Global Literary Encounters with Contemporary Writing

About this course

The course examines how contemporary literature crosses cultures, languages, national borders and generations. Participants read extracts from four works of fiction and one memoir, considering global literature as a category and comparing it with comparative, postcolonial and world literature. Sessions combine small-group and whole-group reading and discussion with short presentations introducing authors, literary techniques and theories. Discussion explores migration, trade, digitisation, nationalism, populism, ecological change and cultural exchange, alongside encounters between individuals and communities across different places and periods.

What you'll learn

• Evaluate the usefulness and limitations of global literature as a literary category
• Distinguish between, and examine the overlap among, global, world and comparative literature
• Develop comparative readings of contemporary fiction and memoir using literary and narrative techniques

Is this course right for you?

The course is open to learners at all levels and involves shared reading and discussion in small and whole-group settings. Reading aloud is optional. An interest in contemporary fiction and non-fiction is described as beneficial, while preparation involves reading selected extracts outside class.

Before you go

• All course extracts will be provided by the tutor before or during class.
• Learners are encouraged to obtain and read the set texts in advance, either by buying them or borrowing them from a library.
• The set texts are Sulaiman Addonia’s The Seers, Gurnak Johal’s Saraswati, Priya Hein’s Riambel, Scholastique Mukasonga’s The Barefoot Woman and Youssef Rakha’s The Dissenters.