Spring 2025 variant:  Linguistic translation theories

Course leader

Annjo Greenall (annjo.k.greenall@ntnu.no)

Outline

The interdisciplinary field of Translation Studies (TS) started out, in the 1950s-60s, from a dovetailed source. On the one hand, it was an offshoot of comparative literary studies, and on the other of linguistics, of which it quickly became an ‘applied’ branch. The foci on literature vs. language/linguistics have remained until today, even though the currently dominant approaches within TS could be said to be ideological, cultural and sociological, with a focus on how ideology, culture and society influence translation (processes), and vice versa.

The present course delves into the language/linguistics sub-discipline of TS, which, even though it has resided somewhat in the shadows of these ideological, cultural and sociological approaches, has continued to develop and thrive, up to this day. In the course, we will trace the development of the language/linguistics TS sub-discipline from its beginnings, when the influence from linguistics came predominantly from structuralist linguistics, through to later decades when the field has come into contact with, and emulated ideas from, text linguistics, pragmatics, sociolinguistics, corpus linguistics, and cognitive linguistics. We will also have a look at translation in light of new technologies, and at translation and language acquisition. Throughout, there will be a focus on the special case of English as the most translated language in the world.

Learning outcomes

Spring 2025 variant:  Magical Realist Border Fiction

Course leader

Nicole Falkenhayner (nicole.falkenhayner@ntnu.no)

Outline

Magical realism is a literary genre that stands in a close relationship to postcolonial literature and the experience of migration, as well as to the broader field of border studies. Magical-realist aesthetic strategies and tropes have been employed in literary expressions of boundary-crossing experiences on many levels: from traumatic experiences to cultural boundaries. Often, literary texts that are invested in political and cultural discourses have included fantastical or magical elements. The three novels and the short story that will be read in this class reflect the multiplicity of the negotiation of borders and boundaries in literature, as expressed through a combination of realistic and fantastic elements. They variably address borders between ethnic groups and cultures, genders, and temporalities, as well as boundary zones between humans, animals, and nature.

The aims of the class are to 1) discuss questions of genre concerning magical realism and 2) investigate the similarities and differences of novels and short stories that address problematics of borders and boundaries through an aesthetic strategy of estrangement.

Learning outcomes

Spring 2025 variant: ‘The Merchant of Venice and its afterlife’

Course leader

Paul Goring (paul.goring@ntnu.no)

Outline

This course explores one of William Shakespeare’s most performed, most controversial and most problematic plays: The Merchant of Venice (1596-97?). It invites students to undertake a deep and detailed study of this play – examining it slowly, one act at a time – before broadening the investigation to consider a small selection from the many artistic and critical responses that The Merchant of Venice has prompted.

The merchant of the play’s title is Antonio, one of several antisemitic characters, who borrows money from Shylock, a Jew, to finance his friend’s courtship of Portia. Antonio is unable to repay the loan, and showing no mercy, Shylock demands a pound of Antonio’s flesh. In one of theatre history’s most renowned courtroom scenes, Portia disguises herself as a lawyer and saves Antonio. This plot brings up a wide range of themes and issues: inter-ethnic conflict, religious conflict and anti-Semitism, human and legal bonds, the power and performance of the law, cross-dressing, homosociality, genre (can the play really be classed as a comedy?), loyalty and betrayal, daughter/father relationships, female oppression and agency, mercy and its refusal, and more. The course will consider such issues and will examine how a selection of cultural workers and critics have treated them through adaptation practices and in creative and critical responses to this challenging play.

It is a lecture-based course, with opportunities for discussion incorporated within the lectures. Attending the lectures, starting on 28 January 2025, is strongly encouraged.

The course will include showing a film of a production of the play at the Globe Theatre in London. This production will not be considered strictly as pensum (due to issues of availability) but it will be referred to repeatedly and students may, if they wish, refer to it in the final exam for the course. For these reasons, attending the session when the film is shown is very strongly encouraged.

Learning outcomes

Spring 2025 variant:  Literature and (as) Public Health

Course leader

Hanina Musiol (hanna.musiol@ntnu.no)

Outline

Sari Altschuler and Elizabeth Dillon observe that the COVID-19 pandemic renewed interest in literature and narrative medicine, prompting the prestigious medical journal JAMA to devote a special issue to uses of narrative in medicine. There, Abraham Verghese calls writing itself an ignored “vital sign.” Let’s reflect on this powerful statement this term and explore literature as/and public health.

Literature has always engaged with tropes of health, the body, cure, aging, illness, dis-ability, and death. Literature can also make us feel intensely alive and, sometimes, keeps us alive (Hartman; Sharpe). Novels, plays, or poetry also, and literally, impact our emotions, health, and vital signs—heart rate or breathing, for instance. Yet, the relationship between, say, the memoir and cancer recovery, pain and poetry, novels and wellbeing, diaries and dying is not simply very long—but also complicated, making Josie Billington ponder whether “literature is [actually] healthy.” 

This semester, we will turn to the complex Anglo/American literary archives of pandemics, disease, cure, and (enviro)mental, situated public health crises (Armiero; Clare; Wald) and wonder what literature is a vital sign of. To this end, we will read across the medical humanities and public health and across genres—diaries, memoirs, graphic novels, sonnets, collective narratives, “critical fabulations,” letters, elegies—to explore how literary texts document, respond to—and even alleviate—pain, grief, depression, a sense of alienation (Hartman). Yet we will also heed Richard E. Miller’s warning that writing which returns to “scenes of [suffering and], violence and violation” has no miraculously “curative powers.” It can serve equally as a tool of despair, rage, disconnection, and of reparation or healing. Mindful of this, we will pay special attention to how specific communities of readers and writers engage with literary texts. We will, in other words, reflect on the social rituals and practices of narrative repair—diary-ing addiction, documenting recovery in a hospital setting, listening to elegies, reading for dementia, chanting affirmations (or sharing them on social media), imagining other words and writing them together, reading poems live and in public, writing and reading letters, participating in book club or group therapy discussions, talking about novels in class, archiving toxic pollution, and so on—that give meaning and force to the written (or spoken) word.

Eng3430 will be an interactive literature course, taught in partnership with the Kunsthall Trondheim, Trøndelag Centre for Contemporary Art, Literature House Trondheim, and guest scholars and clinicians within and outside of NTNU. Therefore, your active participation in course activities, research and workshop sessions, online debates, and seminars or screenings is indispensable to its success. At the end of the semester, and in addition to the goals listed on the web, you will be expected to recognize the importance of collaborative work and public writing and, last but not least, to explore the role of critical reflection in your own writing, reading, and research.

Please visit our Blackboard site for course updates and note that you must attend the first two lectures of term on February 6, and read 3 short essays posted on Blackboard (Josie Billington, “Reading in Practice”; Rita Felsky, “On Being Attached”, and Abraham Verghese, “Writing Medicine”) before our first class.

Learning outcomes

Course leader

Kristin Melum Eide (Kristin.eide@ntnu.no)

Outline

The Nordic section will be responsible for coordinating this course and will provide information on the course Blackboard site.  Reading lists and texts will be made available on Blackboard (and/or Leganto) at the start of the semester.

Learning outcomes

Course leader

Giosuè Baggio (giosue.baggio@ntnu.no)

Outline

This course is an introduction to the study of human language processing, language acquisition, and developmental or acquired language disorders. Students will become familiar with the main theories, methods, and results in contemporary psycholinguistics and neurolinguistics. Instruction will build on recent evidence from recent research on specific languages of interest (e.g., English and Norwegian), as on diverse populations, such as multilingual speakers, atypically developing individuals, and neurological patients.

Classes will be taught in English. Students admitted to an English program shall, as a general rule, answer the exam in English. Students admitted to a Norwegian/Scandinavian studies program shall, as a general rule, answer the exam in Norwegian.

Learning outcomes