Scribd
Upload
1K views2 pages

Commonwealth Literature

This document provides information about the course "Commonwealth Literature". The course is 3 units and meets for 3 hours per week. It is taught by Mayaki Joseph Ajagunmolu. The course aims to help students understand and define Commonwealth Literature, identify its geography and themes, and analyze texts. Students will discuss works of drama, prose, and poetry from various Commonwealth countries. Assessment is made up of 30% continuous assignments like tests, quizzes, and a written paper, and 70% final exam. The course will examine how the colonial encounter shaped cultural interactions and literature across national boundaries in former British colonies.

Uploaded by

Blessing Edobor
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
1K views2 pages

Commonwealth Literature

This document provides information about the course "Commonwealth Literature". The course is 3 units and meets for 3 hours per week. It is taught by Mayaki Joseph Ajagunmolu. The course aims to help students understand and define Commonwealth Literature, identify its geography and themes, and analyze texts. Students will discuss works of drama, prose, and poetry from various Commonwealth countries. Assessment is made up of 30% continuous assignments like tests, quizzes, and a written paper, and 70% final exam. The course will examine how the colonial encounter shaped cultural interactions and literature across national boundaries in former British colonies.

Uploaded by

Blessing Edobor
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
You are on page 1/ 2

COURSE CODE: ENG 215

COURSE TITLE: Commonwealth Literature


NUMBER OF UNITS: 3 Units
COURSE DURATION: Three hours per week
COURSE LECTURER: MAYAKI JOSEPH AJAGUNMOLU

INTENDED LEARNING OUTCOMES


At the completion of this course, students should be able to
1. problematize and define Commonwealth Literature
2. identify the geography of commonwealth literature
3. state the Functions of Commonwealth Literature
4. discuss how the Commonwealth Organisation has promoted Commonwealth
Literature
5. mention major Characteristics of Commonwealth Literature/Issues common to the
writers
6. list the major themes and literary trends in Commonwealth Literature
7. discuss the problem of language in creative writing in the Commonwealth Literature

COURSE BREAKDOWN
Week 1-2: Problematising and defining Commonwealth Literature?
Week 3-4: Characteristics of Commonwealth Literature/Issues common to the writers

Week 5-6: Major themes and literary trends in Commonwealth Literature


Week 7-12: Textual discussions and Analysis
Week 13: Revision

Required Texts
Drama

a. E. B.Omobowale’s The President’s Physician


b. Athol Fugard’s Sizwe Bansi is Dead

Prose

a. Kiran Desai’s Hullabaloo in the Guava Orchard


b. Ngugi Wathiong’O’s A Grain of Wheat
c. Samuel Selvon’s The Lonely Londoners

Poetry: Selected

a. “Letters to Martha” by Dennis Brutus (South Africa).


b. “Telephone Conversation” by Wole Soyinka (Nigeria).
c. “The Swimmer” by Adam Lindsay Gordon (Australia).
d. “A Ballad of Ducks” by Andrew Barton Paterson (Australia).
e. “The Rising Village” by Oliver Goldsmith (Canada)
f. “The Emigrant” by Alexander McLachlan (Canada).
g. “Gods Can Die” by Edwin Thumboo (Singapore).

Short Stories: Selected

CONTINUOUS ASSESSMENT, GRADING AND EVALUATION


Grading in the course is made up of 30% continuous assessment and 70% final examination.
The 30% components of the continuous assessment are as follows:
In-class test - 10
Mid-Semester Test - 10
Quizzes - 5
Written assignment - 5

Course Description
The course identifies the commonwealth organization as an international structure that has
brought together former colonialists and their former colonies on a platform of supposed
equal relationship as independent nations. It however establishes that the colonial encounter
itself brought about a cultural and social interface in which established norms and values
became models of interactions across national boundaries. The clear link between cultural
valves and literary developments becomes the guiding principles in the course as it seeks to
unravel the connectivity between the social processes and the human person. The impact of
emerging philosophies on the overall development of the human character is a key issue as
the course takes us through the writing of major authors in key commonwealth countries
across a broad spectrum of world literatures: England, Canada, Nigeria, India, Kenya,
Pakistan, South Africa, Ghana etc.

You might also like