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Victorian Literature

Code: 106298 ECTS Credits: 6
2024/2025
Degree Type Year
2504212 English Studies OB 2

Contact

Name:
David Owen
Email:
david.owen@uab.cat

Teachers

Francesca Blanch Serrat
Xiana Vazquez Bouzo
Anna Casablancas Cervantes
(External) David Owen

Teaching groups languages

You can view this information at the end of this document.


Prerequisites

  • In order to take this course, it is highly recommended that students have passed the first-year subject Introduction to English Literature and the second-year subject Literature of British Romanticism.
  • Language level required: C2 of the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages: Learning, Teaching, Assessment. 
  • The competences acquired in the first-year subject Cultural History of the British Isles should be kept in mind.

Objectives and Contextualisation

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE SUBJECT

"Victorian Literature" offers an introduction to the fiction published in the United Kingdom during the reign of Queen Victoria (1837-1901) by reading, analysis, debate and through the critical interpretation of four texts.

This compulsory subject trains students, above all, in reading and interpreting a selection of texts. The training offered is essential to follow all subsequent English Literature subjects.

On completion of "Victorian Literature", students will be able to:

  • Demonstrate a solid reading comprehension of Victorian literary fiction
  • Produce basic literary criticism (academic papers with secondary sources)
  • Use the resources of any university library in relation to Victorian Literature
  • Express an informed assessment of the Victorian literary texts that have been studied

Competences

  • Apply scientific ethical principles to information processing.
  • Apply the methodology of analysis and critical concepts to analysing the literature, culture and history of English-speaking countries.
  • Identify and analyse the main currents, genres, works and authors in English and comparative literature.
  • Students must be capable of communicating information, ideas, problems and solutions to both specialised and non-specialised audiences.
  • Students must have and understand knowledge of an area of study built on the basis of general secondary education, and while it relies on some advanced textbooks it also includes some aspects coming from the forefront of its field of study.
  • Take sex- or gender-based inequalities into consideration when operating within one's own area of knowledge. 
  • Understand and produce written and spoken academic texts in English at advanced higher-proficient-user level (C2).
  • Use current philological methodologies to interpret literary texts in English and their cultural and historical context.
  • Use digital tools and specific documentary sources for the collection and organisation of information.
  • Use written and spoken English for academic and professional purposes, related to the study of linguistics, the philosophy of language, history, English culture and literature.

Learning Outcomes

  1. Analyse and interpret (at a basic level) literary texts in English of the nineteenth century.
  2. Assess how stereotypes and gender roles are present in literary texts of British Romanticism and the Victorian period.
  3. Conduct bibliographic searches of secondary sources related to nineteenth-century Literature using digital technologies.
  4. Correctly contextualise literary texts in English of the nineteenth century in their corresponding historical and cultural environment.
  5. Correctly contextualise nineteenth-century literary texts in English within the History of English Literature.
  6. Demonstrate a solid knowledge of subjects related to the study of Literature and Culture in general.
  7. Demonstrate understanding of a wide range of nineteenth-century literary texts in English and recognise implicit meaning.
  8. Distinguish principal ideas from secondary ideas and synthesise the contents of literary texts of the nineteenth century.
  9. Express oneself effectively by applying argumentative and textual procedures in formal and scientific texts, in the language studied.
  10. Express oneself in English orally and in writing in an academic register and using appropriate terminology in relation to the study of nineteenth-century literature.
  11. Incorporate ideas and concepts from published sources into work, citing and referencing appropriately.
  12. Integrate secondary sources related to nineteenth-century Literature in the production of basic academic criticism.
  13. Locate and organise relevant English-language information available on the internet, databases and libraries, and apply this to work and/or research environments.
  14. Make oral presentations in English of academic content on topics related to nineteenth-century literary texts in English.
  15. Participate in face-to-face and virtual discussions in English on topics related to nineteenth-century literary texts in English.
  16. Write argumentative essays (C2) of medium length and produce textual commentaries in English on topics related to nineteenth-century literary texts in English.

Content

  • UNIT 1 – Reading The Tenant of Wildfell Hall (1847) by Anne Brontë. The 1840s–1850s
  • UNIT 2 – Reading Great Expectations by Charles Dickens. The 1860s–1870s
  • UNIT 3 – Reading King Solomon’s Mines (1885) by H. Rider Haggard. The 1880s
  • UNIT 4 – Reading Dracula (1898) by Bram Stoker. The 1890s

Activities and Methodology

Title Hours ECTS Learning Outcomes
Type: Directed      
Classroom interaction 20 0.8 1, 2, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 14, 15
Lectures 30 1.2 2, 4, 5, 6, 7, 14, 15
Type: Supervised      
Other assesment activities (classroom participation, exam) 25 1 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16
Type: Autonomous      
Personal study 15 0.6 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 13
Reading 35 1.4 4, 5, 7, 11, 13, 16

1 credit ECTS = 25 hours > 6 credits = 150 hours

Please, note: in one of the sessions/lectures establised by the calendar of each centre/degree, 15 minutes will be used for students to fill in the surveys to assess teacher's performance and the assesment system of the subject

Students are strongly advised to take the online UAB Library courses (https://www.uab.cat/web/que-oferim/cursos-de-formacio-1345708785493.html) referred to the search for information.

 

Annotation: Within the schedule set by the centre or degree programme, 15 minutes of one class will be reserved for students to evaluate their lecturers and their courses or modules through questionnaires.


Assessment

Continous Assessment Activities

Title Weighting Hours ECTS Learning Outcomes
Class Participation 10% 4 0.16 1, 2, 7, 9, 10, 14, 15
Class participaction 50% 17 0.68 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 16
Exams/Exercises 40% 4 0.16 1, 2, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 14, 15, 16

ASSESSMENT

The assessment for this subject is based on:

  • 1 essay on  Dickens' Great Expectations (1500 words, at least three secondary sources): 50% [Submission date for this assignment will be confirmed at the beginning of the course]
  • 2 exams in class: 40%
    • exam on the novel by Anne Brontë: 20% (1 question, c. 350-500 words). At the end of Unit 1.
    • exam on the novels by H. Rider Haggard and Bram Stoker: 20% (2 questions, approx. 350-500 words/question). At the end of Unit 4.
  • Participation in the classroom debates both the face-to-face and virtual 10% (self-assessment); students are expected to attend class regularly.

The student's level of English will be taken into account when grading the three assessment activities.

Single assessment

Single assessment consists of the following activities, which will take place on a single day in early June (week 15 or 16):

  • Delivery of 1 essay on Dickens' Great Expectations (1500 words, at least three secondary sources): 50%
  • Classroom exam: three questions (350-500 words) about the novels of Anne Brontë, H. Rider Haggard and Bram Stoker 50%

Guidelines on essay writing, formatting and citation, as well as other information, are available on Virtual Campus.

  • Review procedure
  • After each assessment activity (or in the case of single assessment after all of them), the teacher will inform the student of the procedures to be followed for reviewing all grades awarded, as well as the date on which this review will take place.
  • The student has the right to review the work presented in a personal tutorial with the teacher, on the established dates, never later than two weeks after the qualification of the exercise/exam, including re-assessment. Students forfeit this right if they do not collect the exercise/exam within the period announced by the teacher.
  • Re-assessment procedure (continuous and single assessment)
  • Re-assessment cannot be taken if the subject has been passed (it cannot be used to obtain a higher grade).
  • The student must have a minimum grade of 3.5 (maximum 4.8).
  • It is mandatory to have submitted all the assessment exercises.
  • The re-assessment exam will consist of a two-hour written exam on issues related to the subject, or an equivalent exercise.
  • The exam or equivalent exercise is graded with a simple pass / fail. If the re-assessment exam is passed, the final grade of the course will be 5.0.
  • The date and place of the exam or delivery of the equivalent exercise will be published by the faculty.
  • The student who can present a medical justification may choose to take this exam, or equivalent exercise, on a day and time agreed with the teaching staff.

VERY IMPORTANT

  • READING: You must read the compulsory works of the course. Any indication that the student has not completed their reading can affect the assessment negatively and result in a fail.
  • PLAGIARISM: In case of plagiarism in an assessment activity, the student will be graded with a zero in that activity, regardless of any other disciplinary process that may take place. In case of new plagiarism, the student will receive a zero as the final grade of the subject. Plagiarism consists of copying texts from unrecognized sources and presenting them as one's own. It includes cutting and pasting unrecognized internet sources, presented unmodified in the student's text. The intellectual property of authors must be respected,always identifying the sources they can use; You must also be responsible for the originality and authenticity of the works delivered. 
  • MISUSE OF INTELLECTUAL TOOLS ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE: authorship of the exercises submitted must always be 100% by the student; exercises in which the use of digital tools are used to alter the student's original production will result in a fail, with the exception of online dictionaries and the tools in Word (excluding automatic translation).

Bibliography

OBLIGATORY READING

Please note: YOU NEED TO PURCHASE THE BOOKS BEFORE THE COURSE BEGINS

DO NOT use electronic editions or Project Gutenberg

 

GENERAL INTRODUCTION TO THE VICTORIAN AGE

Moran, Maureen. Victorian Literature and Culture (Introductions to British Literature and Culture). London: Continuum, 2006 (2009).

You may buy this from:

http://www.bookdepository.co.uk/book/9780826488848/Victorian-Literature-and-Culture


UNIT 1

The Tenant of Wildfell Hall (1847) Anne Brontë

Oxford World’s Classics edition

- Other recommendations:

Emily Brontë, Wuthering Heights

Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

 

UNIT 2

Great Expectations (1860), Charles Dickens

Oxford World’s Classics edition

- Other recommendations:

Charles Dickens, Oliver Twist

Elizabeth Gaskell, North and South

 

UNIT 3

King Solomon’s Mines (1885), Henry Rider Haggard

Penguin Classics

- Other recommendations:

Robert Louis Stevenson, Treasure Island

George MacDonald, The Princess and the Goblin

Henry Rider Haggard, She, a History of Adventure

 

UNIT 4

Dracula (1898), Bram Stoker

Oxford World’s Classics edition

- Other recommendations:

Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray

Joseph Conrad, Heart of Darkness

Herbert George Wells, The War of the Worlds

 

Webs

-          The Victorian Web, http://www.victorianweb.org/

-          Voice of the Shuttle: http://vos.ucsb.edu/index.asp

-          BUB Link: English Literature General: http://bubl.ac.uk/Link/e/englishliterature-general.htm


Software

There are no specific programmes for this course.


Language list

Name Group Language Semester Turn
(PAUL) Classroom practices 1 English second semester morning-mixed
(PAUL) Classroom practices 2 English second semester morning-mixed
(TE) Theory 1 English second semester morning-mixed
(TE) Theory 2 English second semester morning-mixed