An UK University Offers Course in Vampiric Literature

[roshiq]

From this fall the MA in Modern Literary Cultures of University of Hertfordsthire is offering courses in Vampiric Literature.

Reading the Vampire: Science, Sexuality, and Alterity in Modern Culture

This module investigates vampire narratives in literature from early vampire stories such J. Sheridan Le Fanuï's lesbian vampire tale Carmilla and Bram Stoker's Dracula, the most famous vampire narrative of all, to the twentieth-century vampire chronicles of Anne Rice and the romantic blockbusters of Stephanie Meyer. Since their animation out of folk materials in the nineteenth century, vampires have been continually reborn in modern culture. They have enacted a host of anxieties and desires, shifting shape as the culture they are brought to life in itself changes form. Reading the Vampire embeds vampires in their cultural contexts, exploring their relationship to modernity; the influence of key thinkers such as Darwin, Marx, and Freud will be addressed, together with issues of gender, national identity, technology, consumption, and social change. The module will provide a forum for the development of innovative research and examine these creatures in all their various manifestations and cultural meanings.

Besides this unique course module this UK School also offers you the chance to explore the representation of different cultural themes across a diverse range of texts and historical periods. In 2010-11 the students will have the chance to explore debates about desire and sexuality in the 1890s and questions of class identity in twentieth-century literature and film.

Entry requirements:
We require at least an upper second class honors (or equivalent) degree with a significant element (at least 50%) of Literature. Graduates with an Honors Degree in any discipline who have other wise demonstrated potential to succeed at postgraduate level in Literature will also be considered. IELTS requirement - 6.5.

For Course details & structure click here.

As we can see by the course description, it won't be an easy A. Students will be required to put actual thought into their favorite vampire stories, they will have to look at them with a new perspective to some extent.

Source: www.vampires.com

[neverending]

That's frightening- you'd actually PAY somebody to make you read Twilight.... wait till Doc reads this.

[scouse mac]

Originally Posted by neverending

That's frightening- you'd actually PAY somebody to make you read Twilight.... wait till Doc reads this.

The cynic inside tells me thats exactly what they intend, cashing in on the whole twilight saga thing.

The university of Hertfordshire is not a renown institution.

[ferretchucker]

Honestly, trust the Hertfordshirians. Always fancy themselves as above the rest of us, the first to try these new things. And WHERE does this course lead them?

[AMICUS HORROR]

Sounds interesting, great thing to study, not sure how it could help someones academics in life.:eek:

[Erika_Knight]

This is awesome - Hopefully Vampire Literature classes catch on, so us unlucky ones can get that privilege too! I wouldn't count on it though :(

[Doc Faustus]

Originally Posted by neverending

That's frightening- you'd actually PAY somebody to make you read Twilight.... wait till Doc reads this.

Classes like this have been going for awhile. A few years ago, a university in California offered a class in Buffy the Vampire Slayer studies. The world of academics is like a combination of Superman's nemesis Brainiac and your dad. There is a desire to attain and explore cultural information, but that information is not quite processed right. There is also a desire to connect to the students and to be hip, a misguided senseless version of hip. It would be great if intelligent studies of popular culture got written, but it doesn't happen very often and comes not out of the ivory tower but out of the mouths of guys like Tim Lucas and Joe Bob Briggs. Twilight will of course be embraced by academics while it is popular and they will attribute traits to it that they believe to be unique in pop culture history and these will be accepted since a lot of those studying the work don't have any grounding in the genre beyond the obvious literary canon and what their teenage daughter is reading. Hopefully, the Mormon AIDS monger and catalyst for a generation of fatherless Charlie Mansons manque will fade from our culture fast enough for this impact to be ephemeral, an impressive financial footnote.

[Bastet]

What amazes me is that this isa post grad course! So not really open to anyone except academics-do academics read Twilight?

[Doc Faustus]

Yes, because of its place in the current zeitgeist. They don't usually have good things to say about it, though. From a gender studies perspective, it would be generous to call it Victorian. Hopefully, they're also upbraiding Typhoid Meyer for the AIDS and teen pregnancy that come out of her ignorance.