Last modified: 05 Oct 2023 08:46
This course explores the ways in which place is negotiated in a range of Scottish texts. Looking at a selection of texts about rural, urban, and diasporic experience across the centuries, and including both canonical and lesser-known works, this course will acquaint students with key debates in the study of regional and national fiction. Place in these texts is something to be praised and scorned, embraced and abandoned, but always remains central in any discussion of individual and communal identities. Major themes and issues to be discussed include: the idea of ‘home’; the role of nostalgia and longing in Scottish fiction; the nature of community; the significance of emigration and displacement.
| Study Type | Postgraduate | Level | 5 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Term | Second Term | Credit Points | 30 credits (15 ECTS credits) |
| Campus | Aberdeen | Sustained Study | No |
| Co-ordinators |
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In a late poem Hugh MacDiarmid asks if Scotland is small and replies by saying that in spite of its land mass Scotland is, on the contrary, ‘multiform’ and ‘infinite’, incorporating within itself a diversity of ways of thinking about place and what this might mean. Looking at a selection of texts about rural, urban, and diasporic experience across the centuries, and including both canonical and lesser-known works, this course will acquaint students with key debates in the study of regional and national fiction. Place in these texts is something to be praised and scorned, embraced and abandoned, but always remains central in any discussion of individual and communal identities. Major themes and issues to be discussed include: the idea of ‘home’; the role of nostalgia and longing in Scottish fiction; the nature of community; the significance of emigration and displacement. The course will also examine the linguistic diversity that underpins so much of Scottish experience and which forms the basis for experimentation in its literature. There will be a particular focus on the North-east, the region in which the University of Aberdeen is located, and the course will also consider the ways in which literary heritage contributes to a complex understanding of nation and region in Scotland today. Authors to be discussed may include William Dunbar, Walter Scott, Lewis Grassic Gibbon, Willa Muir, Nan Shepherd, George Mackay Brown and Leila Aboulela.
Information on contact teaching time is available from the course guide.
| Assessment Type | Summative | Weighting | 10 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Assessment Weeks | Feedback Weeks | |||
| Feedback |
Written feedback will be provided within three weeks of submission and oral feedback upon request. |
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| Knowledge Level | Thinking Skill | Outcome |
|---|---|---|
| Conceptual | Analyse | To identify and analyse the ways in which literary texts engage with questions of national and local identity. |
| Conceptual | Apply | To understand a range of theoretical approaches concerning the relationship of literature and place and be able to apply them. |
| Conceptual | Evaluate | To understand how literature from different periods and across different genres engages with questions of place in varying ways and evaluate the effects produced. |
| Assessment Type | Summative | Weighting | 60 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Assessment Weeks | Feedback Weeks | |||
| Feedback |
Written feedback will be provided within three weeks of submission and oral feedback upon request. |
Word Count | 3500 | |
| Knowledge Level | Thinking Skill | Outcome |
|---|---|---|
| Conceptual | Analyse | To identify and analyse the ways in which literary texts engage with questions of national and local identity. |
| Conceptual | Apply | To understand a range of theoretical approaches concerning the relationship of literature and place and be able to apply them. |
| Conceptual | Evaluate | To understand how literature from different periods and across different genres engages with questions of place in varying ways and evaluate the effects produced. |
| Procedural | Create | To write correctly and argue fluently and to produce pieces of literary analysis at postgraduate level. |
| Assessment Type | Summative | Weighting | 30 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Assessment Weeks | Feedback Weeks | |||
| Feedback |
Written feedback will be provided within three weeks of submission and oral feedback upon request. |
|||
| Knowledge Level | Thinking Skill | Outcome |
|---|---|---|
| Conceptual | Analyse | To identify and analyse the ways in which literary texts engage with questions of national and local identity. |
| Conceptual | Evaluate | To understand how literature from different periods and across different genres engages with questions of place in varying ways and evaluate the effects produced. |
| Procedural | Create | To write correctly and argue fluently and to produce pieces of literary analysis at postgraduate level. |
There are no assessments for this course.
| Assessment Type | Summative | Weighting | 100 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Assessment Weeks | Feedback Weeks | |||
| Feedback | Word Count | 4000 | ||
| Knowledge Level | Thinking Skill | Outcome |
|---|---|---|
|
|
||
| Knowledge Level | Thinking Skill | Outcome |
|---|---|---|
| Procedural | Create | To write correctly and argue fluently and to produce pieces of literary analysis at postgraduate level. |
| Conceptual | Apply | To understand a range of theoretical approaches concerning the relationship of literature and place and be able to apply them. |
| Conceptual | Evaluate | To understand how literature from different periods and across different genres engages with questions of place in varying ways and evaluate the effects produced. |
| Conceptual | Analyse | To identify and analyse the ways in which literary texts engage with questions of national and local identity. |
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