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Vorheriges Semester
Legal Fiction as Surrogate Trial: Victorian Fiction, Gender and the Failure of the Law
DozentIn: Dr. phil. Laura Zander
Veranstaltungstyp: Blockseminar
Ort: 01/114: Freitag, 12.01.2024 09:00 - 16:00, 41/E07: Montag, 05.02.2024 - Dienstag, 06.02.2024 09:00 - 16:00
Zeiten: Termine am Mittwoch, 04.10.2023, Mittwoch, 25.10.2023, Mittwoch, 08.11.2023, Mittwoch, 29.11.2023 10:00 - 12:00, Freitag, 12.01.2024 09:00 - 16:00, Mittwoch, 24.01.2024 10:00 - 12:00, Montag, 05.02.2024 - Dienstag, 06.02.2024 09:00 - 16:00, Ort: 01/114, 41/E07
Beschreibung: The aim of the course is to explore the interaction and interrelation between law and literature in the context of nineteenth-century Britain, drawing on the latest research of the Collaborative Research Center on Law and Literature (Münster/Osnabrück). Looking at selected Victorian novels and shorter works, we will examine the extent to which well-known Victorian novelists engaged in legal criticism in their novels, offering literary discourse not only as complementary but also corrective to the inadequacies of the law. In various 19th century literary works, so the initial premise for this course, it is not only the villains of the novels but also the legal system that are put on trial. Elizabeth Gaskell’s novel Mary Barton (1848), her novella A Dark Night’s Work (1863) and her short story “The Crooked Branch” (1859) together with Wilkie Collin’s novels The Woman in White (1859-60) and The Law and the Lady (1874-5) will serve as primary material, which will not only allow us to explore the sensationalism connected to murder and crime but also look at legal and literary judgements and specifically the role of women in the literary and legal discourse of the time.
This course is explicitly designed as a research seminar. This design will allow participants greater flexibility and agency but will also require increased commitment and personal responsibility. Over the course of the winter semester, the course material will be developed alternately in self-study and group work units as well as in monthly online sessions. An in-person one-day workshop will then take place in January to allow participants to bring together the results of their work to date and to discuss, present, practice and evaluate methodological approaches. The seminar will culminate in a two-day symposium (in the first week after the end of classes in February), where students will be able to present their projects to each other and get feedback by their peers but also respective experts on the field.
Although the course requires a considerable amount of reading and thorough preparation as well as self-study, the project and research focus will hopefully provide a welcome departure from the traditional seminar format and will be of particular interest to those students who are interested in being in touch with current research.
The course is mainly intended for MA students, but advanced BA students may participate, after previous consultation via email.
