2017/18 Undergraduate Module Catalogue

ENGL2025 Medieval Literature

20 creditsClass Size: 80

School of English

Module manager: Dr Catherine Batt
Email: c.j.batt@leeds.ac.uk

Taught: Semester 1 (Sep to Jan) View Timetable

Year running 2017/18

Pre-requisite qualifications

Grade B at 'A' Level in English Language or Literature or in a modern language (or the overseas equivalent), or an achieved mark of 56 or above in a Level 1 module in English / IMS, as a tender of ability to cope with Middle English.

Please note: This module is restricted to Level 2 and 3 students. Enrolment priority will be given to Level 2 students for a restricted period (as detailed in the School's Module Handbook).

This module is mutually exclusive with

ENGL2013

The Medieval Renascence: Chaucer, Langland and the 'Gawain'

Module replaces

ENGL2013

This module is approved as a discovery module

Module summary

This module introduces students to the language and literature of medieval England by focusing on three key areas: Old English poetry, Geoffrey Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales, and late medieval drama. Together these offer startling insights into the relationship between writing, performance, and orality; the ways people adapt their pasts to their present; and the power of writing to question and shape the world we live in.We begin with the earliest literature in English, composed as English-speakers first encountered literacy and Christianity and seized this new opportunity to express themselves. Old English riddles, for example, joyously explore how language makes and remakes the world: how can a dismembered animal speak, or a worm destroy human knowledge? What is the squishy thing that rises when a woman rubs it?A few centuries later, Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales bursts on to the literary scene. At first sight a genial social satire, Chaucer’s cavalcade of pilgrims and the stories they tell lead us into a clamour of sharply competing voices, of women and men, rich and poor, contesting authority, memory, history, and meaning.Finally, by plunging into medieval drama, we get to explore the carnivalesque world of popular literature on the eve of the Reformation. We find ourselves laughing at Christ’s Crucifixion—and uncomfortably asking ourselves why. ‘Why are we saved and not them?’ demands Noah’s wife as her friends are seized by the flood. The plays investigate power and social norms, playing out uncomfortable questions about the social and moral order.With two workshops per week, we are able to explore our chosen texts in detail. We will read Old English texts primarily in translation, but also investigate selected passages in the original, and you will have the opportunity if you wish to feed language study into your literary analyses. Students will be able to reflect on fundamental medieval literary topics, including the status of poetry and the poet, humour, subversiveness, gender, orality and literacy, and the relationship between art and life.

Objectives

This module introduces students to the language and literature of medieval England by focusing on three key areas: Old English poetry, Geoffrey Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales, and late medieval drama. Together these offer startling insights into the relationship between writing, performance, and orality; the ways people adapt their pasts to their present; and the power of writing to question and shape the world we live in.

We begin with the earliest literature in English, composed as English-speakers first encountered literacy and Christianity and seized this new opportunity to express themselves. Old English riddles, for example, joyously explore how language makes and remakes the world: how can a dismembered animal speak, or a worm destroy human knowledge? What is the squishy thing that rises when a woman rubs it?

A few centuries later, Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales bursts on to the literary scene. At first sight a genial social satire, Chaucer’s cavalcade of pilgrims and the stories they tell lead us into a clamour of sharply competing voices, of women and men, rich and poor, contesting authority, memory, history, and meaning.

Finally, by plunging into medieval drama, we get to explore the carnivalesque world of popular literature on the eve of the Reformation. We find ourselves laughing at Christ’s Crucifixion—and uncomfortably asking ourselves why. ‘Why are we saved and not them?’ demands Noah’s wife as her friends are seized by the flood. The plays investigate power and social norms, playing out uncomfortable questions about the social and moral order.

With two workshops per week, we are able to explore our chosen texts in detail. We will read Old English texts primarily in translation, but also investigate selected passages in the original, and you will have the opportunity if you wish to feed language study into your literary analyses. Students will be able to reflect on fundamental medieval literary topics, including the status of poetry and the poet, humour, subversiveness, gender, orality and literacy, and the relationship between art and life.

Learning outcomes
Skills outcomes and Graduate Attributes

In terms of Academic Excellence this module develops critical thinking, flexibility of thought and analytical skills. It supports and develops the ability to work autonomously, initiative, planning and organisational skills. Students will learn to analyse information, synthesise views and make connections; students will be critically aware of, and be informed by, current knowledge; and will develop research skills. In short:

- Skills for effective communication, oral and written.
- Capacity to analyse and critically examine diverse forms of discourse.
- Ability to acquire quantities of complex information of diverse kinds in a structured and systematic way.
- Capacity for independent thought and judgement.
- Critical reasoning.
- Research skills, including information retrieval skills, the organisation of material, and the evaluation of its importance.
- IT skills.
- Time management and organisational skills.
- Independent learning.

Skills outcomes
Skills for effective communication, oral and written.
Capacity to analyse and critically examine diverse forms of discourse.
Ability to acquire quantities of complex information of diverse kinds in a structured and systematic way.
Capacity for independent thought and judgement.
Critical reasoning.
Research skills, including information retrieval skills, the organisation of material, and the evaluation of its importance.
IT skills.
Time management and organisational skills.
Independent learning.

Syllabus

This module introduces students to the language and literature of medieval England by focusing on three key areas: Old English poetry, Geoffrey Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales, and late medieval drama. Together these offer startling insights into the relationship between writing, performance, and orality; the ways people adapt their pasts to their present; and the power of writing to question and shape the world we live in.

We begin with the earliest literature in English, composed as English-speakers first encountered literacy and Christianity and seized this new opportunity to express themselves. Old English riddles, for example, joyously explore how language makes and remakes the world: how can a dismembered animal speak, or a worm destroy human knowledge? What is the squishy thing that rises when a woman rubs it?

A few centuries later, Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales bursts on to the literary scene. At first sight a genial social satire, Chaucer’s cavalcade of pilgrims and the stories they tell lead us into a clamour of sharply competing voices, of women and men, rich and poor, contesting authority, memory, history, and meaning.

Finally, by plunging into medieval drama, we get to explore the carnivalesque world of popular literature on the eve of the Reformation. We find ourselves laughing at Christ’s Crucifixion—and uncomfortably asking ourselves why. ‘Why are we saved and not them?’ demands Noah’s wife as her friends are seized by the flood. The plays investigate power and social norms, playing out uncomfortable questions about the social and moral order.

With two workshops per week, we are able to explore our chosen texts in detail. We will read Old English texts primarily in translation, but also investigate selected passages in the original, and you will have the opportunity if you wish to feed language study into your literary analyses. Students will be able to reflect on fundamental medieval literary topics, including the status of poetry and the poet, humour, subversiveness, gender, orality and literacy, and the relationship between art and life.

Teaching methods

Delivery type	Number	Length hours	Student hours
Workshop	20	1.00	20.00
Lecture	11	1.00	11.00
Private study hours			169.00
Total Contact hours			31.00
Total hours (100hr per 10 credits)			200.00

Private study

Seminar preparation, reading, essay writing.

Opportunities for Formative Feedback

Contribution to seminars.
Submission of assessed work.

Methods of assessment

Coursework

Assessment type	Notes	% of formal assessment
Essay	2,750 word essay	66.70
Essay	1,700 word commentary. Students must submit/sit and pass both elements. Students who fail either element (even as a result of penalties) will have to resit the failed element in order to pass the module.	33.30
Total percentage (Assessment Coursework)		100.00

Students must submit/sit and pass both elements. Students who fail either element (even as a result of penalties) will have to resit the failed element in order to pass the module.

Reading list

The reading list is available from the Library website

Last updated: 28/07/2017

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