English Studies: Writing and Society 1700-1820 – (M.A.)

Writing and Society looks closely at texts of the Eighteenth-Century and Romantic literature. The first semester of the programme focuses on the ways in which they address issues in literary history and the history of genres, philosophy, politics, history and visual culture. We consider these in relation to the preoccupations of the times: the popular culture of coffee house and tavern, the political world on the street and in parliament, the vocations of women poets and polemicists, polite society and its interests in the management of emotions and arts, and the metropolitan life of London. In the second semester, in focusing on Romantic poetics and manifestos, we examine the theoretical and political growth of philosophical and cultural enlightenment in the context of the world-shaking crisis of the French Revolution and its aftershocks, and with regard to the subjective entitlements demanded.

This MA aims to prepare students to formulate a research topic, identify research materials and present an argument in written and oral form that is formed by alternative interpretations. Students who complete the MA will be aware of the interdisciplinary debates concerning the literature and history of this period, and will have engaged with a variety of materials: theoretical, visual, historical and literary. You will also be able to deploy a range of appropriate skills in research, bibliography and IT. You will be taught in small seminar groups, and will be introduced to a number of key research resources in London through a course in research skills: Resources for Research. You take four modules, each of which culminates in the writing of a 4,000 word essay. A dissertation of 15,000 words provides an opportunity to develop a sustained, coherent and fully documented argument on a research topic formulated in consultation with a specially-assigned supervisor.