The Essential Guide to English Studies

Also available from Continuum

How to Read Texts, Neil McCaw

The Essential
Guide to English
Studies

Peter Childs
Continuum International Publishing Group
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© Peter Childs 2008

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system, without prior permission in writing from the publishers.

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Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as Author of this work.

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ISBN: 978–0–8264–8818–3 (Hardback)

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Contents

Acknowledgements vii

PART ONE: The basics 1

1. Higher education 9
2. English studies 19
3. Culture and society 36
4. English and employment 46

PART TWO: Key skills 57

5. Reading 61
6. Research 69
7. Writing 78
8. Note-taking, lectures and revision 88

PART THREE: Assessment: making the grade 95

9. Seminars/presentations 99
10. Close textual analysis 107
11. Assignments 114
12. English language 121
13. Creative writing 129

Notes 136
Further reading and resources 142
Glossary 147
A little test: answers 153
Index 157
This page intentionally left blank
Acknowledgements

A book such as this cannot be written without drawing on the

knowledge, expertise, example and experience of others. Thanks
are due to Debbie Davis and colleagues in the English Department
at the University of Gloucestershire, Ben Knights and the English
Subject Centre team, and all the staff and students with whom
I have taught and studied English over the last 20 years.
Special thanks go to Claire Philpott who researched and drafted
several of the sections of this book while working as a research
assistant at the University of Gloucestershire. Debby Thacker and
Peter Widdowson helped in the drafting of particular sections of
the book through offering advice and examples at various stages of
the project’s development.
I would finally like to thank the Higher Education Academy for
the support provided by the award of a National Teaching Fellow-
ship, without which this book would not have been written.

About the author

Since taking his undergraduate degree (BA), Peter Childs has
accumulated 20 years of experience studying and teaching English
in a wide range of universities and colleges. He gave up a career in
industry in 1989 to study to become an English lecturer after a first
degree in economics at an old University and another part-time
degree in literature and philosophy with the Open University. Fol-
lowing a Master’s (MA) degree and a year spent teaching English in
a college of higher education, he gained a Doctorate (PhD) from
another old university, where he also taught and has since worked
in the post–1992 university sector.
This page intentionally left blank
 PART ONE: The basics

This book is intended to be of use to all students starting on or

contemplating a higher education (HE) course in English. It seeks
to be practical and is not simply an introduction to studying at
university or to the subject of English, but to both. You will find
helpful facts and figures to conceptualize and contextualize your
experience in HE, and English in particular, as well as tips on study-
ing, advice on careers, insights into the mechanics of assessment,
information on the language of HE, pointers on guides and refer-
ences to further study. In short, The Essential Guide to English Studies
aims to be the first stop for all new and prospective English
students.
The book is written with the experience of previous and cur-
rent students informing the comments and observations. So, to
begin with, it will be useful to hear from a number of different
voices, which range from an individual perspective to opinions
expressed through a large national survey. First, one student offers
the following initial key points of advice.

Study tips from a graduate of English

Preparing to come to university: once you have a place at a
college or university you will probably be sent a reading list from
the English Department, which includes all of the essential reading
for the first term or semester. You will also be sent information on
the processes for registration and induction, which gives details of
such things as on-line registration, identification checks, welcome
meetings and other induction activities. This information should be
read carefully to avoid unnecessary confusion once you arrive at the
university.
Student union activities in Freshers’ Week: Student unions
offer a comprehensive programme of social activities for new
2 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

students during the initial week(s) at university. The university’s

website should provide full details of events as well as other relevant
information on the Student union, such as sports clubs and
societies.
Freshers’ Fayres: every university has one or more Freshers’
Fayres; these are worth attending both to meet people and to find
out what’s going on. For example, there may be three Freshers’
Fayres at your university: a Commercial Fayre; a Jobshop Fayre; and
a Sports and Societies Fayre. The Commercial Fayre hosts com-
panies, such as nightclubs, fitness clubs and shops, which usually
give away free promotional gifts to students. A Jobshop Fayre hosts
local firms and recruitment companies, all seeking to find part-
time employees: providing a good opportunity to find part-time
employment. A Sports and Societies Fayre will host a diverse spec-
trum of groups, which may range from an African Society to a
Musical, Acting and Dancing (MAD) group, as well as sports clubs
enrolling you for hockey, badminton or gymnastics.
Beginning lectures and seminars: lectures and seminars for
your chosen modules usually begin in the first week. It is extremely
important to attend these first classes because they will provide
you with the essentials of your learning programme as well as the
necessary information to pursue your own independent research.
Assignments: at the beginning of each course/unit/module
you should be given details of all assessments and the dates on
which these will need to be submitted.
Summer vacations: it is well worth getting into the habit of
doing the principal reading for the course in the summer vacation
before each level; this is vital so that you are prepared when you
begin your dissertation or other major independent-study work at
level 3.
Time management: make sure you set aside specific times to
do reading, research and assignments each week. It is helpful if you
can buy a diary to note down what you will be doing and when;
alternatively, you could keep lists in a notebook, providing you
prioritize the things you have to do. You need to make sure you are
both well organized and self-motivated, otherwise your work will
suffer.
Understanding: university provides an intellectually chal-
lenging environment, so be prepared to find that you may not
 PART ONE: THE BASICS 3

understand everything. Read books, handouts and essays several

times so that you can gain a firm grasp of the ideas being discussed.
Use a dictionary and a guide to literary terms. Most importantly, do
not be afraid to ask questions of lecturers – they are there to help
you learn.
You-time: make sure you do spend some time socializing: either
join a society that interests you, or take up a sport, in order to relax. A
word of warning, however, although it is good to enjoy yourself, do
not allow too much socializing to affect your studies in a negative
way.
Tuning in: this is important if you are going to study success-
fully. It refers to the ability to engage with a text and understand
ideas relating to it, as well as its technical features. Do not worry if
you find this a challenge initially; seminars are a good opportunity
to get assistance in learning how to study effectively, by sharing
ideas and experiences with other students.
Investigate: it is important to research assignments thoroughly
in order to gain a firm grasp of what the question is asking. There is
a range of resources available in order to help you with this, both
within the library and on the internet. But be careful not to depend
too much on critical material, as it is more important to develop
your own ideas and opinions about a text.
Presentations: you may be asked to do individual or group
presentations, which are an excellent opportunity to develop
employment skills. Once you have decided upon the focus of your
presentation it is important to research the subject thoroughly and
practise your presentation before the real thing. The use of a com-
puter or overhead projector, as well as the production of handouts,
makes a presentation look much more professional. Unless you are
giving a seminar paper where the presentational aspects themselves
are not a focus, it is not helpful simply to write down everything
that you want to say on a sheet of paper and read from it – your
presentation will be much more successful if you use prompt cards
and expand on the ideas listed on them while presenting. If you are
working in a group, make sure you all know what your area will be
and organize regular meetings to discuss progress as well as to prac-
tise. Finally, make sure you have a thorough grasp of the concepts
you will be discussing because it is probable that you will be asked
questions at the end.
4 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

Seminars and lectures: it is essential that you attend seminars

and lectures in order to get the best out of studying English. Make
sure you have done the required reading before you attend so that
you have some understanding of the texts, subjects and concepts
under discussion. Although it can be tempting to take lots of notes
in lectures and seminars, it is advisable to keep this to a minimum
because you will learn more if you are able to listen to what the
lecturer or other students are saying. It is important to try to con-
tribute to seminars, even if you feel intimidated by the situation;
remember that the other students are in the same position. Seminars
and lectures provide a great opportunity to broaden your under-
standing of a text, as well as exchange ideas – so do not miss out.

As a second example of helpful student advice, the following ques-

tions and answers are the culmination of a survey of existing stu-
dents on life as an English undergraduate at one university. It will
give you some insight into what it is like to be a student as well as
answering some of the questions you might like to ask an existing
English undergraduate.

Q: What do you like most about studying English at university?

A: The modules available are both interesting and varied, meaning
you can choose a programme of study that reflects your exist-
ing interests or you can try areas of English that you have not
encountered before. Seminar classes provide a good opportun-
ity to discuss texts and authors with fellow students; they are
often lively and intellectually stimulating experiences. The
authors you study are extremely wide ranging: from
Shakespeare to Zadie Smith, from James Joyce to Edward
Said. University gives you the chance to learn, expand your
thinking and meet other people who appreciate language and
literature.

Q: What is the one thing you wish you had known or been told
before coming to university?
A: That it is often your responsibility to take the initiative and find
things out for yourself: how to make module selections, details
about timetables and registration procedures.
 PART ONE: THE BASICS 5

Q: What is the chief difficulty with balancing time commitments

(study/work/play) at university?
A: Deadlines for assignments may fall close together, which can
make it stressful when trying to balance other commitments.
Also there is a great deal of reading to do, so you have to be
organized in order to prepare properly for seminars.

Q: How is studying at university different from what you had

expected?
A: The crucial areas are time management and reading load. There
is enough time to get all of the work done – reading, research
and assignments – outside of university contact time (see the
Glossary at the end of the book), but you have to be disciplined.
The hours in which you study can be as flexible as you want to
make them, but it is easy to get behind if you do not devote
enough time to reading.

Q: What are the most important things to get sorted in the first
semester?
A: Make sure you have copies of all the books that you will need;
it helps to have read them as early as possible. Practise your time
management skills too. On the non-academic side, it is easy for
many people to feel isolated and lonely, so make the effort to
meet other people and remember that everybody is in the same
situation.

Q: What is the best advice that you would give to a new student at
level one?
A: Be systematic with assignments so that work does not build
up; it will be much less stressful if you set aside time in which
to develop them instead of leaving the writing until the last
minute. If you are unsure of anything or have problems, then
seek advice from the lecturers or another relevant member of
staff.
6 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

Q: Do you have any other comments to pass on to new students

about how best to adjust to the experience of English studies in
HE?
A: Join the English Society if there is one. Such organizations
run lots of events and they are a great chance to meet
like-minded people, not all of who may necessarily be
studying English. Although adjusting to university can be
difficult initially, depending on your life circumstances, it does
get easier, especially if you make the effort to mix. For most
people it is a really good experience, both academically and
socially.

Q: Finally, what do you like least about studying at university?

A: Financial considerations. You have to be very careful with
budgeting, and it may well be a necessity to work part-time
while studying to cover living costs. This means that you have
to juggle a lot of different commitments.

As indicated here, a matter on which students often want practical

advice concerns finances. There are many places you will find this
available, but some statistics and a few facts will be helpful. About
40 per cent of students work part-time to help their financial
situation. Many student unions advise that you should not work
more than 15 hours a week because of the difficulties of coping
with both academic and work commitments. Only 30 per cent of
students in 2004 expected to leave university with a debt of less
than £8000, and this is likely to be increasing year on year. Fifty per
cent expected their final debt to be between £8000 and £15 000.
Debt also varies with subject studied. Those studying maths or a
science subject usually have greater debts than students in the
humanities. Around 40 per cent of students said they had less than
£40 a week to live on after paying for accommodation, and around
a quarter of all students now live at home. Indeed, proximity to the
family home is now the most common deciding factor in choosing
a university.
The Times Higher Educational Supplement published, in April 2004,
the results of a survey of 2000 full-time students across 30 uni-
versities. Students were asked: ‘What is your single biggest concern?’
 PART ONE: THE BASICS 7

Their responses were:

• Achieving desired degree classification – 29 per cent.

• Finding a job after graduation – 14 per cent.
• Debt at graduation – 14 per cent.
• Day-to-day financial worries – 19 per cent.
• Balancing academic, work and social commitments – 9 per
cent.
• Self-motivation – 6 per cent.
• Heavy university workload – 4 per cent.
• Pressure to succeed due to financial cost of university – 3 per
cent.
• Homesickness – 2 per cent.1

This range of response reflects the priorities of the wide diversity

of people likely to be studying at university or college in the twenty-
first century. Government targets in the UK aim for 50 per cent of
people under the age of 30 to have had some experience of higher
education (HE) from 2010 onwards. Different measures have been
introduced to try to achieve this. In March 2007, one initiative was
to have all applicants indicate if their parents went to university
or college used as a criterion for deciding who to recruit, giving
preferential treatment to those whose mother and father had no
experience of HE. To meet their targets in the area of access and
widening participation (recruiting students from non-traditional
backgrounds), universities can also ask applicants about their eth-
nicity and their parents’ education and occupations, under changes
agreed by the Universities and Colleges Admissions Service
(UCAS). This has been seen as both social engineering and as
affirmative action on equal opportunities. Either way, the intention
that everyone who can benefit from higher education should do so
is a good one and this book is aimed at everyone considering going
into higher education to study a branch of English studies.
The government’s agenda has not affected all academic subjects
in the same way or to the same extent: the emphasis on employ-
ability skills has in many ways aligned the agenda more with prac-
tical and vocational subjects, which traditionally do not include
English studies. This need not be the case, however, and a suite of
subjects such as English literature, English language and creative
8 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

writing is well placed to attract increasing numbers of students who

wish both to develop their interest in expression and analysis and
also cultivate the knowledge and understanding that will allow
them to enter a range of professions with confidence. Among other
things, this book is therefore an attempt to contribute to the percep-
tion of English studies as a multi-vocational subject that equips
people well for life and work. It will thus refer to such things as
the English Benchmarking Statement, which has been widely
acknowledged as a useful guide to English graduate skills (see
Glossary entry on: English ‘Subject benchmark statement’).
The English Subject Centre (see Glossary) has written a very
useful guide on access and widening participation for English stud-
ies. It shows the ways in which, through interviews, recruitment and
induction procedures, skills training, the Special Educational Needs
and Disability Act 2001(SENDA) compliance, support for mature
students and carers, curriculum design and information technology
(IT) provision, as well as career-planning support, English depart-
ments are changing and enhancing their practices to attract and care
for students from non-traditional backgrounds. The report received
a broad spectrum of insightful and interesting responses when ask-
ing students their reasons for ‘choosing English’. For students who
were returning to education in order to improve their family’s
prospects, for example, it often appeared that vocational degrees
seemed more realistic options than courses in English studies until
they did some investigation into the employment prospects of
humanities graduates. One student commented that:
I came through an Access course and all I thought I could do was
a vocational degree leading to a career. But I was told [at the
English subject meeting on an access open day] to spend the
time thinking about who I was and what I wanted. I had felt that
I had to do a vocational degree as I have children who need
support and the whole point was to find better employment.
Later she reflected:
I sometimes wonder where I would be heading if I had been
doing a business or IT degree. It would have been easier in a way
as it would theoretically lead to a job [but] other types of degree
don’t make you feel something extra in every aspect of your life.
English has that capacity and that is the great thrill of it.2
1 Higher education

With the growing emphasis on widening access to higher educa-

tion (HE), it should come as no surprise that higher educations
institutions (HEIs) are increasingly diverse in character and kind. In
2005 there were 116 universities and 53 higher education colleges,
including one privately funded HEI: the University of Buckingham.
Civic red-brick universities were founded in the late nineteenth
and early to mid twentieth centuries, while the ‘medieval’ uni-
versities of Oxford and Cambridge date from the twelfth/
thirteenth centuries. The first Scottish-, Irish- and English-speaking
North American universities date from the fifteenth (St Andrews,
Glasgow and Aberdeen), sixteenth (Dublin) and eighteenth centur-
ies (New Brunswick). Many ‘old’ universities were founded in the
1950s and 1960s, when they were known as ‘new universities’ – a
title they lost with the subsequent creation of a new sector of uni-
versities in the 1990s. This was when the former polytechnics, often
called new universities even though most of them have long and
varied roots as institutions, were given university status under the
Further and Higher Education Act of 1992. These universities may
have developed from technical colleges, teacher training colleges or
mechanics institutes, and are likely to be less science-intensive than
older universities and to place more emphasis on their teaching
rather than research excellence. Several colleges of higher education
have additionally been made universities since 1992. Which type of
university or college you would like to go to will probably depend
on such factors as geographical considerations, your preferred mode
of study, and the HEI’s specialisms, facilities, reputation and image.
Size varies greatly too, and may affect your choice. The Open Uni-
versity, which largely teaches by distance learning, has over 180 000
students, but the full-time, campus based universities vary from Leeds
Metropolitan, which has over 40 000 students, to the University of
10 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

Abertay in Dundee which has fewer than 5000. The average size of
HE colleges, which are generally smaller than universities, is 3500
students.
Deciding which kind of institution to go to is therefore a
major task, alongside the question of which subject(s) to study.
The qualifications that students study for are also diverse and less
than half will be studying as a ‘standard’ student, under 20 years
of age and straight from school. About half of students in the
UK are first-degree undergraduates, while a quarter are studying
for postgraduate certificates or diplomas, Master’s and Doctoral
(PhD) degrees; a final quarter are studying for an HND (Higher
National Diploma), a DipHE (Diploma in Higher Education),
or a Foundation Degree. There are over 50 000 different higher
education courses in the UK and, from fewer than one million
in 1987, there are now well over two million students in the 169
HEIs in the UK. Nearly 90 per cent of that number come from the
UK, and about 5 per cent travel from other European countries.
The UK spends about 1 per cent of gross domestic product (GDP)
on HE, which is similar to most comparable countries except
for Australia (1.5%), and Canada, Korea and the USA (at least
2.5%).

Who studies English?

According to figures published by the Higher Education Statistics
Agency (HESA), 58 410 students were enrolled on English studies
courses in 2004–5. This figure can be further broken down as:
37 735 (full-time undergraduates); 3330 (full-time postgraduates);
14 175 (part-time undergraduates); and 3170 (part-time post-
graduates). Another breakdown, for the following year, tells us that
50 325 came from the UK, 2095 from the EU and 12 590 from
outside the EU. Of the British students, 36 810 were female and
13 515 were male, emphasizing that the subject is more popular
among women. Reassuringly for many people, after the introduc-
tion of variable or ‘top-up’ fees in September 2006 (when home
students began to be charged about £3000 per year in fees), the
latest figures for 2007 showed that the number of people applying
to full-time undergraduate courses in English at UK universities and
colleges had increased by 7.6 per cent on the previous year, making
 HIGHER EDUCATION 11

English the fifth highest subject in terms of applicant numbers, after

law, psychology, pre-clinical medicine and management.
According to studies, with regard to those undergraduates
enrolled for Single Honours English, the number of full-time stu-
dents on a course ranges from 23 to over 700, with the number of
part-time students ranging from 1 to 210. In terms of numbers
of full-time students enrolled on a Combined Honours English
course, the figures range from 1 to 700, and about half of all under-
graduates reading English do so in tandem with studying another
subject, as part of Combined Honours or Joint Honours pro-
grammes. English is also a central subject in most modular schemes
in the humanities, which allow students to choose from a range of
different modules or units within an overall suite of humanities
subjects (including history, women’s studies, English studies, writing,
American studies or religious studies).
In respect of ethnicity in HE, of the 673 775 first-year UK under-
graduate students in 2004–5, 516 705 were white and 99 290
were from ethnic minorities, which is broken down as: 9,945
(Caribbean descent); 20,315 (African descent); 2,570 (other black
background); 19,765 (Indian descent);12,070 (Pakistani descent);
4,440 (Bangladeshi descent); 5,205 (Chinese); 8,125 (other Asian);
16,855 (other, including mixed); the rest were ‘unknown’.1
In terms of other facets to the student population, fewer than
8 per cent of undergraduate students studying English in 2000
described themselves as disabled. According to staff perceptions,
more students in recent years have been coming to their degree
course with an English language qualification and more have
come from the HEI’s local area, although mature students seem
to be fewer in number in the twenty-first century, compared with
the 1990s when approximately half of all English undergraduate
students were over 25 years of age.

Who teaches in higher education?

If we move to a brief consideration of the people who attend
university from the teaching side, the academic workforce in the
UK increased 20 per cent over the 10 year period, 1995–2005, as
student numbers increased. The total number of full-time equivalent
academic staff has grown over the period by nearly 17 000 to
12 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

97 000. Within this decade to 2005, the proportion of women in

academic posts also rose by 9 per cent to 36 per cent, just over a
third of all academics; yet it remains the case that, while most stu-
dents taking English are women, most academics teaching English
are men. It is interesting also to observe that the proportion of
women professors in HE has doubled over this time span –
although from a low starting point – from 9 per cent of the total
to 19 per cent. The indications are that this upward trend will
continue (although there is a long lead time as few academics are
appointed to professorial posts before their 40s).
This improvement in career progression for women could be the
result of rising proportions of women attending and studying at
universities and colleges in recent decades. Other underrepresented
groups are also increasing in number and HEIs are now recruiting
in a global marketplace, which is reflected in the increasingly multi-
national academic workforce. Consequently, there is also a rising
trend in the proportion of academic staff from black and minority
ethnic backgrounds, rising by 2 percentage points to 8 per cent of
the total – mostly attributable to an increase in the numbers of
Asian staff, especially Indian and Chinese.
Finally, universities and HE colleges employ not just academics,
and in total there were 284 000 people employed in 130 HEIs in
England in 2004–5. More than 1 per cent of the total workforce
in the UK works in HE if we include professional and support staff
as well as academic employees.

What are the key skills for English studies?

In 2002, the English Subject Centre asked English departments
to comment on the student profile at their institutions
(www.english.heacademy.ac.uk/) and some views expressed in
responses were common across the sector: for example, that weak-
nesses of written expression and organization are on the rise and
that there is an increasing decline in the standard of literacy, even
among those with high A-level grades. This is an important factor
in the transition many students will need to make successfully from
pre-university study to HE, where the amount of reading and the
speed with which lecturers expect them to study texts may come as a
surprise. In an age when there are so many calls on people’s time,
 HIGHER EDUCATION 13

there is thus some concern among teaching staff about the depth and
extent of students’ knowledge and their capacity for independent
learning. This is partly to say lecturers perceive that there is a greater
reliance on approaches and readings provided by teaching staff
themselves, with fewer students exhibiting an inclination towards
independent research. It has been suggested that this is a result of
the modern and somewhat instrumentalist emphasis on assessment
in education, which encourages students to be more conservative in
their approach to assignments because of a fear of failure if they rely
too much on imagination and initiative, even though these are
often the characteristics of original thought that markers value.
In essence, if you are preparing for university-level English, you
are best advised to concentrate on the breadth of your reading, in
terms of knowledge and understanding, and the quality of your
writing, in terms of skills. These two elements, combined with a
lively, genuine interest and an enquiring, reflective mind, are the
surest foundations for success. English students are generally highly
praised in terms of their abilities and well placed for most sub-
sequent careers because of the range of general knowledge and
analytical skills inculcated by English studies.

How will you be taught?

Teaching takes place over three levels (or four in Scotland), which
are most commonly taken full-time over the same number of years.
Hence you will find people referring to level 1, 2 and 3. Level 1 is
usually introductory and the threshold achievement you need to
attain, in terms of progressing to level 2, is a pass, although most
students will aim to do considerably better. Levels 2 and 3 are the
‘honours’ years where your final degree classification will be estab-
lished through the marks you receive for the assessed work you
undertake – the balance between levels 2 and 3 in determining
your result varies greatly between universities. Your honours degree
will be denoted by a class: first, upper or lower second, or third. In
recent years, about 10 per cent of students achieve the distinction of
a first, and nearly all the others receive a second, with only a minor-
ity now leaving higher education with a third-class degree. The
‘with honours’ (latin: cum laude) component most commonly rests
on taking the final year dissertation or project module, which is
14 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

offered by the majority of departments and is often deemed the

most important piece of work in terms of academic endeavour and
in terms of achieving success. Some students decide not to take this
module and may thus elect to receive a degree without honours.
The most common diet of teaching is a balance of lectures and
group discussion classes (usually seminars of varied group sizes).
Although a large number will have roughly half and half, many
institutions will have more classes than lectures; only a few will have
more lectures. The full range of teaching methods includes: consul-
tations in tutors’ weekly ‘office hours’; tutorials for the dissertation
project (one to one discussions with the tutor); seminars with
between ten and 30 students; group presentations, usually within a
seminar; practical sessions, especially in creative writing; essay tutor-
ials with up to five students; sessions in IT classrooms (the use
of virtual learning environments and e-learning are increasingly
common); student-led classes; distance-learning or mobile-learning
(m-learning) packages; and on-line discussion groups.
As to the length of time spent each week in classes, or those
periods where undergraduates receive formal tuition from staff,
the average is between six and ten hours a week but might be as
high as 15. With regard to private study, average hours per week are
usually between 20 and 30 hours. In most (but not all) institutions,
the amount of assessment by formal examination on a programme
ranges from 21 per cent to 50 per cent, with the rest given over to
continuous assessment.
Most universities and/or departments provide an extensive pas-
toral network for students, the aim of which is to help enhance
the ‘student experience’, which is a current buzz-phrase in HE.
Specialist advice is available in many areas as well as academic:
accommodation; child care; careers; counselling; finance; medical
matters; support for disabled students. There are other bodies to help
too, from the chaplaincy to the students’ union. You may also have
the opportunity to study in other countries on Socrates/Erasmus or
Brethren Colleges Abroad programmes.

How will English help you in later life?

Remember that English is multi-vocational rather than non-
vocational and many of the skills that are necessary to graduate in
 HIGHER EDUCATION 15

English are highly prized in every job or profession, with students

able to perform a range of important tasks: to write well in a variety
of formats; to organize workloads and work to tight deadlines; to
convey meaning precisely; to summarize, argue and debate within
contexts; to interpret, assess and evaluate sources; to develop opin-
ions, propose ideas and theories; to think logically and laterally; to
absorb and retain large amounts of information; to persuade others
of a point of view; to think and act creatively. This is an impressive
skills set and it is helpful to reflect on the abilities you are develop-
ing in this way; your institution will probably also have in place a
personal development plan (PDP) programme which will encour-
age you to build up a portfolio of your achievements under a variety
of headings.
Traditionally, teaching has been an important career area for
English graduates who wish to use their subject. To teach in state
schools in the UK you need to complete a one-year Postgraduate
Certificate in Education (PGCE) for which early application in
your final year is needed. Teaching English as a foreign language
(TEFL) may require the completion of a short course, although
many graduates teach abroad with no formal teaching qualification.
The media, an area which interests many English graduates, are now
offering more opportunities than in previous years but usually
graduates need to gain relevant work experience (voluntary or paid)
or follow a one-year vocational course to succeed in this competitive
area. This may explain why more English graduates initially enter
management or administrative roles than journalism or writing.
It is still true that many English graduates regard the subject
matter of their degree as essentially irrelevant when making their
career choice and happily investigate the full range of occupations.
English graduates are very adaptable, often pursuing less obvious
routes to their chosen destinations or moving from one employ-
ment sector to another. Many begin their careers in administrative
roles, others enter financial careers, work in management in the
private sector, train to become teachers, social workers or lawyers,
or work in local government and the Civil Service. Good com-
munication skills, which are often developed by studying English,
are highly valued by employers. If you are thinking about future
careers, the best place to start considering your options as a graduate
is the prospects website at: www.prospects.ac.uk
16 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

It is also possible to study at postgraduate level in subjects both

directly related and unrelated to your first degree. It is important
that you begin investigating opportunities for postgraduate study
early and in most instances application should be made directly to
the institution concerned. There is no guarantee of funding for
postgraduate study and it is often easier to obtain a place than it is to
secure finance. This is particularly true for arts graduates. The Arts
and Humanities Research Council is the funding body concerned
with postgraduate awards in English. Competition for awards is
fierce, so it is worth exploring other potential sources of funding.

What is on the curriculum?

English is a diverse and constantly changing subject in which crit-
ical self-awareness is perhaps the most important element. It covers
study of the English language and of the literatures of not only
Great Britain and Ireland, but also of other countries from the
Anglophone world. ‘English studies’ can also incorporate in its
curriculum comparative literature and literature in translation, plus
non-literary texts, as well as the study and practice of drama, creative
writing and film.
Over 90 per cent of HEIs offer Single Honours English, but most
also offer English with another subject as Combined or Joint
Honours. The largest changes in the last ten years have been that
more language teaching is in the curriculum and there has been an
enormous growth in creative writing courses, which has had a sub-
stantial effect on the shape of English studies nationwide. The
majority of courses have at least some compulsory elements, of
which the most common are in these areas: introductions to the
study of English and/or literature at degree level; critical/literary
theory; literary history; literary genres; and critical practice.
The number of optional courses is generally higher than the
number of compulsory courses. ‘Late twentieth century and con-
temporary’ and ‘modernist’ are the most widely available options,
with ‘renaissance’ coming third. ‘Critical/literary theory’ is the
most widely taught compulsory course, with ‘general linguistics’ in
second place. In terms of the way in which the syllabus foundations
are shaped, the following indicate the curriculum choices made
by departments, from most influential to least: coverage of literary
 HIGHER EDUCATION 17

periods; reading/interpretive skills; specialist interests of staff; giving

student choice; coverage of literary history; genre study; theoretical
issues; language/linguistic study; theme-based courses; cultural
history; individual authors; and cultural politics. The most popular
courses are contemporary literature, creative writing, film, modern-
ism, Shakespeare and women’s writing. Amongst ‘global’ English,
Irish literature is the most widely taught.2
From this, you will get a flavour of the kinds of areas and special-
isms you might encounter. To make sure that you will be studying
aspects of English that you feel might appeal to you, it is worth
looking at the curriculum of any department to which you are
thinking of applying. Some students only find out after they have
enrolled that the diet of teaching and learning on offer on their
first-year syllabus is not to their taste, by which time it is far less easy
to change to another choice of course.

What are the characteristics of English studies?

In the UK, a ‘subject benchmark statement’ for the honours
degree was produced for English in 2000 by academics from across
the country for the Quality Assurance Agency (QAA – see
www.qaa.ac.uk/academicinfrastructure/benchmark/statements/
English07.asp). Subject benchmark statements, which have now
been developed for most disciplines, provide a means for the aca-
demic community to describe the nature and characteristics of pro-
grammes in a specific subject and the standards of degree awards,
plus the attributes and capabilities graduates should possess.
Revised in 2007, the English statement characterizes the subject
as, above all, a versatile academic discipline focused on ‘the produc-
tion, reception and interpretation of written texts’ and ‘the nature,
history and potential of the English language’. The study of English
literature and language should aim towards encouraging an open-
ness of mind, conceptual sophistication, and a vibrant dialogue
with past and present cultures and values, and as a student you
‘are expected to be aware of the production and determination
of meaning by historical, social, political, stylistic, ethnic, gender,
geographical and other contexts’.
The document covers the key subject-specific, generic and trans-
ferable skills an English graduate should attain, and you may wish to
18 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

view these on-line, but I should like to say a little more about levels
of attainment and standards. Most fundamentally, an averagely suc-
cessful English student will be able to demonstrate an extensive
knowledge of the subject expressed in an appropriate critical
vocabulary and through an effective command of written English.
With respect to understanding, literature, graduates should also
be able to make connections between a substantial range of
authors, texts and genres from different historical periods or cul-
tures, while language graduates should be able to explain coherently
and cogently a range of approaches to the study of English language.
In terms of skills, English students will generally be able to interpret
different ideas, critical approaches and values. However, English
also aims to develop both powers of textual analysis and of fluent
critical argument.
A report by the Council for Industry for Higher Education,
titled ‘Employability: employer perceptions of subject benchmark
statements’, found with regard to English that ‘70%+ responding
employers recognise that critical thinking, communication skills,
learning and self development and creativity are competences that
are being developed’. Moreover, some of the employers surveyed
also thought that studying English developed a number of other
qualities and attributes that were not in the benchmark state-
ment: persuasiveness, drive, judgement, conceptual thinking and
confidence (see www.cihe-uk.com/docs/PUBS/forbes.pdf).
It can be concluded from this that the skills English students
display are as varied as the discipline, but that key skills of writing,
analysis, communication, and critical and creative thinking are at
the core of the subject. These are far from non-vocational skills, of
course, and will stand you in good stead in the employment market.
2 English studies

The experience of English in higher education strikes new students

in different ways depending on the educational background they
come from and the HE institution they attend. However, there are
some important areas that surface time and again for those adjusting
to the different demands of study at this level. In this chapter we
will look at four aspects of English at university level: the first is the
range of reading and study; the second is the texts you are most
likely to encounter; the third is the broad area of theory, of histor-
ical contexts, and of critical approaches to English studies; and the
fourth is the fraught question of language and meaning.

Breadth and depth

For students who come direct from further education, often the
most striking difference at university level is the requirement to
read more material in a shorter space of time. Although there are
opportunities for more detailed study at various points on a number
of courses, students’ reading schedules will now seem much more
heavily loaded, and you will need to develop the skills to deal with
this as soon as possible. You may also find you are asked to read
more criticism, both as a means to promote debate and to introduce
different schools of theoretical and critical thought. Tutors will be
keen to promote independent study and encourage your reflective
thinking both within the discipline of English and, in many cases,
across the disciplines. Their concern will therefore be to provide
you with the intellectual framework and the reading skills required
for proficient ‘critical practice’.
The main educational aims of English programmes are to provide
opportunities for students to develop a sound knowledge of forms
and conventions alongside the ability to read, debate, and write
20 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

knowledgeably about texts with skill and flair. To do this you must
acquire a critical vocabulary adequate to the understanding and
analysis of complex forms of language while establishing a general
ability to think independently and reflectively upon your learning.
Which is to say, you need to read as widely as possible and reflect
on the connections between different books, ideas, authors and
approaches to texts.
All universities and colleges will have either a library or, increas-
ingly now, a learning resources centre, which is geared as much
towards the use of information and communications technology
as paper-based texts, and will have spaces for small-group work as
well as for solitary reading. Almost all HEIs will provide optional
or compulsory library instruction at levels 1 and/or 2. Essay writing
skills at level 1 are also compulsory for the majority of institutions,
usually provided by the department, with optional instruction avail-
able at later levels. It is only slightly less common these days for
departments to provide some training in oral communication or
presentation skills. You will also find great emphasis placed on
the academic presentation of work, including such aspects as refer-
encing and bibliographic conventions. Some instruction in this
important scholarly area is compulsory at almost all institutions,
while computer and internet training is nearly always available too,
and some HEIs will provide software packages for teaching and
learning aspects of English language.1
To understand how you learn, and how you learn best, is the
hardest educational task for all students. It is also not something that
most people think about. There are several different learning styles
and it is also true that we all learn holistically, in many life contexts,
not just when we think we are studying. For example, your domin-
ant learning style might be auditory, visual or kinaesthetic and tact-
ile (learning by doing): there are many tools on-line for you to
work out which you are; for example the support4learning.co.uk
website has useful materials, including a link to a simple chart to
help you assess your own learning style at www.chaminade.org/
inspire/learnstl.htm
 ENGLISH STUDIES 21

Texts studied
Each English course is distinctive and reflects the interests and
expertise of staff in the department. It is also true, however, that, as
the English Benchmarking statement states, ‘the overall structure,
the relationship between the individual elements, and objectives
of the course as a whole, should be coherent and explicit’. The
courses and modules offered in English studies often largely allow
you to compile your own diet of study according to your needs and
interests. For instance, it may be possible for you to construct a
programme based broadly on a conventional mainstream of English
literature, or on period studies largely arranged in chronological
sequence. The flexibility and range of options on courses is worth
checking in advance, just as it is also important to ask yourself early
on how you would prefer to structure your course around particu-
lar aspects or approaches to English language, or studies of writings
that have not been commonly included on traditional English lit-
erature courses. Most courses will offer modules in American litera-
ture, literatures in English and in a variety of writings by women;
but all courses will differ and have their own specialisms; for
example, English teaching teams may have a strong commitment to
either the canon of ‘great works’ or the study of ‘minority’/‘mar-
ginalized’ writings. At my own institution, for example, we firmly
believe that the study of under-represented writings will enhance
and enrich your understanding of both literature and literary stud-
ies, as well as assisting your understanding of the way that a literary
canon is established and perpetuated. This is one of the much-
debated sides to English study in literature and you will want to
decide for yourself which is more important to you: an opportunity
to study literary ‘classics’, or texts by diverse authors that may be
new to you.

‘Theory’ and the importance of history

In the 1980s and especially the 1990s, literary theory was a domin-
ant aspect of critical study. After the so-called ‘theory wars’ of the
1990s, in the 2000s theory has found an integrated place within the
spectrum of literary analysis. It is less frequent for someone strongly
to identify themselves in terms of theoretical positions such as
22 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

feminism, Marxism or post-structuralism, but an awareness of these

schools of thought features in almost all published literary criticism
and an understanding of ‘theory’ within the spectrum of critical
approaches is probably only second in importance to an under-
standing of literary history and context. Indeed, one of the most
attractive features of an English degree is the opportunity it offers
you to reflect on your own experiences and views in critical ways,
as one student explained in an interview with the English Subject
Centre: ‘The course is not just about [reading “classic” literature], it
also covers critical theory and gives you more confidence in what
you are thinking, [making you] more open to other things.’2
The first point to make about theory is that it argues that we
always do have a critical approach to the study of literature even
though we do not necessarily always think that we do. ‘Traditional’
literary criticism takes itself to be apolitical, disinterested, neutral
and even perhaps ‘natural’. Yet, any approach to literature, if it is to
be replicated, must have a set of assumptions if not principles, and
this is the place we should start.
The most common ‘traditional’ approach to literary study can be
outlined by the following six points:
1 Meaning lies with the author. The novel or poem has varied
meanings to different readers but there is only one true
meaning – that which the author intended. It is the author’s
imagination and moral feeling that we are appreciating in
reading literature. George Eliot said that great art ‘enlarges
our sympathies’, and, in line with this, traditional criticism
thinks good literature educates our sensibilities.
2 Popular literature is that which is ephemeral and merely con-
temporary, whereas good literature conveys and embodies
timeless qualities and values: it is that which communicates
universally and transcends its time of writing. We ought to
note here also that literature is supposed to be well-written,
but good writing alone does not always constitute literature
– otherwise a diversity of texts such as history books, philo-
sophical essays and religious sermons would more often be
called literature – as indeed might menus, advertisements
and magazines. It is worth thinking here what actually does
constitute literature – for example, are the works of Charles
 ENGLISH STUDIES 23

Darwin and Sigmund Freud literature? Is the Bible, the

Koran or Greek mythology? Can biographies be literature? If
so, which and why?
3 The way to read literature is through habits of what are called
close reading and practical criticism. This usually means, on
the one hand paying attention to the formal qualities of the
text (its use of metaphors, rhymes, images and repetitions)
and on the other hand employing our emotion, aesthetic
response and sense of moral values to respond to it. Literary
study requires sensitivity, understanding and feeling rather
than an attention to its extra-textual contexts. Literature is
moral but not political, humane but not didactic.
4 The most important aspects to attend to in studying a novel
are literary language, plot and character. In reading a novel
we ask such questions as are the characters well-rounded and
believable? Do they act as real people do? Is any of the plot
superfluous? Is the ending well prepared for, and does the
beginning make sense of what comes afterwards? Inciden-
tally, these are not modern questions but concerns that go
back to the Greek philosophers. Plato and Aristotle disagreed
about whether plot or character was more important to
imaginative writing, and Henry James and H.G. Wells had
the same argument.
5 A good poem or piece of prose is one with a unified whole
meaning in which all the parts fit together – nothing is
unnecessary and everything adds to the sense of the poem or
the plot of the novel.
6 Last, the question such criticism asks is: what does the literary
work mean?
An alternative approach to the one above begins with the premise
that all (economic, social, cultural and even personal) action is
linked to the operations of power and is therefore political. Litera-
ture, in terms of its production, consumption and interpretation, is
consequently also political.
Perhaps the first thing to say about political theory is that it does
not view literature as timeless and universal. Instead, it maintains
that novels and poems are rooted in history, and texts will reveal
various ‘ideologies’ that lie behind them. So what is ‘ideology’? In a
24 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

traditional sense it is of course a political persuasion, a consciously

held set of beliefs about something; but this only gives a narrow
definition of ‘ideology’ and is the definition favoured by those who
think they do not have an ideology. Critical theory argues by con-
trast that everyone has an ‘ideological perspective’, which is in
Terry Eagleton’s words ‘the largely concealed structure of values
which informs and underlies our factual statements’.3 So, ideology is
not just the politics we hold, the prejudices we show, and the opin-
ions that we put forward, it is our entire (imaginary) relationship
with the real conditions of our existence, and so is most clearly
shown not in what we preach but what we practise: for example, the
ideology of ‘freedom’ promotes the belief in the liberty of everyone,
but in capitalist society there is actually a complex mesh of power
relationships restricting people’s lives at all points, most clearly in
relation to access to such things as money or work. Similarly, the
ideology that maintains ‘people are basically the same’ serves to deny
or obscure the enormous differences in the social and economic
conditions that distinguish people’s lives. So, as an illustration, trad-
itional approaches to literature ask us to consider the universal facts
of birth, death and suffering – to create empathy with the char-
acters’ lives through a perception of shared experience. However,
the conditions under which women give birth, and the circum-
stances under which people suffer, are extremely varied and an
appreciation of these differences will affect our perceptions and
emotions. We also have to pay attention to different ways of reading
fiction because of our divergent perspectives. For example, in Jane
Eyre Charlotte Brontë illustrates the ways in which Jane is necessar-
ily restricted by the male-dominated society around her because she
has no financial independence – only inheritance can change this
for her. From a feminist perspective this highlights the oppression
suffered in Victorian society by women – especially those without
money or advanced social status (even in marriage all a wife’s assets
legally became her husband’s). On the other hand, from a different
political perspective, what the novel omits to discuss at any length is
the source of that fortune – Jane inherits the wealth that her uncle
has acquired from his vineyards in Madeira. The inheritance marks
Jane’s liberation in English patriarchal society, but her emancipation
rests on the suffering and exploitation of slave workers elsewhere.
Ideology, far from being conscious, is most effective in its
 ENGLISH STUDIES 25

influence on us when we are unaware of its operation. Its effect

is to naturalize or normalize existing relations – we generally are
encouraged to think of the social relations we participate in as
in some way unchangeable or usual or right. Perhaps one trivial
example from Jane Austen’s novel Emma can illustrate what I mean.
At the start of Chapter 49 there is the following description: ‘The
weather continued much the same all the following morning; and
the same loneliness, and the same melancholy, seemed to reign at
Hartfield . . .’. Crudely speaking, if the weather complements the
mood of the characters in novels, this conceit is generally praised –
thought of as a literary technique that blends the description of the
weather with the emotions of the characters to show nature and
humanity in accord. What it also does, however, is suggest that
human society and conditions are a part of the natural world: are
to be expected and tolerated because that is the way of things. We
may believe that we are less happy when there is bad weather, but
this is precisely how ideology operates upon us to normalize our
cultural behaviour. It is not such a long step from this perspective to
one that attributes people’s character to the climate and reduces
their personalities to stereotypical traits such as a Mediterranean
temperament or a reserved northern manner.
One immediate observation we can make is that literature works
to create an ideological perspective in the reader and this is
reinforced by traditional literary criticism. We are asked, as readers,
to identify with the characters, to reflect their values, accept their
beliefs. If, as in Emma, the characters are resentful and distrustful of
change, then this fosters a degree of conservatism in the reader also.
A novel that tells us that money, power and class are not as import-
ant as family, romantic love and individual happiness, whether we
agree with it or not, is transmitting an ideology: it encourages
readers to accept their position in the social order and direct their
energies towards personal goals rather than political ones. As will
now be apparent, the term ‘political’ here does not refer just to
party politics and views on such events as the Iraq War, but every
aspect of our lives – anywhere that a relationship of influence is in
operation from the effects of racial attacks and sexual harassment to
the views we express about the novels we read.
If we are aware of and conscious to the workings of ideology in a
text, then our approach to literature may be affected in three ways:
26 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

1 First, we can look at the text to assess the ideology of the

author and his or her time.
2 Second, we can consider the production of literature more
widely. For example, critics argue that the novel form itself
reveals a particular kind of ideology, that of the middle
classes. Its emphasis on the life-like representation of the
existence of ‘rounded individuals’ is the very substance of
bourgeois ideology from a Marxist viewpoint: it reinforces
the values of individualism, free enterprise and a class struc-
ture in which the interdependence of different classes is
downplayed. This is not just a question of politics but one of
history. The novel, as an art form, arises in the eighteenth
century at the same time as industrial capitalism, which is
to say in a changing society that no longer sees itself as prim-
arily communal and collective, but as containing free, com-
petitive, independent and private individuals. The activity of
novel-reading, which is solitary, unlike drama, singing and
the recital of poetry, reinforces individualism in society.
3 Last, we can consider our own ideology – when reading
through a novel, what do we attend to in thinking about or
analysing the text, and how do we write about it – what do
we discuss as important, and why?
Political theory offers many different answers to this last ques-
tion, but we can look at three approaches here that are particularly
prominent, and which focus respectively on gender, class and
colonialism.

Gender
Austen’s novel Emma suggests that marriage is an object in life and
an ending in fiction. The novel insinuates that the main preoccupa-
tion of a young woman’s thoughts should be marriage. This effect is
primarily achieved through ‘closure’, a term used to describe the
way of finishing a novel with a sense of ends tied up. ‘Closure’ is
ideologically important because it suggests that the rest of the novel
has been leading inevitably up to this point: that whatever happens
at the end is in some sense ‘correct’. The more formally structured a
novel is, the stronger this ideological effect will be. In Austen’s
novels, the main plots always end happily and this is united to an
 ENGLISH STUDIES 27

idea about moral worth and growth. The connection between

morality and happiness suggests that if we are good, if we conform
to society’s dictates, we will achieve happiness. The emphasis in
Emma on marriage also suggests that a woman’s life is defined by
her passage from one man, her father, to another, her husband. Her
father, Mr Woodhouse, and eventual husband, Mr Knightley, clearly
occupy positions of dominance, even though Emma believes she
can be mistress of their houses, and the novel is explicit in its belief
in the importance of family life, the obligation to respect one’s
parents, and the necessity of chastity.
Feminist approaches to literature predominantly take one of
three forms:
1 The recuperation of marginalized women’s writing (e.g. by
such publishers as Virago and The Women’s Press).
2 The analysis of gender relations and representations in
literature.
3 A consideration of whether writing has itself become a prac-
tice defined as masculine. Just as the generic term ‘man’ has
in the past supposedly included women, but really made
women invisible, perhaps also the structure and tone of writ-
ing has been shaped by men, because it has been dominated
by them. Some women authors have therefore written exclu-
sively about women’s experience and also attempted to give
birth to a different kind of prose – one that is less controlled,
formal and structured, more fluid, personal and creative.

Class
In Emma class barriers or wealth do not appear insuperable impedi-
ments to individuals from poor classes and this allows us to equalize
in the imagination what is unequal in society. The marriages at the
end of the novel are made to appear ‘right’ or ‘natural’, but we
should also observe that they reinforce the existing class structures.
Harriet cannot marry Knightley; the thought deeply offends Emma,
and although Austen portrays Emma as a snob, the character was
also Austen’s favourite heroine; do the marriages at the end of the
novel suggest that Austen, like her society, is equally disinclined to
countenance marriage across classes? The novel implies characters
will get the marriage partners they deserve, and Austen’s matches
28 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

are based less on romance than on social and economic consider-

ations, tied to moral worth. Fanny Price and Edmund Bertram
end up together at the close of Mansfield Park because on the
one hand Fanny, although a poor relation, has the same breeding,
and on the other because they have both in some sense earned one
another. The novel charts their moral development and education
until Austen considers they are right for each other. Similarly,
Emma has to mature sufficiently to both appreciate and win her
‘Knight’.
Another curious fact of note with Emma is the novel’s dedication
to the Prince Regent, who was a great admirer of Austen’s novels.
On the one hand, we know that Austen disliked him and therefore
it is not a personal dedication but a formal one; on the other hand,
the fact that so hated a member of the Royal Family could identify
with and praise her novels, and be in turn honoured by one of them,
reinforces a reading that wants to argue there is a deeply conserva-
tive ideology at work in Austen’s fiction (e.g. contrast this with
Shelley’s excoriating poem on the monarchy ‘England in 1819’,
just three years later).
Austen’s novels tease away at the morals and manners of the
middle-class country gentry, and are thus mostly unconcerned
with the aristocracy or the peasantry. The scene in which Harriet
encounters the gypsies in Emma is interesting because the threat
they pose to her is similar to the threat they pose to the novel as a
whole. The gypsies are kept at the margins of the plot (almost
ignored, as are servants) and the possibility of their disrupting the
social order is similarly repressed – only a year before Waterloo and
two decades on from the French Revolution. These incidents on
the world stage are of course for the most part also unmentioned in
Austen’s novels (the military are less fighters than potential hus-
bands), and their omission is significant because it could be argued
to represent an attempt to deny or avoid history. The conservative
message about the French Revolution of Austen’s novels is perhaps
that ‘it can’t happen here’, yet the time in which she was writing
was a period of great unrest in Britain and abroad. Probably the
only allusion to this we have in Emma is at the start of Chapter 20,
when we learn that Jane Fairfax’s father was an infantry soldier who
‘died in action abroad’.
If we compare this attitude with similarly lauded canonical
 ENGLISH STUDIES 29

French or Russian novels, the lack of historical engagement in

Austen’s fiction is striking – a point which, given that these con-
temporaries are nearly all men, might take us back to the necessity
for a feminist approach to inform our reading of the novel.
The point here is that what is pushed to a novel’s margins or left
out altogether is just as important, ideologically, as what is put in.
Austen discusses the morals of a class but she does this by turning
within, not looking without. In consequence, by examining one
class it might be argued she is actually examining no classes. The
observation to be made here is one about definition, which is
extremely important to literary theory. Theory argues that some-
thing is known through not identity but difference. We can only
know what white is by considering it in relation to black, what man is
by considering its relation to woman, what the middle classes are by
reference to other classes. And, consequently, by discussing only the
middle class, Austen will never sufficiently discuss them: what the
middle class is can only be defined by considering the relationships
between the classes.

Colonialism
The above discussion takes us to a third political aspect that we
ought to attend to, but which at first sight seems less than important
to novels such as Austen’s. Most succinctly put: we only know what
England is or what Europe is by considering each of them in rela-
tion to the rest of the world. Austen’s Mansfield Park, and E.M.
Forster’s Howards End (1910), as another example, are novels about
English life and gentility that belong to a long tradition where the
eponymous houses are representative of wider society. The debate
over the English country-house novel is one that concerns itself
with the ‘Condition of England’, as it came to be known in the
1840s – with the morals, manners, characters and values of English
society. However, both the societies and the families discussed in
these novels are economically dependent on the development of
the British Empire and on overseas ‘trade’ – trade here largely being
a euphemism for colonial exploitation. These aspects are not fore-
grounded in the novel, and they are not commonly discussed by
critics, but this is itself an ideologically significant omission. British
colonialism is considered unimportant because it is marginal in the
novel’s textual discussion. Sir Thomas Bertram in Mansfield Park is
30 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

the source and fount of authority; he is both the law and the moral
order in the house. When he is abroad, regulated discipline and
puritan soberliness are gently challenged by the frivolity, romance
and profligacy of the younger generation, under the spell of the
Crawfords. The climax of this is of course to be the play, the ethical
status of which troubles Fanny Price so much. Fortunately for
Fanny, the book’s moral conscience, Sir Thomas returns in time to
restore order and propriety.
Yet, where has Sir Thomas been? The answer is to his plantations
in Antigua where he has been similarly ruling and controlling the
local community. And in fact the regulated harmony of Mansfield
Park is dependent on Sir Thomas also holding sway on his plantation
in Antigua – where, as it so happens, the early nineteenth century
was a time of serious economic problems, slave revolts and colonial
competition with France. Antigua economically sustains Mansfield
Park and both places are controlled by and for wealth – in Antigua
its production, in Mansfield Park its consumption. Both communities
are also to do with rule – with the maintenance of the status quo,
with the right to rule, and with the appropriate sense of proper
behaviour that accompanies a hierarchical social order. But there is
a striking discrepancy, even an incompatibility, between the refined
moral sense that Austen delineates in the Bertram household and
the basic conditions of slavery imposed in the West Indies. The point
here is not that Austen ought to criticize her society but that the
society we witness in Mansfield Park is a slave-owning one, whose
moral as well as material well-being is founded – contentedly – on
the cruelty and inhumanity of the sugar trade of the period and on
enforced slave labourers transported from Africa to a Caribbean
island. A century later, African ‘trade’ supports Howards End too.

Language and textual theory

I conjectured earlier on the question of what texts we might con-
sider to be ‘literature’? If you spend any time thinking about this
question you will soon find it is almost impossible to answer satis-
factorily. Political theory will say that ‘literature’ is an ideological
construct – like everything else in society, the concept of literature
is determined by ‘power’ and vested interests (including institutions
like universities).
 ENGLISH STUDIES 31

Another response, however, would query the concept behind the

word ‘literature’. The concept itself relies on the notion of a ‘canon’
and the kind of reading practice I outlined earlier – it seems to
require that there are good books and bad books. It also implies three
ideological positions: that the things to attend to in a novel are not
history and culture but character and plot; that literature enriches
our cultural lives more than other writing; and that the important
guarantor of meaning is the intention of the author who produced
the work of literature. However, if we interrogate these ideas then
we will, at the same time, be questioning the category of ‘literature’
altogether. If we move to studying not what the text says but how it
says it and if we analyse metaphors not for their imaginativeness but
for what they imply, then surely the things that we study when we
do ‘English’ are present in all texts.
Undoubtedly, what is present in all literature is writing. So, to
many critics, the most important aspect to analyse is actually the
movement and play of ‘language’, or what is called ‘textuality’.
When studying a novel, for example, we need not ask what char-
acters or authors mean, but we do need to ask what words mean
and, as importantly, how do they mean? The context becomes the
most important thing here: what language means is not fixed by the
author but is produced by the particular reader from the written
text within a historical context. Earlier I said that we can only know
what something is by considering it in relation to what it is defined
against, by what it is not. This is actually where literary theory begins.
It starts of course with language, but we need to know what lan-
guage is. Traditionally linguists chiefly studied language diachronic-
ally, which means across time. They studied the development of a
language and how its usages changed in speech communities and
from generation to generation. At the start of the twentieth century,
however, linguists began to consider language synchronically – in
one time period – and ask how people used language at any one
time. Two important points were deduced.
First comes the point that linguistic referentiality is not best rep-
resented by the relation between a ‘word’ and a ‘thing’, but between
a ‘signifier’ (or symbol) and a ‘signified’ (or concept). There is thus
a SYMBOL and a CONCEPT but no connection in language
between the SYMBOL and the world, or what we call ‘reality’. So, a
signifier’s meaning is dependent on context:
32 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

e.g. ‘Cat’ means a four-legged domestic furry animal, but it also

denotes:
the general name for a genus of animals including lions and
tigers
a rope-whip on a ship
a woman
a tripod
etc.
If we put ‘cat’ in other contexts, like the expressions ‘cat got your
tongue’ or ‘hell-cat’ or ‘raining cats and dogs’ it has very different
meanings. Language uses these different meanings constantly; and
this is particularly foregrounded by literary study. So, to choose a
much-discussed phrase, consider the opening to Keats’s ‘Ode on a
Grecian Urn’: ‘Thou still unravish’d bride of quietness.’ In this phrase,
the word ‘still’ means ‘not moving’, because the Grecian urn is
motionless, as is the scene that is depicted on it, but it also means
‘not yet’. The urn remains metaphorically unravished – suggesting
on one level simply that it is unbroken. As the poem develops we
find new meanings and contexts (marriage, silence, vows, sex) for
the other words too because, evidently, the urn is not in fact a
‘bride’ and is certainly not married to quietness in any conventional
sense, and so on. This quality of plural meanings has been thought
to be a property of literary language, but it certainly is not
exclusively so by any means. It is a property of all language. The
word ‘still’ has different meanings no matter who uses it and any
words can be shifted into new contexts that provide new meanings.
Consequently, the way we understand or interpret ‘literature’ and
all writing reveals our preoccupations and cultural concerns as
readers, not what the text means in any definitive sense. ‘Literary’
language is more a property of the process of reading texts than a
property of a separate category of writing, although we might argue
that some texts provoke more, and more interesting, readings than
others.
Second comes the point that language is arbitrary and works
through difference not equivalence. For example, with a set of traffic
lights, which is a simple language or code, red means ‘stop’ and
green means ‘go’ – to those who know the code. But there is no
necessary reason for this arrangement. We could reverse the colours;
 ENGLISH STUDIES 33

or blue could be used to mean ‘stop’ and orange to mean ‘go’. The
same applies to language – there is no reason why ‘cat’ should mean
a four-legged animal – any word (or signifier) will do. That is, any
symbol will suffice as long as it is distinguishable from every other
symbol. The same is true with traffic lights: it does not matter
which colours are used just so long as they are distinguishable and
known. Consequently, we may say that language means what it
does through ‘difference’. ‘Cat’ means what it does because it is
distinguishable from ‘dog’ and ‘cap’ and ‘bat’, not because it bears
any relation to a four-legged animal.
This is actually one of the most radical developments in thinking
in the last century. Primarily it is important because it asserts the
social nature of language. I said that we could agree to reverse the
traffic lights signs for stop and go; but who is ‘we’? Individuals or
groups can do it themselves easily but unless it is socially and collect-
ively agreed then we are going to have a lot of accidents! On the
one hand, language is ‘immutable’, ‘unchangeable’ – the relation
between red and ‘stop’ in wider society is fixed as far as we are
concerned as individuals. However, language is also ‘mutable’ or
‘changeable’ because words do change their meanings over time.
But this is only within a collective system. The conclusion to this
may be that we should pay as much attention to the use of language
in society as to the use of language by an author. Also, the fact that
language is a system that gives rise to meaning through differences
is particularly important if we extend the idea to other realms of
meaning. So, for example, we can again ask ‘what is literature?’ We
know that one answer is to cite great literary works that communi-
cate timeless human values. Another response, however, is to say
that by ‘literature’ what is meant is that which is not ‘minor’ or
‘popular’ or ‘genre’ writing, and so on. Similarly, a marital status of
‘married’ is most meaningful because it signifies ‘not single’, ‘not
divorced’, ‘not widowed’: like ‘red’ at a traffic-lights party, the wed-
ding ring signifies ‘not available’. And of course the status of ‘mar-
ried’ would have no meaning without the other signifiers, which
is to say that the other conceptual categories are referred to or
implied by the word ‘married’. Language therefore functions in the
fashion of an ‘alibi’, which is primarily significant for its differen-
tiation from another possibility. An alibi is not important because it
says where you were at a certain time, but because it says that you
34 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

were not present at the scene of a crime. So, with language we can
attend to the words that are not used, and the inferences we can
make, when a government spokesperson describes the long-term
unemployed as ‘economically inactive’, or a butcher is only referred
to as a ‘purveyor of meat’.
Last, another implication of a theory that says language only
means through differences between signifiers/words, is that when
we speak, when we write and when we read literature, all we have is
language. If I give you a new word – let us say ‘interpellation’ –
I have almost no way of telling you what that word means without
using other words, which are themselves defined by other words
(I can of course use another sign-system, such as charades, but
I cannot break free from signifiers).
As an exercise, ask yourself what ‘horse’ means; decide on your
answer (or use the definition in the dictionary) and then consider
the following five comments:
1 Presumably you have thought of other words, or perhaps
pictures; but you have not attempted to round up all the ‘real’
(and imaginary) horses that there are.
2 So the word ‘horse’ does not mean anything on its own – it
‘means’ all these other symbols/words/signifiers in your def-
inition. And if we pick any of the defining words, they again
only have a meaning elsewhere, in further words.
3 ‘Horse’ does not make meaning through its relation to the
world, but through its relation to words or other signifiers.
4 The same is true of ‘black’, ‘love’, ‘England’, etc.
5 Meaning is never present to itself – it is always in other words.
Similarly, when we think about anything, all we have is language.
All we have are words that we did not invent and which mostly
existed before we did. They are words we have been given and which
we then speak. The result of this is that we are located in language.
We are in the ‘prison-house’ of language as one critic puts it; which
means that we also have to change our view of what language does
as well as what it is. Traditional criticism argues that we use words to
reflect or at least represent reality. We have an experience or a
thought and then we express ourselves through language. ‘Theory’
argues, however, that this is the wrong way around. Language comes
first – it exists before we do and once we have been given language
 ENGLISH STUDIES 35

and taught the way to play with it, it becomes transparent and
natural to us. Language therefore exists before any of our experi-
ences do and consequently we do not express ourselves through
language – language is expressed through us. It is language that for
human purposes constructs what we call ‘reality’ – it does not
reflect it.
This is where much theory actually begins, but it is such a radical
idea that I thought it would be a better place to end: there will
be plenty of opportunity when studying English to debate this
approach to language and literature.
3 Culture and society1

English does not exist in a vacuum, and you might want to consider
English literature, creative writing and English language as a family
of subjects within the one area of study. You might also want to
consider taking more than one of them as a joint or combined
degree, but there are other subjects that students frequently choose
to combine with one of them. The most common of these are
fellow humanities and social science subjects such as politics,
history, psychology, religious studies and philosophy, or cultural
studies courses, including American and women’s studies, or arts
and media courses.
When writing the Subject Benchmark Statement for English
discussed in the previous chapter, its authors stated clearly that
in framing the statement they had ‘been sensitive to the fact that
English has strong affiliations with several complementary discip-
lines, including Linguistics, Drama, Communication Studies and
Philosophy, and that there are cases where disciplinary boundaries
overlap’. English studies ought to be an interdisciplinary subject and
arguably it is implicitly one even when course descriptions do not
make this explicit. So, for example, when asked if their courses
provide the opportunity for interdisciplinary work 79 per cent of
departments replied affirmatively.2
In fact, it could be argued that English is an area of study in
which almost all the other disciplines can legitimately be discussed.
History is crucial to a full understanding of language, for example.
Philosophy is similarly the basis of some literary works, and many
others are largely incomprehensible without an understanding of
key religious texts. Psychology shares a discourse with literature, not
least through the emphasis on analysis and the study of mental
processes, while sociology and cultural studies clearly overlap with
the socio-cultural aspects to studying both literature and language.
 CULTURE AND SOCIETY 37

In terms of interdisciplinarity within joint honours or within

English single honours, you are most likely to encounter a syllabus
that overlaps with history or media studies (especially film). How-
ever, according to surveys of departments, you may find that
an English degree contains an interdisciplinary element related to
any of these subjects: philosophy; cultural studies or cultural
history; sociology; art history; American studies; drama; psychology;
religious studies; modern languages; or music.
English also has a context outside of the academy. In the follow-
ing sections we will therefore examine the importance of English in
society and culture. In particular, you will find discussion of topics
such as how the discipline contributes to the economy through the
culture and tourism industries; what an English degree offers in
terms of society and culture; and how skills learned on an English
degree can specifically be applied to your future contribution to
society.

How English contributes to the economy

English and English graduates contribute to the economy in myriad
ways, but it is worth sometimes spelling this out as government and
other organizations can underplay the role of the arts and humanities
in wealth generation. We will touch on two areas here: the culture
and creative industries and English’s contribution to tourism.

Culture and creative industries

A review published by the British Academy, entitled ‘That full
complement of riches: the contributions of the arts, humanities
and social sciences to the nation’s wealth’, quotes a Department for
Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) finding that the creative indus-
tries accounted for 5 per cent of Britain’s GDP in 2001. The
DCMS defines this industry as including television and radio, film
and video, the performing arts and publishing. It is predicted that
there will be a 136 per cent growth in output of the industries and a
46 per cent growth in employment from 1995 to 2015. The indus-
tries will become a larger employer of English graduates; already
they employed 6.6 per cent of English leavers in 2004. What follows
is a short introduction to the main culture and creative industries,
and how they contribute to the economy.
38 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

The BBC began with radio in 1922, and is now accessed by

millions worldwide; nearly 35 per cent of the viewing population
watched one of the main BBC channels in 2004. Much program-
ming involves dramatizations of existing literary works or the
production of new material; the broadcast on Channel 4, in 1987, of
Tony Harrison’s poem ‘V’ is one such example of bringing new
poetry to a mainstream audience. The programme caused great
media controversy and debate especially amongst the tabloids, lead-
ing to a new edition containing the press coverage of the poem’s
screening. Not only do television and radio create revenue for the
economy, they contribute to the richness of people’s everyday lives
and support the transmission of English studies through landmark
programmes on language and literary adaptations that bring the
classics to new audiences.
Cinema is another form of entertainment that generates con-
siderable wealth. In 2001 there were over 141 million cinema visits,
with high-grossing films including the adaptation of the popular
children’s Harry Potter books and J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings.
Literary adaptations of various kinds have become mainstream film
fare, and a novel such as Bram Stoker’s Dracula has been returned to
repeatedly, with over 70 adaptations made for the screen between
the 1920s and the 1990s. Alongside cinemas, a network of theatres
exists countrywide, although they are most prolific in major cities,
particularly the capital. The National Theatre, in London, opened in
1963 with a production of Hamlet. It now holds 1000 performances
per year, and has 600,000 visitors.
Literary Festivals began in 1949, starting with the Cheltenham
Literary Festival, which continues to attract many thousands of
visitors for ten days every autumn. The Edinburgh International
Festival focuses on the performing arts, aiming to showcase the best
in Scottish culture to an international audience. Festivals are becom-
ing more and more widespread, to attract millions of visitors drawn
to different cultural areas, from music and film to fiction and poetry.
Single-author festivals are increasingly common too, for example
the Graham Greene Festival in his hometown of Berkhamstead.
Print media and publishing have evolved into a massive industry
that digital technology is only likely to expand into new forms.
The first British newspaper, The London Gazette, started in 1665,
while magazines began to be produced in the following century.
 CULTURE AND SOCIETY 39

Publishing thrived on a large scale in the nineteenth century,

making many significant Victorian novelists accessible to a growing
literate population. After World War Two, in a more competitive
market for entertainment, Penguin began publishing their famous
paperbacks in large numbers as prosperity and growing literacy
brought more people to an appreciation of literature and culture.
Now newspapers range from local to national, from tabloid to
broadsheet; and magazines are available on almost every conceivable
subject. With new digital technologies, newspapers, magazines and
books are available via the internet, making them accessible on an
even greater scale and creating more jobs in the culture sector.
More broadly, it is clear that what we now call the creative indus-
tries both have a long history and will continue to contribute to the
economy both in terms of investment and employment, providing
opportunities for graduates of English studies as much as other
disciplines.

The tourism industry

English-related industries not only add to the cultural fabric of
the British population, they also contribute to the economy by
stimulating tourism. For example, the number of tourists visiting
Britain rose by 6 per cent between May 2005 and May 2006, from
29 million to nearly 31 million. Theatres and festivals, in particular,
attract overseas visitors and therefore investment into the country.
Perhaps the most famous example of a small ‘industry’ growing
around interest in a particular writer is that of Shakespeare and his
hometown of Stratford, where he was born in 1564 and died in
1616. Today the town has three theatres, and a whole commercial
infrastructure including restaurants, hotels and guesthouses, to cater
for the tourist trade. This industry has created many jobs for local
people. Another attraction to emerge from Shakespeare’s fame is
the reconstructed Globe Theatre in London, modelled on the
theatre where Shakespeare worked, which was first constructed in
1599. The season runs from May to September, with Shakespeare’s
plays performed in a setting based on the original ‘wooden O’ (as
Shakespeare calls the theatre in Henry V ).
There are other areas of the country that attract visitors because
of their literary associations. The Lake District, for example, is
sometimes known as Wordsworth Country because of its link with
40 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

the Romantic poet, William Wordsworth. His home, Dove Cottage,

is now a museum and attracts 70 000 visitors a year. Hardy country,
Jane Austen’s regency Bath, Joyce’s Dublin, and Laurie Lee’s
Cotswolds are all sites of pilgrimage and it is widely acknowledged
today that a proportion of tourism’s multi-billion-pound success is
founded on the country’s literary heritage.
In terms of language, English in its many varieties has clearly
become dominant in many ways across the globe. Such influential
institutions as the BBC, the UK Parliament and CNN have adopted
the standard form of authorized ‘correct’ English; however, ‘English’
is much more widely spoken in the form of dialects, pidgins and
creoles around the world. You will hear English in its many local
styles in countries as diverse as Pakistan, Uganda, Jamaica and New
Zealand. According to the latest estimates, around 1.3 billion
people will be speaking a form of English by 2050, and the demand
for specialist English language courses is set to rise six-fold by 2025,
signalling that English is fast becoming the chief global language of
business.

English subject knowledge and culture

On an English degree you not only study the literary or linguistic
texts themselves, but are expected to learn about the contexts in
which an author writes. This aspect of learning English contributes
to an understanding of the development of British society and
international relations.
Literature often also affects and contributes to our understanding
of history. You may thus study texts composed as early as Beowulf,
which was written in approximately ad 1000 in Anglo-Saxon, or
Old English. This long poem gives important insights into the his-
tory of Anglo-Saxon culture: its myths and legends, as well as its
politics. The text has been linked to a seventh-century ship-burial
site at Sutton Hoo in Suffolk, as it gives insights into the Christian
and Pagan practices of those that buried the ship. Here we see how
literature may link with other disciplines; in this case archaeology
(Sutton Hoo is also a crucial touchstone for Angus Wilson’s much-
admired 1956 comic novel Anglo-Saxon Attitudes). Associated with
the knowledge gained of historical contexts is the understanding of
how culture has both changed and remained similar. This enables
 CULTURE AND SOCIETY 41

students to see how the past was radically different as well as how it
has influenced society today.
With regard to the significance of the study of language, one
of the most important cultural changes within British society was
the Great Vowel Shift. This phenomenon occurred between the
fifteenth and eighteenth centuries and was characterized by the
articulation of vowels higher up in the mouth, which signalled a
huge alteration in how words are commonly pronounced. If you
study Chaucer, you will know that he wrote in Middle English,
in the fourteenth century, before the great vowel shift, and many of
the rhymes in The Canterbury Tales no longer work because of the
change.
‘The past is a foreign country’, L.P. Hartley says at the start of his
novel The Go-Between, but English degrees today often introduce
you to literature and language-use from a wide variety of nations
and ethnicities. Studying English at university can provide a better
appreciation of literature by non-canonical authors and minority
cultures. For example, the novels of V.S. Naipaul (born in the
Caribbean of Indian parentage) dissect the broad variety of modern
experience in a post-colonial world, and texts such as The Enigma
of Arrival also deal revealingly with the experience of migration
within the UK through his unnamed main character’s isolation
and unrealized expectations. Another example would be Alan
Hollinghurst, whose The Swimming Pool Library gives a candid
account of gay culture in the 1980s, revisited in his Booker prize-
winning novel The Line of Beauty. Similarly, the celebrated work of
Jeanette Winterson and Sarah Waters has changed perceptions of
lesbian experience among mainstream readers.

The English graduate’s role in society

English students gain skills that can be applied to their chosen career,
as well as on a personal level. These include disciplined reasoning,
critical and analytical thinking, the ability to look at issues from a
number of perspectives, and the development of greater creativity.
In terms of disciplined reasoning, an English degree gives you the
opportunity to develop techniques of persuasion and argument,
which can be applied to journalism, for instance, where you need to
make concise points, supported by evidence. Through participating
42 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

in seminars and doing presentations, studying English builds upon

these abilities, including the political skill of debating – which
can be used in both public speaking and private interactions. The
use of rhetoric in speech-making can be a valuable asset alongside
compelling evidence to substantiate your claims, and such devices
as repetition to make strong points. Public speaking is of course a
skill increasingly needed in a wide range of careers, and an English
degree will help you to cultivate an appreciation of rhetoric,
eloquence and persuasion.
English students also develop writing skills through assessment in
a variety of formats. Essay writing involves the discussion of a set
question, in which you are expected to show evidence of effective
research from selected sources. Careers in management, in particular,
demand these skills for the purpose of report writing. A good pre-
sentation should contain succinct arguments and employ support-
ing material such as handouts, as well as make use of IT provision,
including PowerPoint if appropriate. These skills are particularly
applicable to careers such as law, in which advocates must prepare
presentations on a regular basis. In exams, students need to be pre-
pared to submit a written argument under strictly timed conditions –
this develops skills to assist time management and working under
pressure. Careers such as marketing demand this type of skill, as it is
a high-pressured business environment, where meeting tight dead-
lines is essential. Note taking is a daily task on an English degree, in
lectures and in the library, and involves a balance between the skills
of listening, careful reading and writing. Such careers as arts adminis-
tration need this skill, where employees are expected to take notes as
well as contribute in meetings, and take accurate minutes.
English also fosters critical and analytical thought, which are
needed in many careers, particularly those where finding both
errors and shortcomings within documents is an essential pre-
requisite. Administrative and management positions require this
type of attention to detail and close reading skills are important in a
range of careers where you need to draw independent and object-
ive conclusions regarding the reliability of reports and accounts.
Being able to analyse closely any form of text, whether it be in an
employment or personal capacity, will contribute to your ability to
make clear judgements in relation to the validity of any claim made
by a writer.
 CULTURE AND SOCIETY 43

As discussed in the previous chapter, literary theory is often

taught as part of an English degree. The ability to examine a text
from the diverse perspectives of these differing critical schools of
thought (for instance Marxism, post-structuralism, post-colonialism,
feminism and psychoanalysis) can also be used in encounters
with other cultural forms, such as television, cinema, music and art,
as well as novels, poetry and plays. With regard to these last-
mentioned literary forms, many graduates pursue some form of
creative writing, either as a pastime or at work. Within the suite of
English studies, there are now creative writing courses running
throughout the country, from diplomas in local colleges and com-
munity centres to Master’s degrees at universities: the most famous
of which is the MA in Creative Writing at the University of East
Anglia.
The usefulness of cultivating creativity is not only limited to
creative writing work, but can also be applied in careers such as
advertising, where a high level of original and independent thought
is required. More generally, the transferable skills acquired on an
English degree allow graduates to benefit society and culture
through habits of disciplined reflection as well as critical approaches
to social questions approached as analytical problems or ‘texts’ from
a number of perspectives. These skills are not just applicable to the
workplace where graduates make an economic contribution to
society, but also in everyday interactions with others.
In conclusion, English plays a vital public role in several ways:
culturally through the study of a major world language and its
written artefacts; economically through its considerable contribu-
tion to the creative and tourism industries; and societally through
the subject knowledge and transferable skills gained by graduates.
Which is to say that the study of English gives you the opportunity
to benefit from language and literature’s part in society and culture
long after graduation.

Websites and further resources

General
www.intute.ac.uk/artsandhumanities/
An academic search engine that provides links to appropriate
resources on the internet for English students.
44 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

English language
www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/routesofenglish
This website accompanies the Radio 4 programme ‘Routes of
English’, which is an investigation into the history of the English
language. There is information on each of the programmes, with
the opportunity to listen again.

Crystal, D. (2003), The Cambridge Encyclopaedia of the English Lan-

guage, 2nd edn. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. A useful
reference book on all aspects of the English language. This sec-
ond edition includes the addition of new information on world
English and internet English.
Crystal, D. (2004), The Stories of English. London: Penguin. A com-
prehensive history of the English language from its beginnings
up to the present day, with a particular focus on non-standard
forms.

English literature
Medieval, Renaissance and seventeenth century
www.luminarium.org/lumina.htm
A website devoted to the above periods in English literature, through
which information on prominent authors and historical contexts
of the periods can be found, as well as a selection of academic
essays.

Romantic
www.rc.umd.edu/
This website is an extensive guide devoted to romantic literature
and culture. It has a ‘Scholarly Resources’ section, which provides
useful bibliographies for further research.

Nineteenth century
www.victorianweb.org/
A comprehensive guide to political, social history, gender, science,
religion and philosophy of the time. In addition, a list of the most
important authors through which information on their lives and
works can be found.
 CULTURE AND SOCIETY 45

Contemporary and postcolonial literature

www.contemporarywriters.com
This website, run by the British Council, contains a database of
British and Commonwealth authors, where biographies, bibli-
ographies, criticism, prizes and photographs can be searched and
browsed easily.
www.usp.nus.edu.sg/landow/post/
This website contains brief and concise information on authors and
their country of origin, covering Africa, Australia, New Zealand,
South Asia, Singapore, Canada, the Caribbean, UK and Ireland.
Drabble, M. (ed.) (2000), The Oxford Companion to English Lit-
erature. Oxford: Oxford University Press. An excellent reference
guide to authors, books, literary theory, allusions and characters,
which can form a sound basis for further research or simple
clarification.

Creative writing
Anderson, L. (2005), Creative Writing: A Workbook with Readings.
London: Routledge. A practical guide to creative writing, which
includes exercises to develop skills. Suitable for students as well as
individuals interested in doing creative writing as a hobby.
4 English and employment

As has been said, English is sometimes considered a ‘non-vocational’

subject but you will find it more helpful to consider it multi-
vocational. This should be taken to mean that it is a subject most
students decide to take without a particular career in mind. When
choosing English, many students will not be considering any def-
inite area of employment after their degree and will rightly see the
study of literature and language as an end in itself.
However, you will probably proceed to some form of paid work
after you finish your degree, although this may be preceded by
further study or by other non-paid activities. It is helpful, therefore,
to reflect on the kinds of employment English graduates commonly
choose, and some of the skills required by those jobs or professions.
First, we may say that in addition to the literary and linguistic
content itself, the most significant subject-specific knowledge and
skills English students acquire centre on: the contexts of literature
(historical, intellectual and cultural); close reading abilities; knowl-
edge of diverse theoretical and critical approaches (the areas where
lecturers are least satisfied with student attainment). According to
surveys, the most important general skills English cultivates in add-
ition to subject-specific ones are: self-reflection and self-criticism;
mental flexibility; critical reasoning; conceptual and analytical skills;
communication skills and creativity (conversely, the degree is not
thought likely to promote your enterprise and negotiation skills).
With these skills in mind, in this chapter we look at the opportu-
nities available to English students, suggesting some non-traditional
and unexpected career destinations as well as well-trodden paths.1
English is a diverse and versatile discipline, and will prepare you for
a wide variety of careers, some of which may not seem obvious.2
Here you will find an exploration of some of the options, comment
on how past students have used their degree, and advice on where
 ENGLISH AND EMPLOYMENT 47

to find information on careers, including part-time employment,

voluntary work and work experience whilst studying. You will also
find other choices, if you do not wish to proceed to a career
immediately, such as postgraduate study.
As previously said, English studies is traditionally seen as an
academic degree. However, in many respects it is really poly-
vocational, so employment opportunities are very broad.3 Careers
available are as varied as advertising and marketing, teaching, pub-
lishing and media work as well as less apparent alternatives, such as
law.4 What follows are some examples of career choices as well as
the duties and training requirements they involve.

Teaching
If you wish to use your subject knowledge directly then teaching
may be an appropriate career choice. The Teacher Training Agency
(TTA) advises that this vocation is particularly appealing for gradu-
ates who are interested in and inspired by children or adolescents,
and who wish to encourage them to engage with and enjoy the
study of English.5 It is a career that requires dedication, patience and
creativity as it is both physically and intellectually challenging.
There are decisions to be made regarding which age group to teach,
with the options of primary or secondary schools as well as post-16
further education. Whichever age range you choose, you will be
required to undertake a Postgraduate Certificate of Education, or
PGCE, or a PGCFE in the case of further education. This training
involves a one-year intensive course, taken after completing your
undergraduate degree. The prospect of motivating a class of 30
young people may seem daunting but, as the TTA says, teachers
encourage children to learn and foster what can become a much
longer-term pursuit, which most will testify is an extremely reward-
ing aspect of the job.6

Commercial
Some graduates would prefer to work in either an office or retail
environment, making the publishing or bookselling industries more
appealing opportunities than teaching. A publishing career is most
commonly entered through the post of publishing assistant; however,
48 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

after gaining experience in this role, there is the possibility of pro-

gressing to desk editor then to commissioning editor.7 Alter-
natively, there is the option of working freelance as a publishing
copy-editor and proofreader.8 The role of a commissioning editor is
to generate new titles for publishers’ portfolios, and you will be
responsible for investigating which titles are most popular with con-
sumers, liaising with writers and managing other staff members.
This career is attainable with a minimum of five years’ experience
of working within the publishing industry; a postgraduate qualifica-
tion such as an MA in publishing may be of assistance.
Copy-editors and proofreaders work on contractual terms with
publishers, which means usually working at home; the primary role
is to ensure books are clear to the reader and accurate in terms
of such aspects as punctuation. After gaining considerable work
experience, you might progress to lead responsibility for a complete
book, from its conception to publication. Again there are post-
graduate qualifications that would assist you in pursuing this career,
but your English degree would be beneficial for these avenues
because the degree is evidence of training in critical and analytical
skills.
Another aspect of the industry is the promotion, marketing and
selling of the books themselves, which often provides opportunities
to meet the public face to face on a daily basis. You would need to
be a sound communicator, well organized and in possession of a
broad understanding of a range of subject matter – all attributes
fostered through the study of English.9 The main job-related tasks
include helping customers by giving them information about
books they may wish to purchase, sometimes using computer
databases and operating till systems. There is also the opportunity
to assist with book-related events, such as book signings and
poetry readings. Bookselling is an exciting area of retail to become
involved in, and will give you the opportunity to use your initiative
more than other retail sectors would, for example in terms of
responsibility for buying stock and budget management.

Librarianship
Librarianship also gives you the opportunity to meet and assist
others, whether you are employed in an academic or a public
 ENGLISH AND EMPLOYMENT 49

capacity. Academic librarians generally work in universities, further

education or research institutes and may be involved in some teach-
ing activities in relation to the use of research methods and informa-
tion tools in a learning environment.10 Within this branch of the
profession you would also have the chance to apply specific subject
knowledge through specializing in English.
Public librarians are mainly employed by local authorities and
provide a service to the surrounding community.11 Increasingly,
librarians are expected to have a sound grasp of information tech-
nology, particularly the use of the internet and associated resources.
Most librarians begin their careers as library assistants, while com-
pleting the postgraduate qualifications necessary to become fully
qualified; this training could take the form of either a Postgraduate
Diploma or a Master’s Degree in librarianship, information science
or information management. Whichever route you choose, librar-
ianship offers an intellectually challenging career and makes good
use of English skills.

Journalism
Another popular option for English graduates is journalism, which
may be of particular interest to you if you find the element of
writing in your degree to be the most enjoyable. Journalists work in
two main sectors: broadcast and print. Broadcast journalists are
engaged in radio and television and are, according to June Kay,
involved in initiating ideas for stories and researching them, which
might include talking to relevant parties involved, then generating
an article suitable for the intended audience.12 Print journalists are
employed to do a similar job, but in a different medium: newspapers,
magazines or journals. In order to enter either sector of the profes-
sion a postgraduate qualification is almost essential, as well as having
some form of prior experience.13 This career is also very competi-
tive and undertaking a related work placement during vacations, or
assisting on a university newspaper, would be beneficial.

Law
Law may seem a less obvious career to choose, but is an excellent
profession to enter for more than a few English graduates. Barristers
50 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

tend to work in Crown and Higher Courts providing advocacy,

from cases brought against alleged criminals, to multinational
corporations, to complex divorce proceedings; solicitors are now
working increasingly in higher courts, such as Crown Courts, due
to a decrease in restrictions.14 To enable you to work in law as an
English graduate – as either a barrister or solicitor – you would
need to take a postgraduate conversion course called a Common
Professional Examination (CPE) or a Graduate Diploma in Law
(GDL).15 For those wishing to pursue careers as a barrister, a further
qualification known as a Bar Vocational Course is necessary. Which-
ever path you decide upon, a career in law frequently involves
conveying an argument convincingly through public speaking, so it
is a sound option for those who are confident debaters in seminar
situations and who enjoy giving presentations.
This is by no means an exhaustive list of opportunities for you to
choose from on completion of your degree in English. Most com-
panies that recruit graduates do not require a specific subject
because the fact that someone has studied successfully for a degree
is taken as evidence of intellectual ability.

English employment destinations

Evidence of the employability of English graduates is strong, both
in terms of employment rates and the career patterns of previous
students. A ‘Prospects’ national survey of graduates finishing their
degree in 2003, which included 83.1 per cent of all English gradu-
ates, found that over half were in employment in the UK, while
others were either studying for further qualifications or overseas;
only 6.3 per cent were believed to be unemployed.16 Of those that
were employed, 19.6 per cent were in administrative or secretarial
roles, 13.8 per cent in teaching, 11.4 per cent were commercial,
industrial or public sector managers, 6.8 per cent were in health and
childcare related professions, and 6.2 per cent were in media, public
relations, literary, design or sports professions. What this data shows
most obviously is the breadth of careers for which an English
degree will prepare you.
However, these statistics were collected soon after students grad-
uated; a CHERI survey carried out several years after students
finished university gives a clearer indication of longer-term career
 ENGLISH AND EMPLOYMENT 51

patterns.17 Through this survey it was found that only 9 per cent of
English graduates had experienced unemployment during the time
period, which is a similar percentage rate to that for all university
leavers. However, it was found that most English graduates were
working in either the public or non-profit making sectors. Overall,
84 per cent were in jobs expected to be taken by graduates, showing
that those with an English degree are very capable of maintaining
employment at the same level as other graduates and underlining
how a multi-vocational subject such as English can prove beneficial
in terms of your career choice after graduation without preparing
you for one profession alone.18

Careers information
To provide you with the best information about employment
opportunities as well as offer guidance while you are studying, all
colleges and universities run careers services. These support units
will include resources such as reference books, informative litera-
ture on career opportunities, and the latest graduate vacancies; in
addition there will be careers advisors who are available to assist
with your planning after graduation.19 There are likely also to be
careers events within institutions, at which you can meet prospect-
ive employers, both local and national. Also there are countrywide
events of a similar kind, although on a larger scale, held for example
at Birmingham’s National Exhibition Centre – universities often
organize trips to such events. The internet is also a source of
information and advice for students, particularly the Prospects
website at www.prospects.ac.uk, which is specifically designed to
assist graduates with career planning and also provides details of
vacancies.

Work experience
Work experience can be voluntary or paid employment and involves
any job undertaken before embarking on your career. As well as
part-time or voluntary work, this could take the form of ‘work
shadowing’, which is when a student watches an employee at work
in order to gain insight into his or her job. Sources of information
about work experience include: the Prospects website and magazine;
52 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

university careers centres; and the National Council for Work

Experience (www.work-experience.org), with its own guide spe-
cifically for students. In addition they give details of organizations
that operate schemes. Applications for such placements should be
made formally, and in the same way as if you were applying for a
full-time job because there is much competition when vacancies
arise. Work experience is beneficial because it enables you to
gain new skills and decide on a specific career. It will also be impres-
sive to future prospective employers when you are looking for
employment after graduation.20

Voluntary work
Volunteering can be part of work experience gained while study-
ing. It is particularly beneficial when applying for careers in areas
such as social work and teaching, as a means of demonstrating suit-
able skills, prior commitment and an understanding of the profes-
sion’s demands.21 The Prospects’ website advises that voluntary
work need not interfere with your studies, as only a morning or an
afternoon per week is sufficient to gain insight into a profession,
develop relevant skills and demonstrate capability to the appropriate
agencies.
Student Community Action, which is run as part of universities’
student unions, often run a number of volunteering projects from
working with children to assisting adults with disabilities or the
elderly. There may also be the opportunity to form your own pro-
ject, as all such initiatives are student led. Participating in a scheme
such as this enables you to gain valuable work experience and also
make a contribution to the local community. Voluntary work of
this kind is specifically relevant for English students because of the
numbers who enter either the public or non-profit making sectors
once they graduate.22

Advice for students who are unsure about which

career to choose
When beginning an English degree not everybody has a specific
career in mind, which is where voluntary work or work experience
can be of great assistance. Many students choose English studies
 ENGLISH AND EMPLOYMENT 53

because of an enthusiasm for and interest in literature, language

or creative writing, and wish to devote their time to the degree
without planning for post-university employment. However, some
thought does need to be given to the future, daunting though it
may sometimes seem. A good place to start is with an objective
consideration of your attributes – both positive and negative – as
well as the skills you are developing through both studying and
part-time work. These could be listed with the relevant examples,
and become a starting point for thinking about possible careers.
A further means of exploring career options is the internet tool,
Prospects Planner, on the Prospects website.23 Once registered on
this, students are asked to answer a series of questions relating to
skills, attributes and preferences; a series of career options are then
given, which can be further investigated. Similar tools may be avail-
able at university career centres. They can be an effective basis for
career planning if students are unsure of the type of employment
that might suit them.

Postgraduate study
Postgraduate study is an interesting alternative if you find your
undergraduate course in English particularly enjoyable. Taught
Master’s (MA) courses in literature, language or creative writing are
run at universities throughout the UK. The variety of specialisms is
immense, with courses ranging from Middle English to European
literature. There is also the opportunity to study in another area
that may relate to English, or on a vocational course, such as
those required for librarianship or journalism. According to a UK
Graduate Careers Survey in 2003, postgraduate courses are becom-
ing increasingly popular, with more graduates embarking upon
them than going straight into employment.24 Gaining funding can
be difficult however; the Arts and Humanities Research Council
(AHRC) has grant awards for taught Master’s degrees as well as
Research degrees, but there is the option of combining part-time
work with study if no award can be secured. Therefore, you should
think carefully through your decision to embark upon a post-
graduate qualification, taking into consideration issues such as
finance and time management as well as choice of subject, before
applying.25
54 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

An English degree equips you with the necessary knowledge and

skills to enter a diverse range of professions, giving prospective
employers a strong indication of your abilities and aptitude. As a
graduate you can expect to enter a career that will both challenge
and interest you, building on many of the skills developed in your
time as an English student.

Websites and further resources

General careers
Jenner, Shirley (2000), The Graduate Career Handbook: Make the
Right Start for a Bright Future. London Pearson Education. A
comprehensive guide to careers for all graduates that gives advice
on the whole process of career planning, from deciding which
career to pursue to beginning employment.
www.prospects.ac.uk
The most comprehensive careers website with facilities ranging
from the means to find a suitable career if you are undecided, to the
latest graduate vacancies. Prospects publish a number of career-
related magazines, some on specific career sectors, such as Focus on
Law, and others on postgraduate opportunities (including Postgrad
Magazine) and Prospects Finalist, which gives general information to
graduating students. These should be found at universities’ careers
centres.
Swann, Jamie (ed.) (2004) AgCAS Special Interest Series. Sheffield:
AgCAS. A series of booklets that give succinct and useful advice
on career-related topics from interview techniques to continuing
study.

English careers
Dixon, Beryl (2002), What can I do with an Arts Degree? Richmond:
Trotman and Company. There is a specific section dedicated to
English within this book, where the emphasis is on less trad-
itional career choices.

Career specific
Tatterton, Jane (ed.) 2003, AgCAS Sector Briefings, Sheffield: AgCAS.
A series of booklets, each dedicated to a specific career sector, for
 ENGLISH AND EMPLOYMENT 55

example publishing, education and legal, which includes infor-

mation about the career as well as case studies and further
resources.

Journalism
www.bbc.co.uk/jobs/
A comprehensive site for anyone interested in applying for employ-
ment with the BBC, including work experience opportunities.

Law
www.lcan.org.uk
This is the website for the Law Careers Advice Network, giving
information on training and recruitment statistics, as well as links
to websites which contain vacancies for vacation placements and
mini-pupillages.

Teaching
www.teach.gov.uk
A website designed to give advice on such matters as training
requirements and finding employment in the profession, as well as
giving an insight into the demands of the career.
This page intentionally left blank
 PART TWO: Key skills

In this part of the book, we will look at the essential study skills for
English: reading, writing, research, note-taking and revision for
exams. These are the core skills that will inform, and to an extent
determine, the level of success you achieve on your course. Together
with your acquisition of greater knowledge and understanding, and
your enjoyment of the course itself, the development of key skills is
the most important part of your study in higher education. Key
skills are the ones that will help you succeed at degree level but they
are also extremely important for your future employment prospects.
Advanced and sophisticated literacy skills, together with the ability
to work independently on tasks assigned to you, or developed
through your own initiative, form the core around which many
jobs are built, as discussed in Part One. While the subject know-
ledge acquired on many degrees, including English, is of direct use
in a limited number of employment situations, both the core and
transferable skills cultivated on your course will be ones in which
nearly all employers are interested.
In terms of tools to assist you in connecting up the skill-set
you develop at university or college with your planning for employ-
ment, a government initiative outlined in the 2003 White Paper,
The Future of Higher Education, has introduced the concept of a
personal development plan/portfolio (PDP) with the objective of
helping you to understand your own learning patterns, and to
use this skill to plan for your future.1 In the twenty-first cen-
tury, students will be increasingly expected to reflect upon their
own intellectual development, and this process should begin in
school, progress through further and higher education and con-
tinue throughout employment post-graduation. PDPs, together
with your transcripts of course results and achievements, are some-
times referred to as progress files, which are meant to encourage
58 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

you to examine your skills and build into an invaluable tool to

support you in compiling a CV (Curriculum Vitae) when making
job applications.
A CV is the standard means of showing your suitability for a
specific type of employment in a concise and coherent manner.2 It
needs to include an employment aim or aspiration that you can
express as the motivation for your job application, as well as details
of previous and current education, employment and, if appropriate,
other activities such as hobbies. Although it is best to start writing
your CV as early as possible, when graduation approaches and you
are beginning to think more deeply about employment after
university, your institution’s careers advisors should be able to assist
with compiling an effective CV. It will be helpful as you move
through the levels of your degree to keep a record of such things as
vacation work and the skills it has involved, so that the necessary
information to compile your CV is always at hand.
It may also be necessary for you to have a CV while at university
because increasingly, and particularly with the rise in tuition fees
and undergraduate debt, students need to undertake some form of
part-time employment while studying. This may be in vacations,
but is more often in term-time, in order to meet the financial
burdens that now exist, including rent, bills and fees. A MORI Poll,
which surveyed 1103 students across 22 universities in 2001, asked
the question ‘Have you done or are you doing any of the following
types of work during your years at university?’ It found 30 per cent
of students were working between one and 29 hours per week
during term time while nearly 2 per cent were doing more than
30 hours.3 A further 20 per cent were undertaking some kind of
work during university vacations.
If you become one of the growing number of students that
does need to work during your time at university, there are many
sources of assistance in finding part-time employment. A national
web-based employment agency called www.hotrecruit.co.uk assists
students in finding suitable jobs within their local area. Local press
publications also often have an employment section where jobs
are advertised. Another means of finding more flexible work is to
join local recruitment agencies, which can assist with fitting work
around your studies as they offer mainly temporary contracts.
Increasingly, student unions have a job shop scheme, offering help
 PART TWO: KEY SKILLS 59

with finding part-time work, and giving details of suitable current

vacancies. However, most universities would advise that part-time
work should be restricted to a minimum, particularly during term-
time, because there is a risk that it could begin to impinge upon
your studies. This warning is particularly pertinent to English stud-
ies where, as we have said, there is an expectation that you will read
widely as part of your degree, and it is with reading that we will
now begin a review of core skills in English studies.

Further reading on CVs and PDPs

Bright, Jim and Earl, Joanne (2001), Brilliant CV: What Employers
Want to See and How to Say It. London: Pearson Education Ltd.
This book is a very useful and clear guide to writing successful
curricula vitae, with lots of examples to assist students and
graduates.
Cottrell, Stella (2003), Skills for Success: The Personal Development
Planning Handbook. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. This book
gives very practical advice on personal development planning,
including exercises to assist with the process.
This page intentionally left blank
5 Reading

The focussed discussion of reading lies at the heart of learning in

the subject. It is important that students are able to engage in
dialogue, and develop and negotiate conclusions with others,
which is a key component in the acquisition of both subject-
specific and transferable skills.
(English Benchmarking Statement)

On all English studies modules, the methods of teaching, learning

and assessment are given careful consideration and are informed by
clear aims and expectations. You will soon find that classes employ a
range of learning methods, often incorporating aspects of indepen-
dent learning such as project or group work and worksheets. These
elements are designed to give you the opportunity to engage actively
with the material under study, to stimulate your intellectual curios-
ity and to elicit a lively response to primary and secondary sources.
Like the principles of personal development planning, a structured
and supported programme of independent learning within a module
will always be designed to provide an opportunity for you to give
some reflective thought to your own learning, as well as improve
your analytical and problem-solving skills.
English is a highly textual field of study and demands intensive
reading. Indeed, you should see reading and not lectures as the main
source of stimulation, if not inspiration. Lecturers will often delib-
erately open out discussion and encourage you to investigate a
subject independently and you should ensure that you make full use
of library or Learning Centre resources, particularly of the journal
holdings, which can be a source for cutting-edge or radical critical
readings. Most English modules are structured around specific texts.
These texts may be novels, short stories, poems or plays, but they
may be also be, for example, essays of literary criticism, theory,
62 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

or abstract arguments which deal with methods and strategies of

writing or reading.
Also, apart from the required primary reading, a number of add-
itional critical texts may be recommended and these will provide
valuable help in the understanding and interpretation of the pre-
scribed texts. However, this recommended secondary reading might
not necessarily be a direct commentary on a primary text or even
an author. It could be on the cultural or literary movement of which
the text or the author in question is a part. For example, if your
required reading is James Joyce’s A Portrait of the Artist as a Young
Man (1916), the recommended reading could well be on Modern-
ism in general, or Irish politics, or Irish literature, or themes such
as gender relations, colonialism, or aesthetic philosophy. It is not
uncommon for recommended reading to be of a theoretical nature,
which is intended to provide varied tools and strategies for the
analysis of primary texts.

How and how much?

Where pre-university study usually involves the detailed scrutiny of
a small number of set books, English at university moves quickly
through a comparatively large number of primary texts. Con-
sequently, a 2004 report asked students, among many other things,
how well prepared they felt for the range and quantity of primary
and secondary reading required in HE, and for placing texts in
historical and social contexts.1 The results of the survey overall
showed that students felt less well-prepared for this aspect of
English studies than any other. Indeed, only 22 per cent of the
students surveyed felt they were suitably prepared for the amount of
reading of primary texts (novels, plays, poems, linguistic texts and
so on) they were required to do, while a third considered they were
poorly prepared. A quarter felt well prepared for the amount of
secondary reading (critical, historical and theoretical texts), and
28 per cent felt poorly prepared. Those who had studied A-level
English literature (rather than a language and literature course or an
access course, for example) were slightly more likely to say they felt
well prepared. In terms of putting texts in historical, literary, or
social context, 30 per cent felt well prepared and 24 per cent poorly
prepared for this aspect of their studies.
 READING 63

Who and what?

English literature is one of those subjects that are defined more
from within than without. By this we mean that its object is not just
more cultural than natural, for example like a social science such as
economics or sociology, but is almost entirely cultural. Many sub-
jects debate their parameters but a disciplinary area such as English
literature even debates whether it has a central object of study. Is
there a ‘canon’ of English literature? Where did it come from? Who
decided what was in and what was out? Should there be a canon?
Tom Stoppard, in his play The Real Thing, has a central character
argue to her playwright husband: ‘You judge everything as though
everyone starts from the same place, aiming at the same prize: Eng.
Lit. Shakespeare out there in front by a mile and the rest of the field
strung out behind trying to close the gap.’
The playwright replies by digging out his cricket bat and saying:

This thing here, which looks like a wooden club, is actually

several pieces of particular wood cunningly put together in a
certain way so the whole thing is sprung, like a dance floor. It’s
for hitting cricket balls with. If you get it right, the cricket ball
will travel two hundred yards in four seconds, and all you’ve
done is give it a knock like knocking the top off a bottle . . .
What we’re trying to do is write cricket bats, so that when we
throw up an idea and give it a little knock, it might . . . travel . . .

The suggestion here is that some writing works better than other
writing: is both better made and more successful because its ideas
resonate. This is highly contentious, yet it is generally true that for
those who study ‘Eng. Lit.’ there is a changing but broadly stable
hierarchy of writers, one end of which is identified in the simple
division between those writers who are included on the syllabus
and those who are not. In terms of what is taught (as opposed to
read or researched), this is how the subject is defined from within,
even though there are many voices without that influence the
choices made.
The idea of a literary canon derives from the term’s use in the
Catholic Church where the ‘canon’ refers to those texts considered
to be divine scripture. The notion of authentic and authoritative
texts was later applied to language and classical studies, where there
64 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

were disputes over authorship, originality, corruption and forgery.

It is a short step from this debate over a text’s worth centred on
authenticity to one focused on value: aesthetic, cultural, formal
and artistic. A hierarchy of poetry and to a lesser extent of poetic
forms has been in place for many centuries, while fiction has been
separated into genre(s) and ‘literature’. When a piece of writing
becomes ‘literature’ it curiously loses its genre tag – Brave New
World, Frankenstein and The Lord of the Flies are all books that could
be, but are not, located in genre fiction (science fiction, horror,
children’s literature, for example).
What and who students are asked to read will vary from one
institution to another and between choices made within the pro-
gramme offered. In terms of single-author modules likely to be
encountered, the following list of writers covers most of those cur-
rently studied on English literature courses:2 Jane Austen; Samuel
Beckett; William Blake; the Brontës; Lord Byron; Angela Carter;
Joseph Conrad; Charles Dickens; John Donne; George Eliot;
Thomas Hardy; Henry James; James Joyce; Ben Jonson; Rudyard
Kipling; D.H. Lawrence; Philip Larkin; Andrew Marvell; John
Milton; V.S. Naipaul; Sylvia Plath; Edmund Spenser; Jonathan Swift;
Oscar Wilde; and W.B. Yeats. Of these, only Naipaul is still living,
while Beckett, Yeats and Kipling have also won the Nobel Prize for
Literature, along with T.S. Eliot, Harold Pinter, Doris Lessing and
William Golding, who do not figure in this list. Who is taught is a
question of which kinds of writing are valued, and what for. With
contemporary writers, recurrent inclusion on a syllabus is less pre-
dictable than with those from before the twentieth century and few
authors from the last 50 years are secure in the canon of taught
writers.

On, around and off the syllabus

One of the most significant changes in study habits you will
probably encounter in higher education concerns the amount of
studying you are expected to do around the syllabus in addition to
reading and re-reading the primary texts. To an extent, the primary
text you will be asked to read forms the first dialogue you need to
have in order to be able to enter into other dialogues; a second will
be with staff and students; a third will be with critics who have
 READING 65

commented on the text and the author; a fourth will be with com-
mentators who have written about the literary, cultural, social,
political and historical contexts for the primary text. This sounds
like a great deal of course, and you are not expected to engage with
everything, but the more you read the more you are likely to be
able to contextualize your own initial response to reading the pri-
mary text. As you progress through the levels of your study it is
likely you will do more and more secondary or contextual reading.
It is also probable that a further element of your reading – theory –
will grow, as you increasingly seek to situate your reading of the text
into a structured argument consciously informed by a particular
perspective.
We looked above at the most commonly taught authors, and
the first kind of reading ‘off the syllabus’ that you might usefully
undertake is of other key literary texts and authors. There is no
single text that you will be expected to read on each and every
English studies degree – a surprising fact perhaps – but there are
many authors whose work it will be of benefit to you to be familiar
with, including Chaucer, Shakespeare, Milton, Wordsworth, Joyce,
Yeats, Woolf, Austen, Orwell, Donne, Blake, George Eliot, the
Brontës, Hardy, Dickens, Conrad, T.S. Eliot and Samuel Beckett.
This list is to an extent arbitrary but as a suggestion of up to
20 authors whose work is most referenced in the mainstream of
English studies, it would not be wide of the mark. You may want to
create your own ‘canon’ of key authors to reflect the emphases of
your own degree course, or you might want to think of an alterna-
tive list of non-canonical authors who, for example, reflect a better
mix of gender and ethnicity. Such an exercise would help you to
consider the merits of different units or modules you undertake:
why particular authors and texts have been selected is a question
worth asking, but do not jump to easy conclusions: the texts are
unlikely to have been chosen because they are the lecturer’s prefer-
ences/favourites, or simply because they are canonical, or because
they are ‘teacherly’ (a phrase meaning different things to different
people, but suggesting that they are texts that generate discussion),
but all these will be factors, as will the broader institutional context
of the module and of English studies itself. There are wide differ-
ences between the texts taught on different English courses in the
UK, but there are also many similarities and you may want to
66 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

review the points made in relation to the English benchmark state-

ment in the first chapter.
The next key area is critical vocabulary.Along with a good diction-
ary and thesaurus, you will want to have access to a guide on literary
terminology. Like all specialisms, English studies has a vocabulary of
its own, and many familiar terms will have different nuances while
many unfamiliar terms will have complex or disputed meanings.
How confident, for example, are you that you know what is meant
by terms such as irony, realism, gender, post-modernism, decon-
struction or the uncanny? This vocabulary also ranges from literary
critical terms to theoretical concepts, and you will find it helpful to
have an understanding of each.
The other area to think about is contextual reading. Literary
historical knowledge is obviously helpful to you but so is cultural,
political and social understanding – this may indeed be more help-
ful to you depending on your course of study and the emphases of
particular modules or units. Clearly, this is where issues of time
management and life priorities come into question. You need to
work out for yourself how important it is to read different texts
that are on, around and off the syllabus. This will depend on your
reasons for doing the course to begin with. For example, do they
include these: to get the best degree result; to get into a particular
profession; to go on to further study; to develop your subject
knowledge and understanding in a suitably conducive educational
environment; or to broaden your interests? It may be that your
reasons involve a combination of a large number of elements, but
the reading you choose to do will follow on from such motivations.
Consequently, you may want to read for pleasure, for edification, or
solely for the purposes of assessment. Above all, try to remember
that English studies should be enjoyable and, although it is a stock
phrase to use, it is nonetheless true that you will get out of the
degree what you put in. And what you put in will primarily be
reading and thinking about the texts you read.
Please see the chapter ‘Further reading and resources’, for
examples of texts you might buy or consult, but ensure you also
learn to exercise judgement in your use of secondary material.
Read critics critically and remember the fact that because someone
has published a book or an article does not mean that they have
pronounced the last word on a given subject. This is even more of
 READING 67

an issue when using internet sources. You may want to quote a

critic to support your own thinking, but you may also wish to argue
against a particular critic’s point of view. In either case you should
never feel intimidated by critics: their writings are valuable contri-
butions to the community of learning (of which you are also a part)
and you should learn to read them with the same discriminating
eye that you bring to primary texts.3

Skimming, reading, relevance

With all this material available to you, how should you decide what
to read and how should you read it when you have decided? In
answer to the first question, you do need to remember the old
adage that there is no right answer in English studies. Markers value
creativity, originality, flair, argument and idiosyncratic but cogent
analysis. Having said this, there are answers that reflect the critical
consensus and then there are ‘riskier answers’: ones that rely solely
on your own personal response to the text; ones that assess the
characters as though they are real people; ones that rely on under-
standing the text through the author’s biography; ones that address
the question tangentially; ones that have an unusual structure or
take a formulaic approach to arranging the material. Reading helps
to avoid these ‘riskier answers’ because it provides you with more
knowledge and understanding. In general terms, we can say that,
first, the more relevant reading is to the question you have been set
the more directly helpful it will be; second, the more relevant it is to
the angle your answer is going to take the more you will probably
benefit; and, third, the more relevant to the text under discussion
the better (although some people work best by reading unrelated
material and transferring or applying ideas). When considering this,
make sure you remember that ‘the question’ will have several terms
within it and therefore several dimensions – do not lightly neglect
some in favour of others. Also, the reading most obviously relevant
to the question will be the reading that the majority of students are
likely to want to undertake, so remember two more things: relying
on the most obvious reading to inform your answer is quite likely
to lead to an average grade; and the best texts you can read to write
engagingly for the marker are unlikely to be found in the most
obvious places, unless you have been specifically directed to them
68 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

by the question-setter. Also, think about that word ‘relevance’: it is

not one that markers often take kindly to because it is overused.
Relevance can sometimes be a euphemism for ‘easy to connect
with’ or ‘readily comprehended’. The most intriguing work
frequently occurs when the writer, whether an academic critic or a
student, makes new links and undertakes fresh analyses by success-
fully revealing or re-imagining what is ‘relevant’.
In consideration of the second question above, remember that
you don’t have to undertake research by scouring each book
(or other source) you have selected for secondary reading from
cover to cover. First, use the contents page to inform your decision.
Second, consult the index and look for key words. Third, be guided
by the recommendations of others: tutors, fellow students, other
sources and critics. You are often best advised to skim through a
book to try to see what is most relevant to your assignment and
what is less so. This does not mean that you should ‘skip’; it means
you should use the time available to you in the best way possible. If
you read more thoughtfully rather than more passively, you will
be better able to sift and select between and within texts; which is
to say that reading is a process which can be vigorous in the sense of
an active engagement with the words on the page in an energetic
dialogue between the text and the reader, or can be active in the
sense that the reader draws on a multitude of opinions and forms a
range of new thoughts from consulting, skimming, and scrutinizing
a variety of texts in many forms and in different ways at varying
speeds.
6 Research1

You will probably have taken notes from books before. When you
start studying at university you may therefore think of books as the
main library resource for your degree work. However, there are
other sources for productive inquiry and in this chapter we will
look at some of the ways and means by which research is conducted
by English students in higher education.

Journals
What are journals?
Journals are periodic publications, often released quarterly. They
carry articles covering the latest research within a particular subject
area, and may relate to a specific genre, period or approach. The
articles are scholarly and often complex, but can be key or even
essential reading to assist with your research at undergraduate level.
They should be consulted as part of your routine work for assign-
ments, particularly at levels 2 and 3.

What journals are there?

There are two main forms of periodical that can be found and
used for research purposes. In terms of academic journals, all uni-
versity and college libraries will have a reading list of the ones that
they hold for a particular subject discipline. It is good practice to
obtain a copy of this as soon as possible and consult it for each
assignment set. For example, for an essay question such as ‘Discuss
the role of nature in romantic poetry’, you may find useful
the period journal Eighteenth-century Studies or the genre-specific
journal Romanticism. There will also be multi-disciplinary or cross-
disciplinary journals that prove useful in assisting with research for a
particular assignment.
70 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

Additionally, high-quality papers such as the Guardian or the

Independent carry book reviews and cultural discussions, which con-
tain articles on new publications as well as author interviews that
can prove useful and help you to keep abreast of current popular
titles on a particular subject. In-depth articles can be also found in
publications such as the Times Literary Supplement and the London
Review of Books. These are all more frequent publications than
academic journals.

How can I access journals?

As already mentioned, universities hold an A to Z listing of all
journals that are stocked in their libraries/LRCs. This list is often
available on your university’s website, and is a good starting point
for finding relevant journal articles. Librarians are available to assist
should you have difficulty accessing this list.
However, looking on library shelves for relevant journal articles
can be a time-consuming process, and it is often much easier to
consult online indexes. You will probably be shown how to use
these when you first arrive at university. Online indexes include the
British Humanities Index, Humanities Abstracts, Index to Theses,
ISI Web of Knowledge and the Times Literary Supplement. All of
these indexes are useful for all English students so you would be
wise to familiarize yourself with them early on. They contain lists
of journal articles, with descriptions of their content, which can be
found using the search tool facilities too. Often they are linked
to the university library’s website, so availability of articles found
can also be checked. Like books that are unavailable within the
library, journal articles can also be ordered through the inter-library
loan service.
When utilizing these databases it is important to be able to
search effectively. Although help is always available, regular use will
enhance your searching skills. It is often advisable when searching
one of these databases to use keywords from the essay title; so, from
the above example, it may prove useful to begin with a search under
the terms ‘nature’ and ‘Romanticism’. Alternatively, you might
choose to search under the names of authors or texts to be used in
the essay, for example ‘Wordsworth’ and ‘Prelude’ for the above title.
In the case of the British Humanities Index it is possible to search
under the following categories: key words, author of article, title of
 RESEARCH 71

article and descriptors (short contents within an article). When

searching for ‘Romanticism’ and ‘nature’ under the criteria ‘des-
criptors’ the article ‘In city pent: echo and allusion in Wordsworth,
Coleridge and Lamb, 1797–1801’ by Lucy Newlyn (Review of
English Studies, 32, November 1981, pp. 408–428) was found. The
experimentation with different key words and search terms will
either widen a search or make a search more specific.
There are also online journals available, many of which can often
be located through your university’s library website. For the above
question, there is the online journal Romanticism (Edinburgh), which
can be found on the host site Humanities International Complete.
Once connected to the host site it is possible to do an advanced
search for articles in the same way as searching for an article in an
index. In the case of online journals, though, it is often possible to
see the full article in PDF format. It is essential to use these tools
regularly in order to find suitable articles both for general reading
and assignments.

What should I look for in a journal?

Similar questions of journals need to be asked of books when exam-
ining whether an article is suitable for use in an assignment. Most
important, perhaps, is to ask how relevant the article is to an assign-
ment. However, journals can often prove most useful for con-
textualizing a question or giving background information about a
period or genre. Also it is important to look for different arguments
or opinions surrounding a question, for example in the above
question it may be interesting to examine it in terms of eco-
criticism or from a post-structuralist viewpoint. Careful use of
journals in these ways will assist in effective research and add greatly
to your understanding of current thinking on a particular topic or
question.

The internet
The world wide web has become a popular source of information
for students, but it must be used carefully and with a critical eye.
Many sites are not appropriate sources for degree-level assignments,
and over-dependence on such material will be penalized when
work is assessed. What is very important when using the web,
72 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

however, is that this material must be referenced in the same way as a

book or a journal article. Articles and other work published on
websites have authors, titles and addresses, and, even where these
are not obvious, as full a reference as possible should be given
whenever you use such sources, whether you are quoting directly,
paraphrasing or using an idea suggested by a source on the web.

What internet resources are there?

There are numerous resources available to English students on the
internet that will assist you with research, be it for general reading
or specifically for an assignment. There are six main types of website
that may prove to be of most use to students of English: author-
specific, genre-specific, historical, bibliographic, books online, and
journals/newspapers online.
Author-specific websites contain useful critical evaluations of
a specific writer; this may include biographical information, criti-
cal appraisals of and examples of their work. This material is of
course particularly useful in terms of gaining valuable informa-
tion on authors and their works, and it is often a first point of
research on essay questions. An example of an author-specific web-
site that might be used for the essay question ‘Discuss the role
of nature in romantic poetry’ is The Wordsworth Trust (www.
wordsworth.org.uk). This site gives information on William
Wordsworth himself, other writers he was associated with, the
Romantic Movement and analysis of some of his major works, such
as The Prelude or the poems he included in Lyrical Ballads.
Genre-specific websites give contextual information on a par-
ticular type of literature, including biographies and critical analyses
of texts by authors, plus commentary on important cultural and
historical themes within a movement. It is frequently important
to be able to contextualize an author within a genre, and these
websites can assist you with this task. So, for example, a website
for the above essay question is ‘The Romantic Movement in
British Literature’ (www.accd.edu/sac/english/bailey/engroman.
htm), which has an extensive list of links under the categories
‘Resources for Romanticism’ and ‘Specific Authors’.
Historical-period-based websites give contextual information
focused on a specific period in history, which may include political,
economic, social and cultural information. Knowing the historical
 RESEARCH 73

contexts for an author’s work is intrinsic to understanding litera-

ture, since all writing is a product of the period from which it
emerges. An example of an unusual historical-period-based resource
for background information on the above essay title is the ‘Eight-
eenth Century England’ website (www.umich.edu/~ece/), which
contains projects by final-year literature students on different aspects
of eighteenth-century cultural history.
Bibliographic websites are important sources of information to
find other texts or websites on a given period, genre, work or
author. They often contain descriptions of each website or book so
that you can evaluate how important a particular resource may be
to you. These websites are particularly useful as a way into research,
to locate relevant resources that can be accessed at the beginning
of the research process for an essay. An example of a website like this
is Literary Resources on the Net (http://andromeda.rutgers.
edu/~jlynch/Lit/), which carries a bibliographic index of other
websites, focusing on most areas of English literature including
Romanticism, eighteenth century and Victorian literature, with
descriptive information on these websites.
‘Books online’ resources are now various and plentiful, covering
poetry, plays and novels, which are available in full-text versions on
the internet. They may be useful on many occasions, particularly if a
book you need has gone out of print or if there are no copies
available in the library, or if only a small number of poems, for
example, are needed for a particular lecture or seminar. They are
also searchable, which is useful if you are trying to track down a
phrase, word or image. A good example of a poetry online website
that could be used for the above essay question is English Verse
(www.englishverse.com), which contains over 750 poems from the
Middle English period to the twentieth century. For each author
there is some biographical and critical information.
Journals and newspapers online have been discussed in the jour-
nals section of this chapter. However it is worth noting that the Times
Literary Supplement has a website at http://tls.timesonline.co.uk,
which carries current articles and allows subscribers access to their
archive. As can be easily appreciated, these different types of website
all serve multiple purposes for English students. It is important to
use them regularly in order to make the best use of degree-level
study. Time spent investigating the resources available for your
74 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

research will be well spent online but there is now such a wealth of
information available that you need to ensure you are focused in
your inquiries.

How can I get access to the internet?

The internet can be accessed at a number of places both within
your university and in the university’s city or town. HEIs generally
have a large number of computer rooms and terminals through
which the internet can be accessed, both within their libraries and
in specifically designed computer suites, although wireless internet
connection (wifi) may be available in many zones if you have a
suitably enabled laptop. Increasingly, there will also be broadband
access within the student halls of residence.
For personal use of the web there are generally now internet
cafes or shops within towns and cities. Also the internet can be
accessed within the town or city’s public library. There is generally
no charge for this service, but usually a computer has to be booked
in advance and the user has to be a member of the library. Wifi is
also more and more common.

What search engines and websites should I use?

It is always preferable, and more reliable, to use academic search
engines and websites when surfing the internet for university
purposes because you can then be sure that a particular website is
likely to be scholarly and of a good standard, usually written by
experienced and qualified academics.
Examples of academic search engines, which would be useful for
English students are Intute (www.intute.ac.uk/artsandhumanities),
BUBLlink (http://bubl.ac.uk) and Google Scholar (http://scholar.
google.com/ or go to www.google.co.uk and click on ‘Scholar’ on
the main menu). When surfing, similar rules apply to searching for
books or journals and these search engines include informative
descriptions of the websites that appear on their result-lists so
that you can evaluate their usefulness without having to follow
each link. Another helpful resource is Pinakes: a subject launchpad
(www.hw.ac.uk/libwww/irn/pinakes/pinakes.html) that has links
to academic search engines for all subjects including those in the
arts and humanities.
 RESEARCH 75

It is worth reiterating that care should be taken when searching

the internet so that students can be sure they are using properly
accredited and academic websites to ensure accuracy of informa-
tion gained.

How can I make the best use of the internet?

The internet is a huge resource for students, but care must be taken
in order to get the most from it; information on many sites is
inaccurate, hence the need to use recognized search engines, and
especially ones that are designed for students.
When searching, to achieve the best results always use an advanced
search facility where possible. Also try to be precise, but not overly
restrictive; it is advisable to use six to eight search terms when doing
a search. Try to use phrases that seem natural. Use nouns as much as
possible and try to avoid using verbs, adverbs, conjunctions and
adjectives. Where possible it is advisable to make use of ‘Boolean
syntax’, particularly the ‘AND’ function.2
There are online tutorials available, which will assist you greatly,
listed in the further reading part of this section.

Libraries, LRCs and databases3

You should acquaint yourself early in your course with the
appropriate sections of the library or Learning Resources Centre
and its procedures and regulations. You will also find that library
sessions for new students are a part of most English programmes. It
is worth noting, however, that in addition to recommending books
through the ordinary loan system, tutors may place in-demand texts
on short loan or ‘academic reserve’. Workshops may often also be
held at various times during the academic year to acquaint you
with the various electronic resources available.
The word database is a generic term for a collection of informa-
tion held in a particular structured format. It can be applied to
abstracts and indexes, and online journals and newspapers. Abstracts
and indexes specialize in particular subject areas and pull together
all essential information about journal articles. They can appear in
various forms – online, DVD or print – and while indexes provide
the bare facts (author, title, journal title and individual issue details),
abstracts give the same information with the addition of a short
76 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

summary about each article, which is more useful in helping you to

decide which articles would be relevant to your research. Other
useful texts to refer to are theses or dissertations, which present
research and findings submitted for examination for a degree or
professional qualification. A guide to theses published in the UK
can be found online: www.theses.com/

Further help on research

BBC Key Skills: www.bbc.co.uk/keyskills/extra/module2/
2.shtml
The Key Skills website gives basic advice on using books, journals
and the internet, mainly in the form of observations and tips.
The Seven Steps of the Research Process:
www.library.cornell.edu/olinuris/ref/research/skill1.htm
This website takes students through a seven-step guide to research-
ing for assignments, with useful hints on and links for more infor-
mation on each of the steps.
How to do Research in the Library: http://library.ucsc.edu/
ref/howto
This website, from the University of California, Santa Cruz, allows
students to sample all areas of research. It includes lists of relevant
books and journal articles, as well as evaluating web resources.
Education World: Higher Education Community: Study
Aids: www.education-world.com/higher_ed/study.shtml
This American website gives useful information on such topics as
copyright and plagiarism. Also there are good links designed for
undergraduates, listed under ‘Undergraduate Study Aids’.

Researching on the internet

Bright Planet: www.brightplanet.com
This website contains a downloadable PDF resource on how to
use the internet effectively. This is a detailed and informative
tool for assistance with searching and using information on the
internet.
 RESEARCH 77

Virtual Training Suite: www.vts.intute.ac.uk.

This website contains a virtual training suite for both further educa-
tion and higher education English students. The training is of a
practical nature, giving students the opportunity to practise their
internet information skills.
INTUTE: Arts and Humanities: www.intute.ac.uk/
artsandhumanities
This website contains a search facility with over 18,000 web
resources. As well as this, each entry contains a detailed description
of the particular website’s contents.
A Student’s Guide to WWW Research: www.slu.edu/
departments/english/research/research.html
This website breaks down all aspects of internet research, in an easy
to understand format.
Thinking Critically About World Wide Web Resources:
www.library.ucla.edu/libraries/college/help/critical/
This website attempts a critical examination of the internet; how to
look at websites and conduct research with critical questioning.
7 Writing

Reading is often the catalyst for writing but you also need to know
when to stop. You will not be able to read everything on a subject,
and assignments you are set will never be solely about reading;
indeed they are likely to be primarily about writing or presenting. It
is also not usually the best approach to do all your reading before
beginning to write. Starting to fashion your thoughts in prose may
well give you the best guide to what you need to read because it
will probably illustrate where your knowledge and understanding
are weak. This is particularly true of primary texts, which are the
most important ones to read and re-read because an important
principle in the writing and use of literary criticism is that, what-
ever the nature of the assignment you are required to do, you
should never let the critic do the work for you. Use the views of
others to support your own argument rather than as a substitute for
it. Always remember that the marker wants to see evidence of your
thinking about a subject in any assignment, rather than a demon-
stration of your skill in googling subjects or collecting books off the
library shelf and transcribing quotations.
The skills, or disciplines, that the marker will want to see concern
your writing practice. This covers your use of English (literacy
skills), your argument (rhetorical skills), your essay form and struc-
ture (presentational skills), and your use of bibliographic and other
conventions (scholarly skills).

Bibliographies, referencing and other conventions1

This section is more important than you might first think. Scholarly
conventions enable tutors to read your essays effectively and to
understand your use of others’ work. At best, a poorly referenced
assignment will frustrate your marker and reduce your grade; at
 WRITING 79

worst it may have grave consequences if it is thought you are pass-

ing off others’ work as your own. All departments will offer rules
and also advice on how to use appropriate scholarly conventions in
your work. The suggestions and recommendations below are
indicative and are based on the guidelines in the Modern Humanities
Research Association Style Book, which is a standard guide for human-
ities subjects, although there are others, especially the Harvard
system, which is more commonly used in the sciences. The most
important thing is consistency, so you should make sure that, which-
ever system you settle on, you use it carefully.

Quotations

• Employ quotation marks to indicate direct quotations and the

definition of words (e.g. the word ‘orange’).
• In quoted passages follow the original spelling, punctua-
tion, etc.
• Short quotations (approximately 40 words or two lines of
verse) should be enclosed in single quotation marks (‘. . . .’)
and run on with the main text.
• Double quotation marks (“. . . .”) are used for a quotation
within a quotation.
• Longer quotations should start on a separate line, with no
quotation marks and indented throughout.

Footnotes/endnotes and referencing

• Purpose: notes are used for documentation and citation of

sources relevant to the text; notes should not duplicate infor-
mation already made clear in the text.
• You can use footnotes, which appear at the bottom of each
page, or endnotes, which are provided after the text.
• Notes should be numbered consecutively (1, 2, 3 . . .)
throughout the text.
• Reference numbers are placed at the end of quotations (not
following the author’s name if this is given previously).
• If a quotation is not used, reference numbers are placed at the
end of a sentence to interrupt the flow of the text as little as
possible (alternatively you may insert one at a major break
within a sentence if there will be more than one note).
80 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

• Reference numbers should be without punctuation and

presented in superscript, appearing above the line of text,
like this:1

Footnotes/endnotes and style

Notes should document information in the text in order to allow
the reader to check the evidence on which an argument is based;
the information given varies with the kind of text:

• Books: author (surname and initials), title underlined or in

italics (and after the first full citation using a suitable and easily
recognizable abbreviation for long titles), publication details
in brackets (Place of Publication: Publisher, Year of Publica-
tion), page numbers (p. 15; pp. 14–16), for example:
Author, Title of Book (London: Publisher, 1991) p. 15
• Articles: author, title of article in single quotation marks, name
of journal underlined or in italics, volume number, year of
publication, page reference, for example:
Author, ‘Title of Article’, Journal, vol. 1, 1994, pp. 14–16
• Plays and poems: titles of plays and long poems should be
underlined or in italics; titles of short poems and critical essays
should be in single quotation marks.
• Titles of films are italicized (or underlined in hand-written
script), and given with the director’s name and the date of
release, thus, for example:
Citizen Kane (Welles, 1941)
• Internet sites: full details are required, including the date on
which you accessed the article, for example:
Author (if known), ‘Title of internet article’, Title of web
page (if available), [accessed 1 January 2009], available from:
http//www . . . (full website address).

Bibliography

• A bibliography should be presented on a separate sheet of

paper after the text and notes detailing all of the materials con-
sulted in the preparation of the essay (be particularly sure to
include all works referred to in the text and notes).
 WRITING 81

• Bibliographical references are presented in alphabetical order

by (first-named) author or editor/
• Bibliographical references should give the full title of the
book (underlined or in italics) or article (in single quotation
marks), name of journal (underlined or in italics) and full
details of publication (place of publication: publisher, year).
• For style of presentation see the examples given above.
Finally, every HEI, at institutional, departmental or subject level,
will have requirements for the presentation of your work in terms
of the physical submission of the assignment. Most will also have an
assignment cover sheet that must be submitted too, so that your details
are known. A basic set of guidelines may look like the following.

General presentation

• Use white, A4 paper.

• With word-processed work, this should be double spaced
with ample margins all around.
• Indent the first line of each paragraph.
• Word-processed work should be left-justified.
• Number pages consecutively in the top right-hand corner.
• Assignments should be carefully checked before submission
for spelling, consistency, style, quotations against originals, etc.
• Do not staple the pages together; use a paper clip.
• Include student’s name, module number and title, and name
of module tutor on the first page.
• Give the full title (underlined) of the question being answered.
• ALWAYS retain a copy of your work.

Use of English
As discussed in the first chapter, one of the areas of most concern to
lecturers in HE is students’ writing ability. If you would like some
guidance and help with your use of English, you will find there
are now many websites that can assist. For example, some I would
recommend are:

• The English Style Book: A Guide to the Writing of Scholarly

English: www.litencyc.com/stylebook/stylebook.php
82 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

• Judy Vorfeld’s Webgrammar site: www.webgrammar.com/

• The Purdue Online Writing Lab (OWL) (University of
Purdue): http://owl.english.purdue.edu/
• Powerwrite: Grammar and Punctuation Help (Furman
University): http://alpha.furman.edu/~moakes/Powerwrite/
grammartoc.htm
Additionally, you will find many guides available in book form.
Some I have found helpful to students are:

• Cassell Guide to Common Errors in English, by Harry Blamires

• Cassell’s Dictionary of English Grammar, by James Aitchison
• Grammar and Writing, edited by Rebecca Stott and Peter
Chapman
• Write in Style, by Richard Palmer
• Grammar Guide, by Gordon Jarvie
You will also find some older reference works at the end of the
book in Further Reading, but the following are five important areas
to consider if you want to think about your literacy skills:

1 Possessives and apostrophes

• The tree’s leaves = the leaves of the [single] tree.

• The trees’ leaves = the leaves of the [plural] trees.
• [The trees drop their leaves = a simple plural, not a possessive.]

• The car’s engine [= the engine of the car] is running well.

• The car’s running well = the car is running well [not a
possessive].
All the above examples are correct, but the following one is not:
The car had it’s engine serviced at the garage [incorrect: its
should have no apostrophe in this case].
So, beware misusing ‘its’ and ‘it’s’ especially:

• Its = of it or belonging to it [possessive]: its coat is wet.

• It’s = it is [abbreviation of verb-phrase – as in the second ‘car’
example above]: it’s going to get its coat wet. It’s can also = it
has [It’s been raining].
 WRITING 83

2 ‘Subject-verb agreement’
Make sure single subjects have single verb forms. Ditto for
plurals.

• The sound of fireworks upsets the dog.

• Fireworks upset the dog.
• Before now, fireworks have upset the dog.
• Before now, the sound of fireworks has upset the dog.

• Walking and reading are her favourite hobbies.

• Walking, not reading, is her favourite hobby.

• Each of us is going.
• None of us is going.
• All of us are going.
Beware collective nouns:

• A flock of sheep was in the road.

• The trade union was in turmoil.
• The trade unions were in turmoil.
• She was one of many writers who were there, and was
pleased to be in their company.

3 ‘Fragments’
A ‘fragment’ is an incomplete sentence presented as a full sentence,
in which something crucial – usually a verb, a conjunction (‘and’,
‘but’, ‘since’, etc.) or punctuation – is missing, for example:

• In the desert, I saw a wonderful sight. A long line of camels

across the horizon. [Wrong – no verb in second
‘sentence’.]

• Emma created quite a stir. Wearing a soldier’s tunic. [Wrong

– no verb in second ‘sentence’.]
Citizens have a responsibility. To vote in every election. [Wrong –
no verb in second ‘sentence’.]

• Citizens have a responsibility to vote in every election. [Right

– one sentence.]
84 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

• Citizens have a responsibility: to vote in every election.

[Right – colon links the second ‘sentence’ to the
first.]
• Citizens have a responsibility, and should vote in every elec-
tion. [Right – comma and conjunctive phrase inserted.]
• Citizens have a responsibility, which is to vote in every elec-
tion. [Right – comma inserted and dependent clause
created.]

4 ‘Comma-splices’
A ‘comma-splice’ is the joining of two independent sentences or
ideas with only a comma, for example:

• Bill hid his money under the floor, no one has ever found
it. [Wrong – two separate sentences ‘spliced’ with
comma.]
• Bill hid his money under the floor, and no one has ever found
it. [Right – comma and conjunction inserted.]
• Bill hid his money under the floor; no one has ever found it.
[Right – semi-colon links two related clauses.]
• Bill hid his money under the floor. No one has ever found it.
[Right – two complete sentences created.]

5 Correct use of commas

It is difficult to give succinct but comprehensive and definitive
advice on when and where to use commas properly: practice var-
ies widely, with some writers using a great many and others very
few. However, the commonest places in which commas should be
used are:

• In lists, for example:

There were apples, pears, bananas, peaches and grapes in the
basket.
• Where a sentence starts with an adverb or adverbial
clause, for example:
Presently, the ship came into view.
In all these respects, the book is a good one.
At the beginning of the novel, Emma is a prig.
 WRITING 85

• To join two or more related but separate parts of the

same sentence, for example:
He was enjoying himself, but on the stroke of nine decided to
leave.
The novel is a good one, with many interesting characters, a
good plot and a convincing setting.
• To ‘bracket off’ a subsidiary clause in a sentence, for
example:
The novel is a good one, although rather long, and contains
many interesting characters.
Peter, amongst many other people present, could not get a
view of Emma.

A little test
Finally, if you want to test your English literacy skills as they are at
present, try the little test below. There are 12 sections with five
questions in each. If you score over 50 you should feel fairly con-
fident about your abilities, although there may still be considerable
room for improvement. If you score between 40 and 50 you should
be working to improve your standard of English. If you score lower
than 40, you need to work on your literacy skills urgently. The
answers are given at the end of the book.

Yes or No?

1 Which of the following words are spelled correctly?

occassion
committee
neccessary
paralell
parliment

2 Which of the following words are spelled correctly?

cemetery
seperate
goverment
deceive
concious
86 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

3 Which of the following are sentences?

About a boy.
You thief.
Loves me like a rock.
You exist.
The sound of silence.

4 In which of the following sentences are all the commas correctly

placed?
He is here, but, she is there.
They are going, now.
I am young, free and single.
No one knows, the trouble I have seen.
Entering the pub, I noticed her in the corner.

5 Which of these sentences make sense?

Coming round the mountain, the pub appeared in the distance.
Going to Mars, the astronauts would need copious supplies.
Looking out of the window, the car was at the end of the street.
Thinking quickly, I gave the necessary reply.
Though they were passed their sell-by date, the men ate the eggs.

6 Which of these sentences have an excess word?

This ever-changing world in which we live in is too fast for me.
The last thing of which I thought of was my own safety.
I want to buy a house on the street you live on.
The school to which she went to was far away.
Of the five remaining, two were highly thought of by the selection
panel.

7 In which of these sentences is the semi-colon correctly used?

I am old; you are young.
There are three people in the room; Sue, John and Mary.
He is late; you should go.
The cat is by the door and; the dog is by the fire.
It is time; to go.

8 Which of the following could be considered grammatically

correct?
It is hot, the sun is shining.
It is hot: the sun is shining.
 WRITING 87

It is hot. The sun is shining.

It is hot; the sun is shining.
It is hot and the sun is shining.

9 Which of these sentences are grammatically correct?

We would of gone tomorrow.
They gave the tickets to you and I.
He is over their.
It is I.
Nobody effects me.

10 Which of these sentences imply that judges should not take

sides?
Judges should be disinterested.
Judges should be impartial.
Judges should be uninterested.
Judges should be partial.
Judges should be unbiased.

11 In which of these sentences are the apostrophes used correctly?

It’s a dog’s life.
That’s the dog’s bone.
It’s a girl.
Every dog has it’s day.
It’s raining men.

12 In which of these phrases are the apostrophes used correctly?

It’s a man’s bag!
The womens’ movement.
Boys’ don’t cry.
The girls’ have left.
The working-men’s club.
8 Note-taking, lectures and
revision

Lecturer A: ‘I thought you said you’d taught the students that.’

Lecturer B: ‘Yes, but I didn’t say they’d learned it.’

Note-taking
One-hour lectures are perhaps the strangest experience for new
students in higher education. There may be little in your previous
studies to prepare you for this learning experience. Still more
unnerving for many freshers is the fact that note-taking skills of the
kind required by lectures are unlikely to have been covered in your
education before going to university.
At school, for example, you may have been used to taking copi-
ous notes; but this is not the best way to approach lectures, as tutors
will not be looking for you to regurgitate their material in your
essays – and you would need to have excellent shorthand skills to
keep up anyway! Nonetheless, this is a common approach that new
students take to lectures. Remarking on this, Keverne Smith advises
that ‘In reality, an effective response to a lecture requires selective
note-taking and an ability to recognize the overall shape of the
lecture and to register the hierarchy of ideas being presented; it
requires an overview.’1
Many students unhappily expect lecturers to dictate notes but
today this will be rare (unless there is a key quotation, for example)
even though dictation was part of the original purpose of lectures
in the Middle Ages before print technologies. Some lecturers now-
adays will use PowerPoint or handouts to provide an overview of
the lecture, its key points, or the quotations used. Although lectures
are a good way of putting over a wealth of ideas to large numbers of
students, especially as seminar preparation, Smith found that only
34 per cent of students felt well prepared for note-taking in lectures
 NOTE-TAKING, LECTURES AND REVISION 89

and he concluded that the lecture ‘is not the main or the most
conducive aspect of the learning experience’.
Consequently, you will find that some courses will hardly use
lectures at all or will use shorter lectures, especially in the first year.
Several departments have now introduced note-taking guidance
into early lectures and ‘icebreaking’ exercises. In terms of practical
advice, you would be best advised in lectures to: sit near the front to
ensure you can hear well; think about what is being said and why
before you write anything down; engage with the argument rather
than try to note down or remember what is said verbatim; go along
as well prepared as possible because prior reading will be beneficial;
write up or reorganize your notes afterwards; remember the lec-
turer is speaking from a point of view and so is not simply giving
you facts or telling you what to think. Lectures are there to help
you gain an overview of the topic in hand, and so your primary role
is to listen and reflect, not to write.
Similarly, the primary role of reading is to spur your thought and
so note-taking outside of lectures is best undertaken with this in
mind. Note-taking should always have a purpose, and this may
affect your choice of technique: note-cards, underlining, highlight-
ing, marginalia, A4 notes, aide memoirs or typing at a computer.
In general, it is good advice to see note-taking and reading as
simultaneous activities; but, if this disturbs instead of focuses your
thoughts, you may want to make notes later, for example using
‘mind maps’ to show the connections between parts of your
reading.
Many universities will also have workshop sessions on writing,
speaking, listening and thinking skills. Additionally, you may find
lecturers introduce elements of ‘dialogue’ into their sessions with
you, by putting forward different interpretations of texts, for
example, to encourage debate. This is to stress that the purpose of
university-level study is to stimulate the process of learning, which
in the humanities is best understood as sharpening your under-
standing and your analytical skills. The acquisition of knowledge is
very important but often not as important as the uses to which you
put it. What you are therefore attempting to identify when note-
taking are main points, themes, new ideas and questions, connec-
tions with your previous learning, potentially helpful references,
and material for discussion or debate.
90 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

In summary, you will probably want to take some notes during

lectures; many of the citations or references given during lecture
sessions are invaluable and should be followed up independently.
You should not, however, attempt to record the lecture at the expense
of listening and, more particularly, at the expense of thinking. This
is not to make English studies a confrontational affair; it is rather to
stress that it should be an interactive and, indeed, creative process
of learning in which you aim to survey, question, read, recall and
review.2

New technologies
Word-processing packages provide excellent means of organizing,
spell checking and revising your work. They also allow you to
determine the word-count, which is helpful throughout the process
of writing. Essays should go through several drafts, and you should
ensure you proofread your work at the end: the worst impression to
give to the marker is that you couldn’t be bothered to check your
work before submitting it.
There have also been a number of recent initiatives using elec-
tronic resources as an additional teaching and learning method. In
some cases, the use of Blackboard or WebCT (products that enable
universities to host classes on the world wide web) as a source of
information, interaction and discussion may be either optional or a
requirement on a module. These are usually available as an add-
itional resource to enrich knowledge and open up discussion, as are
printed resource-packs, audio-visual materials, corpora and a range
of electronic media, especially on courses that have developed
distance-learning resources. In addition to PowerPoint, you may
also find lecturers use podcasts, really simply syndication (RSS)
streaming, weblogs or other adjuncts to their teaching, but always
remember that the primary purpose of education is not teaching,
but learning.
As noted earlier in Chapter 6, your decision how to use the
internet is one of the most important ones. Your bibliography must
show where your ideas have come from and lecturers will not be
impressed with a list of references to sites you have found via
Google, for example. Selective web use for information checking
and for tracking down helpful scholarly work is good practice, but
 NOTE-TAKING, LECTURES AND REVISION 91

remember that the web is an uncontrolled repository for the most

part and the majority of material has not been through the checks
and review processes that paper-published work usually has. Also,
be sure what your motives are for using the web rather than for
reading – webwork tends to be quick and easy but that is rarely
what the tutor marking your essay will be wanting from you. The
best use of library computers is often to track down paper-based
reading that your lecturers will have requested the learning centre
or library to stock for you.

Revision strategies
Revise selectively, but in an organized and directed way. First and
foremost be clear on the rubric and format for the exam, and
especially on two points: do you know how many and what kind
of questions you will be asked to answer; do you know on what
texts or topics the questions might be asked? You may want to
select your revision topics and texts on the basis of the number of
different question-areas they would allow you to tackle, or choose
to revise the ones you know best and then see what your options
would be. In any case, you should try to decide before the examin-
ation the texts you would like to use to answer a question on
possible subjects (this does not mean you cannot change your
mind in the exam). You might also want to think about specific
points you would like to make, and particular critics/theorists you
would want to discuss. All of this can be done in advance, with the
aim of allowing you to use your understanding imaginatively in
the exam.
Suggested areas to revise for most literature exams are:
(a) Langage usage (imagery, style, tone, character construction,
syntax, allusions, descriptions, etc.).
(b) Identity (of all kinds, and especially in terms of gender,
sexuality, ethnicity, class, childhood, nationality and so on;
e.g. for texts concerned with the post–colonial, where the
writer/narrator/character is from, their colonial history, their
relation to colonial/post-colonial events, their allegiances,
their sense of hybridity or mimicry, the constructions of
colonial discourse [e.g. stereotypes], parody, polemic, and the
92 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

assertions of national/post-colonial independence, the rela-

tion between colonized and colonizer).
(c) Narrative form (imitative, historical, fantastical, first/third
person, long/short narrative, order of events, divisions
between book’s sections, etc.).
(d) Historical situation: changes in politics, art, technology
and science, etc.
(e) Differences/specificities of key cultural aspects such as
‘race’, gender, and nation in terms of author, narrator and
characters.
(f) Concern with psychology and use of unusual or multiple
perspectives (in modernist work, for example, cubist
perspectives, multiple or repeated narration, collage, doppel-
gangers, underground or shell-shocked characters, etc.).
(g) Aspects to poetic analysis. It may be useful to have a mne-
monic that will prompt you to cover key elements, for
example:
• Capitalizations
• Rhyme scheme
• Allusion and alliteration
• First line
• Theme
• Versification
• Imagery
• Personification
• Enjambement/line ends
• Rhythm
• Sentence construction.
NB. Many of these overlap and the list is by no means exhaustive.

Practical advice for revision is to: start early; plan your time; work
with others; use mnemonics or other memory aids; and consult
previous exam papers. Above all, the best way to prepare is to try
sample questions. If you attempt a previous paper’s question under
exam conditions you will not only find out how you perform, you
will learn more: as an occasional practice-technique, the intense
experience of doing a mock-exam question for yourself will prob-
ably be a better use of an hour than reading. Exams are not memory
 NOTE-TAKING, LECTURES AND REVISION 93

tests; they are opportunities to deploy the understanding you have

of a topic or text in a creative, analytical and engaging way.

Exams
Exams in English vary and you may find you are asked, for example,
to write three essays in three hours, to offer a reading of a poem or
extract (gobbet), to define some terms, or to write several small
essays. For all of these you can plan and practise your answers by
setting yourself exercises in advance of the examination.
Several things affect your performance in exams. Of these,
arguably the most important are your:3
1 Knowledge
2 History of exam success
3 Exam preparation
4 Exam practice
5 Writing skills
6 Use of time
7 Approach.
In the exam hall, take some time to read through the entire
examination paper once, to decide which are the best questions to
answer and to get a sense of how the examiners are covering the
syllabus through the questions. This is also the time to think about
which texts you will be using in your answers.
A next step is to draw up a plan for your answers, ensuring that
you do not duplicate your material and that you have a structure for
your response to each question. You should then have the confidence
to tackle the questions calmly and methodically.
(a) For an extract analysis: go through it once to appraise its liter-
ary aspects (style, tone, metaphors, narrative perspective, col-
loquialisms, repetitions, omissions, dialogue, intertextualities,
characters, suspense, vocabulary, etc.); go through it again to
pick up on themes relevant to the (author and the) longer
work itself – you may also want to refer to the passage’s pos-
ition in the overall narrative, but do not use this as an excuse to
‘tell the story’; go through it once more looking for events or
‘keywords’ you can discuss in terms of historical themes.
94 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

(b) For an essay: avoid discussing texts too literally – do not

summarize the plot of a novel and do not paraphrase. Pick
out the keywords in the essay question and be sure to discuss
them. If you have read relevant critical or theoretical works,
cite them or their authors. If the question has a quotation,
think about it, but answer the question not the quotation.
Finally, you should leave time at the end of the session to read
through your answers and make any corrections. This allows you
the opportunity to tidy up any infelicities of expression or sentence
construction as well as put right errors.
 PART THREE:
Assessment: making the
grade
Having started to look at approaches towards assessment in the last
part, including the particular test of the exam, I will be looking in
this section at other forms of assessment and the ways you can
handle them. The English Benchmarking Statement stipulates that
‘programmes in English should articulate principles of coherent
and progressive development across the curricular provision and
the learning experience of students’. The assessment tasks used to
measure the achievement of learning outcomes by students thus
aim to test ideas and subject knowledge as well as skills of problem
solving, research, comprehension and analysis.
The primary tool used in non-examination assessment in Eng-
lish is the essay, to which the Benchmark Statement draws specific
attention, because it enables you to engage in sustained written
debate with ideas and display the understanding and knowledge
you have acquired in a structured way. The essay, or article, is
also the primary means by which research in English is dissem-
inated in journals and books. However, you may also be assessed
by seminar presentation, performance or even appearance, by group
work, seen class-test, unseen exam, close reading exercise, research
task or study-skills assessments, or by a number of other less
common means such as writing a book review or making an
anthology.
From the table, it can be deduced that results for English students
compare favourably with those achieved by undergraduates on
related subjects. The overwhelming majority of students, approxi-
mately 90 per cent, emerge with a second-class degree. This state of
affairs, once realized, means that many students see their perform-
ance almost exclusively in terms of a 2(i) or a 2(ii) degree result: the
former being the desired grade to indicate above average perform-
ance. This was not the case 20 years ago, for example when a 2(ii)
96 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

was at least as common as, if not more common than, a 2(i), and was
considered the most expected degree result.

Degree classes – 2000 HESA data. Students obtaining a classified

degree from their first degree course

Class of English History, Languages,

degree archaeology & linguistics &
classics area studies

First class 448 9% 701 9% 1224 9%

Upper second 2969 60% 4550 61% 7527 59%
Lower second 1439 29% 2105 28% 3876 30%
Third 108 2% 159 2% 330 2%
Total 4964 7515 12 957

(Source: English Subject Centre/HESA

www.english.heacademy.ac.uk/explore/publications/newsletters/
newsissue5/hestats.htm)

All universities, and English departments within them, will have

marking criteria. These indicate the difference between a ‘pass’ and
‘fail’ grade, but they also indicate the different expectations of work
that falls into the grade classifications, as well as some areas within
them; for example, within ‘first class’ it is possible to talk of a ‘good
first’, which is useful to funding bodies (such as the Arts and
Humanities Research Council (AHRC)) when deciding between
students who apply for grants to do postgraduate work.
Pass marks may vary but it is common for this to be set at 40,
which is the threshold for a third-class degree if a student is gradu-
ating with honours (cum laude). Next is the 2(ii) classification
spanning from 50–59, 2(i) from 60–69, and first from 70–100.
An example of broad criteria used in the classification of assess-
ment marks is given below as a basic guideline. Additionally,
specific criteria for each piece of assessment will most likely be
provided on course materials distributed at the beginning of
each module or unit, and these will be linked to the ‘learning
outcomes’ set.
 PART THREE: ASSESSMENT 97

Mark Descriptor

80–100 Everything in the ‘excellent’ category but with

or ‘A’ grade evidence of an additional capacity for original
outstanding thought and independent judgement, and the
ability to relate the topic/question to a wider
context/framework.
70–79 Comprehensive grasp of the question and all
or ‘A’ grade major issues involved. Wide range of sources
excellent used. Clear structure. Detailed critical and
theoretical analysis. Excellent organization and
argument. Adept use of language, spelling and
grammar. Capacity to look at issues from several
standpoints and to synthesize viewpoints as well
as draw a sound conclusion. Wide bibliography
and careful footnoting.
60–69 Well-focused on the question. Shows a sound
or ‘B’ grade grasp of the key issues of debate involved in the
topic. Good use of both primary and secondary
source material. Sound organization and a well-
structured argument. Capacity to engage with the
material and issues arising from it. Ability
to engage with critical and theoretical
perspectives.
50–59 Demonstrates a grasp of the question and
or ‘C’ grade engages with the key issues. Shows evidence of
reading and an ability to assimilate recommended
texts. Material shows evidence of shape and
coherence. Assignment either lacks depth of
analysis or is overly dependent on description or
secondary material.
40–49 Shows superficial understanding of the question.
or ‘D’ grade Not focused on key issues. Material may be partly
relevant, but is not well-organized or presented.
Lack of clear conclusion. Little evidence of general
reading.

(Continued)
98 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

30–39 Failure to engage with the question. Inadequate

or ‘F’ grade use of sources. No evidence of general reading.
Lack of content. Misunderstanding of the basic
issues.

0–29 Very little material relevant to the question.

or ‘F’ grade

While these guidelines indicate the general criteria required for

each grade, it is also important to understand that expectations will
change throughout your degree according to the notion that both
the subject-specific and transferable skills you acquire at each level
will be built upon in the next. Poor use of English, spelling, punctu-
ation and grammar will nearly always reduce your mark but the
reduction will not usually be quantified.
In general, assessment over the levels will require a growing
amount of autonomy and a development from a broad to a special-
ized knowledge base. Thus, a higher proportion of sophistication in
your argument, a more developed sense of judgement, and an
increasingly independent approach to learning will be expected at
each level. For example, at level 1 it may not be a requirement that
you regularly consult secondary source material, although many
lecturers and tutors will recommend books and articles that could
enhance your understanding. By level 2, however, it is likely to
be an expectation that you regularly consult secondary material,
including journals, and that you refer to this reading in your written
and seminar work. Finally, at level 3, it is normal to expect you
to exercise a critical facility in selecting and commenting on the
material you find in your independent research.
9 Seminars/presentations

Although teaching practice varies, perhaps the most common

approach to learning in contact time on HE English courses com-
bines seminars and lectures. Of the two formats, a majority of uni-
versity teachers favour the more flexible and open forum that a
seminar situation provides. Many modules that do have lectures
stage them at regular intervals or at specific points in the pro-
gramme rather than have them every week. When combined,
seminars commonly follow a lecture, with the aim of discussing
ideas and approaches that have been suggested by the lecturer.

Seminar
A ‘seminar’ is the name given to discussion classes of, usually,
between about five and 25 students. Smaller sessions would more
likely be ‘tutorials’. The seminar is, for most students, the hub of the
contact-time learning experience. You must therefore ensure that
you have done the required reading and are both well prepared
and willing to participate actively in the seminar. Seminars are
designed to enable fuller and more active student participation than
a lecture situation affords. The word seminar derives from the Latin
seminarium meaning ‘seed-bed’ and it might be useful to think of
the seminar as an opportunity for the dissemination and exchange
of ideas. Seminars should promote the exploration as well as the
acquisition of knowledge. Keverne Smith found that 54 per cent of
students felt well prepared for contributing to seminar discussion,
and 32 per cent adequately prepared. This is a better response than
for lectures, and while 33 per cent thought all teaching methods
were equally valuable, 50 per cent thought they learned more from
seminar discussion than from any other method.1
Seminars can operate in many different ways. Sometimes the
100 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

whole seminar group will be involved in a general discussion, or

the group may be given a specific focus, textual exercise or topic.
Small group-work is also common. Sometimes a seminar will be
‘student-led’ and this often involves individual presentations. These
presentations will reflect an individual’s research but should also
invite queries from, and ask questions of, the rest of the seminar
group. The role of the tutor in seminars can be very flexible. As
seminars are not ‘lessons’ as such, the tutor is there not only to
impart information or provide answers but also to guide the discus-
sion. On some modules, seminar work additionally forms part of
the assessment component, but in all cases your fullest participation
is seen as necessary for a successful and generally satisfying learning
experience.
Studying one or two subjects requires a high degree of specializa-
tion at university, which means that English students are likely to
have a concentrated skills set too. Pre-university work will focus on
both note-taking and group discussion, which is helpful for seminar
work. Often the tutor will recommend that you work on a particu-
lar question or topic or text in small numbers of four to six students.
This provides a good chance to learn from each other and to
talk through the issues without feeling that the whole class is
involved, which can be intimidating. Working in subsets is also a
step towards independent learning, which your tutor will be keen
to encourage, and this is an element that is likely to increase over the
course of the degree. Unlike most lectures, seminars rely on par-
ticipation and are opportunities for active learning, as opposed to
the more passive environment of the lecture room. The seminar
leader will sometimes ask you to discuss ideas in your sub-group
and then report back to the whole (plenary) group. The tutor is
likely to query some of your feedback or seek clarification in
order to tease out the key salient points for all the students in the
seminar as well as add their own specialist viewpoint. Contribu-
tions will always be valued but a good seminar tutor will aim to
ensure that all students participate and that a few voices do not
dominate.
As Smith notes, the seminar has been more favoured on English
courses than the lecture in recent years as it is considered ‘that
knowledge is more a matter of perception and analysis of con-
flicting interpretations than had been thought for much of the
 SEMINARS/PRESENTATIONS 101

twentieth century’. Opinions, ideas, perspectives, debate, argument

and analytical depth are often more important than facts, but some
students will still unfortunately say they find the latter more
important for their note-taking. According to studies, most students
feel reasonably well prepared for seminars and believe they take
away more than they do from other teaching methods. Within this,
the seminar debate or presentation is an extremely useful method of
learning for those who speak and for those who listen and respond.
Two types of presentation are common.
The first is in groups, when a subset of the overall seminar group
may be asked to make a short presentation on an author or an aspect
of a text or context. The particular form of the presentation will
vary according to the tutor who sets it and the students who plan it,
but the following are possible formats:
• Individual students in the group are assigned to speak on dif-
ferent aspects of the same topic.
• A series of overheads are individually prepared by members of
the group but introduced by a ‘compère’.
• A jointly prepared ‘diagram’ of the topic might be explained
jointly.
• A rehearsed reading of material jointly researched by all the
group members.
The most important factor in group work is to ensure that
everyone takes an equal share and that, while tasks will be different,
each member of the group has a sense of shared ownership. The
activity of a group presentation is one of the best for gaining
experience helpful to teamwork, interaction and cooperation in
the workplace. However, most of the advice for a group presenta-
tion is the same as for an individual one, so this will be discussed
next as the second type of common presentation format regularly
included in seminars. 2

How to give a presentation

Most students will be asked to give a presentation at some point in
their studies, and this is excellent practice for future working life.
The fundamental key to presentations is the familiar phrase: ‘prior
preparation prevents poor performance’. The crucial term here is of
102 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

course ‘preparation’ and this can be separated into three parts:

people, planning and practice.

The 3 Ps: people, planning, practice

People
Although you will be thinking a great deal during your preparation
about your own likely experience of the presentation, the most
important people in the room are going to be your audience.
So, to begin your preparation, ask yourself two questions:

• Who is my audience and what is their current knowledge or

understanding?
• What do I want my audience to LEARN or DO as a result of
my presentation?
These questions should help to focus your approach to the pitch (or
level), structure (or organization) and material (or content) of your
presentation.

How can I keep the audience interested?

This is not just a matter of content, but also of style. What aids are
you using to help your audience understand your argument? Are
you thinking about whether you are engaging and animated?
Are you going to practise modulating your voice to emphasize and
accentuate different points and words?
People respond best to others, and presentations in particular, if
they are both interested in the topic and involved in the speaker’s
academic investment in it. Try to put yourself in their place and
imagine the queries they might have. Such questions are perhaps
those you should seek to answer in the course of your presentation.
Also, aim wherever possible to keep the presentation simple
while remembering that simple is not the same as simplistic. Simple
means straightforward and to the point – if your presentation is
convoluted or too detailed your audience will lose interest. You also
do not have to explain everything; just your key points and the
thrust of your argument.
 SEMINARS/PRESENTATIONS 103

Planning
Your presentation will have a structure whether you realize it or not.
If you do not pay attention to how your talk is organized, however,
you will confuse your audience, put things in the wrong order, and
have no clear sense of time, direction or purpose. Structure is impor-
tant – your presentation should have a beginning, a middle and an
end. You may want to explain this to your audience too, so they
know where you are in your argument. The key elements of an essay
in which you explain what you are doing, do it, and then explain
what you have done, are also good ingredients for a presentation.
Therefore, your beginning should aim to tell your audience in
a succinct and engaging way what you are going to proceed to
explore with them or explain to them later. Be positive throughout
and try to engage the people in the audience’s attention – they will
only be interested in your topic if you are, so be sure to take them
with you in your enthusiasm. Speak directly and clearly, make eye
contact, and let them know you are interested in their attention
and their reactions. The guidelines here are similar to those for an
interview situation.
The middle section of your presentation will be the longest and
may have several parts. Structure this with a logical sequence that
develops from one area or topic to another – probably by using
verbal queues or visual links to guide the audience. The whiteboard,
PowerPoint and overhead transparencies can also be of considerable
assistance here and may help you to link each bit of the presentation
in a less formal way than you would in an essay.
The end of your presentation should include a brief summary or
reiteration of the key points. You could use handouts or a bullet-
point style here, but you may also want to summarize your overall
analysis with an apposite quotation or with a well-chosen sentence
that encapsulates the nub of your argument. Finally, thank your
audience.

Practice
Practice will help with timing, confidence, your expression and
your sense of speaking to a ‘room’. You should also practise in the
seminar room beforehand if possible, but at the very least you
104 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

should try out any equipment before you use it in the actual presen-
tation. If you are able, practise in front of someone else and get some
feedback on your performance: speed, clarity, structure and level of
engagement are all useful subjects to get some comments on.
The following are a few hints and tips for you to consider when
making the presentation:

• Talk at a medium pace and breathe slowly.

• Speak up and project your voice appropriately, but do not
shout – be conscious of the volume you are speaking at.
• Pace, tone and inflection are important. Speaking in a mono-
tone voice is very tedious for the audience – be enthusiastic
and engaged but not pedantic or hectoring.
• Beware using jargon, acronyms or colloquialisms. Not every-
one speaks the same (technical) language – use full phrases and
avoid slang terms.
• Always stand if you can. It may seem more daunting, but it
gives you confidence and helps with voice projection.
• Be conscious of your gestures – look at news presenters if you
want to get an idea of how much and how little to use your
hands.
• If you are nervous, holding something in your hand can calm
you but be careful not to shake it or play with it. Do not wave
your hands about but do not keep them firmly stuffed in your
pockets either.

Using audio visual equipment

Do:

• Use landscape rather than portrait.

• Remember the 6, 7, 8 rule – no more than six lines to an
overhead or slide, use letters no less than 7mm high, and
employ no more than eight screens or acetates for a 10 minute
presentation.
• Check your spelling, punctuation and grammar.
• Focus the projector and then check everyone can see.
• Use a consistent format to the slides.
• Stop talking when you change transparencies and avoid
simply reading them out.
 SEMINARS/PRESENTATIONS 105

• Provide your audience with a handout copy.

• Use pictures and diagrams to illustrate your points but not to
make them.
Do not:
• Talk too fast.
• Umm and aah, fidget or fiddle.
• Block the people in the audience’s view or turn your back to
them.
• Put too many points onto a slide/acetate.
• Write up to the edge (leave a margin instead).
• Point at the screen unless you have a pointing device.
• Leave the projector light on between transparencies.
• Use too many colours.

What is the marker looking for?

With a presentation, the markers will be looking for understanding
of the topic as well as for strengths in relevant skills: fluency, articu-
lacy, coherence, pace, delivery, audibility and the ability to engage
the audience. Additional resources may be of benefit to your
presentation but do not use them indiscriminately or gratuitously.
Content is usually more important than form in most presentations,
so remember that the markers will be looking at subject-specific
factors in addition to your skills at presenting material. For example,
one university assessment pro forma for a group presentation states:

The presentations will be assessed according to the following

criteria:

• The cogency of the argument presented.

• Effective use of the time available (maximum 15 minutes).
• Evidence of collaboration and team-work in planning and
presentation.
• Capacity to generate further discussion.

The assessment criteria for your presentation will not be the

same as this, but you do need to focus on the elements the markers
106 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

will be looking for, so ensure that you have the relevant information
to hand when you are preparing it. The remaining advice to offer
for presentations has to focus on attitude. If you can, try to relax, be
confident and enjoy it; the worst part of presenting for many people
is the anticipation, rarely the performance.
10 Close textual analysis

The skilful and creative analysis of a text, whether a poem, a prose

extract or a piece of recorded speech, lies near to the heart of
English studies. Such analysis often lies behind the phrase ‘reading
the text’ or ‘close reading’, and in many ways detailed analytical
reading is the aspect of English studies that is most distinctive. There
are few disciplines in which you will be regularly asked to consider
the language of a piece of writing in such detail. It is also one of the
key points at which English literature, English language and creative
writing meet. All these related disciplines are interested in the use of
words and their combination. There will be a chapter considering
studying language and practising writing later in this book, but here
I will consider textual analysis as it applies to reading literature.
The first thing that might be considered is the title, if the piece
has one. Its relation to the rest of the text is important (does the title
refer to a person, a place, a symbol or a well-known phrase, for
example). An important consideration here is whether the title is
primarily referential or metaphoric (compare, for example, David
Copperfield or Northanger Abbey, which respectively name a person
and a house, with The Heart of the Matter or The Turn of the Screw).
Considering whether the title is primarily denotative (as in descrip-
tive) or connotative (that is, suggestive and allusive) is useful but it is
also important to consider the range of meanings that a title could
have because there may be more than one, as with Enduring Love, for
example. A further aspect that can be considered before analysing a
poem or extract in detail is the layout of the text: how it looks on
the page. This is in terms of paragraph length, typography, ellipses,
dashes and so on, as well as such aspects as the use of short or long
lines/sentences, speech marks, sub-divisions or headings.
Within the text under analysis, quotations and allusions are
important features that you should always think about. These may
108 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

be flagged up, as often happens under the title for example, or may
be submerged – without any acknowledgment. The crucial point is
that you should be alive to ‘borrowed’ or familiar phrases and to
words which seem to be ‘freighted’ with extra significance, because
allusions can be made to almost anything: contemporary events,
popular culture, religion, politics, folk tales, limericks, poems, (auto)-
biography or scientific theories. Usually, these are connections
known to the author, but any phrase or piece of text can be add-
itionally considered in terms of its status as ‘discourse’ – its use of
expressions and terms familiar from non-literary contexts (e.g.
religious, historical, popular cultural or political). All of these can be
remarked upon because they indicate facets of the text, in terms of
class, gender, education, ethnicity, beliefs, prejudices and so on.
As with the title, there is only one first line or sentence and it
serves as a prelude to the rest of the text. Even in an extract, the
opening sentence has a unique position, and this is partly why there
are many famous opening lines or sentences but few second or third
ones. You should therefore consider the effect that the initial line or
sentence has. Does it orient you by giving information? Does it
throw you into the narrative as though you had entered a story in
the middle? Is it in speech marks? Is it authoritative or hesitant,
succinct or rambling? How is it arranged in terms of word order?
Imagery is a crucial part of any text’s effects, and comes in many
guises and places. Significant imagery may be present in the title, or
apparent in repeated references, or created through descriptions,
metaphors or similes. Every use of language that is not (meant to
be) literal is a form of imagery and can be profitably analysed (very
few uses of language are in fact not figurative). For example, you
might consider whether the image has a relevance to the general
subject matter of the text, whether it is an image from nature or
culture, or even whether much of the imagery in a text is consist-
ently similar (to create a particular effect on the reader, whether it
be romantic, eerie or comical, for example). The most important
types of figures of speech to look out for are metaphors, metonyms,
personification, similes and synecdoche.
Another distinctive aspect to any piece of writing is its style. Here
you should consider the vocabulary and grammar of the extract, the
tone, the ratio of narration to dialogue, the use of (especially
unusual) punctuation, the employment of dialect, contractions,
 CLOSE TEXTUAL ANALYSIS 109

adjectives or adverbs, passive sentences, specialized terms and

colloquialisms – again, in this light you should also think about
qualities that have been mentioned before such as imagery, figura-
tive language and repetitions. Further aspects to the language that
might be considered, especially in an analysis of poetry, are:
emphasis (exclamation marks, capitalized words, italicization), use
of alliteration (consonant repetitions, as in ‘seven sins’) or assonance
(vowel repetitions, as in ‘bee-keeper’), and rhythm (important
when discussing poetry as well as the fiction of modernist writers
such as James Joyce, Virginia Woolf, or E.M. Forster). One more
thing to add to this list is structure, which can depend upon rhythm.
Structure does not just mean whether or not the piece seems organ-
ized, but whether it is discernibly patterned or designed.
There are four other aspects to close reading that should be
considered here. They require a little more explication but are
useful components of an analytical vocabulary and a specialist ter-
minology: spatial reading, intertextuality, irony and prolepsis. The
concept of ‘spatial reading’ was derived from the idea that modern-
(ist) art is pervaded by a philosophical formalism that amounts to a
‘style’ (as opposed to nineteenth-century ‘stylization’) that requires
the reader to be more active and highly self-conscious. This is
mainly because of the text’s complex construction, which works
against drawing conclusions from any part of it before the finish is
reached. A parallel example is with land surveying, which is nigh
impossible from flat ground and needs to take place at an elevated
level. The idea of spatial reading largely derives from the cubist art
movement, which argues that a three-dimensional object or event
ought to be analysed from all angles and not just one, as in trad-
itional painting. Spatial reading is particularly important when
looking at modernist fictional texts that deploy terms repeatedly
across their narratives, such as Heart of Darkness, where a complex,
rhythmical usage of words such as ‘light’ and ‘dark’ militates against
any straightforward understanding of their meanings, which are
necessarily always partial and provisional.
A second key consideration is that when discussing any piece of
literature, readers should think about influences, allusions and refer-
ences to other texts. A different way of approaching this is in terms
of ‘intertextuality’, which, as a concept, acknowledges that a text is
not simply the work of an author in isolation. Any piece of writing
110 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

deploys language drawn from many textual systems (usages from

the law, aesthetics, mythology and so on) in one ‘weave’ by thread-
ing together strands of social discourse. A text is never original in
the sense that the words it employs, if not the expressions, are to be
found elsewhere (in intertexts), even though the text is original in
the sense that it is a unique arrangement of those words.
Third, ‘irony’, which is pervasive in poetry and prose, occurs
whenever appearance and reality differ. This is even though, in a
limited verbal sense, ‘irony’ refers to a figure of speech in which one
meaning of a word or expression clashes with an alternative mean-
ing. In most literary criticism, intentional irony has generally been
admired as a quality of textual complexity, but it is also common
now to consider ironies in the text irrespective of authorial inten-
tion, precisely because the flexibility and plurality of meaning in
relation to language allows multiple interpretations of almost any
utterance. So, on the one hand, all language is ambiguous and has a
plurality of meaning, and, on the other hand, all language is nar-
rated. Who is speaking is always a key question, and it may have
more than one answer. The opening sentence to Jane Austen’s Pride
and Prejudice is spoken directly by the narrator. For many readers,
this narrator is synonymous with Austen herself. Alternatively,
it soon becomes clear that the view expressed in the opening
sentence is not that of the narrator, let alone the author, but of
Mrs Bennet. In other words, a case can be made for thinking that
the opening words of the novel are those of a character, of the
author (or an ‘implied’ author), or simply of the narrator. The key
point is that when readers identify a piece of writing as ‘ironic’, they
are asserting that it does not mean what it appears to at face value,
and so are opening up a gap between what the text says and what it
means: a reading practice that, because of the ability of language to
mean so many things, including the opposite of what we initially
take it to mean, can be expanded to all kinds of interpretations that
read between the lines of texts. For many critics, it is precisely this
richness of narration and speech in literature that makes it such a
fertile and ‘open’ genre. For example, the voice of any one character
in a novel will be a meeting point for all sorts of overt and covert
discourses, or viewpoints, which will themselves be put into com-
petition with other discourses and voices, creating an enormously
complex tapestry of language, in which stresses and emphases
 CLOSE TEXTUAL ANALYSIS 111

can be placed not only on what the text says but on what it does
not say.
Fourth, ‘prolepsis’ is the anticipation of an utterance or an event
that has yet to occur or be narrated. Strictly speaking, prolepsis
requires that a future event be treated as though it is currently
happening (e.g. ‘I am gone’), but critics use it more loosely to refer
to allusions to, and foreshadowings of, later incidents in the narra-
tive. For example, Robinson Crusoe speaks on the opening page of
his narrative of ‘the life of misery that was to befal me’, explicitly
placing current events and descriptions in the light of what has not
yet been narrated. Prolepsis is a figure of speech that can be used
either to anticipate some future incident’s connection with that
which is currently being narrated, or simply to create suspense, but
it can also work at the level of language, where words and phrases
themselves can be linked to future ones, or phrases can be built up
before it is known to what they refer (e.g. see the opening sentence
of Paradise Lost where the main verb – ‘sing’ – is repeatedly
delayed). Additionally, telling the story with hindsight, as with Jane
Eyre (Charlotte Brontë), Tintern Abbey (Wordsworth) or Great
Expectations (Dickens), is a common method through which narra-
tors introduce a sense of a double-perspective, speaking, to different
degrees, as both older and younger self. A further technique to
create suspense by introducing two timeframes is to begin the story
at its end, as many films do and a novel such as Malcolm Lowry’s
Under the Volcano does.
The question should also be raised of the omnipresence of not
narrators but narrative. To begin with, it is obvious that narrative is
not exclusive to fiction. Films, television programmes, plays, songs
and poetry all contain narrative: they all tell stories, using images
and/or words. The more difficult question to ask is: what uses
of language, or of visual imagery, do not contain narrative? Does
a bank statement have a narrative? Does the description of a scien-
tific experiment have one? Do the workings of a mathematical
calculation?
Although we would want to make distinctions between kinds of
narrative, we would probably give an affirmative answer to each of
these questions. All of these examples are concerned with narrative
in that they are concerned with causation. They all tell stories by
arranging events in an order, with one event succeeded by another
112 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

that in some sense follows on from it. This brings us to one import-
ant element of narrative: time. Stories tell us about change over
time, and so does a bank statement: your bank balance has gone
down because you wrote a cheque, took some money out, or had to
pay bank charges and so on.
More difficult examples would be photographs, shopping lists or
telephone directories. These are more problematic because they do
not usually deal with time; but, even so, many critics would argue
that they are concerned with narratives because human beings are
story-telling animals. People will provide them with narratives
when they look at them or read them, because they contain infor-
mation from which it is possible to construct stories. Photographs
often seem to tell us things about the people in them; shopping lists
imply a great deal about people’s lifestyles; and even telephone
directories tell a story about people in relation to towns and
addresses – a telephone directory is a structured narrative of names,
families and genealogies.
In conclusion, we can say that, when approaching a piece of
writing for the first time, the reader should think along at least two
lines. First, it is important to consider what is specific to the text, in
terms of genre, mode of publication, author, historical context, set-
ting, stylistic devices, allusions, main theme and so on. The more
thought given to these areas, the more individual portions of the
narrative will seem to have significance. Second, the reader needs to
pay attention to the fact that there are features all texts have in
common, to do with the mechanics of language, which can be
analysed profitably in any one particular piece of writing. Consider-
ation of language in this detail is most familiar in the study of
poetry, and it is likely that any analysis of a poem would take into
account such aspects as imagery, repetition and metaphor, but
these are also qualities of prose, so readers of fiction should pay
attention to these formal features as well as to the larger issues
of plot, character development, narrative style, or historical and
political significance.

What is the marker looking for?

The Subject Benchmark Statement for English states that ‘The
assessment of students should be explicitly linked to the learning
 CLOSE TEXTUAL ANALYSIS 113

processes and outcomes of their degree programmes, which should

recognise that assessment significantly influences how and what
students learn.’ Tutors will therefore be considering the aims and
learning outcomes of the course when setting your assessment and
when marking it.
It is widely acknowledged now that assessment should be forma-
tive as well as summative. This means it should help you with your
future work and should be aimed at diagnosing as well as evaluating
your strengths and weaknesses with regard to different elements of
the assignment’s tasks. As the Benchmarking Statement recognizes,
if ‘assessment does not provide helpful feedback that assists the stu-
dent’s development of their skills and knowledge, their understand-
ing of both their own current abilities and of the ways to improve
their performance, it is only fulfilling half of its function, which is to
address the student as well as assess the grade’. Your best way to
think about what the marker is looking for is therefore to go back
to the learning outcomes of the course and think about how they
relate to the assessment. The marker is often looking for evidence of
your thinking more than your knowledge – the skills you have
developed in argument, expression and analysis are the ones most
markers will want to see demonstrated in close textual reading.
11 Assignments

English studies offers a wide variety of assessment patterns, which

include familiar exercises such as examinations and assignments and,
especially on creative writing modules, imaginative work. These are
kept under continuous review and, on most modules, changes are
made from year to year in order to provide you with a fair and
practical programme of assessment. The most common form of
assessment is the assignment and you may still encounter a degree
where the vast majority of your pattern of assessment takes this
form.
Broadly speaking, an assignment is an essay or equivalent piece
of written work with a specific instruction, and students usually
choose from a list of titles published with the module materials.
Where examinations are designed to test a different set of skills from
those required for coursework assignments and foreground factors
such as memory and speed of thought, essays assess your ability to
reflect at length on a given subject, research aspects to a chosen
question, and formulate a convincing argument in your own time.
Alternatively, as previously discussed, some modules require a pre-
sentation, which tests your awareness and reaction to an interactive
situation where you need to communicate verbally, unlike the writ-
ten form of the essay. Overall, however, the variety of forms of work
should result in a system of assessment that aims to be fair to all,
drawing on different strengths.

Essays
If you think of a degree course as a process of intellectual discovery,
then essay writing forms a central part of this exploratory activity.
In fact, the word essay means the attempt at discovering something,
so lecturers will be looking for evidence in your writing that you
 ASSIGNMENTS 115

are not merely duplicating or following material from critics, lec-

tures, seminars and so on, but that you are attempting to argue your
own viewpoint. This idea of essay writing emphasizes its central
feature: that you learn through the process of planning and writing.
When planning your work, it is vital that you spend an appropriate
amount of time attending to the thread of your own argument,
and not merely flitting from point to point, or from one set of
borrowed critical thoughts to another. It may be helpful not only to
make a plan of the structure and key points of your essay but also a
first draft which you then consider carefully, asking yourself such
questions as:

• Do I provide a clear response to the question?

• Does the beginning of my essay link up with the conclusion
in terms of the development of my ideas?
• Am I building the essay up through the use of quotations, or
are the quotations elements which pad out what remain
loosely connected points?
• How is my essay organized?
• Can I summarize the line of argument in a sentence?
• Does it address the assessment criteria of this specific assign-
ment?
It is important to note that, in the study of literature, reference is
made continually to the work of other commentators and critics. It
is therefore desirable that you are aware of any important work in
the area about which you are writing, but it is equally important
not to be overwhelmed by other people’s critical ideas, otherwise
your essay will not perform its proper function. It may be best
that you read critics after an initial attempt to sketch out an outline
for your essay; then your reading will be governed by your own
ideas, although they will not limit your writing.
Most new university students feel they have a fair grasp of
essay writing and that this is less problematic than conducting the
research and note-taking activities that accompany it in higher edu-
cation. However, new students are likely to focus on narrative, facts
and description rather than argument and analysis. Consequently,
tutors in your first year are likely to encourage you to move away
from either repeating the views of others verbatim or relying too
heavily on your own opinions. Instead, they will emphasize the
116 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

importance of discursive and academic debate ‘pitting different

interpretations against each other and assessing the different insights
each produces’.1 Essay writing is thus about balance: finding your
voice within the range of critical registers and integrating critical
opinion with your own perspective on a text or subject.

Dissertation
A dissertation is the longest essay you are likely to write. It is a
substantial piece of work independently conceived and produced,
usually at the end of your course. In the United States it is known as
the Honour’s Project and in the UK it is often the most important
element in the calculation of your degree classification. It fre-
quently provides an opportunity for you to study a topic of your
choice over a whole academic year, developing your work under
the close supervision of a member of staff.
The dissertation is considered in many English departments to be
the culmination of your studies. You will be expected to use your
skills of independent learning, close reading and critical analysis to
develop a clear argument or ‘thesis’ over the course of many thou-
sand words. It is the best opportunity also for you to engage in
discussion with a tutor, in order to consolidate your material, exer-
cise critical judgement and demonstrate awareness of the subject’s
scholarly conventions.
Because the dissertation is a much longer piece of work than
an essay it is even more important that you plan it properly. The
dissertation may be a topic of particular personal interest to you
that you work on throughout your final year, for example. There
are likely to be few or no formal classes and you will have to
work independently. This is the closest you are likely to come to
undertaking a research project, as your tutors would understand
it. If you particularly enjoy the dissertation process it may be
that you are well suited to continuing into postgraduate English
studies.

Other assignments
The Benchmark Statement notes that other forms of assessment
that may be used in English studies include:
 ASSIGNMENTS 117

• formal unseen examinations of various kinds and durations;

• ‘take-away’ examinations;
• coursework (including short and long essay requirements and
reviews);
• project work (which might be collaborative);
• dissertations (which might require evidence of considerable
scholarly research);
• oral assessment (including formal presentations, the
management of meetings, assessment of seminar
performance, etc.);
• external placement or work-based learning reports;
• tasks aimed at the development of specific skills (including IT
and bibliographical exercises);
• portfolio work (including creative writing, reflective journals,
essay plans, annotated bibliographies, created resources, etc.).

The most frequent types of alternative assessment are: essays

written in non-exam conditions, sometimes during contact time
(a ‘class test’); individual or group projects; the preparation and
presentation of a portfolio; student logs or even blogs recording the
development of your understanding on the module; short answer
tests; peer assessment; multiple-choice and/or computer-based tests;
and vivas (oral exams), which are less common than in the past but
may be used to assess borderline students who are on the cusp of a
degree classification at the end of their course.
English studies now has a wider range of assessment because
tutors realize the importance of encouraging different skills and
recognizing different abilities. Twenty years ago a degree might have
been assessed solely by examination. Ten years ago it might have
been overwhelmingly assessed by essay. Now it is likely to be a
blend of different assessments, each one designed to allow you to
show how you have met the learning outcomes of the module.

What is the marker looking for?

All courses should provide you with assessment criteria so that you
know on what basis your essay or other assignment will be marked.
118 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

The Benchmark Statement observes that markers in English are

interested in the following elements:

• breadth and depth of subject knowledge, including relevant

contextual knowledge and the demonstration of powers of
textual analysis as appropriate;
• the management of discursive analysis and argument, including
the awareness of alternative or contextualizing lines of
argument;
• rhetorical strategies which demonstrate the convincing
deployment and evaluation of evidence;
• independence of mind and originality of approach in
interpretative and written practice;
• fluent and effective communication of ideas and sophistication
of writing skills;
• critical acumen;
• informed engagement with scholarly debates.

Another thing the marker will be alert to is plagiarism: the

unacknowledged use of material not your own. It is important,
therefore, to make sure that you are aware of correct referencing
systems and expectations before you embark on assignments. To
avoid plagiarism you should cite your source when you quote
other material or make substantial use of ideas taken from some-
one else’s work, whether quoting verbatim, lightly paraphrasing,
or referring to ideas derived from the work of another author.
Plagiarism from websites is common and material from the inter-
net, including popular study sites, must be acknowledged in your
work just as paper-based sources must.2
In general terms, we might say that there are five requirements of
a good essay:
1 It is well structured, well presented, and well written.
2 It demonstrates that you have undertaken and understood a
range of relevant and supportive background reading in both
the bibliography and in the body of the essay.
3 It makes sufficient reference to the text(s) under discussion,
drawing on illustrations and quotations appropriately.
 ASSIGNMENTS 119

4 It displays an appropriate awareness of critical commentaries

on the text(s) and of important contextual concerns.
5 It has a sustained, informed, and coherent level of argument
throughout.
Finally, below are two versions of an introduction to an essay
question at level 1 of an undergraduate degree course in English
studies: the first answer is poor and inappropriately presented; the
other is corrected and improved, although in no way offered as a
model. The second version is simply meant to show how the first is
deficient and may be developed.

Question: ‘Choose a text you have read recently

and explain why you think it is suitable for study in
university English departments today.’

Answer 1
The book I have chosen to write about is ‘Macbeth’ by Shake-
speare. It is a book that stays in the readers mind as it is full of life-
like description and characters. The plays’ main setting is Scotland.
Which makes it a Celtic play. The character of ‘Macbeth’ is a thane
who has ambitions to be the king. The realism of the play is shown
in Shakespeares use of real places and characters from Scottish
history.

Macbeth is encouraged to kill the king Duncan by his wife. She tells
him they must ‘screw their courage to the sticking place’ if they are
to take the throne from Duncan. The play can thus be read as a
study of ambition and the modern reader can relate it to twenty first
century politics or to people known in his or her life. As Jan Kott
showed in his book ‘Shakespeare our Contemporary’, Macbeth
can be studied ‘as though it were about the present day’ even
though it was written 400 years ago. Lastly, the play can be said to
be suitable for study in English department’s today because it
has true-to-life descriptions, relates to our contemporary experi-
ence, tells us something about human ambition, and displays
Shakespeares mastery of the language.
120 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

Answer 2
For this assignment, I will offer a reading of Shakespeare’s
Macbeth. The essay will discuss the play in terms of the vividness
of its poetic and political description as well as the subtle delinea-
tion of character. The main setting of the play is Scotland, and
Macbeth is considered one of Shakespeare’s ‘Celtic’ plays; it is
worth noting that Shakespeare makes use of real places and char-
acters from Scottish history.

Macbeth begins the play as a thane with ambitions to be king. He

is encouraged to kill King Duncan by his wife, Lady Macbeth, who
tells him they must screw their ‘courage to the sticking place’ if
they are to take the throne (Act x, Sc x, l x). The play might
thus be read as principally a study of ambition, and the modern
reader might easily relate it to examples of political machinations in
twenty-first century Western society. As Jan Kott showed in his
classic study Shakespeare: Our Contemporary, Macbeth can be
studied as though it were about power-politics in the post-industrial
era even though it was written 400 years ago.3

I will conclude that the play can be said to be suitable for study
in English departments today because it is a forceful and affecting
study of power relations, still relates to contemporary experience,
tells the reader something significant about the nature of human
ambition, and displays Shakespeare’s linguistic dexterity at its
height, deepening our understanding of the possibilities of poetic
expression.
12 English language1

English is spoken by over three hundred million people as a first

language and over three hundred million more as a second; it is a
world language in the sense that it is used internationally in both
business and leisure. You will find that studying English at university
level is both challenging and enjoyable; however, particularly as a
native speaker of English, you may wonder what exactly you might
learn about your own language. The following section therefore
gives a brief overview of the aspects of language you will study
and aims to help you become familiarized with some of the key
concepts and ideas.
What we know as ‘English’ has undergone many changes and the
history of the language is a subject commonly taught at level 1.
When it was originally brought to this country by the Angles,
Saxons and Jutes, in the fifth century, the language was in a form
that would be unrecognizable to people today. What we now know
as Anglo-Saxon or Old English remained until the twelfth century,
and consisted of four dialects: Northumbrian, Mercian, Kentish and
West Saxon. When the Vikings invaded they occupied the north
and east of England, known as the Danelaw, and brought with them
their own language, Old Norse. They were able to communicate
with the Anglo-Saxons as both languages were Germanic in origin,
although suffixes were omitted where the languages were different,
which led to a simplification in the emergent English. Where there
was no English equivalent word, such as in the cases of ‘egg’ and
‘take’, they were borrowed from Old Norse.
In 1066 the Normans invaded England, and brought with them
Old Northern French. By the end of the fourteenth century many
words of French origin had been adopted into English, and Norman
French became the language of state, church and aristocracy. Old
English was seldom written down, which meant there were marked
122 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

changes to the language between 1150 and 1450. By this time

a dominant language had emerged as what we now call Middle
English, and became standardized around the London, Oxford and
Cambridge dialect, since these places were the capital city (London
superseded Winchester in this capacity in the twelfth century)
and capitals of learning. Standardization became important in
the eighteenth century, aided in particular by the publication of
Dr Johnson’s Dictionary. English has undergone relatively small
changes since this time, although historical forces, such as the
impact made by the British Empire and Commonwealth, mean the
vocabulary in the UK is continually incorporating new words from
other languages: curry from India, racoon from America and
boomerang from Australia being just a few examples.
An overview of English along these lines is just one possibility
amid the numerous areas of linguistic history likely to be covered
on a degree course. There will be other approaches taken, from
those that focus on regional variation, dialect, vocabulary or lexi-
cology, to those that involve you in a deeper understanding of
semantics, ethics or discourse analysis.

What modules might I take?

You will appreciate by now that a module is a short course lasting
one or two semesters; successfully studying a number of modules
(or units, etc.) will accumulate credits that add up to completion of
level 1 of a degree course. Further modules chosen at levels 2 and 3
build up enough ‘points’ for you to graduate with an honour’s
degree. Each module has its own assessments, which have to be
passed in order to gain the necessary points/credit. The number of
modules taken may vary depending upon the institution where you
study. Some modules are compulsory, meaning you have to take
them, while others will be optional and can be chosen according to
your interests.
Most universities will have compulsory introductory English
language modules. Although the content of these will vary, you will
be expected to become familiar with a number of areas, such as:
variation in English, including dialects and register; phonetics, or
language sounds; semantics, or word meaning; grammar and syntax,
or sentence structure. A university will assume you are a competent
 ENGLISH LANGUAGE 123

user of English, so the modules will not usually be any more con-
cerned with improving your skills in this area than modules on any
other humanities degree, but be theoretical in nature. Research
skills and study skills may be taught as separate modules in the first
year. As part of these modules you may be assisted in learning to use
computer tools for language study, such as Wordsmith and Cytor.
There will most likely be optional modules in the first year,
which may include modules from both within the English language
field and outside of it, in related subject areas. Some examples
of optional modules may be media and language or the study of
linguistic variants in British regions. Other related subjects that are
popularly studied with English language at degree level on joint
honour’s courses are: other modern languages, such as French and
German; creative writing; English literature, possibly including the
way language relates to literature; and communication, including
inter-cultural communication.
One of the main subjects that you might choose in combination
with English language is linguistics, which is the study of language in
general. If you select this option, there are often introductory mod-
ules to be taken at level 1, for example sociolinguistics, or language
and society, and psycholinguistics, or language and psychology.
Whichever modules you choose, they will be broad enough to
give a good grounding in key approaches to studying English
language whilst helping you with decisions over module choices or
specialisms for levels 2 and 3.

What will I do in lectures and seminars?

Lectures involve large groups of students listening actively to a talk
on a specific syllabus-subject within a module; a lecture schedule,
giving you a list of what the forthcoming lectures will concern, is
normally distributed at the beginning of the semester or term. It is
best to do some reading around this schedule so that you are pre-
pared; most lecturers will also distribute a reading list with the
schedule. You are not always expected to contribute when in lec-
tures, but there may be a question and answer session at the end
whereby students can pose queries to the lecturer. Lecturers often
also circulate a handout with a basic outline of the lecture and its
key points, detailing how it will be structured. If no such handout is
124 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

given it may be necessary to take more detailed notes, but this

should not be at the expense of listening to the lecturers and con-
centrating on what they are saying. After a lecture it is always a good
idea to go through your notes and make sense of them.
Seminars are smaller groups with a tutor. Reading material will
be specified in advance and you will be expected to do preparation
work as well as come along with some of your own ideas related to
the required reading. You will be expected to play a full part within
the discussion and the tutor’s role may be aimed at initiating further
debate rather than giving you further information. Seminars vary
in style: tutors may introduce a topic for discussion then ask you to
talk about its various aspects in small groups before feeding back to
the class as a whole; you may be given exercises to carry out either
in pairs, groups or individually; or you may be sent to research a
topic and then feed back, for example using IT software. Some
notes can be taken in seminars, but they should be a record of your
ideas as they occur in the discussion.

How will I be assessed?

There is a variety of assessment types for an English language
degree course; these may include essays, presentations, exams and a
dissertation completed in the final year of a degree course.
For an essay you will be asked to discuss an aspect, or aspects, of
the module you are studying – generally these are topics that have
been covered in lectures or seminars. As an example, for a module
on the concepts and components of language you may be asked to
answer the following question: ‘ “We recognize nouns, verbs, adjec-
tives, adverbs, prepositions, etc. because of the form they take as
well as their distribution and function in the sentence.” Discuss,
with examples’.2 When you are writing an essay it is important to
examine the question from several different viewpoints and there-
fore to target research and reading towards addressing the assign-
ment title. Planning an essay is particularly important; you might
want to use techniques such as ‘spider diagrams’ or ‘mind maps’
to ‘map out’ your answer. This enables you to link your ideas
together, out of which an argument should emerge. Essays should
be researched and planned well in advance of the deadline, as
resources may not always be available immediately.
 ENGLISH LANGUAGE 125

Presentations should be planned in a similar way to essays, and

given the same amount of attention. While much of your English
language study will be specialized, the transferable skills and con-
fidence gained from doing presentations will prove useful in many
careers after graduation. You may be asked to present on a given
topic either in a group or as an individual. If it is a group presenta-
tion each person should be given equal research to do; the group
should then collate this information and present the findings.
Individual presentations can prove as challenging because it is your
responsibility to do the research and presentation on your own. It is
not advisable to read from a sheet of paper but, for example, to
practise the presentation and talk around bullet points. You may also
consider producing a handout with these points on them.
Exams can be intimidating, but with good revision techniques
they will not prove a problem for most students. Revision and plan-
ning are essential, and this should be done well in advance of the
exam. Practice questions may be available, and can assist with time
management when taking the actual exam; for example a two-hour
exam when answering two questions should be split equally in time,
with one hour for each question. Students learn differently, so it is
essential to know the learning styles that suit you best as an indi-
vidual. For some, speaking into and listening to a Dictaphone may be
the best way to revise, while for others doing ‘spider diagrams’ may
be best. When taking the actual exam, think calmly, answer the
questions thoroughly, and plan the answer systematically before
beginning to write. An example of an exam question on an intro-
ductory concepts and components module might be: ‘Describe the
main morphological processes found in English, with examples.’3
Here you need to register that the question is asking for descriptions,
that these must be of the main processes, and that you should give
examples. Appropriate attention to the requirements of each of these
three parts to the question will determine the success of your answer.
The dissertation is a requirement at most universities in order to
gain an honour’s degree. It is often likened to a long essay that
reflects your personal interests and is completed independently,
with tutorial support. It is usually written in level 3 of a degree and
it is wise to set aside a certain amount of time each week to work
on the dissertation because you will be expected to complete it
alongside other modules with more pressing deadlines.
126 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

What skills will I gain as an English

language student?
A variety of skills are developed throughout an English language
degree. Most obvious, perhaps, is the subject knowledge gained,
which may include technical, sociological, historical and theoretical
elements. However, there will be less obvious knowledge and
skills you obtain while studying. Research skills are part of these,
which might gathering include data and information, analysing
data and interpreting statistics. Associated with this is report writ-
ing, which involves seeing an argument from several different view-
points, problem solving and critical analysis. All of these contribute
to the development of excellent communication skills; giving
group presentations also enhances these skills, and will assist you in
thinking about teamwork. In 2005 over half of English graduates
(including English language graduates) entered full-time employ-
ment immediately after finishing their degrees. Most took up either
administrative posts, which might include bi-lingual secretaries, or
went into educational professions, such as teaching.
However, because English language is an academic degree, the
career opportunities it affords are greater. Some careers such as
speech therapy may relate to subject knowledge; however most
careers do not, using instead the transferable skills gained on the
degree. These may be as different as law, the media or public rela-
tions. Other graduates have successfully pursued careers in the
police, diplomatic service, local government, marketing and adver-
tising, and the tourism industry. As can be seen from this, opportun-
ities are broad and provide challenging careers.

Further references
Introductory texts
Trask, R.L. (1999), Language: The Basics, 2nd edition (London:
Routledge). This book gives a good, easy to understand, general
introduction to the study of the English language. It includes
chapters on grammar, meaning, variation, and children and
language.
Freeborn, D. with French, P. and Langford, D. (1993), Varieties
of English: An Introduction to the Study of Language, 2nd edition
 ENGLISH LANGUAGE 127

(Basingstoke: Palgrave). A very practical guide to studying the

English language. This book includes a cassette tape and lots of
activities to assist students in their understanding and develop-
ment of language skills.

Reference texts
Crystal, D. (2003), The Cambridge Encyclopedia of Language, 2nd
revised edition (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press). This
book is an excellent reference text for any student of English
language. This new revised edition includes sections on the
internet and world English. Also statistics and references, includ-
ing further reading, have been updated.

The Oxford English Dictionary: http://www.oed.com

A website worth subscribing to. A comprehensive guide to the
English language, including the meaning, history and pronunciation
of over half a million words.

Journals
English Today: The International Review of the English Language, www.
cambridge.org/journals/journal_catalogue.asp?mnemonic=eng
A scholarly journal that can be accessed online for a subscription
fee. It is likely that universities will hold this journal as a hard copy.
It covers all aspects of the English language, from the influence of
new technologies to the history of the language.

The history of English

Bryson, B. (2002), Mother Tongue: The English Language (Oxford:
Oxford University Press). A light-hearted and witty introduction
to the history of the English language. Bill Bryson’s book is a
good preparatory text to read before beginning an English
language degree.
Crystal, D. (2005), The Stories of English (London: Penguin). David
Crystal has produced a brilliant overview of the history of
the English language. Easy to understand, he traces not only the
origins of standard English but of its dialects too.
Burchfield, R.W. and Simpson, J. (2002), The English Language
(Oxford: Oxford University Press). This book demonstrates how
complex the development of the English language is, tracing it
128 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

along from the runes through to the twentieth century. It is an

interesting read, and has won much critical acclaim for its breadth
and depth.

Language variation
‘BBC Voices’ www.bbc.co.uk/voices/
An interactive website ideal for research into regional variation.
This website shows the results of a survey of language in the UK
conducted by journalists. Its interactive element makes it easy and
enjoyable to use.

‘The Speech Accent Archive’ http://accent.gmu.edu

This website is ideal for research into regional accents in the USA.
Non-native and native speakers of English were recorded saying the
same paragraph of text. These have been transcribed, and are of use
for analysis and comparison.
13 Creative writing1

While there are many kinds of writing you might pursue on your
course, from autobiography to travel writing, creative writing gen-
erally falls into three main forms: fictional prose, poetry and plays.
One of the main differences between further and higher education
level work is the amount of reading expected of you, and this
applies to creative writing courses as much as to other subjects, not
least because most creative writing students find they need to read
widely in order to become more competent writers themselves.2
This not only includes reading other writers’ work, but also literary
criticism, which will provide you with ideas, stimulate thought, and
serve as a basis for discussion with your peers.
Theory may seem a daunting thing to explore, but it is often part
of a literary writer’s methodological approach to creative writing.
Theory has been a part of writing dating back to the times of
Sir Philip Sidney, through to Wordsworth, Coleridge and Shelley to
Virginia Woolf and T.S. Eliot at the beginning of the twentieth
century.3 In earlier centuries, what we now know as ‘creative writ-
ing’ was very much perceived as an expression of a writer’s phil-
osophy and personality. However, Roland Barthes’s revolutionary
1968 essay ‘The death of the author’ challenged the authority of
writers over meaning and gave primacy to the reader in the inter-
pretation of texts. A theoretical framework for creative writing has
developed within universities since this time, and it is common for
academics who are also creative writers to research into areas such
as aesthetics and genre theory. The development of new technolo-
gies such as the internet also promises exciting opportunities for
the sharing of ideas and theories on a global scale. Overall, creative
writing seems to have a positive future as a discipline within uni-
versities and increasing numbers of students find themselves engaged
by what the subject has to offer.
130 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

What modules might I take?4

Most universities that offer creative writing as a degree have some
form of introductory module to the subject in the first year of
study. These modules often include a combination of discussing the
work of published authors alongside intensive practical creative
work. This may include poetry, plays, fiction and non-fiction.
Other universities may begin with some genre-based modules.
These modules will probably include the above genres; however,
some less traditional university courses may include a broader defin-
ition of creative writing, encompassing such areas as: writing for
television, radio and film, which may include producing a DVD;
genre fiction, such as detective stories, as well as graphic novels and
multimedia, or more factual writing, such as biography and travel
writing.
Many creative writing degrees combine this course of study
with English literature, which provides students with a grounding
in genre studies and literary criticism. It also allows for the devel-
opment of critical and analytical skills, as well as cultural awareness
through the study of literature from a variety of periods up to the
twenty-first century. This aspect of the degree is likely to involve
some study of literary and cultural theory, which informs the work
of most writers. Some universities also offer the opportunity to
study some English language modules, as well as modules from
other departments and faculties. Study-skills modules are another
popular option for some universities to offer, and may be generic or
more specific to creative writing. The module might include learn-
ing about the writing process, for example researching, revising,
drafting and editing, as well as creative technique, which includes
such skills as plotting and characterization.
The last main type of module offered is careers-linked. These
are modules that aim to give you a sense of the publishing indus-
try. Again, this occurs in two main forms: first, visiting-writers
programmes and work placements; and second, the teaching of
professional business aspects such as writing book proposals and
proof-reading. However, the most striking aspect of creative writing
in HE is the diversity of courses running across the UK. It is espe-
cially important, therefore, to choose one that reflects your interests
and aspirations.
 CREATIVE WRITING 131

What will I do in creative writing workshops?5

Writing has a reputation as a solitary activity and so participation in
workshops may seem an odd use of your time. However, writers
have always found it useful to join together to read and comment
on each other’s work, and the workshop is simply a formalization of
this activity.
A workshop may contain some or all of the following elements.
You might be asked to examine a published author’s work critically,
but, from a writer’s perspective. This might include composing a
critical review, reflection, analysis or commentary in response to the
author’s work. You may also be given trigger exercises, which are
designed to assist in the creation of ideas: you might, for example, be
given ten minutes to write some snatches of dialogue on a given
theme and then the opportunity to share your ideas with others.
To begin with, you will generally be put into smaller groups to
share work and so should not feel intimidated when first attending
workshops. Workshops are very useful in the sense that they give
you inspiration, good-quality honest feedback on your work-in-
progress, time to experiment with different ways of writing, and the
motivation to maintain your commitment as well as enthusiasm.

How will I be assessed?6

Assessment for creative writing comes in two main forms: original
practical work and reflective essay writing. The practical work is
almost self-explanatory in that you will be expected to produce
examples of your own creative writing for assessment; this may be a
set of verses for a poetry-writing module, for example. Here you are
expected to demonstrate engagement with a chosen genre through
your writing, as well as an awareness of the work of other published
writers in the same genre.
The less obvious form of assessment, which you may not have
previously encountered, is reflective essay writing. The central point
of these assignments is to discover something new about the prac-
tical work you are engaged in, usually through a consideration of
your writing techniques in the light of primary and secondary
reading. As with all essays, you are expected to form an argument
and structure the essay around it. The use of critical material to
132 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

support a view is welcomed, but must not become the main thread
of the piece and should be read after outlining your own ideas for
the essay. Writing in this way may seem intimidating, but it is
necessary to acquire a range of skills in order to become a reflective
creative writer.

What skills will I gain as a creative

writing student?7
As a creative writing student it is important to understand the types
of skills you will gain on the degree in order to plan for your
graduate career. Creative writing develops a number of skills, most
of which are transferable.
The main transferable skills are those relating to communication:
both oral and written. As a creative writing student you will
learn how to express ideas in a variety of different genres, and as a
graduate you will be expected to have the ability to summarize,
argue and debate in a variety of contexts, for example through
your experiences in workshop situations and writing essays. You
should find that you grow in confidence through presenting your
own work to peers, developing opinions, ideas and theories as
well as learning to be persuasive by using supporting evidence
appropriately.
Time management is another important transferable skill. You
will be required to work to strict deadlines and be highly self-
motivated. Awareness of the importance of time constraints is devel-
oped by both the production of your own written work and having
to read widely in a relatively short space of time. Critical skills,
including the ability to be able to interpret, evaluate and assess
sources, are also useful in terms of postgraduate careers. You will
develop these in several different contexts: in terms of your own
pieces of written work, those of peers and those of published
writers. Above all, and perhaps most importantly, is the amount of
valuable specialist knowledge acquired on the degree, as well as the
development of your ability to be creative in both thought and
action.
 CREATIVE WRITING 133

What type of career will a creative writing degree

equip me for?
The transferable skills gained on a creative writing degree make it
useful in a variety of careers, from teaching through journalism to
public relations, and from arts administration to publishing, advertis-
ing or the media. However, perhaps the most obvious career paths
to choose are those of writer or critic.8 Writing is a challenging
career to enter since writers are generally not ‘employed’ in the
conventional sense of the word. If you are interested in following
this career path you should consider some form of postgraduate
study to develop your skills and creativity further. There is some
funding available for this through the Arts and Humanities Research
Council and various charitable organizations, but there is strong
competition for these awards, so ensure that you contact the univer-
sity’s careers service and work with current lecturers on applica-
tions. Alternatively, attending a local group where peer reviews
occur is also useful for developing your skills and making contacts.
You will also have to be prepared to sell your work, whether this
is to agents, publishers or the media, and careful consideration
needs to be taken to ensure the format is appropriate. More infor-
mation regarding this can be found, for example, on the BBC website
(www.bbc.co.uk), alongside details of opportunities for you to apply
for work-experience with the Corporation.
Allied to writing creatively is the work of a critic or reviewer.
You will understand some of what this career involves already,
through your reflective essay writing on the degree course. Critics
generally work for either newspapers, magazines, websites or, less
commonly, television, and are frequently responsible for reviewing
all genres within the arts. This also includes not only carrying out
relevant research on a piece of writing/performance or on a writer
but also interviewing relevant participants, for example actors or
the director of a theatre production. Getting involved in the student
media while at university is a sound way of beginning to learn
about this kind of career. There are many other possibilities, how-
ever, and as you can appreciate from the above discussion, a creative
writing degree provides a solid foundation for many satisfying jobs.
As more and more graduates are finding, learning the art of writing
imaginatively is an excellent platform for launching a future career.
134 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

Further references section

General creative writing guides
Julia Casterton (1998), Creative Writing: A Practical Guide, 2nd edn
(Basingstoke: Macmillan). This book gives concise, supportive
advice on creative writing. It specifically examines techniques
such as characterization, as well as the range of genres, including
the short story and poetry.
Robert Graham, Helen Newell, Heather Leach and John Singleton
(eds) (2005), The Road to Somewhere: A Creative Writing Com-
panion (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan). A collection of essays
exploring writing in its traditional forms, as well as more exper-
imental genres. There are exercises and examples to stimulate
writing, and more theoretical essays to encourage debate and
discussion.
Paul Mills (2006), The Routledge Creative Writing Coursebook
(London: Routledge). This is a very practical guide to creative
writing in all its forms. It may be particularly useful if you have
never done any creative writing before. The chapters are genre
based and include children’s fiction, film, radio and theatre.
Julia Bell (ed.) (2001), The Creative Writing Coursebook (London:
Pan). This book is perhaps the most well known of its kind, since
it was inspired by the first creative writing university course, at
the University of East Anglia. It includes contributions by such
writers as Malcolm Bradbury, Andrew Motion and Ali Smith.
The book itself guides the beginner through all stages of
the writing process, with practical exercises, to the point of
becoming published.

The novel
John Gardner (1999), On Becoming a Novelist (London: W.W.
Norton). Described as inspirational, this book is not a step-by-
step guide to becoming a novelist in a conventional manner. It
does not contain practical exercises; instead its main aim is to
explore what it means to be a novelist.

Poetry
Robin Behn (1992), Practice of Poetry: The Writing Exercises from Poets
who Teach (London: HarperCollins). This is a very practical guide
 CREATIVE WRITING 135

to writing poetry. It is suitable for use on your own or, alter-

natively, for discussion in poetry workshops.

Plays
Noel Greig (2005), Playwriting: A Practical Guide (London:
Routledge). Greig’s book is a comprehensive guide to writing
for the theatre. It contains a wealth of practical exercises, from
building characters to writing multiple drafts.

Philosophy of creative writing

Nigel Krauth and Tess Brady (eds) (2006), Creative Writing: Theory
Beyond Practice (Teneriffe: Post Pressed, 2006). This collection of
essays brings together writers, teachers and theorists who exam-
ine the underlying philosophy behind creative writing from
perspectives as broad as architecture and ecology.

Creative writing websites

‘100 Words’ www.100words.net
This website began in 2001 and has grown in popularity. One
hundred words of text every day for a month is the commitment
you must make. This is a particularly good exercise when embark-
ing on a degree because it instils self-discipline and creativity: core
skills needed on a creative writing degree.

‘Association for Creative Writing and English’

www.hlss.mmu.ac.uk/english/acwe/
This free website gives information on workshops, reading
events, and publishing and competition opportunities. Perhaps of
most interest is that the site provides access to creative writing
journals, which will be useful when writing critical assignments.9
Notes

Part One
1 See UKstudentlife: http://www.ukstudentlife.com/index.htm
2 Siobhán Holland, Access and Widening Participation: A Good Practice
Guide, English Subject Centre Report Series, 4, February 2003, p. 16.

Chapter 1
1 Source: ‘A review of black and minority ethnic participation in higher
education’,
www.aimhigher.ac.uk/sites/practitioner/resources/
Conf%20Summary%20report%20final%20(2).pdf
2 See www.english.heacademy.ac.uk/archive/publications/reports/
curr_teach_main.pdf, English Subject Centre, ‘Survey of the English
curriculum and teaching in UK higher education’, Report Series,
Number 8, October 2003.

Chapter 2
1 See www.english.heacademy.ac.uk/archive/publications/reports/
curr_teach_main.pdf, English Subject Centre, ‘Survey of the English
curriculum and teaching in UK higher education’, Report Series,
Number 8, October 2003.
2 Holland, S. (2003), ‘Access and widening participation: a good practice
guide’, English Subject Centre Report Series, Number 4, February,
p. 6.
3 See the Introduction to Eagleton, T. (1983), Literary Theory
(Oxford: Blackwell).

Chapter 3
1 Help in writing and researching this chapter was given by Claire
Philpott.
 NOTES 137

2 See www.english.heacademy.ac.uk/archive/publications/reports/
curr_teach_main.pdf, English Subject Centre, ‘Survey of the English
curriculum and teaching in UK higher education’, Report Series,
Number 8, October 2003.

Chapter 4
1 Information here has been adapted from The Value of Higher Education
by Vikki Pickering,
www.cihe-uk.com/docs/PUBS/0503ValueHEStudents.pdf
2 This section was drafted by Claire Philpott.
3 Martin, P. and Gawthrope, J. (2004), ‘The study of English and the
careers of its graduates’, in Knight, P. and Yorke, M. (eds) Learning,
Curriculum and Employability in Higher Education (London: Routledge)
p. 74.
4 Appleton, Diane (2004), Your Degree in English . . . What Next?
Liverpool: AgCAS, February. pp. 1–2.
5 The Teacher Training Agency, Experience Teaching,
www.tda.gov.uk/Recruit/experienceteaching.aspx
6 The Teacher Training Agency, Life as a Teacher,
www.tda.gov.uk/Recruit/lifeasateacher.aspx
7 Kingston, Paul, Occupational Profile: Commissioning Editor,
www.prospects.ac.uk/downloads/occprofiles/profile_pdfs/
Y1_Commissioning_editor.pdf
8 Zajac, Camilla, Occupational Profile: Publishing Copy-editor/Proofreader,
www.prospects.ac.uk/downloads/occprofiles/profile_pdfs/
Y1_Publishing_copy-editor_proofreader.pdf
9 Proudfoot, Rachel, Occupational Profile: Bookseller,
www.prospects.ac.uk/downloads/occprofiles/profile_pdfs/
H3_Bookseller.pdf, p. 2.
10 Whatnall, David, Occupational Profile: Academic Librarian,
www.prospects.ac.uk/downloads/occprofiles/profile_pdfs/
W1_Academic_librarian.pdf
11 Thompson, Rhoma. Occupational Profile: Public Librarian
http://www.prospects.ac.uk/downloads/occprofiles/profile_pdfs/
W1_Public_librarian.pdf Accessed 11/10/07.
12 Kay, June, Occupational Profile: Broadcasting Journalist,
www.prospects.ac.uk/downloads/occprofiles/profile_pdfs/
Y2_Broadcasting_journalist.pdf
13 Dawson, Hilary, Occupational Profile: Newspaper Journalist,
www.prospects.ac.uk/downloads/occprofiles/profile_pdfs/
Y2_Newspaper_journalist.pdf
138 NOTES

14 Trickey, Graham (2004) ‘The Call of the Bar’ in Trickey, Graham (ed.)
Prospects: Law 2004/05. Manchester: Graduate Prospects, pp. 168–169.
15 The Law Careers Advice Network, The Non-law Degree Route –
Solicitors,
www.lcan.org.uk/qualifying/the_non_law_degree_route.htm
16 Graduate Prospects Ltd and AgCAS, English – 2003 Graduates,
www.prospects.ac.uk/cms/ShowPage/Home_page//What_do_
graduates_do_2005/charts_and_tables_pages/p!eiglkfk?subject_id=12
17 See Martin and Gawthrope [3].
18 Martin and Gawthrope [3], p. 74.
19 University of Gloucestershire Careers Centre (2004) Careers Centre:
Support for Students, Staff and Graduates of the University. Cheltenham:
Careers Centre, pp. 1–2.
20 ‘The good, the bad and the tea-making’ in Shanahan, Andrew (ed),
Prospects Work Experience 2004/5. Manchester: Prospects Ltd, p 6.
21 Prospects, Voluntary Work,
www.prospects.ac.uk/cms/ShowPage/Home_page/Explore_types_
of_jobs/Types_of_Job/p!eipaL?state=showocc&idno=53
22 See Martin and Gawthrope [3].
23 This can be found on the Prospects website under ‘What jobs would
suit me?’ – in the ‘Jobs and work section’. You will need to register
with an email address but the registration is free,
www.prospects.ac.uk/cms/ShowPage/Home_page/
What_jobs_would_suit_me___Prospects_Planner_/Show_login_
page/p!eLaXgjk
24 Fazackerley, Anna, Students want to stay on,
www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/story.asp?storyCode=177554&
sectioncode=26, p. 1.
25 Ewing, Jim (General Secretary of the Postgraduate Committee) quoted
in ‘What the experts say’ in O’Connor, Joanne (ed.) (2005) Prospects
Postgrad 2005/6. Manchester: Graduate Prospects Ltd, p. 6.

Part Two
1 For example, see the EPPI-centre review of personal development
planning effectiveness at:
http://eppi.ioe.ac.uk/EPPIWebContent/reel/review_groups/EPPI/
LTSN/LTSN_June03.pdf
2 Timms, Jane (2003), Making Applications. Sheffield: AgCAS, p. 5.
3 For a full report, involving a second wave of interviews, see:
www.unite-group.co.uk/data/Reports/The%20Student%
20Living%20Report%202002.pdf
 NOTES 139

Chapter 5
1 Smith, L. (2004), ‘An investigation into the experience of first-year
students of English at British universities’, Arts & Humanities in Higher
Education vol. 3(1), 81–93.
2 See www.english.ltsn.ac.uk, English Subject Centre, Survey of the Eng-
lish Curriculum and Teaching in UK Higher Education, Report Series,
Number 8, October 2003.
3 Advice here and in some other parts of this book is partly drawn from
the University of Gloucestershire’s handbook for students studying
English.

Chapter 6
1 Help in writing and researching this chapter was given by Claire
Philpott.
2 Boolean syntax makes use of operators such as AND and OR.
For a useful explanation see www.brightplanet.com/resources/deails/
tutorial-part–4.html
3 A useful discussion on this topic will be found in Hawthorn, J.,
Goring, P. and Mitchell, D. (2001), Studying Literature: The Essential
Companion (London: Arnold).

Chapter 7
1 Examples in this section were devised by Peter Widdowson.

Chapter 8
1 See Smith, K. (2004), ‘An investigation into the experience of first-
year students of English at British universities’, Arts & Humanities in
Higher Education, vol. 3(1), 81–93.
2 These are the processes recommended by Derek Rowntree in his
well-established book Learn How to Study (2002) (New York:
TimeWarner).
3 For a discussion of each of these see the ‘Introduction’ to Cottrel, S.
(2006), The Exam Skills Handbook (Oxford: Macmillan).

Chapter 9
1 Keverne Smith says in ‘An investigation into the experience of first-
year students of English at British universities’, Arts & Humanities in
140 NOTES

Higher Education 2004, vol. 3(1), 81–93): ‘Of the remaining 17 per cent,
9 per cent thought lectures the most valuable method, 5 per cent one-
to-one tutorials, and 3 per cent workshops.’
2 Several of these tips have been adapted from a resource providing
support for formal presentation speaking and oral communication
created by Patricia Palmerton. For further details see the full website:
www.hamline.edu/personal/ppalmerton/ocxc_site/Welcome.htm

Chapter 11
1 Keverne Smith (2004), ‘An investigation into the experience of first-
year students of English at British universities’, Arts & Humanities in
Higher Education 2004, vol. 3(1), 81–93.
2 For example, material in this section is derived from the University
of Gloucestershire’s (2003), Handbooks for Students Studying English
Literature, English Language and Creative Writing, originally prepared
by Dr Deborah Thacker (Cheltenham: University of Gloucestershire).
3 Kott, J. (1964), Shakespeare Our Contemporary (London: Methuen).

Chapter 12
1 This chapter was originally researched and drafted by Claire Philpott.
2 Specimen essay question taken from the University of Gloucestershire
first year undergraduate English language degree module ‘EZ103:
What is language? Concepts and components’ November 2006.
Module tutor: Dr Jonathan Marshall.
3 Specimen exam question. Ibid.

Chapter 13
1 This chapter was originally researched and drafted by Claire Philpott.
2 Information for this paragraph is based on McLoughlin, N. (2006),
Creative Writing: Field Guide 2006–2007 (Cheltenham: University of
Gloucestershire) p. 10.
3 Information for this paragraph is based on Brady, T. and Krauth, N.
(2006), ‘Towards creative writing theory’ in Krauth, N. and Brady, T.
(eds) Creative Writing: Theory Beyond Practice (Teneriffe: Post Pressed)
pp. 13–18.
4 Information for this section comes from an internet search and survey
of 20 UK universities conducted by the author.
5 Information for this section is based on Heather Leach (2004),
‘Writing together: groups and workshops’ in Graham, R., Leach, H.,
 NOTES 141

Newell, H. and Singleton, J. (eds) The Road to Somewhere: A Creative

Writing Companion (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan) pp. 89–100.
Also thanks go to Tiffany Murray for enabling the author to watch a
creative writing workshop for WT102: prose fundamentals, at the
University of Gloucestershire, on 30 April 2007.
6 Information for this paragraph is based on McLoughlin, N. (2006),
Field of Creative Writing: Field Guide 2006–2007 (Cheltenham: Uni-
versity of Gloucestershire) pp. 17–21. Also used was ‘15: assessment
criteria’ in Murray, T. (2007) WT102: Prose Fundamentals: Syllabus
(Cheltenham: University of Gloucestershire) p. 11.
7 Information for this paragraph is based on McLoughlin, N. (2006),
Field of Creative Writing: Field Guide 2006–2007 (Cheltenham: Uni-
versity of Gloucestershire) pp. 41–42.
8 Information for the following two paragraphs is based on ‘Writer’ and
‘Critic’
www.prospects.ac.uk/links/occupations
9 Thanks go to Tiffany Murray and Nigel McLoughlin for their assist-
ance with this section.
Further reading and resources

Here you will find many references to paper-based and on-line

resources that will help you with your degree in English studies.
Additionally, to find out statistical data about student experiences
of universities in the UK, I strongly recommend you go to:
www.unistats.com/

Five key resources you should have

1 A good dictionary, e.g. the Concise Oxford (UK) or Webster’s
(USA).
2 A good thesaurus, e.g. Roget’s Thesaurus, published by
Penguin.
3 A dictionary of literary terms, e.g. Childs, P. and Fowler, R.
(eds) (2006), The Routledge Dictionary of Literary Terms (Lon-
don: Routledge).
4 A guide to the pitfalls and niceties of using language, such
as the widely available Fowler’s Modern English Usage
(Oxford: Oxford University Press).
5 An overview of literary history and chronology such as
Widdowson, P. (2004), The Palgrave Guide to English Literature
and its Contexts (Basingstoke: Palgrave); or Cox, M. (2004),
The Concise Oxford Chronology of English Literature (Oxford:
Oxford University Press).

To help with reading and thinking

Buzan, T. (1989), Use Your Head, revised edn (London: BBC
Books).
Buzan, T. (1995), The Mind Map Book, 3rd.edn (London: BBC
Books).
 FURTHER READING AND RESOURCES 143

Cottrell, S. (2003), The Study Skills Handbook, 2nd edn (Basingstoke:

Palgrave).
Drew, S. and Bingham, R. (1997), The Student Skills Guide (Alder-
shot: Gower).
Payne, E. and Whittaker, L. (2000), Developing Essential Study Skills
(Harlow: Financial Times/Prentice Hall).
Race, P. (1992), 500 Tips for Students (Oxford: Blackwell).
Smith, M. and Smith, G. (1990), A Study Skills Handbook (Oxford:
Oxford University Press).

To help with writing

Barnes, R. (1995), Successful Study for Degrees (London: Routledge).
Barrass, R. (1982), Students Must Write: A Guide to Better Writing in
Course Work and Examinations (London: Routledge).
Berry, R. (1995), The Research Project: How to Write It (London:
Routledge).
Blight, G. (1996), Mastering English Spelling (Basingstoke:
Macmillan).
Burton, S.H. (1984), Mastering English Grammar (Basingstoke:
Macmillan).
Burton, S.H. and Humphries, J.A. (1996), Mastering English Language
(Basingstoke: Macmillan).
Casey, F. (1993), How to Study: A Practical Guide (Basingstoke:
Macmillan).
Collinson, D., Kirkup, G., Kyd, R. and Slocombe, L. (1992), Plain
English, 2nd edn (Buckingham: Open University Press).
Cottrell, S. (2005), Critical Thinking Skills (Basingstoke: Palgrave).
Fairbairn, G.J. and Winch, C. (1996), Reading, Writing and Reasoning:
A Guide for Students, 2nd edn (Buckingham: Open University
Press).
Greetham, B. (2001), How to Write Better Essays (Basingstoke:
Palgrave).
Northedge, A. (1990), The Good Study Guide (Buckingham: Open
University Press).
Peck, J. and Coyle, M. (2005), Write it Right (Basingstoke: Palgrave).
Pirie, D.B. (1985), How to Write Critical Essays: A Guide for Students
of Literature (London: Routledge).
144 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

Theory, terms and concepts

It is worthwhile obtaining a guide to literary theory as well as one
that covers terms more generally. The best available is probably still:
Hawthorn, J. (2001), A Glossary of Contemporary Literary Theory,
4th edn (London: Arnold).

Literary theory links

Glossary of Literary Theory at the University of Toronto English
Library www.library.utoronto.ca/utel/glossary/headerindex.html

Literary terms and concepts

A useful online guide by John Lye at Brock University with many
links to other relevant sites can be found at www.brocku.ca/
english/courses/4F70/
VirtualSalt: A Glossary of Literary Terms by Robert Harris
www.virtualsalt.com/litterms.htm
The Cambridge English Faculty Virtual Classroom Glossary of
Literary Terms www.english.cam.ac.uk/vclass/terms.htm
Bob’s Byway: a glossary of poetic terms by Robert G. Shubinski
www.poeticbyway.com/glossary.html

Complete literary texts online

Use the following links to access different databases containing
online literary texts.

Full Text Great Literature Classics – A Teaching and educational

website from the Book Worm organization www.book-worm.org/
index.htm
The Online Literature Library – the full and unabridged texts of
classic works of English literature, and of classic scientific texts
http://www.literature.org
Project Gutenberg – the internet’s oldest producer of free electronic
books http://promo.net/pg/
The Electronic Text Center from the University of Virginia Library
http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/collections/languages/english/
 FURTHER READING AND RESOURCES 145

The Oxford Text Archive from the University of Oxford http://

ota.ahds.ac.uk/

General skills
Clarke, A. (2005), IT Skills for Successful Study (Basingstoke: Palgrave).
Cottrell, S. (2003), Skills for Success (Basingstoke: Palgrave).
Cottrell, S. (2006), The Exam Skills Handbook (Basingstoke:
Palgrave).
Littleford, D., Halstead, J. and Mulraine, C. (2004), Career Skills
(Basingstoke: Palgrave).
van Emden, J. and Becker, L. (2003), Effective Communication for Arts
and Humanities Students (Basingstoke: Palgrave).
van Emden, J. and Becker, L. (2004), Presentation Skills for Students
(Basingstoke: Palgrave).

Language
Additional resources to those mentioned in Chapter 12 are:
Carter, R. (2001), Working with Texts, 2nd edn (London: Routledge).
Fromkin, V., Rodman, R. and Hyams, N. (2002), An Introduction to
Language, 7th edn (London: Heinle & Heinle).
Yule, G. (2005), The Study of Language, 3rd edn (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press).

Creative writing
Additional resources to those mentioned in Chapter 13 are:
Anderson, L. (2005), Creative Writing: A Workbook with Readings
(London: Routledge).
Braine, J. (1974), Writing a Novel (London: Methuen).
Browne, R. and King, D. (1994), Self-Editing for Fiction Writers
(New York: HarperCollins).
McKee, R. (1999), Story Structure (London: Methuen).
Mills, P. (1996), Writing in Action (London: Routledge).
Queneau, R. (1998), Exercises in Style (London: Calder Publications).
Singleton, J. and Luckhurst, M. (eds) (1996), The Creative Writing
Handbook: Techniques for New Writers (Basingstoke: Macmillan).
146 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

English literary study

Cuddon, J.A. (1999), The Penguin Dictionary of Literary Terms and
Literary Theory (Harmondsworth: Penguin).
Fabb, N. and Durant, A. (1993), How to Write Essays, Dissertations and
Theses in Literary Studies (Harlow: Longman).
Hawthorn, J. (2001), Studying Literature: The Essential Companion
(Arnold).
Hawthorn, J. (2001), Studying the Novel (London: Arnold).
Lennard, J. (1996), The Poetry Handbook: A Guide to Reading Poetry
for Pleasure and Practical Criticism (Oxford: Oxford University
Press).
Matterson, S. and Jones, D. (2000), Studying Poetry (London: Arnold).
Wallis, M. (2002), Studying Plays (London: Arnold).

Literature websites
http://andromeda.rutgers.edu/~jlynch/Terms/
A very comprehensive (century by century) list of links to literary
websites.
http://crossroads.georgetown.edu/
Resources for students interested in North American literature.
www.ctheory.com/ctheory.html_Theory discussion site.
Critical essays, etc.
http://extra.shu.ac.uk/emls/emlshome.html
Journal for students and researchers in the area of early modern
literature.
www.lib.ncsu.edu/stacks/alex-index.html
A vast virtual library, with thousands of texts.
www.literature.org/
A number of texts in electronic form. Good on Gothic.
www.victoriandatabase.com
Good Victorian links.
Glossary: the language of HE and
the language of literature

The language of HE
AHRC – Arts and Humanities Research Council.
Contact-time – Timetabled interaction between lecturers and students.
Course (of study) – The award for which you are studying, e.g.
English language, or English literature and Creative Writing. Also called
‘programme’.
CSU – Careers Service Unit.
Curriculum – The overall course of study, e.g. the English curriculum.
DfES – Department for Education and Skills.
DipHE – Diploma in Higher Education.
Dissertation – It is common for honour’s degree programmes to include
a large independent study module or unit called the ‘dissertation’ or
‘project’, especially in the final year. It is often thought to be the cul-
mination of the degree.
English ‘Subject Benchmark Statement’ – An overview of the
characteristics of English degree level study (to see the statement go to:
www.qaa.ac.uk/academicinfrastructure/benchmark/honours/
english.asp).
English Subject Centre – one of the Higher Education Academy’s
many disciplinary centres aiming to encourage and support good prac-
tice in teaching and learning: see www.english.heacademy.ac.uk/
HE – Higher education.
HEA – Higher Education Academy: a national government-funded body
that works with institutions, discipline groups and individual staff to
provide the best possible learning experience for all students.
HEFC – Higher Education Funding Council.
HEIs – Higher education institutions: universities and HE colleges.
HERO – Higher Education and Research Opportunities in the United
Kingdom; the official gateway to HEIs.
HNDs – Higher National Diplomas.
LEA – Local Education Authority.
Lecture – A scheduled talk of usually 40+ minutes.
148 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

LSC – Learning Skills Council.

Module – The individual unit of study taken on the course.
National Student Survey – According to Hefce: ‘The aim of the
National Student Survey (NSS) is to gather feedback on the quality of
students’ courses, to help inform the choices of future applicants to
higher education, and to contribute to public accountability.’ See
www.thestudentsurvey.com/
‘New’ university sector – Refers to HE-sector colleges and to uni-
versities brought into existence by or since the government act of 1992
which allowed polytechnics to apply to take the title ‘university’.
NUS – National Union of Students. See www.nusonline.co.uk/
OFFA – Office for Fair Access introduced by the 2004 Higher Education
Act that aimed to widen access to HE beyond traditional groups and
introduced variable tuition fees.
‘Old’ university sector – This loose term refers to universities in
existence prior to 1992.
QAA – Quality Assurance Agency for Higher Education: the body
responsible for ensuring standards in HEIs are monitored and
enhanced.
Reading – A specialist term in English studies that means something a
little different (depending on context) from its lay use; to ‘read’ is to
analyse and critique.
Semester – Most universities these days have semesters along USA lines,
with one starting in September and one in February (cf. Term).
Seminar – Scheduled classroom contact-time between a tutor and a
group of students.
SENDA – Special Educational Needs and Disability Act 2001.
SLC – Student Loans Company.
Syllabus – Books or topics to be studied in the course.
Term – Traditionally universities have three terms, separated by Christmas,
Easter and the summer recess (cf. Semester).
Tutorial – One student or a small group of students scheduled to discuss a
topic or text with a tutor, most commonly on a dissertation/project
module or independent study module.
UCAS – Universities and Colleges Admissions Service.
Units – See Modules.

The language of literature

Allusion – An overt or indirect reference to something else, whether a
text, person, event or anything else.
Alliteration – Repeated rhyming consonant sounds.
 GLOSSARY 149

Assonance – Repeated rhyming vowel sounds.

Ballad – A poem, composed for singing, that narrates a story, usually
dramatic. A traditional ballad, passed down from generation to gener-
ation by word of mouth, typically has a simple verse structure, refrains,
stock phrases, repetitions, dialogue and an impersonal narrator. A literary
ballad is a work written in imitation of the traditional ballad.
Bildungsroman – A German word that translates as ‘novel of develop-
ment’. It is associated with novels that show an individual coming of age
or serving some kind of apprenticeship. Its main theme is therefore
usually the protagonist’s growth or development from childhood to
adulthood. Examples are Dickens’s David Copperfield, Twain’s Huckleberry
Finn, and Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre.
Ellipsis – A gap in the text usually indicated by three dots, which are
called an ellipsis. An ellipsis requires the reader either to reconcile
themselves to the omission, and conjecture on its importance, or
to speculate on what has been repressed: what has gone unsaid or
un-narrated.
Figure of speech – An unusual use of language, usually non-literal and
usually to associate or compare unconnected things. The best known
figures of speech are metaphor, metonymy, personification, simile and
synecdoche.
Free indirect discourse – The representation of speech or thoughts
without tags (such as ‘he said’ or ‘she thought’) or quotation marks.
Genre – The three major genres of literature are poetry, prose fiction and
drama, but there are many subgenres such as gothic, satire, tragedy,
comedy, the Bildungsroman, the picaresque, the ode or the sonnet.
Gothic – The Gothic novel is a subgenre of fiction usually considered to
have been initiated by Horace Walpole’s The Castle of Otranto (1764).
Some of the subgenre’s characteristics include a gloomy setting, dark
mysteries, an atmosphere of foreboding, simplistically good or evil
characters, passionate natures, remote locations and graphic or implied
horror. Its heyday continued until the 1820s, but novels and films in
the Gothic mode still appear regularly. Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein is in
the Gothic vein, and Angela Carter’s ‘The Bloody Chamber’ is in part a
pastiche of it.
Intertextuality – Although often employed as a synonym for allusion,
reference or echo, intertextuality refers to the belief that all texts are
made up of citations and are weaves of other texts.
Irony – A term in rhetoric to signal a gap between word and meaning,
between what is said and what is meant or conveyed.
Linear plot – A plot that proceeds chronologically, without extended
flashbacks or significant atemporal ordering of events in the narrative.
150 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

Metafiction – In Patricia Waugh’s words, this is ‘fiction which calls

attention to itself as an artifact in order to raise questions about the
relationship between fiction and reality’.
Metaphor and metonymy – Figures of speech. Metaphor works by
substituting one word or image for another in terms of resemblance.
By contrast, metonymy works by contiguity and association, and replaces
an object with its attribute (e.g. ‘the deep’ instead of ‘the sea’). Metonymy
is often considered also to include synecdoche, which replaces the
part for the whole (‘hands’ for ‘workers’) or the whole for the part
(‘Scotland played hockey last night’).
Mimesis and diegesis – Mimesis is a word used by Plato in The Republic
to describe the imitative representation of speech. By contrast, diegesis
is the term he uses to indicate when ‘the poet himself is the speaker
and does not even attempt to suggest to us that anyone but himself
is speaking’. In narrative, diegesis is distinguished from mimesis to
describe the way narrators indirectly report and summarize speech
or scenes (telling) rather than presenting them directly through mono-
logue, dialogue or direct speech (showing). Aristotle, in his Poetics,
expands mimesis to include the ‘imitation of an action’ as well as
the representation of speech.
Modernism – The vast majority of attempts to offer alternative modes of
representation to realism, from the middle of the nineteenth century to
the middle of the twentieth century, have at one time or another been
termed Modernist, and this applies to literature, music, painting, film
and architecture (and to some works before and after this period). In
poetry, Modernism is associated with moves to break from the iambic
pentameter as the basic unit of verse, to introduce vers libre, symbolism
and other new forms of writing. In prose, Modernism is associated
with attempts to render human subjectivity in ways more real than
realism: to represent consciousness, perception, emotion, meaning and
the individual’s relation to society through, among other tools, interior
monologue, stream of consciousness, defamiliarization, rhythm and
irresolution. Modernist writers therefore struggled, in Ezra Pound’s
brief phrase, to ‘make it new’, to modify if not overturn existing modes
of representation, partly by pushing them towards the abstract or the
introspective, and to express the new sensibilities of their time: in a
compressed, condensed, complex literature of the city, of industry and
technology, war, machinery and speed, mass markets and communica-
tion, of internationalism, the New Woman, the aesthete, the nihilist and
the flâneur.
Oedipus/Electra complex – According to Freud, a number of largely
unconscious feelings in the under-five child focusing on the wish to
 GLOSSARY 151

possess the parent of the opposite sex and overthrow the parent of the
same sex.
Pathetic fallacy – An expression coined by John Ruskin in 1856 in
Modern Painters to describe the way inanimate nature may be endowed
with human emotions in art (one of Ruskin’s examples is Kingsley’s
‘cruel, crawling foam’ in Alton Locke). Another would be Forster’s line
in the opening of A Passage to India: ‘when the sky chooses, glory can
rain into the Chandrapore bazaars’.
Personification – A figure of speech in which something non-human is
treated in human terms.
Picaresque – From the Spanish picaro, an unpleasant anti-social character
of low birth in sixteenth-century novels. In English literature picaresque
has come to mean a rambling, episodic story with a narrator or hero from
the lower classes. Novels discussed in terms of this subgenre are: Defoe’s
Moll Flanders, Fielding’s Tom Jones and Dickens’s Nicholas Nickleby.
Prolepsis – A figure of speech in which a future event is treated as though
it has happened or is happening.
Readerly and writerly – Terms coined by Roland Barthes in his
book S/Z to distinguish the way ‘classic realist’ texts can encourage
their passive consumption by conforming to familiar narrative codes
(e.g. of coherence, linear structure, clear plot, strong characterization
and historical specificity) and experimental texts which disrupt those
codes and so place a greater weight on the reader’s active participation
in the construction of the text’s meanings.
Realism – Realism, according to many critics, is characterized by its
attempt objectively to offer up a mirror to the world, thus disavowing its
own culturally conditioned processes and ideological stylistic assump-
tions. Realism, modelled on prose forms such as history and journalism,
generally features characters, language, and a spatial and temporal setting
very familiar to its contemporary readers, and often presents itself as
transparently representative of the author’s society. The hegemony of
realism was challenged by Modernism and then postmodernism, as
alternative ways of representing reality and the world. Realism itself
was once a new, innovative form of writing, with authors such as Daniel
Defoe (1660–1731) and Samuel Richardson (1690–1761) providing a
different template for fiction from the previously dominant mode of
prose writing, the Romance, which was parodied in one of the very
first novels, Cervantes’ Don Quixote (1605–1615), and survives in
Gothic and fantasy fiction. Throughout modern literary history, realism
remains the favourite style of writing for novelists. ‘Classic realism’,
which flowered in the nineteenth century, has been delineated by critics
such as Roland Barthes, Colin MacCabe and Catherine Belsey. It is a
152 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

term used to describe the work of such writers as Balzac, Dickens,

Mrs Gaskell and George Eliot: novels with reliable narrators who deal
with contemporary social and political problems. David Lodge provides
this summary in After Bakhtin (London: Routledge, 1990: 26): ‘The
mode of classic realism with its concern for coherence and causality in
narrative structure, for the autonomy of the individual self in the presen-
tation of character, for a readable homogeneity and urbanity of style, is
equated with liberal humanism, with empiricism, common sense and
the presentation of bourgeois culture as a kind of nature.’
Romance – Romance has its origin in medieval literature. First used to
describe verse narratives about knights and heroes – the best known
example is Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, which dates from 1375.
From the latter part of the eighteenth century, a romance is a story in
which the scenes and incidents are surrounded by an atmosphere of
strangeness and mystery. The Romance involves heroes, the super-
natural, symbols, and adventure. Romance aims at the embodiment of
psychic or moral truths which cannot be expressed through a depiction
of everyday reality. It is therefore concerned with unreal or fantastic
worlds in order to deal with the beliefs, principles and ethical systems
that lay behind human behaviour but which are not necessarily evident
if we simply observe what people do.
Signifier/signified – For the Swiss linguist, Ferdinand de Saussure, the
signifier and signified are the two sides to the linguistic sign, which
previously had been considered to be ‘a word’ and ‘a thing’. The signi-
fier refers to the sound image or written mark used to represent an
abstract concept or idea – the signified. For Saussure the two were
inseparable despite the relation between them being arbitrary.
Spatial reading – The idea that every part of a text has to be considered
in the light of the knowledge of every other part. The complex con-
struction of many texts militates against drawing conclusions from any
part of them in isolation.
Structuralism – A theoretical school heavily influenced by the linguistic
study of Ferdinand de Saussure and based on the belief that all elements
of culture can be understood in terms of and as parts of sign systems.
For structuralists, anything that people do or use to convey information
of any type is a sign. Influential European structuralists such as Roman
Jakobson, Claude Lévi-Strauss and Roland Barthes attempted to develop
a semiotics, or science, of signs.
Unreliable narrator – A narrator who does not properly comprehend
the world and whose judgements the reader mistrusts.
Verisimilitude – The appearance or semblance of truth to nature or
reality.
16 A little test: answers

Yes or No?

1. Which of the following words are spelled

correctly?
occassion No
committee Yes
neccessary No
paralell No
parliment No

2. Which of the following words are spelled

correctly?
cemetery Yes
seperate No
goverment No
deceive Yes
concious No

3. Which of the following are sentences?

About a boy. No
You thief. No
Loves me like a rock. No
You exist. Yes
The sound of silence. No

4. In which of the following sentences are all the

commas correctly placed?
He is here, but, she is there. No
They are going, now. No
I am young, free and single. Yes
154 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

No one knows, the trouble I have seen. No

Entering the pub, I noticed her in the corner. Yes

5. Which of these sentences make sense?

Coming round the mountain, the pub appeared in the No
distance.
Going to Mars, the astronauts would need copious Yes
supplies.
Looking out of the window, the car was at the end of No
the street.
Thinking quickly, I gave the necessary reply. Yes
Though they were passed their sell-by date, the men No
ate the eggs.

6. Which of these sentences have an excess word?

This ever-changing world in which we live in is too Yes
fast for me.
The last thing of which I thought of was my own Yes
safety.
I want to buy a house on the street you live on. No
The school to which she went to was far away. Yes
Of the five remaining, two were highly thought of by No
the selection panel.

7. In which of these sentences is the semi-colon

correctly used?
I am old; you are young. Yes
There are three people in the room; Sue, John and No
Mary.
He is late; you should go. Yes
The cat is by the door and; the dog is by the fire. No
It is time; to go. No

8. Which of these sentences could be considered

grammatically correct?
It is hot, the sun is shining. No
It is hot: the sun is shining. Yes
It is hot. The sun is shining. Yes
It is hot; the sun is shining. Yes
It is hot and the sun is shining. Yes
 A LITTLE TEST: ANSWERS 155

9. Which of these sentences are grammatically

correct ?
We would of gone tomorrow. No
They gave the tickets to you and I. No
He is over their. No
It is I. Yes
Nobody effects me. No

10. Which of these sentences imply that judges

should not take sides?
Judges should be disinterested. Yes
Judges should be impartial. Yes
Judges should be uninterested. No
Judges should be partial. No
Judges should be unbiased. Yes

11. In which of these sentences are the apostrophes

used correctly?
It’s a dog’s life. Yes
That’s the dog’s bone. Yes
It’s a girl. Yes
Every dog has it’s day. No
It’s raining men. Yes

12. In which of these phrases are the apostrophes

used correctly?
It’s a man’s bag! Yes
The womens’ movement. No
Boys’ don’t cry. No
The girls’ have left. No
The working-men’s club. Yes
This page intentionally left blank
Index

Academics 11–12 Economy (contribution to)

AHRC see Arts and Humanities 37–40
Research Council e-learning 14
Allusion 109 English (grammatical) 81–5
Arts and Humanities Research English Benchmark Statement 8,
Council 16, 96 17–18, 36, 61, 112, 118
Assessment 13, 113, 131 English Curriculum 16–17
Assignments 2, 5 English society 6
English Subject Centre 8, 12
BBC 38 Essays 114–16
Bibliographies 78, 80–1 Ethnicity 11, 12
Exams 93–4
Canon 63–4
Careers 15, 46–54, 133 Fayres 2
Cinema 38 Festivals 38
Class 27–9 Finances 6
Close Reading see Textual Analysis Footnotes 79–80
Colonialism 29–30 Freshers’ week 1–2
Commercial (careers) 47–8 Further and Higher Education
Contexts 40 Act 9
Council for Industry for Higher
Education 18 Gender 12, 26–7
Creative Industries 37 Grade Descriptors 97–8
Creative Writing 129–35
Creativity 43 Honours 13
CVs 58
Induction 1
Databases 75–6 Interdisciplinarity 36–7
Degree classifications 95–6 Internet (Research 71–4)
Degrees (kinds of) 10 Irony 110
Disabled students 11
Dissertation 14, 116 Journalism (careers) 49
158 THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO ENGLISH STUDIES

Journals (Research 69–71) Seminars 4, 99–101, 123–4

SENDA 8
Language 30–5, 40, 41, Sexuality 41
121–7 Shakespeare Industry 39
Law (careers) 49–50 Skills 20, 41–2, 46, 57–9, 126,
Lectures 4, 123–4 132
Librarianship (careers) 48–9 Spatial reading 109
Syllabus 21
Narrative 111–12
New technologies 90–1 Teaching (careers) 47
Note-taking 88 TEFL 15
Textual Analysis 107–13
PDP see Personal Development The Future of Higher Education 57
Portfolio Theory 21–35, 43, 129
Personal Development Portfolio Time management 2, 5
15, 57, 61 Times Higher 6
PGCE see Postgraduate Certificate Tourism 39
in Higher Education
Postgraduate Certificate in Higher UCAS see Universities and
Education 15 Colleges Admissions Service
Postgraduate study (53–4) University (kinds of) 9
Presentations 3, 101–6 Universities and Colleges
Prolepsis 111 Admissions Service 7
Publishing 39
Vacation 2
QAA see Quality Assurance Vocabulary 66
Agency Voluntary work 52
Quality Assurance Agency 17
Quotations 79 Work experience 51–2
Workshops 131
Reading 61–8 Writers (commonly taught)
Registration 1 Writers (most commonly taught
Revision 91–3 on single-author modules) 64
Writing 12, 43, 78–87
Search engines 74 Written presentation 81