English and drama

Contemporary Literature and Culture

Module code: Q3306
Level 5
30 credits in spring semester
Teaching method: Seminar, Lecture
Assessment modes: Coursework

How far are we able to identify a distinctive phase in the history of cultural production in the contemporary epoch? We begin with an overview of theoretical developments and debates in the latter part of the twentieth century. By interrogating the discourses and rhetoric of late capitalism, globalisation, neo-liberalism, postmodernism and imperialism, we ask how they capture certain pre-millennial tensions, as well as post-millennial possibilities. 

We present a conceptual basis from which to explore how new literary and other cultural formations have come into being in response to these developments.

In the context of debates about the ‘value’ of the study of humanities, in what ways are our senses of literary possibility being expanded? Given the turbulence of the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries, we consider the complex relations between literature, politics and history in flux.

The module will engage with the work of a wide range of emerging writers, film makers and visual artists, in order to map the contours of peculiarly contemporary ‘structures of feeling.’

Authors taught in the past include Ali Smith, Cormac McCarthy, Teju Cole, Kamila Shamsie, Don DeLillo, and Ling Ma.

Module learning outcomes

  • Understand a range of theoretical, political and cultural developments, associated with the end of the twentieth and the beginning of the twenty-first centuries.
  • Demonstrate contextually-informed knowledge of a range of literary and artistic practices that are emerging at the beginning of the new century, across a number of genres and media.
  • Reflect on the interrelationships between the literature of the period and the visual, musical, artistic, philosophical and theoretical cultures of the period.
  • Evaluate the relationship between creative and critical writing, in the context of the production, circulation, consumption and reception of literature in the new century.
  • Reflect on the possibility of novelty in the new century, and have a critical understanding of questions of originality and cultural transformation under twenty-first century conditions.
  • Demonstrate close reading skills peculiar to works that have been written very recently, and for which there is not an existing body of critical work.