LFU:online

Students will

• get to know a transmedial corpus of contemporary Anglophone texts that represent remembering as a complex process;
• discuss how literature reflects current understandings of the functions of autobiographical memory, especially for identity formation;
• practise close reading in order to analyse how memory processes are represented in different types of media

“There is no escape from yesterday, because yesterday has deformed us, or been deformed by us.” Samuel Beckett’s quote evokes the significance of autobiographical memories for our sense of who we are – and, conversely, of our sense of who we are for the way in which we remember our past. In this course, we will look at contemporary Anglophone literature that seeks to explore what the neuropsychologist Daniel Schacter has termed “memory’s fragile power”. We will encounter works that deal with the process of reconstructing one’s own past, which may be complicated by memory gaps, unreliable memories or competing narratives. We will ask how authors incorporate psychological findings on the process of remembering and the function of memory for identity by means of specific narrative technique. Although the main focus of the course will be on novels (Penelope Lively: The Photograph; Kazuo Ishiguro: The Remains of the Day; Patrick McGrath: Spider), we will also consider how remembering as a complex process can be staged in the graphic novel (Alison Bechdel’s Fun Home will be our prime example) and in film (Memento).

Discussion, presentations, group work, expert groups, writing/research assignments

 Oral (active participation in class, presentation as part of an expert group) and written (short writing assignments during the semester, final paper)

Please buy: Penelope Lively, The Photograph; Kazuo Ishiguro, The Remains of the Day; Patrick McGrath: Spider; Alison Bechdel: Fun Home)

Further mandatory materials will be made available in a reader at the beginning of the semester.

MA: keine

Lehramtsstudium 2001: abgeschlossener 1. Studienabschnitt

Aufgrund der substanziell unterschiedlichen Zuteilung von ECTS-AP in den verschiedenen Curricula des MA Anglistik und Amerikanistik und des Lehramtsstudiums Englisch ergeben sich für diese Lehrveranstaltung unterschiedliche Anforderungen. Informationen hierzu erhalten Sie bei Beginn der Lehrveranstaltung durch die Lehrveranstaltungsleiterin/den Lehrveranstaltungsleiter.