2026/2027
Ключевые тексты литературы США
Статус:
Дисциплина общефакультетского пула
Кто читает:
Школа филологических наук
Где читается:
Факультет гуманитарных наук
Когда читается:
4 модуль
Охват аудитории:
для всех кампусов НИУ ВШЭ
Язык:
английский
Кредиты:
3
Контактные часы:
36
Course Syllabus
Abstract
This intensive one-module course is intended for undergraduate Arts and Humanities students seeking a structured overview of American literary history from its earliest stages to the contemporary period. Drawing on a representative selection of works from American writing of the 17th century and until the 21st century, the course acquaints students with landmark texts and major literary movements and authors. The module is designed to deepen students’ knowledge of literary genres, conventions, and approaches to criticism and to cultivate independent, evidence-based interpretation. By closely engaging with a set of assigned Key Texts—canonical and representative works selected from different periods and traditions—students develop stronger analytical reading skills and a broader understanding of American cultural and intellectual history. Pre-requisites: successful participation requires confident written and spoken English. Students are expected to have a CEFR proficiency level between upper-intermediate (B2) and advanced (C1).
Learning Objectives
- To expand students’ understanding of literature written in English in the United States of America from the 17th century to the present, and to relate individual works to the authors’ thematic preoccupations, the historical circumstances of their production, and the cultural forces that shaped them.
- To strengthen students’ ability to read, interpret, and analyze the assigned Key Texts in the original language from historical and contextual perspectives, with attention to figurative language, rhetorical devices, formal organization, recurring themes and motifs, symbolism, allusion, cultural and historical references, critical reception, and continuing relevance.
- To advance students’ analytical reasoning and argumentation so that they can develop precise, logically organized, and convincingly supported interpretations of literary works in both spoken and written form.
Expected Learning Outcomes
- Students show a secure understanding of the conventional periodization of American literature, including the principal writers, genres, and literary forms associated with each period, and demonstrate familiarity with the subject matter and importance of the assigned Key Texts.
- Students are able to read American literary works in the original and develop independent, informed interpretations grounded in specific textual evidence. They distinguish between explicit meaning and justified inference and recognize points at which a text remains ambiguous or unresolved.
- Using close reading as a core analytical method, students recognize and interpret formal and stylistic features, including major tropes and figures of speech, and explain how choices of language, structure, and form shape literary meaning.
- Students place literary works within relevant historical and cultural frameworks and can discuss their reception, long-term significance, and contemporary resonance while remaining attentive to cultural plurality and difference.
- Students formulate defensible arguments about the required Key Texts and recommended further reading and communicate those arguments effectively in speech and writing. They contribute meaningfully to individual and small-group discussion, engage constructively with alternative interpretations, and apply the critical vocabulary and methods introduced during the course.
Course Contents
- Week 1. Introduction. The Early Development of American Literature. Journalism and the Transition to Fiction
- Week 2. The Romantic Period in American Literature. Part I: Washington Irving, Edgar Allan Poe, Henry David Thoreau, and Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
- Week 3. The Romantic Period in American Literature. Part II: Nathaniel Hawthorne, Herman Melville, and Walt Whitman
- Week 4. American Literary Realism. Part I: Harriet Beecher Stowe, Mark Twain, Ambrose Bierce, and Emily Dickinson
- Week 5. American Literary Realism. Part II: Henry James, O. Henry, and Jack London
- Week 6. American Literary Realism and the Emergence of Modernist Tendencies in the Early Twentieth Century: Theodore Dreiser, Upton Sinclair, and John Reed
- Week 7. American Literature between the First and Second World Wars. Part I: Sherwood Anderson, Sinclair Lewis, John Dos Passos, and William Faulkner
- Week 8. American Literature between the First and Second World Wars. Part II: F. Scott Fitzgerald, Ernest Hemingway, John Steinbeck, T. S. Eliot, Ezra Pound, and Eugene O’Neill
- Week 9. American Literature during World War II and the Second Half of the Twentieth Century. The Rise of the Beat Generation. Contemporary American Literature
Assessment Elements
- Creative writingAssignment-specific instructions and formal requirements will be distributed electronically. Plagiarism is strictly prohibited. One point is deducted for every plagiarized sentence (for example, 8 → 7); if a submission contains more than three plagiarized sentences, the essay receives a grade of zero.
- Analytical writingAssignment-specific instructions and formal requirements will be distributed electronically. Plagiarism is strictly prohibited. One point is deducted for every plagiarized sentence (for example, 8 → 7); if a submission contains more than three plagiarized sentences, the essay receives a grade of zero.
- In-class work
Interim Assessment
- 2026/2027 4th module0.25 * Creative writing + 0.25 * Analytical writing + 0.5 * In-class work
Bibliography
Recommended Core Bibliography
- Gray, R. J. (2012). A History of American Literature (Vol. 2nd ed). Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&site=eds-live&db=edsebk&AN=398621
- Lawrence, D. H. Studies in Classic American Literature / D. H. Lawrence. — Санкт-Петербург : Лань, 2013. — 105 с. — ISBN 978-5-507-36565-4. — Текст : электронный // Лань : электронно-библиотечная система. — URL: https://e.lanbook.com/book/41914 (дата обращения: 00.00.0000). — Режим доступа: для авториз. пользователей.
Recommended Additional Bibliography
- Emerson, Melville, James, Berryman, , 2011
- Ernest Hemingway in context, , 2013
- Lost intimacy in American thought : recovering personal philosophy from Thoreau to Cavell, Mooney, E. F., 2009
- The Oxford encyclopedia of American literature. Vol.2: William Faulkner - Mina Loy, , 2004