Researching Texts

This fortnightly workshop will be structured around six key thematic categories that shape research in the text-based humanities: text; reading; author; archive; context; value. These themes will be engaged as the vital building blocks of a research project in literary or performance studies. The workshop will engage these categories through a range of methodological approaches and conceptual positions that inform critical engagement with literature, theatre and other forms of textual practice. It will encourage students to reflect upon their own social, cultural and intellectual positioning as researchers and writers, and in relation to the projects they are beginning to define. Students will examine a range of historical debates on the nature and practice of research in the text-based humanities. They will also engage with current debates about the role of the humanities, in general, and literature, more specifically, in contemporary culture and society.