School of English
Module manager: Professor Katy Mullin
Email: k.e.mullin@leeds.ac.uk
Taught: Semester 2 (Jan to Jun) View Timetable
Year running 2024/25
ENGL3410 Modernist Sexualities
This module is not approved as a discovery module
This module investigates how twentieth century literature engaged with emerging theories about sexuality, sexual orientation and gender identity. We will read literary texts alongside quasi-scientific writing about sex and gender to explore how both heterosexual and queer / LGBTQ+ subjectivities became the focus of creative experiments. Through seminars and workshops, we will work together to understand how experimental forms of writing responded to the challenge of subjects considered to be taboo or even obscene.
Writing Modern Sexualities aims to create a historically informed and critically sophisticated understanding of literatures of the twentieth century. As a specialist research module, it is designed to enhance students’ appreciation of the relationship between experimental form and risky content. Through lectures, workshops, and weekly seminar discussion, the module will show how writers responded to and helped advance new thinking about sexuality, sexual orientation and gender identity.
On successful completion of the module, students will be able to:
1. Identify the historical development of theories of sexuality, sexual orientation, and gender identity.
2. Show how literary texts engaged with these theories and were influenced by them.
3. Evaluate relevant criticism and scholarship about twentieth century literature and the history of sexuality.
Skills Learning Outcomes
On successful completion of the module, students will be able to:
4. Conduct independent research, gathering information from a range of sources, and engaging in good academic practice in referencing their sources.
5. Produce independent arguments demonstrating advanced proficiency in critical thinking and writing skills.
Details of the syllabus will be provided on the Minerva organisation (or equivalent) for the module
| Delivery type | Number | Length hours | Student hours |
|---|---|---|---|
| Lecture | 2 | 1 | 2 |
| Practical | 2 | 2 | 4 |
| Seminar | 10 | 1 | 10 |
| Private study hours | 184 | ||
| Total Contact hours | 16 | ||
| Total hours (100hr per 10 credits) | 200 | ||
Formative feedback will be provided weekly in seminars and in response to weekly seminar preparation, informally captured through a shared document. Feedback on the first assessment will be formative for the second assessment.
| Assessment type | Notes | % of formal assessment |
|---|---|---|
| Source Analysis | Analysis (500 words) | 10 |
| Essay | Essay (3,500 words) | 90 |
| Total percentage (Assessment Coursework) | 100 | |
The first assessment requires students to analyse a historical source about sexuality / gender identity and show how a literary text engages with it. Feedback will be formative for the second assessment, an extended essay, which will require sustained interdisciplinary engagement between historical sources and literary texts.
The reading list is available from the Library website
Last updated: 5/22/2024
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