English Masterclass
On October 30th we ran our most recent edition of the English Masterclass. Students began by discussing why we read and write and we came up with some interesting answers! We then engaged with some texts on writing by P.B. Shelley and Salman Rushdie. Students were encouraged to discuss whether reading is just a fun thing to do, as a form of aesthetic experience, or whether reading serves some social or political function. In the afternoon students were introduced to various branches of literary criticism including New Historicism, Feminist and Marxist analysis, New Criticism, and Reader Response Theory. Students were given an opportunity to do their own feminist analysis of Christina Rossetti’s “Goblin Market”. We talked about how to read and interpret a text: can a piece of literature be anything you want it to be, or does it have to conform to the author’s intentions? How can we know what the author wanted the text to mean, anyways? Alice in Wonderland and Humpty Dumpty as well as more well-know literary theorists such as Barthes and Bloom helped us out with this discussion. We ended the day with a heated discussion of postcolonial literature and we looked at two postcolonial poems: “Traditions” by Seamus Heaney and “Goats and Monkeys” by Derek Walcott. We also examined how language can be used as a source of power in colonial exploits. This was a lively day with a great group of students!
If this sounds interesting – have a look at our next English Masterclass taking place on the 26th of November 2011.