“Cultural Literacy” Project – Recommended Films and TV Drama Essay

“Cultural Literacy” Project – Recommended Films and TV Drama Essay

Twentieth-Century English Literature

Dept. of Foreign Languages & Literatures, NTU, Spring 2022

Class Time                 Friday, 9:10 a.m. – 12:10 p.m. (periods 2, 3, 4)        

Classroom                 505 Core Subjects Lecture Building (普通教學館)                           

Instructor                   Chun-yen Chen

Office                          155 Gallery of NTU History (校史館)

Office Hours              Monday, 3:00 – 5:00 p.m. (appointment required)

Course Objectives.

This course provides a critical introduction to important twentieth-century English literary works. The course is not intended to be a comprehensive survey; rather, it examines the artistic, philosophical, and political underpinnings of select figures and movements with a view to offering in-depth analysis of specific issues. The course will focus on two things: on the one hand, the modernist writers’ innovative ways of representing the inner truth and outer reality; on the other hand, crucial questions surrounding the historical vicissitudes during the twentieth century, including the impact of wars on the societal and individual psyche, the crisis of personal and collective identity occasioned by cultural or racial clashes, and the repercussions of imperialism and colonial history.

二十世紀的英國文學，展演了至少以下兩大重要發展：一方面，世紀之初幾位現代主義作家革新了文學表現內在與外在真實的方式；另一方面，此時的文學作品也大量反映出，西方殖民主義如何在步上顛峰之後逐步崩壞，卻在前殖民地留下難以磨滅的文化、社會、政治、心理衝擊，其後座力甚至擴及當今世界局勢。本課程內容設計便將環繞這兩大主軸。課程目的除了加深學生對現、當代世界的文化學養，亦冀望訓練學生的分析、思辨能力。

上課方式包括講課與討論：講課部分，授課教師將援引藝術史、通俗文化、哲學及世界史，提供背景資訊；討論部份，則透過全班共同深入閱讀文學文本，掌握作品的主題精髓。其中數週會嚴格要求課前預習。

Course Material.

• Course packet compiled by the instructor. (You may also use any recent edition of The Norton Anthology of English Literature, Volume 2, published by W. W. Norton & Company.)

Course Requirements.

• Preparation, attendance, and class participation. For particular weeks (Weeks 11-15), preparation prior to the class meeting is required. Participation in class discussion is essential. One absence may be allowed without penalty during the semester. Unexcused absence from four classes will result in zero point on the “preparation, attendance, and class participation” part of your final grade. (See “Class Policies” for the definition of “unexcused absence.”) Habitual lateness will also affect your final grade adversely.
• Midterm exam. In-class, closed-book.
• Final exam. Format to be decided.
• “Cultural literacy” project. This assignment is meant to help you gain additional knowledge about the twentieth-century English-speaking world through English-language movies and TV dramas. Watch a movie or drama series on your own, following the instructor’s recommendation list (see below), and write a 300-word response. The response should be word-processed (with a 12-point font, 1.5 times line spacing) and is due on NTU COOL no later than Sunday, Apr. 10, 11:00 p.m.

**For this assignment, focus on the cultural milieu, social debates or the political climate portrayed in the film or drama series. There is no need to consult secondary materials.

**If you opt to watch a TV series, watch 3 episodes minimum.

**You may propose to watch something not on the recommendation list, but please discuss with the instructor first.

 Class Policies.

• If you have to miss a class, there is no need to submit a formal leave request through the university system. You do not need to inform the instructor, either, unless it is for a) a serious illness that drags on for more than two weeks, b) a family emergency, or c) participation in international competitions. Any reason other than these three, albeit legitimate in most cases, is considered “unexcused” for administrative purposes.
• If you have skipped class, you are responsible for obtaining the materials given out in class from your classmates (not from the instructor).
• To prepare for the exams, you may consult secondary materials though you are not required to. Be sure to digest them well, and do not reproduce critics’ remarks verbatim in the tests.
• Do not consult “study guides” such as SparkNotes. They are rife with errors.
• No smartphone while class is in session!
• Plagiarism on the cultural literacy project or cheating on exams will not be tolerated. Plagiarism means drawing on other people’s ideas or words, including information that looks “objective” (such as information on Wikipedia), without proper acknowledgement.

Grade Distribution.

            preparation, attendance, and class participation                     20%

midterm exam                                                                                                     35%

            final exam                                                                                                       35%

            “cultural literacy” project                                                                   10%

**Bonus points for people who finish reading the entirety of Virginia Woolf’s Mrs. Dalloway on their own before the day of the final exam

Class Schedule

WK	Date	Assigned Reading
1	2/18	Introduction to the Course
2	2/25	Ezra Pound, “In a Station of the Metro” William Butler Yeats, “The Second Coming” —, “Sailing to Byzantium”
3	3/4	T. S. Eliot, “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” —, The Waste Land
4	3/11	T. S. Eliot, The Waste Land (cont.)
5	3/18	Virginia Woolf, Mrs. Dalloway
6	3/25	Virginia Woolf, Mrs. Dalloway (cont.)
7	4/1	CULTURAL LITERACY PROJECT   **Response due on NTU COOL by Apr. 10, 11:00 p.m.
8	4/8	Virginia Woolf, Mrs. Dalloway (cont.)
9	4/15	James Joyce, selections from Ulysses
10	4/22	MIDTERM EXAM
11	4/29	[prep required] D. H. Lawrence, “The Horse Dealer’s Daughter”
12	5/6	[prep required] Joseph Conrad, Heart of Darkness
13	5/13	[prep required] Joseph Conrad, Heart of Darkness (cont.)
14	5/20	[prep required] V. S. Naipaul, “One Out of Many”
15	5/27	[prep required] Salman Rushdie, “The Prophet’s Hair”
16	6/3	HOLIDAY
17	6/10	FINAL EXAM

 “Cultural Literacy” Project – Recommended Films and TV Drama

1. All the videos listed here are available either in the Multimedia Center (多媒體服務中心) located in the Main Library or in the Foreign Language Teaching & Resource Center (外語教學暨資源中心).
2. I have requested the Multimedia Center to put items available there on their Reserve Shelf. 公播版 are those materials that are available for individual or group viewing in the Multimedia Center but can’t be checked out. Films that do not have a公播版 may be checked out. Films available at the外教中心 may be watched only in their lab.

Title	Note
A Room with a View (1985, dir. James Ivory) –Adapted from E. M. Forster’s novel. About the Edwardian-era England.
Howards End (1992, dir. James Ivory) –Adapted from E. M. Forster’s novel. About the class issue in the English society in a transition period.	Highly recommended!
A Passage to India (1984, dir. David Lean) –Adaptation of E. M. Forster’s novel. Set in the colonial India in the 1920s.
The Hours (2002, dir. Stephen Daldry) –About Virginia Woolf and other women.
Out of Africa (1985, dir. Sydney Pollack) –Based on a true story, about Europeans in the colonial Africa in the early 20th century. Starring Robert Redford (!!!) and Meryl Streep.
Michael Collins (1999, dir. Neil Jordan) –Based on a true story, about Irish independence movement leader Michael Collins. Starring Liam Neeson and Julia Roberts.
Atonement (2007, dir. Joe Wright) –Set in pre-WWII and wartime Britain. Starring Keira Knightley.
The Remains of the Day (1993, dir. James Ivory) –About the decline of the British empire. Based on Kazuo Ishiguro’s (石黑一雄) novel.	Highly recommended!
Apocalypse Now (1979, dir. Francis Ford Coppola) –Set in the Vietnam War, story inspired by Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness. Very heavy stuff, but a classic in film history.
Downton Abbey (TV drama) (2010-2015, 6 seasons, 52 episodes) –Portrayal of drastic changes confronting the British society in the 1910s and 1920s. Exquisite period drama.	Highly recommended!

“Cultural Literacy” Project – Recommended Films and TV Drama Essay