Subjects under this heading are taught by the Centre for Comparative Literature and Cultural Studies or are taught by other departments and made available to students under a centre code. The centre is an interdepartmental and interdisciplinary teaching unit, maintained by the Faculty of Arts, with responsibility for teaching and research in three main areas of work: comparative literature, cultural studies and critical theory.
Comparative literature is the study of literature in ways which go beyond particular national or linguistic boundaries. In practice, comparative literary studies are of two main kinds: substantive studies of the literature of two or more languages or literary cultures; and generalising studies of the literary process itself, for example literary history, the sociology of literature or psychoanalytic approaches to literature. Texts studied in the centre at undergraduate level are all taught in English or in English translation, but knowing a language other than English is helpful, and those students with no exposure to one are strongly encouraged to pick up the study of a language.
Cultural studies is the study of cultural texts, spaces and practices, including texts that are not normally included in the canon of high literature (the texts of popular fiction, television or cinema, for example). These aspects of culture are studied in relation to the various social, historical and other contexts within which cultures manifest themselves.
Critical theory is a term which has come to signify a number of contemporary approaches to textual and cultural theory, for example, hermeneutics, structuralism, semiotics, poststructuralism, theories of ideology, psychoanalytic theory, and so on. Such theories have also been central to, for instance, recent work in anthropology, philosophy, English, performance studies and film studies.
Students enrolled in sequences offered by the centre may combine courses from any of these areas. However the critical theory subjects have a separate code as they are also intended to be available within the sequences of other departments.
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