Erste Sitzung: 25. Oktober 2016
Die Anmeldung findet im Rahmen des allgemeinen Verfahrens der Fachrichtung Anglistik, Amerikanistik und Anglophone Kulturen statt. Bitte beachten Sie die Mitteilungen auf der Website der Fachrichtung und die Aushänge.
Children's literature is indeed a curious genre, marked by "a specific power relation," as Lewis Roberts puts it: It is "generally defined by its readership and yet seldom produced by those readers." Children's books provide a mixture of entertainment and education - they contain messages which adults deem important for the child's understanding of the world. As a result, they tell us as much about adults as they do about children. Moreover, they point to the fact that children and childhood are concepts specific to a certain culture, time, and place - they are thus unstable and can change. In this course, we are going to look for the "hidden adult" (cf. Nodelman) in three classic British children's books. Our discussions will focus on how these texts construct childhood, identity, good and evil.
Please read Alice's Adventures in Wonderland before the start of term.
Texts:
Carroll, Lewis. Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass. 1865/1871. Ed. Hugh Haughton. London: Penguin, 2003. Print.
ISBN-10: 9780141439761 / ISBN-13: 978-0141439761
Hodgson Burnett, Frances. The Secret Garden. 1911. London: Puffin, 2015. Print.
ISBN-10: 0141321067 / ISBN-13: 978-0141321066
Dahl, Roald. Charlie and The Chocolate Factory. 1964. London: Puffin, 2007. Print.
ISBN-10: 0142410314 / ISBN-13: 978-0142410318 |
