ENG31780

Learning Outcomes:

1. Demonstrate a critical understanding of the contemporary European crime novel through analysis of a range of texts across differing cultural contexts.
2. Engage with key critical and theoretical concepts relating to national identities, race/ethnicity, gender, sexuality and class, and their representation within contemporary narratives.
3. Apply such concepts and contexts to close analysis of the course texts (primary and secondary), analysis that is also alert to generic concentions and their revision/subversion.

Indicative Module Content:

• Genre (shifting conventions and hybrid forms)
• Transcultural contexts (the historical/political/social forces that shape crime fiction)
• Ideological implications of representations of criminality, detection and social order (especially in relation to race/ethnicity,
class, sexuality and gender)
• Popular/critical reception and the dissemination of contemporary crime ‘narratives’ through other media (e.g., television and
film).

Student Effort Hours:

Approaches to Teaching and Learning:

Each novel will be situated in the context in which it was written and to which it is responding over the course of two weeks (so with the introduction and conclusion), we will have 2 weeks per novel/region.

The teaching team will address the wider contexts of European crime fiction, including discussion of genre, historical period, social, cultural and political issues and the implications of geography in shaping the works of these European crime writers. Close reading of assigned novels will help to situate these wider questions and particular attention will be paid to the relationship between content and form. We will consider how different forms of the crime novel take shape in different European contexts and what traits persist across all regions and subgenres. Specific attention will be give to core features of crime fiction, such as the representation of the detective/police and of victims, the role of landscape, the depiction of violence, the interrogation of what we mean justice and 'crime'.

Requirements, Exclusions and Recommendations

Not applicable to this module.

Module Requisites and Incompatibles

Incompatibles:
ENG30920 - The Crime Novel, ENG32020 - Detecting Fictions

Additional Information:
​ENG 31780 Contemporary European Crime Fiction: ​​students registered to this course should not register to ENG 32020 Detecting Fictions: the Crime Novel in Britain, America and Ireland.


 

Assessment Strategy

 

Please see Student Jargon Buster for more information about remediation types and timing. 

Feedback Strategy/Strategies

• Feedback individually to students, post-assessment

How will my Feedback be Delivered?

Feedback available following C/A assignment/s.

Contemporary European Crime Fiction: Reading List (Provisional)


Arnaldur Indridasson, Strange Shores
Mick Herron, Slough House
Fred Vargas, The Chalk Circle Man
Javier Cercas, Even the Darkest Night

Timetabling information is displayed only for guidance purposes, relates to the current Academic Year only and is subject to change.