Dr. Simone Broders

English and American Literature 101 (=Grundseminar Literaturwissenschaft)

Zeit und Ort: Do 9:45 - 11:15, Raum 1.121, Campus Regensburger Straße in Nürnberg

Preliminaries:

BA English and American Studies (neu): Basismodul III Literature. (Keine Zulassungsvoraussetzung) Lehramt Englisch an Gymnasien (neu): Basismodul III Literature. (Keine Zulassungsvoraussetzung) Lehramt Englisch an Grund-, Haupt- und Realschulen (neu): Elementarmodul L-UF Literature. (Keine Zulassungsvoraussetzung)

Mandatory Reading:

William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet. Romeo und Julia. Ditzingen: Reclam, 1994. (bilinguale Ausgabe Englisch/Deutsch).

Robert Louis Stevenson, Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. Ed. Katherine Linehan. Norton Critical Edition. London and New York: Norton, 2003.

Nünning, Ansgar und Vera, Grundkurs anglistisch-amerikanistische Literaturwissenschaft. UNI-Wissen. Stuttgart: Klett, 2001.

How to study for your literature exam

Revise regularly. Psychologists have discovered that "bulimiac learning", that is, absorbing as much of the subject matter as possible in a relatively short time frame, can be detrimental to the learning process.[1] It is better to study regularly over the course of the semester than start revising the week – or even the night – before the exam. Reserve time to revise the previous and prepare the following course meeting each week. A rule of thumb is to spend as much time on this as you spend in the seminar itself. For a course of 90 minutes a week, you should calculate 90 minutes a week of study time at home, not counting the time you need to read longer texts such as plays or novels.

Write your own manuscript. Yes, you do get PowerPoint slides. They provide the basis to structure your learning, as a table of contents shows you how a book is organized. Taking notes during seminars forces you to rearrange what you have heard. This will be more easily memorized than what you read on the slides. Besides, you cannot find interpretations which are developed together in class on the slides. Students who rely exclusively on the material provided by the course convenor frequently have trouble applying theory to texts they have never seen before.

Think outside the box. If you attend a seminar in which you have to give a presentation, be creative in the ways you arrange your material. An original presentation will be remembered – a monotonous recital of two or three articles in a journal will be forgotten before you leave the room.