Course Catalogue

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This course explores the ways in which the writing and art of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries radically expanded the forms and manners in which the world was represented. It considers how Romantic-period societies and cultures portrayed the environments in which they flourished, to which their citizens journeyed and which they sought to link together.  As well as canonical writing by figures like William Wordsworth and Lord Byron, the course draws on materials including visual art, topography, travel accounts, periodicals and collections. It focuses extensively on the resources of the University Library and the Hunterian Museum in order to consider Scotland's distinct relationships with national and international discourses.

10 x 2hr seminars

Standard entry to Masters at College level.

1 x 1,500-word collection-oriented exercise (submitted as a mid-term) - 30%

1 x 3,500-word final essay - 70%

This course aims to:

■ Familiarise students with the historical development of art and literature in the Romantic period, building on any previous experience they may have;

■ Enable students to discern connections between local and global contexts for cultural production in the Romantic period;

■ Encourage students to engage critically with questions of genre, periodicity and canonicity;

■ Introduce students to a wide range of post-1900 criticism of the Romantic period;

■ Introduce students to Glasgow's special collections and museum holdings from the Romantic period.

By the end of this course students will be able to:

■ Analyse relationships between Romantic-period art and writing and the cultural, political, social and imperial history of the period;

■ Critically engage with a range of different cultural genres from all parts of the Romantic period;

■ Articulate connections and contrasts between writers and texts from different parts of Britain and the world in the Romantic period;

■ Use special collections and museum holdings for postgraduate research;

■ Assess a wide range of critical and theoretical approaches to the Romantic period;

■ Frame arguments effectively in speech and in writing at an advanced level.

Students must submit at least 75% by weight of the components (including examinations) of the course's summative assessment.