggling
to decide which modules to take you can contact your personal tutor via email.
I had arranged to have a semester abroad next year. What should I do?
If you haven’t done so already, please contact Ella Mershon (ella.mershon@newcastle.ac.uk) to discuss your
options.
What if I change my mind or make a mistake?
If your choices do not comply with your regulations, they will be rejected and we will contact you to choose all
your modules again – if you do not respond by the given deadline, modules will be chosen for you. If you change
your mind you will be given the opportunity to change your modules at a later date. Further information will be
released closer to the time.2
Rules of your Programme
You must have a total of 120 credits with either a 60/60, 50/70 or 70/50 credit split across
the semesters
Circle or highlight your choices, then add up your credits in the total column
Total
Rules Code Module Title Sem 1 Sem 2
Credits
Example SEL1234 Example 20 20
SEL3362 Dissertation in English Literature 40 20 20
SEL3364 Independent Essay I (English Literature)* 20 20
SEL3365 Independent Essay II (English Literature)* 20 20
Independent SEL3400 Prose Portfolio 40 20 20
Work SEL3401 Theatre Script Portfolio 40 20 20
Pick 1 SEL3402 Poetry Portfolio 40 20 20
SEL3403 Screenwriting Portfolio 40 20 20
SEL3405 Exhibiting Texts 40 20 20
SEL3417 Dissertation by Digital Edition 40 20 20
SEL3392 Between the Acts: English Theatre, 1660-1737 20 20
SEL3406 Making Ireland 20 20
Pre 1800 SEL3418 Stagecraft: sex, subversion and salvation 20 20
Literature SEL3419 Gender, Power, and Performance in Early Modern Culture 20 20
Pick 1, 2 or 3 SEL3420 Gothic Fiction 20 20
SEL3412 Writing Liberty in the Romantic Era 20 20
SEL3340 Romantic Poetry: Journeys of the Imagination 20 20
SEL3016 Orgasms, Odalisques, Onanism 20 20
SEL3347 Contemporary Documentary 20 20
SEL3378 Landscapes of American Modernism 20 20
SEL3386 Modernist Poetry: Pound to the Beats 20 20
SEL3388 Caribbean-US Cultures 20 20
Post 1800
SEL3395 The Victorian Novel: Time, Change and the Life Course 20 20
Literature
Pick 1, 2 or 3 SEL3404 High-toned, Middlebrow, and Lowdown 20 20
SEL3409 Planetary Imaginations 20 20
SEL3421 Contemporary Experimental Writing and Medicine 20 20
SEL3422 Reading Freud 20 20
SEL3011 Growing up Global 20 20
SEL3397 American Poetry Now 20 20
Optional Outside NCL3007 Career Development for Final Year Students 20 10 10
Modules HSS3110 Outside Dummy Module: 10 credits in semester 1* 10 10
Pick no more
HSS3210 Outside Dummy Module: 10 credits in semester 2* 10 10
than 20 credits
HSS3120 Outside Dummy Module: 20 credits in semester 1* 20 20
HSS3220 Outside Dummy Module: 20 credits in semester 2* 20 20
TOTAL
*requires DPD approval. You will also need to complete a module change form at the beginning of Semester 1 in
October 2021 to change your HSS code into your chosen outside module.3
Module Descriptions
Further details of each module can be found in the module catalogue:
https://www.ncl.ac.uk/module-catalogue/
SEL3362: Dissertation in English Literature
Module Leader: Dr Meiko O'Halloran
Semesters 1 & 2, 40 credits total
Pre-requisites: Students will have completed SEL2210 or SEL2218, or have permission from the module leader to
enrol on this module.
This module allows students to write at length on a self-directed topic in English Literature. Students will have
considerable choice in terms of how they decide to proceed and could choose to orientate their research towards
the analysis of written texts, or film or theatre, or indeed to shape a project that is interdisciplinary in character.
They will be asked to identify their likely area of interest at the end of their second year and be required to produce
a research plan in the first few weeks of semester 1 of their third year. In this process they will be supported by the
module leader and provided with a series of guided learning activities to support them in their initial planning. They
will be assigned a supervisor and be expected to work with that supervisor over the course of the dissertation
module. In regular meetings, they will discuss the overall design of their dissertation and have the opportunity to
receive feedback on a submitted plan and annotated bibliography at the mid-module point. Further guided learning
activities throughout the year will support student reflection on academic skills, independent research, approaches
to argument and scholarly presentation.
Component When Set % Comment
Written Exercise Mid 10 The semester 1 written assessment will
be a project plan of 500 words, plus an
annotated bibliography of at least 15
items
Dissertation End 90 A dissertation of between 8,000-10,000
words.
SEL3364/5: Independent Essay (English Literature)
Module Leader: Dr Meiko O'Halloran
Semester 1 or 2, 20 credits
Pre-requisites: Available to Q300: English Language & Literature students without request. Q306: English Literature
students must have permission from the Module Leader to enrol.
This module allows students to write an essay on a self-directed topic in English Literature. Students will have
considerable choice in terms of how they decide to proceed and could choose to orientate their research towards
the analysis of written texts, or film or theatre, or indeed to shape a project that is interdisciplinary in character.
They will be asked to identify their likely area of interest at the start of the semester. In this process they will be
supported by the module leader and provided with guided learning activities to support them in their initial
planning. They will then be assigned a supervisor and be expected to work with that supervisor over the remaining
months of the module. In regular meetings, they will discuss the overall design of their essay. There will be further
support in the form of guided learning activities relating to academic skills, independent research, approaches to
argument and scholarly presentation.
Component When Set % Comment
Written Exercise Mid 10 The mid-module will be assessed by a
250-word project plan and an annotated4
bibliography containing at least 10
items.
Essay End 90 4,500 word essay, plus or minus 10%
SEL3400: Prose Portfolio
Module Leader: Dr Lars Iyer
Semesters 1 & 2, 40 credits total
Pre-requisites: Students should have taken either SEL2224 or SEL2226 or SEL2227 or SEL2228 to be able to take
this module.
This module aims to prepare a portfolio of work which may consist of: a complete long story; or a collection of short
stories; or the opening chapters of a novel (plus a synopsis of 300-350 words).
Component When Set % Comment
Portfolio End 100 8500 words of creative prose PLUS
1500 word commentary
SEL3401: Theatre Script Portfolio
Module Leader: Dr Zoe Cooper
Semesters 1 & 2, 40 credits total
Pre-requisites: Students should have taken either SEL2224 or SEL2226 or SEL2227 or SEL2228 to be able to take
this module.
Over the course of one to one tutorials, small group work sessions and independent research and a final workshop
students will develop a self-contained play and self-reflective essay. In small group work sessions students will
explore playtexts, online theatre and live theatre (if available) and discuss this with other students in order to
develop their understanding of contemporary theatre and present their findings to the tutor. In the one to one and
small group work sessions they will reflect on drafts of their own creative work. In the final workshop they will listen
to each other's work and offer critical feedback alongside their peers and tutor. The largest portion of the syllabus is
taken up by independent research in which students will develop drafts of their plays and self-reflective essay.
Component When Set % Comment
Portfolio End 100 A self-contained one act play (4500-
5000 words) plus 1500 word self-
reflective essay.
SEL3402: Poetry Portfolio
Module Leader: Dr Tara Bergin
Semesters 1 & 2, 40 credits total
Pre-requisites: Students should have taken either SEL2224 or SEL2226 or SEL2227 or SEL2228 to be able to take
this module.
Students will gain an understanding of the process of selecting and planning an extended creative project, and
acquire an insight into the imaginative processes of writing at length and the affective power of language. They will
understand key technical aspects of poetic form and expand their knowledge of a range of contemporary poetry.
They will prepare and shape a portfolio of creative work consisting of a collection of about 20 poems or equivalent,
and an accompanying reflection on the processes, influences, and themes of the work.
Component When Set % Comment5
Portfolio End 100 20 poems PLUS 1500 word
commentary
SEL3403: Screenwriting Portfolio
Module Leader: Dr Tina Gharavi
Semesters 1 & 2, 40 credits total
Pre-requisites: Students should have taken either SEL2224 or SEL2226 or SEL2227 or SEL2228 to be able to take
this module.
The syllabus for SEL3403 is a focused portfolio module for Screenwriting, encompassing self-directed study and
supervision. It aims students:
1. To prepare a file of work which may consist of: approx. 20 pages of script for film or television
2. To show through the file a finally shaped work or body of work along with a self-reflexive commentary on the
processes, influences, and themes of the work.
Component When Set % Comment
Portfolio End 100 Approx. approx. 20 pages of screenplay
PLUS 1500 word commentary.
SEL3405: Exhibiting Texts
Module Leader: Dr Ruth Connolly
Semesters 1 & 2, 40 credits total
Pre-requisites: Students must have studied either SEL2210 or SEL2218 to enrol on this module. Pre-requisite may be
waived, under certain circumstances, on application to the DPD or DELT.
This module allows students to select a topic of their choice and to develop an online exhibition based on that topic.
Students may draw on text, image, sound files and film clips to develop their exhibition. Students will learn:
1. how to choose and develop a topic suitable for an exhibition.
2. how to compose a narrative appropriate for the audiences accessing an exhibition.
3. how to use web-publishing platforms to create an online exhibition.
Component When Set % Comment
Design / Creative End 85 Online Exhibition: 30-60 items with
Project accompanying word count of 3500-4500
words
Report End 15 Project outline including research
bibliography -1000-1500 words
SEL3417: Dissertation by Digital Edition
Module Leader: Dr James Cummings
Semesters 1 & 2, 40 credits total
No Pre-requisites
This module gives students the opportunity to work with the Special Collections archive and to produce their own
scholarly digital edition. In undertaking a digital edition students will learn:
1. how to work with archival primary sources
2. how to transcribe, edit, markup, and publish an edition
3. how to convey their editorial process to readers6
Component When Set % Comment
Research Proposal End of Formative Edition plan including choice of text,
Semester 1 summary of editorial work to be
undertaken, and an annotated research
bibliography
Essay End 50 Editorial introduction to the digital
edition
Written Exercise End 50 Scholarly Digital Edition
SEL3392: Between the Acts – English Theatre, 1660-1737
Module Leader: Dr James Harriman-Smith
Semester 1, 20 credits
Pre-requisites: There are no pre-requisites for this module, although any theatre studies or eighteenth-century culture
modules would be good preparation for it.
This is a pre-1800 Literature module.
Eight decades fundamentally reshaped English theatre: the first professional actresses performed, the first
celebrities emerged, Shakespeare became a national icon, government censorship took on modern forms, and plays
began to be published in scholarly editions. This module will introduce you to the period 1660 to 1737, with a focus
not only on the wide variety on drama produced at this time (everything from tragedies and comedies to burlesques
and pantomimes), but also on the people who made such drama possible. As you acquire a familiarity with this little-
known period, you will have the chance to introduce others to it by contributing to a collection of online
introductions to plays by seventeenth-century women: these introductions will both compensate for a bias towards
male authors in the modern study of this period and offer an opportunity of learning how to share scholarship in an
accessible format with a wide audience.
Component When Set % Comment
Essay End 65 A keyword-based essay of 2 500 words.
Portfolio Mid 35 Assessed website: see rationale for
details.
Written Exercise Mid Formative The composition of a webpage on a set
topic (for example, a plot summary of
group’s play)
SEL3406: Making Ireland: Kingdom, Colony and Nation in Text and Performance
Module Leader: Dr Ruth Connolly
Semester 2, 20 credits
No Pre-requisites
This is a pre-1800 Literature module.
This module asks students to analyse the representation of Ireland in the Irish and British literary traditions. The
module focuses on the early modern period as the point of origin for modern imaginings of Ireland in the English
language. We look at the presence of Ireland and Irishness in works from writers such as Shakespeare, Spenser or
Swift but we also look at other kinds of writing including the 1641 Depositions and memoirs and poetry from writers
such as Laetitia Pilkington and Peg Plunkett. The later part of the module will draw on work from all the communities
on the island of Ireland, from a range of literary and non-literary genres including drama, poetry, prose, folklore and
ballads and will explore the enduring influence of issues of nation, language and identity for Irish writing. Material
for this part of the course will be drawn from writers such as Seamus Heaney and Eavan Boland, Brian Friel, Norah
Hoult, Elizabeth Bowen and John McGahern and film-makers such as Tomm Moore.7
Component When Set % Comment
Portfolio End 85 Students choose to do one of the four
options available. All options are equally
weighted.
Report Mid 15 An outline of the portfolio - 500-750
words - for feedback before moving to
write up the final piece.
SEL3418: Stagecraft
Module Leader: Dr Kate De Rycker
Semester 2, 20 credits
No Pre-requisites
This is a pre-1800 Literature module.
Themes explored in this module:
Performance (audiences, actors, staging, metadrama)
Material culture (props, special effects, costumes, cosmetics)
Dramatic representation (race, sexuality, gender, class)
Politics and religion (containment v. subversion)
This module takes a creative, imaginative, and practical approach to pre-1700 drama. Our focus on ‘stagecraft’
means that we will be workshopping scenes from late medieval and Renaissance plays to see how they actually
worked under the conditions for which they were written. We will explore how you can conjure up a devil onstage,
what makes effective stage blood, and consider what it was like to see female audience members hijack a
performance. Early drama was also a subversive medium of entertainment, and so we will be exploring the wider
social and political ramifications of these plays: if an actor can perform royalty simply by putting on a crown, then
what really is the difference between a stage-king and a real one? How can you get away with speaking blasphemy
and profanity onstage? We will also be engaging with topics that are controversial today, such as how and whether
plays that originally included antisemitic characters or the use of blackface can be studied and performed today. Is it
ever possible to truly modernise old plays for performance? How can we draw out the contemporary relevance of
centuries-old drama?
Component When Set % Comment
Portfolio End 100 Portfolio consisting of essay or creative
project+rationale, written exercise and
curated set of blog posts. 4000 words
+/- 10%
Research Proposal End Formative Essay/Project Plan
SEL3419: Gender, Power, and Performance in Early Modern Culture
Module Leader: Dr Emma Whipday
Semester 2, 20 credits
No Pre-requisites
This is a pre-1800 Literature module.
This module explores performances of gender and power on the early modern stage and page. On this drama-
centred module, we will explore how gender and power are represented and negotiated across a range of
performance spaces, from theatres to country houses, and across a range of genres, from comedy and tragedy to
closet drama and voyage drama. In so doing, we will trace how gender and power intersect with race, class, and8
sexuality in early modern culture, and seek to recover perspectives and voices from those in marginalised positions.
Our approach will be informed by the lively critical conversations about these issues being conducted in current
research.
Component When Set % Comment
Essay End 75 3000-word essay
Portfolio Mid 25 1000-word minimum participation
portfolio
SEL3420: Gothic Fiction
Module Leader: Dr Leanne Stokoe
Semester 1, 20 credits
No Pre-requisites
This is a pre-1800 Literature module.
The aim of this module is to analyse how Ann Radcliffe’s concept of the ‘explained supernatural’, and its debt to
Edmund Burke’s philosophy of the sublime, shaped the evolution of Gothic fiction between the late eighteenth and
late nineteenth centuries. Students will develop knowledge of a range of canonical and non-canonical texts,
including examples of literature written by authors whose Gothic influences are less well-known. We will focus
particularly on the process through which Burke and Radcliffe's theory of ‘terror’ illuminates contemporary anxieties
surrounding gender, class, race and nationhood, and examine how these fears were transformed throughout the
eighteenth-century, Romantic and Victorian eras.
Students will gain a thorough knowledge of the historical and cultural contexts which inspired the rise of Gothic
fiction. They will also combine this knowledge with some contemporary philosophies of the human mind, in order to
interpret the supernatural entities of the Gothic as manifestations of tyranny, repressed desire, and fear of ‘the
Other’. We will connect these historical and cultural changes with formal and generic developments in the literature
of the period, paying particular attention to the way that Victorian writers re-imagined Gothic tropes such as the
natural landscape, anti-hero, and angel/whore dichotomy for a new age. The module will culminate by questioning
the extent to which the sublime and ‘explained supernatural’ not only uncover cultural anxieties, but also promote
education, reform and the toleration of difference as their most powerful remedy.
Component When Set % Comment
Essay End 85 3500 word essay
Written Exercise End 15 500 word reflective piece on learning
and participation
Portfolio Mid Formative 1000 word research plan and annotated
bibliography for final essay preparation
SEL3412: Writing Liberty
Module Leader: Professor Michael Rossington
Semester 1, 20 credits
No Pre-requisites
This is a pre-1800 Literature module.
The principal focus of the module is likely be on the writings of two pairs of writers of different generations who
were strongly engaged with one another's work as well as with liberty in Britain, continental Europe and elsewhere:
William Wordsworth & Dorothy Wordsworth and Percy Shelley & Mary Shelley. Other writers with a global
perspective such as Mary Wollstonecraft, Lord Byron and Mary Prince will also feature. The module is committed to9
giving due attention to writing by women. Genres to be explored will include poetry, prose fiction and prose non-
fiction (e.g. travel writing, letters, journals, autobiographical writing).
Attention will be given to the manuscripts and early editions of some of the texts we study through digital resources
such as ‘The Shelley-Godwin Archive’ and ‘Romanticism: Life, Literature, Landscape’. Access to Newcastle University
Library's Special Collections and the Jerwood Centre Reading Room at Dove Cottage, if the public health situation
permits, will enable students to see the material objects (manuscripts and rare books) in their original form.
Component When Set % Comment
Essay End 85 Final Essay (2,500 words)
Reflective Log End 15 Reflection on participation and
engagement with module (300 words)
Formative Essay Mid Formative Critical commentary (1200 words)
SEL3340: Romantic Poetry – Journeys of the Imagination
Module Leader: Dr Meiko O'Halloran
Semester 1, 20 credits
No Pre-requisites
This is a pre-1800 Literature module.
In poetry of the British Romantic period (c. 1789-1832), other worlds often serve as symbolic sites of self-
interrogation and conflict. This module explores some of the ways in which several major Romantic poets use
journeys of the imagination – and imagined places – to address their individual and societal preoccupations. How do
these Romantic poets explore private and public concerns about the role of the poet, freedom and constraint,
power, pioneering, utopia, the importance of nature or place, and the creative faculty of the imagination? How and
why do they choose to focus on issues of love, death or suffering, family relationships, the politics of early
nineteenth-century Britain, or changing ideas about religious faith in their poetry? And how do they respond to their
poetic forefathers?
Primary texts may include Coleridge’s 'The Rime of the Ancient Mariner' (1798 and 1817), Shelley's 'Queen Mab'
(1813) and 'A Defence of Poetry (composed 1821), Hogg's 'The Pilgrims of the Sun' (1815), Keats’s 'Hyperion' (1818)
and 'The Fall of Hyperion' (1819), and Byron’s poetic drama, 'Cain, A Mystery' (1821). Throughout the module, we
will consider Romantic poets' imagined journeys and uses of other worlds in response to the work of 'high' literary
ancestors such as Dante and Milton as well as popular eighteenth-century ballads of supernatural abduction or
visitation.
Component When Set % Comment
Essay End 85 Students write an essay of 3500 words.
Professional Skills End 15 Participation in seminar and study group
Assessment discussions.
Formative Essay Mid Formative A short mid-semester practice essay
SEL3016: Orgasms, Onanism, Odalisques: Desire and the Body at the fin-de-siècle
Module Leader: Dr Stacy Gillis
Semester 1, 20 credits
Pre-requisites: Students must have studied both SEL1003 and SEL1004, or have the permission of the module leader
to enrol on this module.
This is a post-1800 Literature module.10
This module introduces students to how sexual desire was understood in the U.K. at the turn of the century (1890-
1930). We will consider the rise of popular interest in psychoanalysis, the emergence of sexology as a discipline,
fears about degeneration, and the stylistic figurations that spoke (both literally and figuratively) to the frissons of
desire. How was sexual desire constructed, controlled and codified at the fin-de-siècle? The module introduces and
investigates theories of sexology, anthropology and psychoanalysis to read such authors as Elinor Glyn, Bram Stoker,
E.M Hull, and/or Georgette Heyer and/or texts such as *The Yellow Book* and the newspaper reports of the Oscar
Wilde trial. By the end of the module, students will have a sophisticated understanding of how desire was
understood and signified at the fin de siècle. This module is assessed by a study group chapter and a portfolio
(consisting of a portfolio outline and one of the following: online exhibition; blogposts; podcasts; creative
submission; essay).
Component When Set % Comment
Portfolio End 80 Two parts: 1) portfolio outline and 2)
one of the following: online exhibition;
blogposts; podcasts; creative work;
essay).
Written Exercise Mid 20 Study Group Chapter (approx 800
words)
Computer Mid Formative N/A
Assessment
SEL3347: Contemporary Documentary: Theory and Practice
Module Leader: Dr Tina Gharavi
Semester 2, 20 credits
No Pre-requisites
This is a post-1800 Literature module.
Through lectures, screenings, technical workshops, production practice and a short series of visiting lecturers,
students will have the experience of studying documentary as a genre and becoming aware of its various strands.
Students will give presentations on a range of filmmakers whose work will be introduced through the course of the
semester, they will analyse methodologies including codes and conventions and be able to make some practical
experiments with the medium.
Students will be required to give oral presentations, create a short documentary, and write an essay on an aspect of
contemporary documentary practice or, alternatively, will be able to make a proposal to create one of a select
number of final projects which can be practice based.
All practice-based final submissions (in lieu of a formal essay) will also have a written element in which students are
expected to reflect on their experience of practice, self-analyse their completed production and place their work in a
historical and contemporary context.
Not all students may be allowed automatically to follow the practice-based option. There may be a selection process
for this according to the quality of applications and the availability of resources.
Component When Set % Comment
Essay End 80 Essay (of 2500 words) or Documentary
Practice Film (plus 2000 word reflective
commentary)
Oral Exam Mid 20 10 minute in class/on-line oral
presentation11
SEL3378: Landscapes of American Modernism
Module Leader: Dr Fionnghuala Sweeney
Semester 2, 20 credits
Pre-requisites: Students must have studied both SEL1003 and SEL1004, or have the permission of the module leader
to enrol on this module.
This is a post-1800 Literature module.
What is modernity? Where does it happen? Who experiences it and what are the aesthetics of its expression? This
module explores a range of American literary responses to what it meant to be ‘modern’ in the early 20th century.
We will be looking at American modernist writers’ attitudes to contemporary politics, to history, Europe and the
regional landscapes of the United States. There will be a dual emphasis on form and theme in this module, which
aims to develop a vocabulary for critical analysis of both in the works studied. We will therefore consider the ways in
which the asymmetries of modernity are expressed through focused reading of writers including Larsen, Faulkner,
Fitzgerald, Cather, Hurston and Steinbeck. We will explore the ‘newness’ of much of the work that emerged in the
period, its interest in experimentation, its narrative concerns, its expression of the uneven experiences of American
modernity. We will also consider the ways in which these writers engage with debates around region, conflict,
migration, labour and race.
Texts will include (i.e. all these texts will be taught this year):
F Scott Fitzgerald, Tender is the Night
Nella Larsen, Quicksand and Passing
William Faulkner, The Sound and the Fury
Zora Neale Hurston, Their Eyes Were Watching God
Willa Cather, The Professor's House
John Steinbeck, The Grapes of Wrath
Component When Set % Comment
Essay 1 Mid 40 In course essay 1800 words
Essay 2 End 60 End of module essay 2200 words
SEL3386: Modernist Poetry – Pound to the Beats
Module Leader: Dr Alex Niven
Semester 2, 20 credits
No Pre-requisites
This is a post-1800 Literature module.
This module explores the development of modernist poetry from the early-twentieth century to the heyday of the
post-war Anglo-American counterculture. It begins with the poetic revolution initiated by Ezra Pound in the 1910s
and concludes with the late modernism of the Beat Generation and the British Poetry Revival.
After looking at Imagism's break with poetic tradition, we will examine various currents in modernist verse: its
origins in the late-Romantic avant-garde of the nineteenth century, its ambivalent relationship with English,
American and regional identities, its use of music as inspiration and ideal, the often neglected centrality of women
poets and the much-contested political backdrop. In the final weeks students will look closely at how these subjects
found expression in Newcastle-upon-Tyne from the 1960s onwards, in the writing and activities of local poet Basil
Bunting and his circle (a field trip/walking tour of Newcastle will supplement this part of the module).12
The module aims to give students a thorough grounding in the techniques and historical evolution of twentieth-
century modernist poetry. Particular emphasis will be placed on Poundian modernism as a project combining
aesthetic radicalism with social and political engagement.
Component When Set % Comment
Written Exercise 1 Mid Formative Preparation for final piece of
assessment
Written Exercise 2 End 100 4000-word comparative and critical
essay OR a creative exercise
SEL3388: Caribbean-U.S. Cultures
Module Leader: Dr Hannah Durkin
Semester 2, 20 credits
Pre-requisites: Students must have studied SEL1030, or have the permission of the module leader to enrol on this
module.
This is a post-1800 Literature module.
As well as serving as a significant source of its labour and migration, the Caribbean has exerted a powerful cultural
influence over the U.S.A. This module aims to introduce students to a variety of twentieth- and twenty-first-century
Caribbean-U.S. literary and cultural production. Ranging from Trinidad to New York and from early zombie cinema to
reggae and hip hop, the module explores a range of art, film, literature and music that has emerged from and been
popularised by Caribbean and U.S. cross-cultural exchange. Focusing on African American and Caribbean American
cultural encounters in particular, it explores ways in which such shared creative expression has often served as a
vehicle for political protest and resistance. The module interrogates tendencies to lump together Caribbean-U.S. and
African American histories and artistic traditions by introducing students to the geographical, linguistic and ethnic
diversity of Caribbean cultural production. It also investigates ways in which Caribbean and Caribbean-derived
cultural and spiritual practices have been represented in the mainstream U.S. imagination and attitudes to race,
gender, sexuality, class and nationhood as they relate to the Caribbean-U.S. experience.
This module examines a range of literary, visual and oral texts that explore both the U.S.’s neo-imperial influence
over the Caribbean and the Caribbean’s cultural impact on the U.S. The texts featured on the module will vary from
year to year, but in the past have included “Harlem Renaissance” writers Zora Neale Hurston and Claude McKay,
Hollywood- and calypso-star Harry Belafonte, reggae icon Bob Marley, hip-hop developers Grandmaster Flash and
the Furious Five and graffiti artist Jean-Michel Basquiat.
Component When Set % Comment
Formative Essay Mid Formative 1500 word essay
Professional Skills End 15 Participation in class activities
Assessment
Essay End 85 3000 words
SEL3395: The Victorian Novel: Time, Change and the Life Course
Module Leader: Dr Jacob Jewusiak
Semester 1, 20 credits
Pre-requisites
This is a post-1800 Literature module.
This module examines how characters mature and develop (or fail to do so) in the Victorian novel. As we will see, the
way an individual is represented as growing up reflects deeply held beliefs about the value of societal progress and13
reform. Through a detailed analysis of Victorian novels, we will reflect upon how the human lifespan changes in
response to the burgeoning modernity of the nineteenth century. We will explore how the novel form contributes to
the construction of subjectivities across the life course and consider a broad range of questions, including the
following: How did social expectations about gender and sexuality change with age? How did industrialisation create
and shut down opportunities for young and elderly workers? What role did race and empire play in the perception of
ageing? How was the concept of the life course informed by the partitioning of the novel into a beginning, middle,
and end?
Component When Set % Comment
Essay Mid 25 Close reading essay (1000 words)
Research Paper End 75 Research essay (3000 words)
SEL3404: High-toned, Middlebrow and Lowdown – Jazz-Age Literature in the
Magazines
Module Leader: Dr Kirsten MacLeod
Semester 1, 20 credits
No Pre-requisites
This is a post-1800 Literature module.
This module introduces students to the study of literary texts within the contexts of their publications in magazines.
It also invites students to consider the magazine as a literary genre in its own right that can be read and analysed
similarly to a conventional literary text. The module focuses on American literature and magazines of the 1920s, a
period in which most writers published in and derived significant income from magazines (including F. Scott
Fitzgerald, Ernest Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Dorothy Parker, and T. S. Eliot). In magazines, these writers’ works
appeared alongside an array of other material – other literary content by writers known and unknown to us now;
advertisements; political manifestoes; illustrations and art work; shopping and fashion tips; non-fiction material on
popular fads of the day; etc. Students will be introduced to methodologies, theoretical approaches, and case studies
from the disciplines of book history and periodical studies for engaging with literary texts in magazine contexts and
with magazines as literary texts. Students will learn how the magazine served as a key medium for literature in this
period and how reading literature in magazines is a different form of close reading and allows for different
interpretations of literary texts than analysing them in isolation. They will encounter familiar canonical authors in
these magazines as well as authors who were extremely popular or important to literary culture in the 1920s but are
now lesser known, thereby gaining a broad understanding of the literary field of popular and “high” culture. They
will explore the representation of key movements and themes through these authors and the magazines in which
they appeared.
Component When Set % Comment
Portfolio Mid 50 1700 words of assessed writing and
evidence of weekly note taking
Research Paper End 50 2300 words
Written Exercise Mid Formative discussion board postings
SEL3409: Planetary Imagination: Literature, the Environment and the
Anthropocene
Module Leader: Dr Ella Mershon
Semester 1, 20 credits
No Pre-requisites14
This is a post-1800 Literature module.
This module examines the entanglement of human and earth histories on an increasingly imperiled planet. While
this entanglement has prompted geoscientists to speculate that we have entered a new geological epoch—the
Anthropocene—this term also raises significant questions for literary studies as it suggests that we can no longer
decouple “culture” from “nature.” Taking up the intervention of the human into earth systems, this module will use
the provocation of the concept of the Anthropocene to consider how literature can help us understand, imagine, and
interpret our relationship to geo-histories that eclipse the scale of human life.
This module will begin in the nineteenth century, when the widespread use of fossil fuels launched modern
industrialization, when imperial powers "scrambled" to seize natural resources across the globe, and when the
scientific discoveries of geological and evolutionary timescales revolutionized historical consciousness. We will
discuss Victorian literature and scientific thought to understand how emerging generic and narrative conventions
shaped representations of the human’s place in inhuman timescales. In the latter half of the module, we will turn to
the twenty-first century and consider how postcolonial, Black, and Indigenous writers address these Victorian
legacies that continue to shape the contemporary literary imagination.
Readings from Victorian literature, such as H. G. Wells, The Time Machine and Joseph Conrad, The Heart of Darkness,
will be read alongside excerpts from nineteenth-century geology and evolutionary biology as well as contemporary
environmental literature and ecocriticism. Readings from contemporary literature will include N. K. Jemisin, The Fifth
Season and Kathy Jetnil-Kijiner, Iep Jaltok: Poems from a Marshallese Daughter.
KEYWORDS: Anthropocene; climate crisis; nature/culture; literature/science; environmental justice; race and
environmental racism; Indigenous literature and traditional knowledge; science fiction and speculative fiction;
poetry
Component When Set % Comment
Essay 1 Mid 30 Mid module essay, 1500 words
Essay 2 End 70 Final essay, 2500 words
Oral Presentation Mid Formative Group Presentation (prepared as a
group or, where appropriate & only with
prior agreement from the module leader,
individually)
SEL3421: Contemporary Experimental Writing & Medicine
Module Leader: Professor Anne Whitehead
Semester 2, 20 credits
No Pre-requisites
This is a post-1800 Literature module.
This module examines how contemporary experimental writing has engaged with, and responded to, current health
debates, which may include such topics as disability, neurodiversity, the neoliberalisation of healthcare, and the
politics of diagnosis and vaccination. Focusing on experimental writing of the twenty-first century, we will identify
and explore a range of techniques used by contemporary writers to explore these themes. These could include the
body/visuality of the text, the mixing of poetry and prose, the creative use of a source text, or techniques of erasure
and anecdote.
Conceptual material will draw on critical medical humanities and critical disability studies. Throughout the module,
we will ask how contemporary experimental writing positions itself in relation to the medical, considering whether it
'speaks back' to and contests medical frameworks, or whether it explores its entanglement within medical structures
of knowledge.15
Component When Set % Comment
Essay End 70 N/A
Written Exercise Mid 30 N/A
SEL3422: Reading Freud: An Introduction to the Principles of Psychoanalytic
Theory
Module Leader: Dr Robert McLaughlan
Semester 2, 20 credits
Pre-requisites: It would be useful if students possessed some familiarity with literary theory, although this is not
compulsory.
This is a post-1800 Literature module.
Sigmund Freud imagined psychoanalysis as belonging to an intellectual legacy of disruptors that included Copernicus
and Darwin, with his pioneering work in the development of psychoanalysis instituting a social revolution in the early
twentieth century. This module focuses on that School of psychoanalytic theory known as 'Freudian', and is designed
to introduce students to Freud's metapsychology and his theoretical vocabulary. Freud was an enthusiastic reader of
literary works, but this is not a module in which Freud's ideas will be used to read literature via a psychoanalytic
method. There are no literary texts on this module. Students taking Reading Freud will, instead, be expected to
purchase The Freud Reader (ed. by Peter Gay) from which a curated selection of key Freudian texts will be taken.
Week by week students will be introduced to the classical works of Freudian theory: The Interpretation of Dreams, a
selection of his case studies (including Dora and Anna O); 'Three Essays on the Theory of Sexuality', Civilisation and
Its Discontents and Beyond the Pleasure Principle. In doing so, we will follow the intellectual development of Freud's
work from the early years of the psychoanalysis defined by a concentration on the individual, through to the
'political turn' in the late Freud's writing in which he focuses his psychoanalytic method upon the individual within
society.
As well as covering the key works of Freudian theory, this module will turn to a selection of theoretical interlocutors
who extend Freud's work after his death in 1939. As the module progresses and students become more
familiar/confident with psychoanalytic theory, we will turn to those figures who found in psychoanalysis a
methodology that could be used to develop their own theoretical and philosophical positions. In pairing Freudian
theory with the work of Jacques Lacan, Jacques Derrida, Judith Butler, Julia Kristeva, Hélène Cixous and Luce Irigaray,
Reading Freud will demonstrate the intellectual legacy and importance of Freud's writing as it escapes beyond the
walls of the clinic.
Component When Set % Comment
Essay End 75 Final Essay of 3000 words
Written Exercise Mid 25 A 1000 word encyclopaedia entry
covering a psychoanalytic term.
SEL3011: Growing up Global: Childhood and National Identity from Post-war to
Present
Module Leader: Dr Emily Murphy
Semester 1, 20 credits
No Pre-requisites
This is a post-1800 Literature module.16
In the globalized world of the twenty-first century, children are often cast as “global citizens” who embody the
flexible form of identity needed to survive in a time when changes in migration patterns and advances in technology
are increasingly requiring adults to interact with people of other nationalities and cultures. However, the global
citizen has its roots in early understandings of cosmopolitanism, and has often been deployed as a means of securing
and maintaining a colonial relationship in Western society and expanding the empire. This module will therefore
consider the emergence and development of the child as global citizen within literary, historical, educational, and
other materials targeted for children. You will also be introduced to a number of important works of theoretical and
literary criticism as a way of deepening your understanding of the primary resources discussed in the module.
The module will offer an introduction to American children’s literature, with some attention to international texts
that are rarely taught in the literary canon. Students will have the opportunity to read a range of texts published for
children and young adults, including graphic novels and films, and will consider how these texts construct both the
child and the nation. They will also have the opportunity to work with archives and special collections, including
Seven Stories, the National Centre for Children’s Books and the Robinson Library Collection.
Component When Set % Comment
Essay End 80 Research Essay, 2500 words
Portfolio End 20 N/A
Formative Essay Mid Formative N/A
SEL3397: American Poetry Now
Module Leader: Dr Mark Byers
Semester 2, 20 credits
Pre-requisites
This is a post-1800 Literature module.
This module explores American poetry from 2000 to the present. Placing an emphasis on innovative and/or
experimental writing, the module examines the ways recent American poetry has confronted the public concerns
and social crises of the Unites States in the period, notably those of identity, technology, racism, inequality, and the
environment.
Over the course of the module, we will consider a range of forms and techniques associated with American poetry in
the twenty-first century: its emphasis on the materiality/visuality of the text; its use of ‘found’ texts and procedural
techniques; the emergence of documentary writing and ecopoetics, and its concern with the politics of literary form.
We will also ask how American poetry responded to the major social and political events and transitions of the
period, including the arrival of social media, the Financial Crisis and Occupy movement, and ongoing ecological crisis.
The module aims to give students a firm grounding in the formal practices and theoretical issues associated with
recent American poetry. In particular, the module will give students an opportunity to explore the much-debated
relationship between literary form and social experience.
Component When Set % Comment
Essay End 60 2500 word critical essay
Written Exercise Mid 40 1500 word close reading
NCL3007: Career Development for Final Year Student
Module Leader: Dr Jessica Jung
Semesters 1 & 2, 20 credits total17
Pre-requisites: Details of pre-requisite requirements can be found at:
https://www.ncl.ac.uk/careers/modules/cdm/registration/
This is a Careers module offered as an optional / additional module.
The Career Development module offers students the opportunity to undertake work-related learning in a variety of
environments, both on and off the University campus. Through engagement with the module, students will learn
about themselves, enhancing their employability and personal enterprise skills as well as contributing towards
meeting the aims of the host organisation.
Component When Set % Comment
Portfolio 1 Mid 50 N/A
Portfolio 2 End 50 N/AYou can also read
