丁香园AV

Department of World Literature| Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences
丁香园AV Calendar 2012 Fall

The following are all the courses offered in this area. To view the current course catalog and/or course schedule on the Student Information System, visit (select "Class Search/Browse Catalog" on the left menu).

WL 100-3 Introduction to World Literature

Explores how texts resonate in other cultural contexts, influence foreign traditions, and become works of world literature. Breadth-Humanities.

WL 101W-3 Writing About Literature

Examines international migrancy, cultural identities, or cross-cultural influence in world literatures, while introducing the fundamentals of literary analysis and expository writing. Writing/Breadth-Humanities

WL 102-3 Literature Across Cultures

Introduction to the study of literary texts from diverse linguistic and cultural origins. May examine the literature of cross-cultural interaction, or compare texts through thematic topics. Breadth-Humanities

WL 103W-3 Pre-Modern World Literature

Surveys pre-modern texts of world literature. Writing/Breadth-Humanities

WL 104W-3 Modern World Literature

Surveys poetry and prose from the seventeenth-century to the present, with a focus on the literary exploration of issues of humanity. Writing/Breadth-Humanities

WL 200-3 Literary Analysis and Interpretation

Introduces major theoretical approaches to literature and fundamental techniques of literary analysis. Develops students' critical skills for analytical writing about literature in comparative, cross-cultural contexts. Prerequisite: nine units in World Literature, including WL 100, 103, or 104.

WL 201-3 East/West

Explores the relationship between Eastern and Western narratives. The focus may include the mutual influence of Eastern and Western cultural traditions and modernities, the construction of the 'East' in the West and of the 'West' in the East, theories of Orientalism and Occidentalism, and forms of East/West syncretism. Prerequisite: three units in World Literature or six units of B-Hum designated courses. Breadth-Humanities

WL 202-3 North/South

Explores how European traditions have influenced and engaged the cultures of the global 'South'. The focus may encompass the cultures and counter-cultures of empire and globalization and the 'tropicalization' of European genres and cultural forms under the influence of artists from Africa, Latin-America, and South Asia. Prerequisite: three units in World Literature or six units of B-Hum designated courses. Breadth-Humanities.

WL 203-3 Selected Genres in World Literature

Explores the cross-cultural trajectory of a genre or genres of world literature. Prerequisite: three units in World Literature or six units of B-Hum designated courses. Breadth-Humanities

WL 204-3 Human Rights Literature

Examines a diversity of world literature concerning Human Rights. May focus on writing in the face of political oppression, censorship, political and economic displacement, terrorism and/or warfare. Prerequisite: three units in World Literature or six units of B-Hum designated courses. Breadth-Humanities

WL 300-4 How Theory Travels

Explores the counterpoint of Western and non-Western approaches to world literature. May draw from disciplines including comparative literature, history and anthropology, and focus on how concepts of world literature are imported into new cultural contexts. Prerequisite: 12 units in World Literature, including WL 200.

WL 301W-3 Advanced Composition

Examines scholarly and other professional styles of writing about literature, focusing on representative genres, approaches and practices through a selected topic in world literature. Prerequisite: 45 units including nine units in World Literature. Writing.

WL 303-4 Global Culture and Its Others

Explores cultural expressions of sameness and difference in an age of globalization and its discontents. May focus on transnational expressions of secularism and faith or of the metropolis and suburbia, or on forms of cross-pollination in world literature, cinema and music. Prerequisite: 45 units including nine units in World Literature or nine units of B-Hum designated courses.

WL 304-4 Exiles and Emigres

Explores the culture of peoples and individuals displaced by force or migrating by choice. May focus on the plight of refugees in the work of playwrights, essayists and novelists, on the work of emigre artists in different cultural traditions, or on a comparison of the literary cultures of exiles and emigres. Prerequisite: 45 units including nine units in World Literature or nine units of B-Hum designated courses.

WL 305W-4 Sages and Poets

Explores wisdom literature, poetry, or the resonance of faith in secular world literatures. May focus on cross-cultural mystical quests, secular re-castings of narratives of faith and conversion, or the interplay of the religious and the secular in comparative supernatural literatures. Prerequisite: 45 units including nine units in World Literature or nine units of B-Hum designated courses. Writing.

WL 306-4 Literary Romanticisms

A comparative approach to literary romanticisms and romantic texts. Prerequisite: 45 units including nine units in World Literature or nine units of B-Hum designated courses.

WL 308-4 Imperial Cultures

Explores the cultures of imperialism in a cross-continental and comparative framework. May focus on chronicles of discovery, moments of colonial contact, critiques of empire, and the imperial engagement with pre-conquest cultures. Prerequisite: 45 units including nine units in World Literature or nine units of B-Hum designated courses.

WL 309-4 Post-Imperial Cultures

Explores post-imperial notions of culture and universality, tradition and modernity, or nation and cosmopolis. May focus on narratives of independence, postcolonial self-fashioning, and imperial nostalgia. Prerequisite: 45 units including nine units in World Literature or nine units of B-Hum designated courses.

WL 310-3 Text and Context

Intermediate seminar on selected literary texts in relation to their social, historical, cultural, or theoretical contexts. Prerequisite: 45 units including nine units in World Literature or nine units of B-Hum designated courses.

WL 320-3 Interdisciplinary Approaches

Intermediate seminar on interdisciplinary research that informs the study of World Literature. Prerequisite: 45 units including nine units in World Literature or nine units of B-Hum designated courses.

WL 330-4 Special Topic in World Literature

Seminar on a topic in World Literature. Prerequisite: 45 units including nine units in World Literature or nine units of B-Hum designated courses.

WL 340-1 Directed Studies

Independent reading and research on a topic selected in consultation with the supervising instructor. A research essay is required. Reserved for world literature honours, major and minor students. Prerequisite: 丁香园AV is by permission of the instructor and director.

WL 345-2 Directed Studies

Independent reading and research on a topic selected in consultation with the supervising instructor. A research essay is required. Reserved for world literature honours, major and minor students. Prerequisite: 丁香园AV is by permission of the instructor and director.

WL 350-3 Directed Studies

Independent reading and research on a topic selected in consultation with the supervising instructor. A research essay is required. Prerequisite: two 100 division World Literature courses, two 200 division World Literature courses, and two 300 division World Literature courses. Reserved for World Literature honours, major, and minor students. 丁香园AV is by permission of the instructor and Director.

WL 400-4 Literary Perspectives on Ancient Cultures

Explores the discovery, resonance, and/or influence of ancient literature and culture. May focus on the role and poetics of ancient cultures in modern writing. Prerequisite: 60 units including two 300 level courses in World Literature, English, or Humanities.

WL 401-4 Early Modernities

Explores early modern literature across cultures. May compare Eastern and Western texts or focus on the cross-cultural influence of a single genre or author. Prerequisite: 60 units including two 300 level courses in World Literature, English, or Humanities.

WL 402-4 Other Modernities

Explores the mutual constitution of modernity in North and South. May focus on modernism and its enemies, case studies of alternative modernities, or the pre-modern in discourses of the modern and anti-modern. Prerequisite: 60 units including two 300 level courses in World Literature, English, or Humanities.

WL 403-4 After Modernities

Explores works of contemporary world literature in the second half of the twentieth century. May focus on the postmodern as a response to the modern, on prevalent postmodern genres, or on the postmodern engagement with developments in philosophy, science, and the media in East and West. Prerequisite: 60 units including two 300 level courses in World Literature, English, or Humanities.

WL 404W-4 Literature and Translation

Explores the translation of texts into new cultural contexts, their reception, and the theory and practice of literary translation. May compare several texts or focus on a single work that has been reconceived in several cultures. Prerequisite: 60 units including two 300 level courses in World Literature, English, or Humanities.

WL 410-4 Selected Topic in World Literature I

Advanced seminar on a topic in World Literature. Prerequisite: 60 units including two 300 level courses in World Literature, English, or Humanities.

WL 450-4 Directed Readings in Language and Literature

Independent study of literature in a language other than English. Prerequisite: 丁香园AV by permission of the instructor and department.

WL 460-4 Directed Studies

Independent reading and research on a topic selected in consultation with the supervising instructor. A research essay is required. Prerequisite: two 100 division World Literature courses, two 200 division World Literature courses, and two 300 division World Literature courses. Reserved for World Literature honours, major, and minor students. 丁香园AV is by permission of the instructor and Director.

WL 480-4 honours Essay Research

Directed studies research for an honours essay. Students will present research for their honours essay to the class. Prerequisite: lower division requirements for the World Literature major plus 12 units of upper division requirements including WL 300 and WL 301W. Open only to students who have been accepted into the World Literature honours program. 丁香园AV is by permission of the Instructor and the Director.

WL 490-4 honours Essay

Directed studies for completion of an honours essay. Prerequisite: WL 480. Open only to students who have been accepted into the World Literature honours program. 丁香园AV is by permission of the Instructor and the Director.

Return to world literature index page.