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Semester 1

The Coming of Age Narrative (ELCC08007)

Subject

European Languages and Cultures

College

CAHSS

Credits

20

Normal Year Taken

2

Delivery Session Year

2023/2024

Pre-requisites

**Please see Additional Restrictions below**

Course Summary

The option analyses a range of texts across the corpus (broadly understood) of the 'Coming of Age' Narrative. The course engages with the relevant philosophical, psychological, historical and ethical frameworks that are implicated by an analysis of stories about growing up, self, other, development and environment. All texts will be in English translation.

Course Description

This course examines a selection of writings from a variety of national contexts, and analyses a range of texts across the corpus (broadly understood) of the 'Coming of Age' Narrative. The course explores how writers have responded to the challenge of depicting the complex processes informing how we become who we are, and what we understand to be the rites of passage from childhood through adolescence to adulthood. How do we find 'our voice'? What gets in the way of personal growth, or of us feeling wholly ourselves? What is the impact of nature, nurture, education, language, family, geography, ideology, for example? 'Coming of Age' implies various negotiations of family and society as the individual negotiates a sense of self in relation to others, in the light of existing codes and conventions (for example on sexuality and its norms). Traumatic events occurring in childhood may be shown to have ongoing effects through adolescence and into adulthood. Loss of innocence is frequently depicted in such works, whether at the individual or the collective level. There will be a balance of male and female-authored texts in any one course instance, with consideration of potentially gendered aspects of the genre taken into account as part of the exploration. Readers have enjoyed tales of growing up for centuries, and we will examine a range of modern and contemporary depictions of the journey towards maturity, from the beginnings of the modern novel (Dostoevsky), through the formal experimentations with language and form of the 20th century (by the likes of de Beauvoir, Morante, Perec, or Sarraute). We will explore questions of voice and perspective: who is speaking, from what position, and on behalf of whom? How do they connect the personal, the local, and the global? What political, aesthetic and rhetorical strategies do they employ? We will consider our own positions and experiences as readers, and how we respond to different genres, themes and aesthetic strategies. There is a broad selection of theoretical, secondary sources around the genre of the Coming of Age narrative and its various cultural contexts, which will be presented in the Introductory session, and interrogated throughout the course. Contextual and theoretical considerations will be balanced with close textual analysis. There is a range of possible texts for any one year, and these will alternate depending on availability of staff year to year.

Assessment Information

Written Exam 0%, Coursework 100%, Practical Exam 0%

Additional Restrictions

This course is high-demand, meaning that there is a very high number of students wishing to enrol in a very limited number of spaces. Enrolment is managed by the Visiting Student Office, in line with the quotas allocated by the departments, and all enquiries to enrol in these courses must be made through the CAHSS Visiting Student Office. It is NOT appropriate for students to contact the department directly to request additional spaces.

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