English BA (Hons)

Most people take reading for granted, but active, well-informed, interpretative and critical reading is a highly advanced skill. And with the rise of AI and disinformation, it is one of the most important skills in the world today. This module focuses on the key skills of critical and close reading, as central to the study of literature, but also more widely to allow you to sort out truth from troll. The central aim of this module is to enhance and develop students’ engagement with primary and secondary texts as central to your critical thinking abilities. Students will learn how to analyse and interpret complex texts in various genres, making use of the established techniques and approaches of the discipline. They will engage with the idea of critical reading as a culturally-informed act that must be learned and developed. Teaching is shaped around the goal of developing students’ “reading resilience”, that is, the ability to read, discuss, and write about, varied and challenging texts with confidence. Through discussion, group workshops, lectures and individual tasks, students will become proficient in working with literary and rhetorical texts, learning skills that are essential throughout the degree.

With the rise of social media and now generative AI, the core skills of our degree, reading and writing, have come under fire. Yet just as reading is not about passive reception of information, but rather critical engagement with what you have read, so writing is more than simply following a blueprint. Writing, on our course, is a form of thinking, it is where the critical faculties are tested and developed, and importantly, it is a form of human-centred creativity that the world desperately needs.

The purpose of this module is to enable English students alongside Creative Writers to develop a grounding in effective writing practices and core competencies of textual production. Students will develop an understanding of the different stages of textual production, from prewriting, research, planning and outlining, to drafting, feedback and editing, polishing and submission, as well as an understanding of core writing mechanics. This module will enable students to explore and practice differing conventions of textual production across academic disciplines and in the creative industries. Its focus ranges from non-fiction modes such as the academic essay, critical and reflective writing, to screenplays and fiction manuscripts.  Any machine in the future will be able to put words together in some form of narrative, but this module trains you to become writers, with critical minds and creative practices, which is a very different thing.

It is true that our degree is rooted in the present and often looks to the future. But it would be a mistake to think that literature’s historical origins of literature are not equally important to us. One of the most important elements of critical thinking is historicism or the ability to read a text as informed by, expressing, even hiding its historical context. In an age of AI and disinformation, historical truth based on historical documents has never been more important.

The purpose of this module is to study selected texts in light of their historical, political, cultural, religious, and other contexts. Through the study of a selection of five texts that belong to a particular period or genre, the module will introduce students to the historicist study of literature, one of the central pillars of literary and critical theory, while at the same time training them in close textual analysis. The combination of what a text is actually saying, and the historical events and texts that surround its forms of expression, is an exceptionally powerful transferable skill.

Identity and difference have become two of the most important cultural and political terms in our fractured present. It seems these days that our identities are often formed by attacks on our unique forms of difference. Conflict and accusation seem easier to come by online, than agreement and compromise. Modern literary studies has been dominated by the philosophical, cultural and political idea of difference since the 1980s and this is built into the DNA of literary studies at Brunel.

This module will explore key critical and cultural concepts in modern literary studies and their relevance to a selected body of texts, with a focus on how ideas of ‘difference’ factor into a given body of writing. Students will be encouraged to develop their own understanding of difference in relation to a wide range of theoretical concepts, including (potentially) history, memory, gender, race, and language and deconstruction.

Brunel is proud of its West London location and celebrates being a campus university in one of the most exciting cultural capitals in the world today. London is defined by its modernity, its complex history, its challenges, its diversity and, of course, by its global centrality. This module aims to introduce students to the study of the literature of London, introducing key critical approaches and engaging with texts from a range of cultural backgrounds. Students will learn about London’s rich and varied literary traditions and forms; acquire theoretical perspectives; build a literary critical vocabulary; engage in debates about the meaning and role of London in literature; and reflect on creative practice and literary production in relation to London’s diverse past and present.

Brunel campus is a global majority campus with over 150 different countries represented and well over 150 different languages spoken. It is located in West London, one of the most culturally diverse places on earth, and is just down the road from Heathrow airport. Since its inception, postcolonial studies and diversity in general have always been at the forefront of our programs. This truly innovative module aims to introduce students to the study of World Literature, presenting key critical approaches and engaging with texts from contrasting cultural locations. Students will learn about rich and varied world literary traditions and forms; acquire theoretical perspectives; build a world literary critical vocabulary; engage in debates about the meaning and role of world literature and reflect on creative practice and literary production in world contexts.

Journaling is one of the most widely practiced forms of creative expression in the world today.  If we count things like blogging and social media posts as part of journaling, then surely journaling should be at the heart of any contemporary literature degree.  Yet journals are not something you learn about by reading, but rather offer a form of self-expression, of practice as literacy.  This module will introduce you to the practice of creative journaling. You will explore the different ways this practice can support your personal and professional development as creatives. You will critically analyse the creative journals of writers, musicians, and artists, and keep a weekly creative journal, experimenting with different approaches and techniques for documenting and reflecting on their creativity.

Alongside that crucial term difference, studying culture demands that we think about identity and, of course, representation. In keeping with our promise to cast the net very wide when it comes to what a ‘text’ is, this course gives you access to part of the incredible syllabus offered by our Film and Television unit.

It’s important in the film and television industry to consider whose stories are being told, who is in creative roles behind the camera and how people are being represented. This module will explore identity politics and consider theory such as feminism, queer theory, postcolonialism and disability studies, among others. We will consider how certain identities are portrayed onscreen both historically and now.

Studying English at Brunel is unique in terms of the context and location of where you are based. The English subject is located at the heart of the Department of Arts and Humanities and we share many joint degrees with subjects like Film and Television, Theatre, Creative Writing, Games Design and, perhaps unusually, Music. For over two decades English and Music have shared many common interests and often many students in common. This module offers you a unique chance to branch out and add listening to your critical and creative thinking toolbox. In a culture dominated by complex ways of experiencing and using music, this course teaches the core skills of listening to music with a discerning and sophisticated ear.

On this course you will develop a reflective mind and new ways to think and discuss music. You will learn to write about it with knowledge and depth, to understand how music is made; its forms and structures and to experience music from a diverse range of musical genres. This being Brunel University, you will engage in comparisons of approaches across a range of styles and genres, from Gregorian chant to Aphex Twin and beyond, understanding the function of the music and its context in society.

When you leave university – what happens next? What are your career aspirations? How will you realise them? In this module, you will gain confidence and experience in using your unique-to-you interests and skills to stand out from the crowd. At its heart are four professional activities, which you will choose, complete, and reflect on. These could range from work experience in a field that interests you, to volunteering, learning a language, completing business or skills development courses, publishing a website, blogging, or gaining editorial or media production experience. You are encouraged to think creatively: providing that each activity is developmental for you and your tutor agrees, the sky is the limit.

Contemporary globalisation has brought us cheap food, cheap clothing, and cheap goods, including the smartphone, tablet, or laptop you are probably reading this on – but it has also brought tremendous inequality. In this module, you will look at a range of twenty-first century fiction originating from Africa, Asia, Latin America, the Middle East, and the Caribbean, to explore diverse experiences of inequality in an era of globalisation. You will interrogate a range of novels, stories, and poetry in light of theoretical concepts drawn from world-literary theory and materialist feminism, asking whether and how socially committed fiction can challenge the overlapping oppressions of contemporary times.

The nineteenth century was an era of innovation. Technological invention, scientific breakthrough, geographical discovery, imperial expansion, the abolition of slavery, the rise of the middle classes, the emergence of mass culture, and an ever-stronger push for women’s equality. Within this culture, the novel – as its name suggests, a literary genre founded on newness – came of age. Through the chronological study of a representative selection of five texts, the module will introduce the key generic elements of the nineteenth-century novel, and chart changes in their deployment over the course of the century. Particular attention will be paid to Realism and Gothic. In addition to narrative form, a range of social and cultural contexts will be suggested as a means of accounting for, and understanding, textual features. Stress will be placed throughout on close textual analysis.

Have you ever felt overwhelmed by everything that’s going on in the world? You are not alone! Written during the opening decades of the twentieth century, the texts we study on this module were processing a modern world that was changing rapidly and radically. There were new technologies and ideas, empires were in decline, religion was losing its hold, and established class and gender relations were disintegrating. Then the First World War happened, followed by revolutions, a global pandemic, economic depression, and the rise of fascism. Writers responded in different ways. Some, like TS Eliot, Virginia Woolf, and Katherine Mansfield, experimented with content and form, confronting topics that were formerly taboo or using language and structure that shattered convention. Others, including Daphne du Maurier, Dorothy L Sayers, and Christopher Isherwood, used more ‘realist’ styles to work through their anxieties and concerns. Examining novels, short stories, poetry, and experimental artistic manifestos – by these writers and more, and from diverse perspectives – we will explore a modern world in crisis.

The political events of the late eighteenth century – the American War of Independence, French Revolution, and Napoleonic wars – dramatically changed lives, ideas, and aesthetics in Britain. From the mid 1770s to the mid 1820s, the period we now call Romanticism signalled profound changes in the form and content of literature. Working in a range of genres, including the novel, pamphlets, poetry, and philosophical, satirical, and travel writing, Romantic writers responded to a set of urgent, ethical, aesthetic, and environmental changes. In the module we consider the ‘first generation’ (Wordsworth, Coleridge, William Blake) and ‘second generation’ Romantics (Shelley, Byron, and Keats), and important political writers such as Edmund Burke, Thomas Paine, Mary Wollstonecraft, and William Godwin. Alongside these now-canonical names we read a diverse range of women and Black writers who contributed just as significantly to key Romantic debates: Anna Aikin, Anna Laetitia Barbauld, Ottobah Cugoano, Ouladah Equiano, Hannah More, Ann Radcliffe, Mary Robinson, Ignatius Sancho, Mary Shelley, Helen Maria Williams, Dorothy Wordsworth, Phillis Wheatley, and Anne Yearsley

Shakespeare died over 600 years ago, but his works maintain their relevance, captivating readers and audiences worldwide. In this module, you will study Shakespeare at an advanced level, in greater depth, and with an emphasis on the types of study skills required for advanced critical work in the fields of ‘book history’ and ‘performance studies.’ Using advanced methods of analysis, you will explore early modern texts, both in their original contexts and in their subsequent manifestations in print. You will consider language, performance, and the visual layout of text – both in Shakespeare’s time and in the present day. Overall, you will gain an understanding and experience of the concept of the Shakespearean text as an artefact and art form, one constantly evolving through criticism, editorial intervention and performance

This module introduces students to a range of contemporary British and Irish fiction, developing knowledge of the variety and complexity of contemporary writing and its relation to social and cultural context. The module examines texts which employ a range of themes, forms, and styles. It asks what we mean by the term ‘contemporary’ and encourages analysis of the relationship between texts and the historical moments in which they are produced and consumed.

Postcolonial writing often comes out of difficult circumstances. Its writers sometimes risked everything to publish what they needed to say. These are the new pioneers of Literature in English, whose works would inspire and define the writings of the future. In this module, we get to grips with key concepts encountered in postcolonial studies, which have been developed to investigate phenomena including colonialism and resistance, multiculturalism and globalization, racism, and Islamophobia. Using these, we will explore works by important and fascinating writers, whose texts show a variety of perspectives on colonialism and its legacies, including those of imperialists and the peoples they tried to suppress.

If you’re a fan of genre fiction – Detective, Gothic, Science Fiction, Fantasy, and all things in between – then this module is for you! Besides gaining an understanding some of the key thematic and formal conventions of these genres, and how these have changed over time and with respect to changing social and political contexts, you will get to grips with the critical public sphere that exists outside academic institutions. Beyond academia, there is a world of reviews, blogs, conventions, and festivals relating to books. Therefore, while this module will cover the academic study of genre fiction and require you to write a conventionally structured and referenced academic essay, it will also branch out to consider this wider context by looking at some reviews and debates from the public sphere and require you to write a review of your own.

The English Special Project offers third year students a crucial opportunity to undertake extended independent research, developing their critical and creative skills to investigate a topic of their own choice. Pursuing subjects as diverse as short stories or screen writing, sci fi or romance, and Shakespeare or Salman Rushdie, students construct a 9,500-word dissertation across the course of the year. Guided by regular tutorials with a personal supervisor, this module represents a key stepping stone in their academic career, a culminating moment in the completion of their undergraduate trajectory.

Shaped by industrial revolution and radical social reform, the Victorian period was a time of enormous historical and literary change, introducing key values, institutions, and narratives still shaping modern Britain. Typical of Brunel’s innovative approach to more traditional period studies, this module examines three integral 19^th century ‘case studies’, each focused on a specific aspect of Victorian literature and culture: ‘Class, Conflict, Identity’, ‘Crime and Sensation’, and ‘Women and Society’. Its aims are to explore some of the ways in which Victorian literature might encode or challenge particular cultural assumptions; to analyse the relationships between literary forms and social contexts; and finally, to consider how the knowledge of the period may contribute to the interpretation of texts produced during this time.

Brunel English has been a leader in feminist theory since its formation over 25 years ago. The Women’s Movement is a defining modern social undertaking, a radical inheritance from the 19^th century, which has since redefined itself in multiple ways across numerous contexts. Focusing primarily on Second and Third Wave feminist movements, but also with a nod to First Wave influences and an emergent Fourth Wave, this module considers 20th century women’s writing in dialogue with relevant feminist theory. The Women’s Movement’s relationship to related gender/sexual equality programmes is offered as a central focus of class debate, especially in connection with LGBT perspectives and masculinity studies. Each week brings feminist critical thought into dialogue with literature, considering key concepts, including patriarchy, desire, and intersectionalism, and paying close attention to the interrelationship between literature and activism. An indicative reading list might include theorists such as Simone de Beauvoir, Betty Friedan, Patricia Hill Collins, Judith Butler, and Chandra Talpade Mohanty. Texts will address the range and diversity of feminisms as articulated across history.

Canonical studies of Early Modern literature often ignore the central role of ethnic and religious Otherness, situating texts primarily in relation to European cultures and geographies. Contesting this tendency, this module prioritises early modern interaction between Christians and Muslims, viewed from the perspective of both, specifically with a focus on English drama. It will explore post-Reformation England’s self-redefinition as a Christian nation and how it dealt with increased trade and negotiations with Muslim nations. Main topics of study include common literary tropes about Muslims in early modern literature; Christian and Islamic beliefs and fears in key texts; travel writing and interactions between West and East; prose propaganda and multicultural London; and writings in captivity. Central to all these critical discussions is the space of the Muslim world in Early Modern Literature and how this space shapes Early Modern culture in compound ways.

Brunel English has consistently been a national leader in contemporary literary studies for over two decases. We have a complex and increasingly global understanding of what contemporary literatures can and should mean. In this module we consider the period of the latter half of the 20th century starting with the Second World War which had a major impact on almost every aspect of 20^th century life, with radical implications for society, politics, economics, and culture. This module confronts this shifting global context with a focus on both established and experimental writers, developing students’ awareness of Post-War and Late Twentieth-Century Literatures via a focus on fiction’s negotiation with history. The module foregrounds key sensibilities of this period through an initial discussion of postwar life and art, then moves forward to explore the emergence of the ‘postmodern’ condition. It concludes by examining the experimental fiction of various leading British writers, also considering the influence of late-twentieth century theorists, such as Jean Baudrillard, Fredric Jameson, and Judith Butler.

When it was first launched the Violence module caused quite a stir with its combination of contemporary critical theory and inspiration from the Finnish phenomenon-based learning, leading to a feature on the module in the TLS.  Violence, sadly, represents a shaping force in contemporary life, a site or mode of influence dominating government, society, culture, and the media. This module aims to develop students’ awareness of violence and its representations within modern culture, enlisting a variety of cultural materials, literary, visual, conceptual and technological. It asks a series of questions as regards violence and coercion as they surface in everyday lives, splitting its focus between conceptual understanding and textual readings. Part one, ‘Bioviolence and Biopolitics’, looks at biopolitical theories of power, force, violence, coercion and exclusion as introduced by philosophers such as Michel Foucault, Georgio Agamben, and Roberto Esposito. By contrast, part two, ‘Discourses of Coercion 2015-2020’, applies the theory to case studies taken from contemporary events, such as #Blacklivesmatter, Grenfell Tower, Coronavirus, Zombies and of course serial killers.

Focusing on Austen’s work in relation to adaptation, this module explores the forms of fiction she inherited as a young writer – the novels of Frances Burney and Ann Radcliffe – and how she adapted these models to her own work and concerns. It then considers how Austen was adapted in her turn, in a number of extremely popular films and series, to think about how the late eighteenth century ‘courtship’ and marriage plots continue to be reinvented through to the contemporary period. Texts may include: Radcliffe The Italian 1796, Austen Northanger Abbey (1803/ 1818), Frances Burney Evelina, or the History of a Young Lady’s Entrance into the World (1778), Austen Lady Susan (1794/1871), Austen Pride and Prejudice (1813), Robert Z. Leonard d. Pride and Prejudice (1940), Simon Langton d. Pride and Prejudice (1995), Sharon Maguire d. Bridget Jones’ Diary (2001), Chris Van Dusen’s Bridgerton Season 1 (2020).

This module is focused on your professional development capitalising on the unique and close collaboration between Creative Writing and Literary Studies at Brunel university and representing Brunel’s long heritage when it comes to professionally focused learning.

It will enable you to understand the creative economy and the ways in which people develop careers within it. You will be able to plan your own career after graduation, to identify your goals and write the documents you will need to achieve them. Members of the Creative Writing department at Brunel along with visiting speakers will help you to become familiar with the creative industries through which writers reach their audience. By exploring all areas of your professional development, we will enable you to make a career plan for the next five years, to identify the opportunities and skills you will need and to research the choices you will make in the immediate future.

This module is an exploration of two canonical English writers, Geoffrey Chaucer and William Shakespeare. It examines several key texts by these two authors from a range of perspectives combining the historical and theoretical. The module pays specific attention to such issues as the representation of society and class in Chaucer’s and Shakespeare’s work, the portrayal of the author in the context of the emergence of English as an authoritative language, the relationship between rhetoric, power and ethics in the development of an embryonic literary space in England after the events of 1381, and the depiction and interrogation of gender norms in late medieval and early modern literature. The module will develop and extend critical thinking students have developed in various second-year modules. Most important, it teaches students to read texts even more closely, playing detailed attention to the historical context alongside the theoretical. The module provides a critical examination of key works by Chaucer and Shakespeare and is therefore ideal for students considering a career in teaching, particularly at secondary level.