INTRODUCTION TO NARRATIVE LITARATURE - avsluttet 2009

This course is designed to give students insights into what narrative is, how it is constructed, how it acts upon us, how we act upon it, how it is transmitted, and how it changes when the medium or the cultural context change. With a focus on the historical development of narrative, the course might also include short stories, autobiography, and journalism. Texts to be discussed will span a wide range of styles. The reading list will serve as a basis for studying how the narrative genre works, what our expectations of a text are, and how we as readers interact with it. The course will explore the application of a number of concepts prominent in narrative theory such as point of view, sequential ordering, focalization, genre development, fabula, and place and time in the narrative. The course might examine how the technologies of production affect the presentation of narrative in other media such a film.

This course is part of a package offered to students living outside of Tromsø, to enable them to study English. Teaching methods for these students are not ready yet, but will be posted in the course description shortly.

 

The goals of the course are to study narrative as a way of knowing and how a sense of reality is created by language; to study narrative in its cultural contexts, and to analyze the techniques used by writers to structure their prose writing and to affect their readers' responses.

 

English.

 

13 weeks of teaching and 1 week of academic supervision.

 

Assessment method: 6-hour school exam.

Grading: performance in the course will be assessed with the grades A-F.

 

09.12.2009 – Examination date is preliminary and may be subject to change. The definitive examination date will be announced on notice boards at the faculties at the beginning of the month of May for the spring semester and the beginning of the month of November for the autumn semester.