ENG-30096 - Module Specification
School of Humanities and Social Sciences
Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences

Programme/Approved Electives for 2025/26

Available as a Free Standing Elective

Co-requisites

None

Prerequisites

None

Barred Combinations

None

Description for 2025/26

The graphic novel is becoming an increasingly important form and is proving itself worthy of scholarly attention. For many readers coming to graphic novels for the first time, the form poses specific challenges in the sense that it requires new modes of attention, new ways of reading.
One of the exciting aspects of this module is that it offers students guidance in those new ways. Time is taken with each primary text, reflecting both the scope and ambition of the texts themselves, and also the need for reflection throughout the module on the reading process itself.
Content is not neglected, however, and students will have the opportunity to explore the startling variety of themes, ideas and issues tackled in graphic novels, from racial identity to sexual politics, teenage angst and 9/11. The module is particularly suitable for students with at least a literature background.

- To introduce students to a range of major authors and works from the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries
- To analyse the ways in which graphic novels require a different kind of reading process from conventional novels
- To introduce students to key themes, issues and problems in contemporary American culture
- To develop broad skills in written expression and literary analysis
- To develop research skills

Intended Learning Outcomes

describe and evaluate features of disciplinary scholarship (literature / visual art) relating to study of the contemporary United States
: 1,2
analyse and interpret a range of primary (graphic novels) and secondary (theories of the graphic novel)written sources
: 1,2
make coherent arguments based on evidence and analysis orally and in writing: 1,2
relate textual analysis to social, cultural and historical contexts
: 1,2
carry out detailed and focussed research using a range of textual and electronic sources
: 1,2
consistently employ the bibliographical, referencing and presentation requirements of the core disciplines
: 1,2
describe and analyse features of the social, historical, and political identity of the recent United States: 1,2

Study hours

(24) 12x2-hour seminar;
(02) 1x20-minute one-to-one feedback session;
(01) 1 x 1-hour online Q and A seminar
34 hours seminar preparation;
60 hours critical report, essay and presentation preparation;
30 wider research, including contributions to discussion thread

School Rules

None

Description of Module Assessment