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[Massey Albany]

Paper Number:

139.750

Paper Coordinators:

Dr Mary Paul & Dr Jack Ross

Value:

30 credits

Full Title:

Contemporary New Zealand Writers in an International Context

Prescription:

This course sets contemporary New Zealand fiction and poetry in an international context. The innovations and technical demands of our most challenging writers will be studied with reference to selected international examples. Globalisation and the postcolonial will be addressed as key terms in contemporary cultural debate.

Pre-requisite(s):

Graduate status

Co-requisite(s):

None

Restriction(s):

Albany 139.795 Special Topic in English in 2008

Learning Outcomes:

Students who successfully complete this paper should be able to:

1. Demonstrate an advanced understanding of globalisation and postcoloniality as theories of transnational cultural flows.


2. Place selected New Zealand literary texts within the context of international creative influences.


3. Perform a sustained close reading of a literary text with particular focus on technical and stylistic innovation.


4. Develop written, spoken, and creative responses to course texts and theories at postgraduate level.


5. Develop their own creative writing as a method of critical inquiry.

Assessment:

100% internal assessment comprising:

1. 20% - Creative response in a genre of the student’s choice (up to 1,000 words)
   [learning outcomes 4 and 5]
   • This assignment is developed in discussion with the paper co-ordinators.


2. 20% - Critical journal (up to 3,000 words)
   [learning outcomes 1-4]
   • A series of critical thoughts and reactions to all of the major authors and ideas studied in the course. The journal receives both formative and summative assessment.


3. 20% - Two oral seminars each worth 10% (equivalent to 1,000 words each)
   [learning outcomes 2-4]
   • To ensure coverage of both segments of the course, students are asked to give one seminar on poetry and one on fiction. The intention is that one of the seminars can be developed more formally in the research essay. Each seminar is regarded as equivalent to 1,000 words of formal written output, but (as a general rule) half of this will qualify as drafting for the research essay.


4. 40% - Research essay (up to 4,000 words)
   [learning outcomes 1-4]

Description:

This paper extends, updates, and deepens the introductory approaches to New Zealand literature and postcolonial writing that students receive in their undergraduate papers. Although papers in New Zealand literature are presently listed in the English postgraduate programme, they tend to focus on mid-twentieth century settler writing or ethnic identities rather than contemporary fiction and poetry.

The course invites students to see “New Zealand” and “World” literature as interrelated categories. Students will be challenged to engage with the innovations and technical demands of some of this country’s most demanding local writers in the light of international influences. In addition to this focus on the formal dimensions of texts, the course also draws students into a critical conversation on globalisation and the postcolonial as key terms in cultural theory. This is a timely debate in a period when New Zealand literature has been conceptualised as part of an export culture, in contrast to the predominant mid-century effort to develop an authentic local voice.

The course assessment includes a substantial formative element (the critical journal) as well as a creative component. These assessments are consistent with the principle that informal and creative responses to literature can act as complements to, and preparation for, the more standard academic mode of expository writing.

[New Zealand in the World]