C O U R S E S A N D C R E D I T S

All Seminar students are required to enroll in one Major Course, a four-credit course that runs for the full six weeks of the Seminar. In addition, Seminar students may enroll in a three-credit Optional Course that runs for four weeks. In completing their applications to the Seminar, students should indicate their first three preferences for a Major Course (Category A) and for an Optional Course (Category B). Descriptions of all courses offered in these two categories are provided below.

Seminar students are also welcome to enroll in the Seminar Colloquium, a one-credit, pass/fail course titled British Studies. It involves attending the Tuesday evening lecture series on British culture (literature, architecture, and social and political history). Students interested in this course should check the appropriate space on their applications.

Applicants should also note the following:

Once accepted, all students must sign a Condition of Membership form in order to enroll in classes. No changes in course enrollments may be made after May 1. Reading lists for courses are sometimes provided to students several weeks prior to the Seminar's opening, and their instructors may expect students to complete some reading prior to the start of the Seminar.

The three-credit Optional Courses are usually offered during the first four weeks of the Seminar, leaving students time in the final two weeks to concentrate on the conclusion of their six-week Major Course.

Course load: Most students can comfortably complete one Major Course, one Optional Course, and the Seminar Colloqium during the six-week period. Applicants should note, however, that completing eight academic credits in six weeks requires some prudent management of time. Those students who plan extensive weekend travel while the program is in session should keep this in mind.

All courses award University of Massachusetts Amherst academic credit in the Department of English. Applicants should ascertain, prior to enrolling, that their home department and home institution will transfer these academic credits awarded by the University of Massachusetts Amherst.

Grades awarded by the university use the following scale: A (4.0), A- (3.7), B+ (3.3), B (3.0), B-(2.7), C+(2.3), C (2.0), C- (1.7), D+ (1.3), D (1.0), and F (0). The University of Massachusetts Amherst is fully accredited by the New England Association of Schools and Colleges.


Upon completion of their courses, students will receive both a grade and a written assessment of their work by their tutors. One copy of the assessment is kept by the Seminar; the other is given to the student.

Transcripts of grades and credits earned become a part of the University of Massachusetts’s permanent record. Requests for transcripts should be sent to: Transcript Office, Division of Continuing Education, Suite 201, 100 Venture Way, Hadley, MA 01035, tel. (413) 545-3653. There is a $5 fee for each transcript.

Category A
MAJOR COURSES
(These are four-credit, six-week courses and every Seminar participant
is required to enroll in one)

**Each Category A course is the equivalent of a 300-level class

Romance Literature
Ralph Hanna
The literary term 'romance' covers a multitude of sins. It is the grounding of many popular literary forms—from soap operas to Harlequin romances (and thus we look at a few films that embody romance themes and techniques). But it is, equally, a distinct, if rather amorphous, literary method, one equally adaptable to knights on quest, dramatic studies of lost women, and novels of young men seeking success. This course explores some of its many possible variations and assesses why this mode of writing has proved so resilient. Readings are drawn from: Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, Shakespeare's The Winter's Tale, Dickens's Great Expectations, Tennyson's Idylls of the King, and Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings. Films to be viewed may include Excalibur, Shane, and The Maltese Falcon. (Satisfies an Upper Level Elective requirement for the English major.)

Reading Jane Austen
Clare Connors
There are different Austens for different readers. Some are charmed by her wit, by her heroes and heroines, and by her capacity to write some of the greatest love stories of all time. Others view Austen as the reactionary or at least conservative voice of early nineteenth-century Tory Britain. And still others see her as dangerously subversive of the politics, manners, and mores she depicts. This course will not promote any one Austen, but, through a close exploration of each of her six major novels, we will attempt, like Elizabeth Bennet, to suspend our prejudices and sift the textual evidence, before coming to an opinion. (Satisfies an Upper Division Elective requirement for the English major.)

During your six weeks in Oxford, we will explore key Austen themes, such as love, marriage, money, morality, and sense and sensibility, relating them to their contexts within Regency Britain, and also within Enlightenment and Romantic literary traditions. More importantly, perhaps, we will scrutinize closely the linguistic texture of the novels, discussing how Austen’s famous irony works and focusing on her subtle use of free indirect speech. Since Austen is often discussed in terms of a history of 'women's writing', we will take some time to consider feminist readings of Austen's work, and relate her novels to the issues facing women in early nineteenth-century England.

Modern Irish Literature: Texts and Contexts
Lydia Rainford
Since the end of the nineteenth century, Ireland has produced some of the most significant and stylistically innovative writers of literature in English, and yet many of these writers have been dissenters who chose to live and work abroad. Such voluntary exile can be explained, at least in part, as an attempt to escape religious and political pressures at home, and to make possible a freer reflection through their art upon Ireland's troubled and often violent history and culture. This course will examine a range of seminal literary texts in relation to the social, political, and religious contexts from which they emerged and against which they stand as acts of both exploration and resistance. The works to be studied will be drawn from various genres and periods and will include J. M. Synge's The Playboy of the Western World (1907), James Joyce's Dubliners (1914), W. B. Yeats's The Tower (1922) and other poems, Sean O’Casey’s Juno and the Paycock (1925), Samuel Beckett's Waiting for Godot (first London production, 1955), and selected poems by Seamus Heaney and Eavan Boland. Themes to be considered will include the relation of art to nature and to politics, sexuality and religion, exile and national identity, and the potentially subversive power of comedy.

Shakespeare in Love
Sarah Poynting
In this course we shall be looking both at what Shakespeare wrote about love and at how this has been interpreted and reworked by modern directors and film-makers. We shall read two tragedies (Romeo and Juliet and Othello), two romantic comedies (Much Ado About Nothing and Twelfth Night), and a range of Shakespeare’s poetry: love, desire and sex in their many and varied guises—young, mature, interracial, homoerotic—are put under the spotlight. Close textual analysis will be accompanied by consideration of plays in performance (watched on DVD), from those like Trevor Nunn’s Othello, a record of a magnificent stage production, and reasonably faithful cinema adaptations (Nunn’s Twelfth Night, Branagh’s Much Ado), through Baz Luhrmann’s less faithful but more genuinely cinematic William Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, to modern rewritings such as the BBC’s ‘Shakespeare Re-Told’ Much Ado, which features Benedick and Beatrice as TV news anchors. Of course, Shakespeare’s own love-life has also been the subject of film-makers’ interest, and novelist William Boyd’s A Waste of Shame (on the writing of the sonnets) and Shakespeare in Love itself are not only entertaining, but revealing of the differences between approaches both to love and to the nature of the literary imagination in the Shakespearean and modern worlds. Why do we want the sonnets to be about real people and situations? Why are some people uncomfortable with the idea that Shakespeare took his plots from other literary works.

And just why did the Doctor think fify-seven academics would punch the air in The Shakespeare Code…

The Literary Makings of the Modern Self
Valentine Cunningham
What makes you, you? This course will involve an inspection of a group of major texts, key examples of writing across the tradition of English literature from the Renaissance to the present day, all preoccupied with issues of modern selfhood:

• William Shakespeare, Hamlet (1601), a foundational text for western self-consciousness
  
• Daniel Defoe, Robinson Crusoe (1720), a key to Protestant individualism
  
• George Eliot, The Mill on the Floss (1860), a major nineteenth-century case of emerging, conflictual female being
  
• Samuel Beckett, Waiting for Godot (1948), a seminal work of modern consciousness
  
• Martin Amis, Money: A Suicide Note (1986), whose hero is John Self.

(Satisfies an Upper Division Elective requirement for the English major.)

History of the English Language
Simon Horobin
Why do we write knight but pronounce it nite, why is the plural of ‘ox’ oxen not oxes, why does English have just one second person pronoun, ‘you’, when most other languages have two? Why do Americans say dove not dived, write color not colour, and wear pants rather than trousers? Understanding the structure and varieties of English today requires a knowledge of its history and development. This course will introduce students to the history of the language from its Germanic roots to its present-day manifestations. By examining a range of Old, Middle and Early Modern English texts students will study how the language has changed and why these changes have occurred. As well as providing students with an overview of the English language and its history, this course will also consider developments in literary language and will thus be of use to students wanting to develop their skills in literary analysis. (Satisfies an Upper Division Elective requirement for the English major.)

Introduction to International Law
Jillaine Seymour
The end of the Cold War brought new challenges for, and new expectations of, international law. Recent terrorist attacks have raised, in stark form, questions about the potential and limitations of law in establishing and maintaining world order. The law surrounding the uses of force is, of course, one of the most significant areas of international law, but recent years have also seen important developments in other key areas, particularly the preservation of the environment and the protection of human rights. This course will introduce the foundations of public international law. In light of these key areas, we will question whether international law can truly be termed law and whether it can hope to provide a realistic solution to the problems facing the world today. The course will interest not only those contemplating a career in law and who would like an introduction to legal reasoning via a fascinating and accessible area of the law; but also those who are considering careers in foreign affairs, politics or the media. No prior legal knowledge will be assumed.

Modern Political Thought
Reading of selected political theorists from 16th to 19th centuries. Full description forthcoming.

Graduate Study
For graduate students, six weeks at Oxford University can offer excellent opportunities for guided research and study. All graduate students enrolled in the Seminar will receive the same accommodations and amenities that are offered to undergraduates. Graduate applicants should contact the Seminar Director concerning academic opportunities available to them.

Category B
Optional Courses
(These are three-credit, four-week seminar courses.)

**Each Category B course is the equivalent of a 200-level class

British Detective Fiction
Sally Bayley
This course will include a representative sampling of texts from the classical age of British detective fiction to present-day offerings. Students will conduct trans-historical comparisons of novels and be encouraged to make connections between the texts and events and attitudes in the world at large. Authors whose works will be read include: Charles Dickens, Wilkie Collins, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, G. K. Chesterton, Dorothy Sayers, Agatha Christie, Margery Allingham, A. A. Milne, Michael Innes, Julian Symons, P. D. James, Anne Perry, A. S. Byatt, Iain Pears, and Ian Rankin. A selection of recommended secondary texts and commentaries will also be provided.

British Perspectives on the American Revolution
Andrew Beaumont
The American War for Independence is often viewed as a war against tyranny. Certainly at the time many Americans viewed Britain as a nation governed by a tyrannical king advised by evil counselors. This course examines the validity of that view by looking at British government policy, the opposition's response, and public reaction to the colonies' struggle for independence. This course will examine the relationships among the Crown, Parliament, and the public sphere, as well as the historical debate over the importance of public opinion in the 1770s. Students will examine and discuss pamphlets, prints, newspapers, and parliamentary debates of the day. By the end of the course, students will be able to analyze how documents have been interpreted by historians, thus putting the subject into an historical context. Students should be able to gain a fresh perspective on the debates concerning the Anglo-American relationship at the time.

British Politics: 1979-Present
Richard Coggins
British politics from 1980 to the present provide an eclectic collection of issues. The phenomenon of Margaret Thatcher and "Thatcherism" overshadows the period because it represents the breaking of the post World War II consensus and the attempt, partially successful, to impose another paradigm. There is also the thread connecting Thatcherism to New Labour—the latter could not have existed without the former, and Labour's Tony Blair is, at least partially, the heir to the Tories' Margaret Thatcher. Mrs. Thatcher's career also raises interesting questions about the role of women in British politics and society, in some ways changing rapidly, in other ways strangely static. Another interesting theme of this era includes the cultural, as well as political, crisis of the left, the evolution of a multi-cultural society and its impact on politics, the decline of manufacturing and industrial unionism, the accelerated decline of deference, and the impact of changes in social attitudes and ways of organizing family life. There is the rise of the environmental movement and, of course, the persistent issue of Northern Ireland.

Oxford, The City as a Work of Art
Helena Chance
This course will examine the University of Oxford’s role as patron of British art, architecture, and design from the thirteenth century to the present day. Using the wealth of resources available in Oxford – university and college buildings, museums, galleries, and private collections, students will be introduced through lectures and guided tours to key themes in the history of art, architecture, and design – medieval and gothic, renaissance, classical and modern. Within these broader themes, a variety of topics will be covered, including the role of architecture in shaping the University’s identity, the art and craft of stained glass and sculpture and the University’s collections of paintings including those by Turner and the Pre-Raphaelites. Teaching will be through lectures and discussions, as students will be required to participate actively in analyses of the artifacts studied. Students will be encouraged to choose their own subjects for written work from the topics studied, under the direction of the tutor. No previous experience with art and architectural studies is expected or required but the course will also suit those with prior knowledge, as they will be introduced to new perspectives.

Writing Workshop II: Prose Fiction
Clare Morgan
This course will focus on writing prose fiction, particularly shorter pieces like short stories or chapters in larger fictional works; it may also include some scriptwriting for television, radio or theatre. Working with the guidance of a published author, students may be asked to propose specific topics, plots or media formats they plan to write about and may be asked to submit a writing sample before the course begins.

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