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Gothic Visions: From Sublime to Suburban Gothic
UndergraduateMAQ-ENGX2062019
Course information for 2019 intake
Swoop through examples from literature, film and television. Explore themes of desire, fear, identity and sexuality. Lurk alongside Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Sherlock Holmes while analysing the themes and aesthetics of the Gothic genre
Enrolments for this course are closed, but you may have other options to start studying now. Book a consultation to learn more.
- Study method
- 100% online
- Assessments
- 100% online
- Entry requirements
- Prior study needed
- Duration
- -
- Loan available
- HECS-HELP and FEE-HELP available
Gothic Visions: From Sublime to Suburban Gothic
About this subject
The aims of this subject are:
- to introduce students to a range of Gothic texts and cultural forms
- to develop analytical and research skills that can be applied to past and present cultural and literary debates
- to teach students to communicate historical and theoretical concepts via essays and discussions
- to develop a greater understanding of the profound impact on contemporary culture of eighteenth- and nineteenth-century cultural forms
- to develop a greater understanding of the historical and often hierarchical deployment of concepts of culture, violence and the criminal, progress, reason and superstition, the imagination, literary and aesthetic value.
- Introduction
- Horace Walpole: The Castle of Otranto
- Matthew Lewis: The Monk
- Jane Austen: Northanger Abbey
- Edgar Allen Poe: Selected Tales
- Mary Elizabeth Braddon: Lady Audley's Secret
- Henry James: The Turn of the Screw
- Bram Stoker: Dracula
- Arthur Conan Doyle: The Hound of the Baskervilles
- Daphne du Maurier: Jamaica Inn
- Raymond Chandler: The Big Sleep
- Alfred Hitchcock: Psycho
- Final Threads
This subject tracks the urban cultural history of the Gothic genre from the sublime landscapes and haunted castles of Ann Radcliffe to the hyper-real suburban universe of Buffy the VampireSlayer. From its inception the Gothic genre has been a popular and controversial cultural phenomenon, which has dramatised the darker side of the senses and imagination, as well as testing the boundaries of literary taste. In Gothic fiction, nothing is ever certain. The domestic and familiar are merely comforting illusions that veil the darker reality of unspoken fears and desires. Home, city, work, identity, sexuality, the body and the mind are all sites that are open to the destabilising play and uncanny effects of the Gothic imagination, as the selected texts, films and TV series, which range from the popular to the canonical, exemplify.
- Critical Essay (35%)
- Research Essay (45%)
- Participation (20%)
For textbook details check your university's handbook, website or learning management system (LMS).
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Entry requirements
Prior study
You must have successfully completed the following subject(s) before starting this subject:
one of
- MAQ-ENGX120-Approaches to English Literature
MAQ-ENG110 (Not currently available)
Additional requirements
No additional requirements
Study load
- 0.125 EFTSL
- This is in the range of 10 to 12 hours of study each week.
Equivalent full time study load (EFTSL) is one way to calculate your study load. One (1.0) EFTSL is equivalent to a full-time study load for one year.
Find out more information on Commonwealth Loans to understand what this means to your eligibility for financial support.
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