School of Comparative Literary Studies

Dunton Tower 1701
Telephone: 788-2177
Fax: 788-3544

The School
   Director of the School: Robert Polzin
   Assistant Director of the School: G.A. Woods

The School of Comparative Literary Studies offers programs of
graduate study leading to the degree of Master of Arts in
Comparative Literature. These programs, involving courses in
comparative literary studies and, where appropriate, up to two
courses from other departments, have considerable flexibility in
the sense that they can be tailored to suit each student's special
interests in particular periods or areas while, at the same time,
through the core half courses, Comparative Literary Studies 17.501
and 17.502, and the final comprehensive examination, providing a
specialized training in the techniques of comparative literary
studies.

The purpose of the program in comparative literature is to study
literature in its international context, and to relate and compare
literary phenomena usually studied in isolation because of
linguistic barriers and the traditional departmental division of
academic disciplines. Thus, taking into account the interrelation
of all humanistic studies, such as the various literatures,
philosophy, psychology, sociology, the visual arts, and history,
"comparatists" view literary creation within the total complex
evolution of world literature. The historical flow of literary
archetypes, the role of folklore and myth in literature, recurrent
problems of literary theory, and consideration of the less well
known literatures of the world are some of the objects of
comparative literary studies.

The study of this discipline must be based on a truly comparative
perspective, on a solid linguistic foundation, and on an awareness
of all difficulties that arise in comparative literature, conceived
as a domain both within and beyond the limits of national
literatures.

Students registered in other departments, who wish to register in
one or more courses from the comparative literature program, must
demonstrate a reading knowledge of the languages required for each
course. Such students are encouraged to emphasize their own area of
literary study in presentations and essays when the instructor
judges that the content of the course(s) so permits. Three years of
study at the university level will normally constitute the required
level of language proficiency.

Qualifying-Year Program
The regulations governing admission to the qualify<%10>ing-year
program are outlined in the general section of this calendar.

Applicants who hold only a general (pass) B.A. degree will be
required to successfully complete the basic half courses,
Comparative Literary Studies 17.401: Foundations of Comparative
Literary Studies and Comparative Literary Studies 17.402: Theories
of Literature, and to take courses from other departments of
literature, or Comparative Literary Studies (see Undergraduate
Calendar) to achieve the equivalent of a combined honours B.A. with
high honours standing.

The total course program is to be worked out in consultation with
the graduate studies supervisor. Formal admission to the master's
program may be considered at the end of the first term.

*  Comparative Literary Studies 17.401
   Foundations of Comparative Literary Studies
   The history of the discipline of comparative literature will be
   studied, including its beginnings in nineteenth-century France,
   its evolution, and its current status in Europe, the United
   States, and Canada.
   Prerequisite: Permission of the School.

*  Comparative Literary Studies 17.402
   Theories of Literature
   The course focuses on twentieth-century literary theories in the
   context of comparative studies, providing the student with an
   overall view of the theoretical discussion of literature from
   about 1920 to the present. Included in the study are Russian
   Formalism, American New Criticism, and such other approaches as
   the structuralist, semiotic, socio-cultural and hermeneutic.
   Prerequisite: Permission of the School.
   (Students enrolling in this course under the cross-listed 38.402
   should note the requirements of the Department of Spanish).

Master of Arts

   Admission Requirements

   The regulations governing admission to the master's program are
   outlined in the general section of this calendar.

   The specific requirements for admission to the master's program
   in comparative literature are the following:

   *  An honours B.A. degree (or equivalent) with at least high
      honours standing in a literature (studied in the original
      language) or in two literatures or in a literature and a
      related arts subject

   *  Proficiency in English

   *  An ability to work at the graduate level in an additional
      language approved by the School. Students whose record does
      not clearly demonstrate this ability will be required to take
      as part of their program at least one half credit in the
      literature of this second language in the original language

   Program Requirements

   Students accepted into the master's program without having taken
   the two half courses, Comparative Literary Studies 17.401 and
   Comparative Literary Studies 17.402 (or their equivalent), will
   be required to take these courses as extra to the degree.

   Master's candidates in comparative literature will follow one of
   three programs. The specific requirements are as follows:

   *  The two half courses, Comparative Literary Studies 17.501:
      Problems in the Theory of Literature I and Comparative
      Literary Studies 17.502: Problems in the Theory of Literature
      II

   *  Two full graduate courses (or the equivalent) selected from
      those offered by Comparative Literary Studies. With
      departmental approval, one of these full courses may be a
      400-level course. Courses in other programs in the University
      may also be selected with permission of the Graduate
      Committee, but normally not in excess of one full course (or
      the equivalent)

   *  Either Comparative Literary Studies 17.599: M.A. Thesis
      (equivalent to two full course credits); or Comparative
      Literary Studies 17.598: Research Essay (one full credit) and
      Comparative Literary Studies 17.593: M.A. Comprehensives (one
      full credit); or an additional full graduate course (or the
      equivalent) and 17.593: M.A. Comprehensives (one full credit)

Guidelines for Completion of Master's Degree in Comparative
Literature

   The master's program is normally completed no later than two
   years or six terms after initial full-time registration and six
   years or eighteen terms after initial part-time registration.

Graduate Courses*

A prerequisite for all graduate-level courses is appropriate
linguistic ability and approval of the School of Comparative
Literary Studies. A student may not receive credit for both a half
course and a full course which bears the same topic title.

*  Comparative Literary Studies 17.501W1
   Problems in the Theory of Literature I
   Topic for 1994-95: Specular Narratology
   The problems studied in this course include the following: what
   do narratives tell readers about the ways they construct
   themselves as stories about a certain reality? What do they tell
   us about their own truth value and the techniques they use to
   convey it? What to they tell us about the hermeneutics of either
   telling or reading a story?
   Prerequisite: Permission of the School.
   Fernando de Toro.

*  Comparative Literary Studies 17.502W1
   Problems in the Theory of Literature II
   Topic for 1994-95: Reference, Sense and Meaning: Theoretical
   Problems in Interpretation
   This course focuses on some of the theoretical problems that
   text semantics pose for literary interpretation. Emphasis is
   placed on exploring the external/internal fields of textual
   reference, the language-specific sense of discourse and the
   processes by which meaning effects are conveyed. Literary texts
   will come from twentieth-century English, French, German and
   Spanish poetry and short fiction.
   Prerequisite: Permission of the School.
   H.-G. Ruprecht.

*  Comparative Literary Studies 17.521F1
   Literary History II: Studies of Themes and Myths
   Topic for 1994-85: Forms of Displacement: Modernity and Travel
   The course will examine questions pertaining to exile,
   emigration, exploration, nomadism and tourism in relation to the
   twentieth-century novel and short story. The reflection on
   travel and its role now taking place in literary theory and such
   disciplines as anthropology, geography and psychoanalysis will
   also be considered. The authors on the reading list will include
   Achebe, Conrad, Forster, Gordimer, Joyce, Paci, Pavese, Jelloun.
   Providing the linkage with theory and non-literary discourses
   will be articles and excerpts by Bakhtin, Deleuze, Freud,
   Lévi-Strauss, Lotman, Lukacs, MacCannell, Said and Tuan.
   Prerequisite: Permission of the School.
   F.G. Loriggio.

*  Comparative Literary Studies 17.522F1
   Literary History III: Periods, Styles and Movements
   Topic for 1994-95: Lowell and Larkin: A Cross-Cultural
   Comparison
   A comparison of the work and careers of Robert Lowell and Philip
   Larkin in the framework of their historical positions in
   American and British poetry. Particular attention will be paid
   to their attitudes to Anglo-American modernism. An attempt will
   be made to attain a focus on differences in development of
   American and British poetry in the mid-twentieth century. Texts
   by Lowell, Larkin, and Alvarez.
   Prerequisite: Permission of the School.
   (Also offered as English 18.561)
   A.T. Tolley.

*  Comparative Literary Studies 17.523W1
   Literary History IV: Form and Function of Genres
   Topic for 1994-95: Updating the Comic: Laughter in
   Twentieth-Century Literature and Other Discourses
   The focus of the course will be the function (transgressive,
   integrative etc.) of laughter in twentieth-century theatre and
   in the discussions of the comic and comedy undertaken by such
   disciplines as philosophy, psychoanalysis and anthropology.
   Literary texts will come primarily from Beckett, Campanile, Fo,
   Ionesco, Pirandello, Stoppard. Theoretical and non-literary
   material will include works or excerpts of works by Bergson,
   Bakhtin, Bataille, Eco, Eliade, Freud, Frye, Jung and Nietzsche.
   Some films (Marx Brothers, Woody Allen) will also be studied.
   Prerequisite: Permission of the School.
   F.G. Loriggio.

*  Comparative Literary Studies 17.532T2
   Studies in the Literature of Identity
   Topic for 1994-95: Female Identity: Writing by Women in the
   Twentieth Century
   This course will explore topics such as gender and narrativity,
   women's space, marginalization, women and madness, and mothers
   and daughters in writing by women in the first half of the
   twentieth century in northern Europe and North America. The
   texts will be discussed from a cross-cultural perspective with
   reference to poststructuralist literary theory, including
   feminist criticism. Texts include: Dinesen, Woolf, Colette,
   Stein, de Beauvoir, Skram, Undset, Salverson, and Roy.
   Prerequisite: Permission of the School.
   G.A. Woods.

*  Comparative Literary Studies 17.554T2
   Cross Cultural Studies I: Literatures Written in the English
   Language
   Topic for 1994-95: The Fourth World and the Edge of Empire
   The course will study the emergence of indigenous literatures in
   the modern world. Attention will focus primarily on texts from
   Australia, New Zealand, and the United States but some works by
   South African and Latin-American writers will also be discussed,
   as will some works by non-indigenous writers. Among the authors
   included in the reading list are: Sally Morgan, Hyllus Maris
   (Australia); Witi Ihimaera, Keri Hulme (New Zealand); Marmon
   Silko, Gerald Vizenor, Alice Walker (U.S.); Wilma Stockenstrom
   (South Africa); Marquez (Columbia).
   Prerequisite: Permission of the School.
   Before 1994-95 course 17.554 was offered as 17.550.
   (Also offered as English 18.504)
   J.J. Healy.

*  Comparative Literary Studies 17.556W1
   Cross-Cultural Studies IIB: Literature of the of the
   Francophonie
   Topic for 1994-95: Poétiques des littératures francophones dans
   l'espace antillais et les aires de diaspora
   Analyse de l'émergence des littératures francophones des
   Caraïbes (Haïti, Martinique, Guadeloupe et Guyane). Les
   poétiques des poètes et poèticiens: A. Césaire, E. Glissant,
   Frankétienne, R. Depestre, L.G. Damas. Analyse de l'émergence
   d'une poésie migrante contemporaine (Montréal). Analyse des
   poétiques dans les aires de métissage culturel et littéraire,
   analyse des interrelations vernaculaires et véhiculaires.
   Prerequisite: Permission of the School.
   Before 1994-95 course 17.556 was offered as 17.551.
   Pierre Laurette.

*  Comparative Literary Studies 17.558W1
   Comparative Canadian Literature I
   Topic for 1994-95: Fictional Autobiographical Narratives: Theory
   and Practice
   This course aims to define the characteritics of various
   autobiographical narratives/"récits autobiographiques" through
   the readings of theoretical works from France, the United
   Kingdom, Canada and the United States. Using a corpus of
   Québécois and English-Canadian novels, we will study the
   defining characteristics of various autobiographical
   "sous-genres" (diary, memoirs, autobiography, epistolary, etc.)
   Although the course will emphasize fictional autobiographical
   narratives/"récits autobiographiques fictifs", we will also look
   at non-fictional autobiographical narratives. The
   fictional/factual opposition will allow for the discussion of a
   series of epistemological and narrative questions involving
   problems of simulation, reference, representation,
   fictionalization, postmodernism, historiography and the rhetoric
   of truth claims. Texts by H. Aquin, N. Brossard, D. Godfrey, D.
   Marlatt, M. Monette, M. Ouellette-Michalska, M. Ondaatje.
   Prerequisite: Permission of the School.
   Before 1994-95 course 17.558 was offered as 17.553.
   Julie LeBlanc.

*  Comparative Literary Studies 17.561F1
   Studies in Postmodernism I
   Topic for 1994-95: Postmodern Theory
   This course deals with the theories of postmodernism and their
   relation to feminist theory in art, philosophy, architecture,
   literature, and theatre. Some of the authors that will be
   considered are J. Baudrillard, H. Cixous, T. de Lauretis, G.
   Deleuze, A. de Toro, D.W. Fokkema, F. Guattari, L. Hutcheon, L.
   Irigaray, C. Jencks, J. Kristeva, D. LaCapra, J-F. Lyotard, T.
   Moi, L. Nicholson, P. Portoghesi, G. Spivak, R. Venturi, A.
   Warhol.
   Prerequisite: Permission of the School
   Fernando de Toro.

*  Comparative Literary Studies 17.562W1
   Studies in Postmodernism II
   Topic for 1994-95: Postmodern Fiction
   This course will examine postmodern fiction and fiction by women
   through focusing on their differences and similarities in the
   use of narrative strategies and techniques such as genre
   subversion, non-fictionality, memory, historicity, the
   palimpsest, intertextuality and rhizomatic writing in the work
   of authors such as K. Acker, J. Banville, J. Barnes, J.L.
   Borges, N. Brossard, A. Carter, H. Cixous, J.M. Coetzee, U. Eco,
   G. García, Márquez, M. Puig, A. Roa Bastos.
   Prerequisite: Permission of the School.
   Fernando de Toro.

*  Comparative Literary Studies 17.565F1
   Intertextuality: Literature and Other Cultural Phenomena
   Topic for 1994-95: Intertexuality as Discursive Appropriation,
   Subversion and Manipulation: Modern and Postmodern Artistic
   Practices
   This course deals with the discursive manifestations of
   intertextual relations, i.e. with the various forms of textual
   networks including the ironic transformation of classic genres,
   the subversive use of canonic writings, and the manipulatory
   transcoding of the cultural dialogue between modern and
   postmodern art, poetry, theatre and fiction. Texts by Anouilh,
   Atwood, Barnes, Borges, Brecht, Coetzee, Donoso, Eliot, Handtke,
   Joyce, Lima, Plenzdorf, Roth, Tournier, Vargas Llosa.
   Prerequisite: Permission of the School.
   H.-G. Ruprecht.

*  Comparative Literary Studies 17.580F1
   Seminar in Comparative Literary Studies
   Topic for 1994-95: Interfaces of Deconstruction: Nietzsche,
   Heidegger, Derrida and the Literary Experience
   Devoted to the presentation and discussion of deconstructive
   thinking in contemporary criticism, the seminar concerns itself
   with the fundamental ideas and conceptual frameworks of
   deconstruction as practised by Jacques Derrida. This includes,
   necessarily, selected readings of Nietzsche's and Heidegger's
   writings about literature.
   Prerequisite: Permisison of the School.
   H.-G. Ruprecht.

*  Comparative Literary Studies 17.582F1
   Seminar in Comparative Literature
   Topic for 1994-95: Critical Theory and the Bible
   An exploration of trends in biblical scholarship influenced by
   current literary theory and the philosophy of language. Selected
   biblical texts from Deuteronomy through II Kings are interpreted
   according to these new approaches.
   Prerequisite: Permission of the School.
   (Also offered as Religion 34.520)
   Robert Polzin.

*  Comparative Literary Studies 17.593F2, W2, S2
   Comprehensives

*  Comparative Literary Studies 17.595F3, W3
   Study Abroad
   Under the terms of the accord with l'Université de Picardie in
   France, Università di Bari in Italy, and Universidad de Buenos
   Aires in Argentina, students may do a part of their work for the
   M.A. in Comparative Literature in France, Italy and Argentina.
   The content of the study will be decided by the School of
   Comparative Literary Studies at Carleton. Only students
   sponsored by the School under the exchange may take this course.
   Work done in France, Italy and Argentina will be the subject of
   a report from l'Université de Picardie, Università di Bari, and
   the Universidad de Buenos Aires and will receive a final grade
   awarded by the School of Comparative Literary Studies at
   Carleton.
   Prerequisite: Permission of the School.

*  Comparative Literary Studies 17.596T2
   Directed Special Studies
   From time to time, students whose main interests are not covered
   by courses offered in a given year may pursue independent
   research, subject to the availability of a qualified adviser and
   relevant library resources at Carleton. Interested students
   should apply directly to the supervisor of graduate studies.

*  Comparative Literary Studies 17.597F1, W1, S1
   Directed Special Studies
   From time to time, students whose main interests are not covered
   by courses offered in a given year may pursue independent
   research, subject to the availability of a qualified adviser and
   relevant library resources at Carleton. Interested students
   should apply directly to the supervisor of graduate studies.
   Before 1993-94 course 17.597 was offered as 17.598.

*  Comparative Literary Studies 17.598F2, W2, S2
   Research Essay

*  Comparative Literary Studies 17.599F4, W4, S4
   M.A. Thesis

Courses Not Offered in 1994-95

17.520     Literary History I
17.540     Studies in Modernism and Postmodernism
17.543     Paraliterature
17.555     Cross-Cultural Studies II: Literature of the Francophonie
17.557     Cross-Cultural Studies III: Literature of the
           Luso-Hispanic World
17.559     Comparative Canadian Literature II
17.571     The Theory and Practice of Translation
17.581     Seminar in Comparative Literature