BA English Literature Syllabus MG University Third year (5th and 6th semenster)

Fifth Semester

Reading Drama

Module 1

Macbeth - William Shakespeare (72 hours)

Module 2 - One Act Plays (36 hours)

1. “The Swan Song” – Anton Chekhov

2. “How he Lied to her Husband” – George Bernard Shaw

3. “Before Breakfast” – Eugene O’Neil

4. “A Sunny Morning” – Serafin and Joaquin Alvarez Quintero

5. “Matsyagandhi” – M. Sajitha

6. “The Trick” - Erisa Kironde

4. CORE TEXT
Dr K Sujatha Ed. On the Stage: One-Act Plays. Orient BlackSwan.

LANGUAGE AND LINGUISTICS

Module I – Language and Linguistics (36 hours)

a) What is Language? - Arbitrariness – Interchangeability – Cultural transmission – Dialect – Sociolect – Idiolect - Register – Pidgin – Creole

b) What is Linguistics? - Traditional grammar and linguistics - Synchronic and

diachronic linguistics – Evolution of the study of linguistics – Major linguists -

Basic concepts in linguistics - Langue – Parole – Language as a system of

signs – Signifier and signified - Competence - Performance

c) Branches of linguistics: Phonology - Morphology: Morphemes and allomorphs – Lexical/Content Words - Functional/Structural Words - Simple, complex, compound Words - Word Formation - Inflexion - Affixation - Parts of Speech - Word Order - Phrase - Clause - Syntax: PS Grammar – Transformational Generative Grammar - Basic concepts in Semantics - Applied linguistics

Module II – Phonetics (54 hours )

a) Air stream Mechanism - Organs of speech - Function of vocal cords – Soft palate action – Active and passive articulators

c) R P and G I E – Uniformity and Intelligibility – Mother tongue influence - Cardinal vowels – Vowels in R P - Diphthongs – Triphthongs - Consonants – Phonemes – Allophones

d) Suprasegmentals - Syllable - Stress and Rhythm – Weak forms and Strong forms – Sentence stress - Tone groups - Basic intonation - Juncture - Elision – Assimilation

4. Reading List

for module i

Krishnaswamy and Sivaraman: An Introduction to Liguistics

S. K. Verma and N. Krishnaswamy. Modern Linguistics : An Introduction. New Delhi: OUP, 1989.

H.A.Gleason. Linguistics and English Grammar. New York: Holt, Rinehart &. Winston, Inc., 1965.

For module ii

Daniel Jones. The Pronunciation of English. New Delhi: Blackie and Sons,1976.

A.C Gimson. An Introduction to the Pronunciation of English. London: Methuen, 1980.

J. D. O’Conner. Better English Pronunciation. New Delhi: CUP, 2008.

T. Balasubramaniam. A Textbook of English Phonetics for Indian Students. New Delhi: Macmillan, 1981.

T. Balasubramaniam. English Phonetics for Indian Students : A Workbook. New Delhi: Macmillan, 1992.

THEORY AND PRACTICE

module I (18 hours)

a) Figures of Speech: Metaphor, Synecdoche, Irony

b) Movements: Neo- classicism – Humanism - Magic realism – Symbolism - Russian Formalism - Absurd School – Modernism – Structuralism - Post structuralism - Post modernism - Deconstruction - Psychoanalytic criticism.

c) Concepts: Intentional Fallacy - Affective Fallacy - Negative Capability – Myth – Archetype – Semiotics – Reader-response criticism.

CORE READING

Abrams, M.H. A Glossary of LiteraryTerms. VII Edn. New Delhi:Thomson Heinle, 1999.

module II classical criticism (18 hours)

Plato – Theory of Imitation (Mimesis)

Aristotle – Romanticism and Classicism

core text

M.S. Nagarajan. English Literary Criticism and Theory. Hyderabad: Orient Blackswan, 2008. Chapter I Classical Criticism

module III indian aesthetics (18 hours)

Major Streams of Indian Aesthetics - Theory of Rasa - Rasa and Catharsis

core reading

V. S. Sethuraman. Ed. Indian Aesthetics. Ch. 3 “Highways of Literary Criticism in Sanskrit” by Kuppuswami Sastri. Ch. 13 “Rasa as Aesthetic Experience” by Mohan Thampi.

module IV (18 hours)

Romantic and Victorian Criticism - Twentieth Century criticism

core reading

M.S. Nagarajan. English Literary Criticism and Theory. Hyderabad: Orient Blackswan, 2008; Chapter IV and V.

module V (18 hours)

appreciation of literature (practical criticism)

In this module, critical analysis of short poems and prose passages are to be done by students. The students may be asked to analyse pieces in terms of theme, diction, tone, figures of speech, imagery, etc. Theoretical approaches may be avoided.

General (Background) Reading

Oxford Dictionary of Literary Terms
Peck John et al. Literary Terms and Criticism, New Delhi: Macmillan,1998.

Prasad, B. An Introduction to English Criticism. New Delhi: Macmillan. 1965.
Barry, Peter. Beginning Theory . Manchester and NY: Manchester Uty. Press, 1995.
Bertens , Hans. Literary Theory: The Basics. London: Routledge, 2001.

POSTCOLONIAL LITERATURES

MODULE ONE: Prose (36 hours)

Extract from Edward Said’s Out of Place
Taisha Abraham ed.

Introducing Post Colonial Theories

Chapter I – “The Colonizer and the Colonized” (Macmillan)

MODULE TWO: Poetry (18 hours)

1. Wole Soyinka : ‘Procession I-Hanging Day’

2. Keki N Daruwalla : ‘Pestilence in Nineteenth-Century Calcutta’

3. Mahmoud Darwish : ‘Identity Card’

4. Derek Walcott : ‘A Far Cry from Africa’

5. Claude McKay : ‘The Enslaved’

6. Jean Arasanayagam : ‘Family Photographs’

MODULE THREE: Fiction (18 hours)

Chinua Achebe : Things Fall Apart

MODULE FOUR: Drama (18 hours)

Mahasweta Devi : Mother of 1084

4. CORE TEXT

Dr P J George Ed. Emergent Voices: Selections from Postcolonial Literatures. Macmillan.

Semester Six

WOMEN’S LITERATURE

MODULE ONE: ESSAYS (18 hours)

1. Virginia Woolf : “Shakespeare and his Sister”

(Excerpt from A Room of One’s Own)

2. Alice Walker : “In Search of our Mothers’ Gardens”

(From In Search of Our Mother’s Gardens)

3. Jasbir Jain : Indian Feminisms: The Nature of

Questioning and the Search for Space in

Indian Women’s Writing. (From Writing

Women Across Cultures)

MODULE TWO: POETRY (18 hours)

1. Elizabeth Barrett Browning : “A Musical Instrument”

2. Marianne Moore : “Poetry”

3. Adrienne Rich : “Aunt Jennifer’s Tigers”

4. Sylvia Plath : “Lady Lazarus”

5. Margaret Atwood : “Spelling”

6. Kishwar Naheed : “I am not That Woman”

7. Suniti NamJoshi : “The Grass Blade”

8. Nikki Giovanni : “Woman”

MODULE THREE: NOVEL (18 Hours)

Frances Collins : The Slayer Slain. Ed. Sobhana Kurien and

Susan Varghese (CMS College publication)

MODULE FOUR Short Fiction (18 Hours)

1. Katherine Mansfield : “The Fly”

2. Shashi Deshpande : “A Wall is Safer”

3. Sara Joseph : “Inside Every Woman Writer”

4. Amy Tan : “Rules of the Game”

MODULE FIVE: DRAMA (18 hours)

1. Sheila Walsh : “Molly and James”

2. Mamta G Sagar : “The Swing of Desire”

4. CORE TEXTS

1. Dr Sobhana Kurien, Ed. Breaking the Silence: An Anthology of Women’s Literature. ANE Books.

2. Collins, Frances. The Slayer Slain. Ed. Sobhana Kurien and Susan Varghese (CMS College publication)

5. READING LIST

a) General Reading

i. Kate Millett. Sexual Politics. New York: Equinox-Avon, 1971.

ii. Maggie Humm Ed. Feminisms: A Reader. New York: Wheat Sheaf, 1992.

iii. Elaine Showalter. A Literature of their Own.

b) Further Reading

i. Virginia Woolf. A Room of One’s Own. London: Hogarth, 1929.

ii. Patricia Mayor Spacks. The Female Imagination. New York: Avon, 1976.

iii. Jasbir Jain Ed. Women in Patriarchy: Cross Cultural Readings. New Delhi: Rawat Publications, 2005

iv. Susie Tharu & K Lalitha. Women Writing in India Vol I & II. New Delhi: OUP, 1991.

v. Gayle Green & Copelia Kahn. Making a Difference: Feminist Literary Criticism. New York: Routeledge.

vi. Sandra Gilbert & Susan Gubar. The Mad Woman in the Attic: The Woman Writer. Yale University Press, 1978.

vii. Simone de Beauvoir. The Second Sex. UK: Hammond Worth, 1972.

viii. Angela Davis. Women, Race and Class. New York: Random House, 1981.

ix. Alice Walker. In Search of our Mothes’ Gardens. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1983.

x. Leos S. Roudiex Ed. Desire in Language. New York: Columbia University Press, 1975.

xi. Lisbeth Goodman Ed. Literature and Gender. New York: Routeledge, 1996.

xii. Adrienne Rich. Of Woman Born. New York: Norton.

xiii. Mahasweta Devi. Breast Stories. Calcutta: Seagull, 1998.

Indian Writing in English

Module I – Prose 18 hrs

1. M. K. Gandhi : “The Need for Religion”

2. C. V. Raman : “Water, the Elixir of Life”

3. Nirad C. Chaudhuri : “Money and the Englishmen”

4. Arundhati Roy : “The End of Imagination”

Module II - Poetry 18 hrs

1. Sarojini Naidu : The Soul’s Prayer

2. Rabindranath Tagore : Silent Steps

3 Nissim Ezekiel : The Railway Clerk

4 A. K. Ramanujan : The Striders

5 Arun Koltkar : An Old Woman

6. Jayanta Mahapatra : An October Morning

7. Kamala Das : Nani

8.Meena Alexander : Her Garden

Module III - Short stories 18 HRS

1. Mahasweta Devi : Arjun

2. Anita Desai : Circus Cat, Alley Cat

3. Rabindranath Tagore : The Home Coming

4. Abhuri Chaya Devi : The Woodrose

Module IV - Drama 18 hrs

Badal Sirkar : Evam Indrajith

MODULE V – FICTION 18 HRS

Mulk Raj Anand : Untouchable

4. Core Reading

1. Wilfred Abraham Ed. Our Country, our Literature: An Anthology of Indian Writing in English. CUP.

COMPARATIVE LITERATURE

MODULE 1 – Theoretical Perspectives 36 Hours

Various theories and the central concerns of comparative literature should be explained to the students. Thematology, historiography, Genre Studies, Influence Studies, Movement or Intersemiotic Studies, Translation Studies and Aesthetic theoretical comparison and various other components of comparative literature are to be discussed. A historical analysis of the contributions of the French school of comparative literature and comparativists like Wellek, Halliday, Susan Bassnet and Leo Lowenthal need to be discussed. Alongside, a comparison of notions of comparative literature in the east and the west should be part of the course. Concepts of textuality, intertextuality, genology, stoff, theme, culture, nation, translation and orature are the key terms in the area.

Readings

Susan Bassnet : “Introduction” Comparative Literature

Bijoy Kumar Das : “Retrospect and Prospect”

Bhalchandra Nemade : “A Thematic Framework for Influence Study in the Indo-Anglian

Context.”

R K Dhawan : “The Case for Comparative Literature”

(Included in Between the Lines. Ed. Dr. K. M. Krishnan

MODULE II: Study of Specific Texts 54 hours

In this module a comparative reading of texts that merit analysis will be facilitated. The stress here will be on thematic, stylistic, cultural, linguistic and generic aspects that govern the texts. The study will be based on the following reading material. Care has been taken to choose texts from different cultural and historical contexts.

Readings

1.Thomas Mann : Transposed Heads

2.Girish Karnad : Hayavadana

3.Tennesse Williams : The Glass Menagerie

4.Shyamaprasad : Akale

5.Rabindranath Tagore : Gitanjali Verses 1-4 of Tagore’s own translation

6.Edwin Arnold : Light of Asia Section 1 and 2

7.Kishwar Naheed : Listen to Me”

8.Noemia De Souza : If You Want to Know Me

9.Vengayi Kunjiraman Nayanar : Dwaraka Trans C S Venkiteswaran

10. Sundara Ramaswamy : On Alen Soil

(Items 5, 6, 7, 8, 9 and 10 included in Between the Lines. Ed. Dr. K. M. Krishnan, Current Books Trichur)

Reading List

Core Text:

Dr. K. M. Krishnan Ed.Between the Lines: A Text Book of Comparative Literature

1.Core Reading

Thomas Mann : Transposed Heads

Girish Karnad : Hayavadana

Tennesse Williams : The Glass Menagerie

Shyamaprasad : Akale

2.Background Reading

Susan Bassnet : Comparative Literature

Bijoya K Das ed. : Comparative Literature

Amiya K Dev.& Sisir Kumar

Das Ed. : Comparative Literature: Theory and Practice

AMERICAN LITERATURE

MODULE ONE: ESSAYS (18 hours)

1. Ralph Waldo Emerson : “Art”

2. Henry David Thoreau : “The Battle of the Ants”

3. Robert E Spiller : “The First Frontier”

4. James Baldwin : “If Black English isn’t Language, then

Tell me, What is?”

5. Jerzy Kosinski : “TV as a Babysitter”

MODULE TWO: POETRY (18 hours)

1. Walt Whitman : “Oh Captain, My Captain”

2. Emily Dickinson : “A Bird Came Down the Walk”

3. E A Robinson : “Miniver Cheevy”

4. Robert Frost : “Reluctance”

5. E E Cummings : “My Sweet Old Etcetera”

6. Theodore Roethke : “The Waking”

7. John Berryman : “The Ball Poem”

MODULE THREE: FICTION (36 hours)

1. Nathaniel Hawthorne : “The Wives of the Dead”

2. Edgar Allan Poe : “The Fall of the House of Usher”

3. Mark Twain : “The Five Boons of Life”

4. Ambrose Bierce : “A Horseman in the Sky”

5. Kate Chopin : “The Story of an Hour”

6. O Henry : “Mammon and the Archer”

7. Ernest Hemingway : "A Clean, Well-Lighted Place"

8. Ray Bradbury : “October 2026: Million Year Picni

MODULE FOUR: DRAMA (18 hours)

1. Tennessee Williams : The Case of the Crushed Petunias

2. Lucille Fletcher : Sorry, Wrong Number

3. Richard A Via : Never on Wednesday

4. CORE TEXT

Dr Leesa Sadasivan Ed. Blooming Lilacs: An Anthology of American Literature. Current Books.

Ref:- Mg university official website

English Literature Note

Pages