Welcome

[Massey Albany]

Welcome to 139.750: Contemporary New Zealand Writers in an International Context (Contemporary NZ Writers, for short) at Massey Albany.

This year, 2017, the course will be taught by Dr Jack Ross (course coordinator). Here's what's up about it on the Massey University website:

Paper Number:

139.750

Paper Coordinators:

Dr Jack Ross

Value:

30 credits

Full Title:

Contemporary New Zealand Writers in an International Context

Prescription:

An advanced exploration of contemporary New Zealand fiction and poetry and its relationship to international aesthetic practices, in the context of globalisation and postcoloniality.

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. Relate New Zealand literary texts to international creative influences.


3. Demonstrate the sustained and complex close reading of technical and stylistic innovation in contemporary New Zealand literary texts.


4. Develop written, spoken, and creative forms of critical inquiry as responses to contemporary New Zealand fiction and poetry.

Assessment:

100% internal assessment comprising:

1. 20% - Creative response in a genre of the student’s choice (2000 words or equivalent)
   [learning outcome 4]
   • This assignment is developed in discussion with the paper co-ordinator.


2. 20% - Journal (2,500 words)
   [learning outcomes 1, 2, 3, 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% - Seminar (10 minutes)
   [learning outcomes 2, 3, 4]
   • The intention is that this seminar can be developed more formally in your research essay. Your seminar is regarded as equivalent to 1,000 words of formal written output, but you will be assessed only on the quality of your oral delivery.


4. 40% - Final Assignment (4,000 words)
   [learning outcomes 1, 2, 3, 4]

Description:

The idea of this course is a very straightforward one: to take a few significant contemporary New Zealand writers and look at their work against a background of global trends and ideologies. Each time the course is taught, we examine a different genre. This year (semester 2, 2017), the focus is on poetry and poetics. The plan is to pair off five local poets with five international ones as a means of starting a conversation about some of the larger issues that affect them all: globalization, history, identity, indigeneity and post-colonialism.

The course invites you to see “New Zealand” and “World” literature as interrelated categories. You 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 their international influences.

In addition to this focus on the formal dimensions of texts, the course also hopes to draw you 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 twentieth-century effort to develop an ‘authentic’ local voice.

[New Zealand in the World]