| Unit name | European Literature of Ideas |
|---|---|
| Unit code | MODLM2044 |
| Credit points | 20 |
| Level of study | M/7 |
| Teaching block(s) |
Teaching Block 4 (weeks 1-24) |
| Unit director | Professor. Stephens |
| Open unit status | Not open |
| Pre-requisites |
None |
| Co-requisites |
None |
| School/department | School of Modern Languages |
| Faculty | Faculty of Arts |
This unit explores the key discourses in Europe from the Renaissance to present day, notably: Humanism, the Enlightenment, Romanticism, and (Post) Modernism. The unit will be team-taught by specialists in at least three major areas (as a typical minimum: French, German, Russian), drawing upon a broad but coherent range of examples from a 'literature of ideas' within the European tradition. The precise choice of texts will vary from year to year, but major contributions to each period will be selected so as to facilitate a comparison of the insights and blind-spots at work in each. The unit will evaluate a variety of critical responses and in so doing also explore the changing fortunes of the 'self' as a recurring theme since 1500, from the ultimate locus of personal identity with Humanism to the brutally stripped-down subjectivity of Postmodernism. Emphasis will be placed on the intersections and tensions between these various discourses, with particular attention to the contexts in which these movements unfold.
