Written for Children and Young Adults

Semester and Year Offered: 6th Semester, MS2013, MS2015, WS2018, WS2019

Course Coordinator and Team: Usha Mudiganti

Email of course coordinator:usha[at]aud[dot]ac[dot]in

Pre-requisites: None

Aim: The course aims to illustrate the complexity of the enterprise called writing for children. This course will cover many zeniths and nadirs of children’s literature through three centuries while discussing issues such as the changing ideal of literature for children, the changes in the education of the child, appropriation of literary texts by child readers, the politics of abridgement, endeavours towards engendering the child through literature, elements of subversion in writing for children and the various uses of the realm of fantasy in children’s literature. The newly emerging form of writing called Young Adult Literature will also be taken up for discussion.

Course Outcomes:

1. Gain reflexivity about lived experiences, the self and society.
2. Critically reading texts which may have been read for pleasure a few year back.
3. Develop the skills to build an argument and write an academic essay.

Brief description of modules/ Main modules:

1. Origins of children’s literature :                                                                                                                                       Childhood in Britain in the late-Romantic and Early Victorian periods                                                                                   The Puritans and childhood in New England
2. The first novel written for children – The Swiss Family Robinson by J D Wyss
3. The Victorian Child – Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll
4. Resisting Growing Up – Peter Pan by J M Barrie
5. Childhood after the World Wars – The Hobbit by J R R Tolkien
6. The Child Hero – Harry Potter and The Goblet of Fire by J K Rowling

Assessment Details with weights:

1. In-Class Assignments (2) 20% (Late January/ Mid- March)
2. Mid semester 30% (Late February)
3. Paper Presentations 20% (Early April/ early November)
4. End Term 30% (As per AUD schedule)

Reading List:

• The Swiss Family Robinson by J D Wyss
• Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll
• Peter Pan by J M Barrie
• The Hobbit by J R R Tolkien
• Harry Potter and The Goblet of Fire by J K Rowling

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