Mar 28, 2024  
2021 - 2022 Academic Catalog 
    
2021 - 2022 Academic Catalog [ARCHIVED CATALOG]

ENG 225-01 - Introduction to Postcolonial Literatures

4 credits (Fall)
Postcolonial Literature: Where Aesthetics Meets Politics. Literary critics have often employed the term postcolonial to describe the consequences of occupation during and after colonization. The rise and fall of the British Empire contributed significantly to cultural hybridity, migration, political tension, national sovereignty, and socio-economic inequity that shapes the world as we know it today. Through short lectures, extensive discussion, and intensive writing assignments, we will cover the key concepts and categories used in postcolonial theory to help us investigate the relationship between colonial experience and the content, form, and style of the literature written to understand and comment upon it. Our course will begin by examining texts such as Shakespeare’s The Tempest and Daniel Defeau’s Robinson Crusoe, as a springboard to talk about how modernist and contemporary literature emerged as a product of and response to colonization. We will draw from a range of literary genres, covering work by English, Irish, Caribbean, South Asian, African, Australian, Maori, and Middle Eastern writers.

Prerequisite: ENG 120  or ENG 121  for majors; for non-majors, ENG 120  or ENG 121  or third-year standing. 
Instructor: Sutaria