MAGISTÈRE :
THEORY AND COMPARATIVE LITERATURE

MANUSCRIT SOUS PRESSE - PRESSES UNIVERSITAIRES

Magistère on Literature and Civilization, based on my in-class reader on The Theory of Literature and Comparative Literature.

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(2ème Cycle)

Chef du projet : Professeur BENSAFI Zoulikha

Course Objectives: 

By the end of the year, students will be able 

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• to identify and recognize major literary and theoretical schools

• to read critically through various perspectives

• to use literary approaches and concepts to analyze literary texts.

Teaching Method: 

The lectures are based on my in-class reader on The Theory of Literature and Comparative Literature, my Lecture on Focus and my Lecture on Research Paper Writing. 

Each student is given my books, one of fiction and one on the theory of literature. They prepare oral exposés. They then write papers on both fiction and theory. The lecture on Theory and Comparative literature moves with the rhythm of students' work and oral presentations.

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Having understood what comparative literature is, students are asked to try and build a paradigm of theoretical concepts and use diagrams to explain their project. The first step is to ask the question, what the important ideas developed by the writers are, what new theoretical concepts can be useful to their research. The second step is to choose a direction in the analysis focusing on characters mainly, since when that one literary device is revealed, others usually follow.

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Assessment Method: 

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Test: questions on the lecture to evaluate students' knowledge of the relationship between comparative literature and literary theory.

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Exam: analysis of literary devices in relation to the novel, to show their knowledge of theory and practice.

With my Magistère Students, we have discussions about their choice of topics for a Research Proposal. Just after their year of Theory of Literature and Comparative Literature, they have two years to write their thesis. 

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Samples of student exposés:

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• Bezza Hadjer, “Georg Luckács, Critic and Writer, the Meaning of Historical Materialism and Literary Theory”

• Bouamrane Sarah, “Early Feminist Concepts in Simone de Beauvoir’s Le Deuxième Sexe”

• Benmerzoug, “The Necessity of Theoretical Concepts in Literature: René Wellek and Austin Warren’s Theory of Literature” 

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Samples of books studied:

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Zora Neale Hurston, Their Eyes Were Watching God (1937)

Edward Saïd, Orientalism (1978)

Alice Walker, The Color Purple (1982)

Virginia Woolf, A Room of One’s Own (1929)