Do I want to study medieval literature?

[goroth]

The norton anthology is great.

[01010111]

I've got the Norton Anthology from when I took British Literary History from 800-1800 I really enjoyed it, but FS pretty much described my class exactly. Except we didn't read any Shakespeare, my professor assumed we were sick of rereading his stuff

[FuzzHugger]

I'm late to this party, but I went to school for English Literature with a focus on Old and Middle English (12 credits, including my senior seminar). I did that by choice, and it was fun, but I'd never go through it again...or college, for that matter. Medieval lit. can be hard, depending on the professor...and if the course requires reading non-translated versions. The reading load in any lit. course is heavy, and the more dated the text--even updated medieval--the harder it can be to get through it.

Honestly, unless you're interacting with a great professor, it'd probably be more fun to select your own medieval reading list that interests you, combine it with analysis and context researched online, and do it without the pressure. Like anything, it's more fun without the pressure and forced framework. Being an online course, maybe there's more freedom for you to individualize your study and research alongside your reading? I'd see if I could look at the professor's syllabus before registering.

[goroth]

Good one Tom. Speaking of professors, not sure which university you are looking at but if Tom Burton is involved you should take it: he is one of if not the best in the field in Australia.

[Iommic Pope]

Well, today is the day of my deadline for enrolment. Probably not gonna do it. I think it would put too much strain on shit as it is.
But I'm definitely keen on following it up for personal interest.
Don't think Tom Burton is running that course, plus I will be doing it by correspondence anyway and I've found it's just not as interactive and I really didn't get as much out of the subjects I did that way earlier in the year.
Thanks for the advice guys!
I may even start a thread seperate to this one so we can all nerd it up...

[D.o.S.]

I know MIT and Stanford offer a bunch of online classes for free (with the caveat that you get no academic credit) if you're interested in checking them out.

[Iommic Pope]

Now that I did not know....I might check that out.
Thanks bud!

[D.o.S.]

I just want you to feel the agony--I thought I was sandbagging my last undergrad credits when I signed up for "early English Lit."

I was not.

[Iommic Pope]

Dang.
Yeah, I was going to undertake this unit to bolster subjects for teaching. Not necessary, but helpful.
Alas, the energy factor is lacking.

[fiddelerselbow]

the stories themselves often aren't that interesting for a modern reader devoid of their context.

Basically my point. Assuming your class is anything like the ones I've taken, the basic format is read section>teacher tells you about historical context>read section>teacher tells you how it's been referenced ad nauseam>repeat. If you're unlucky it'll be like in highschool where they make you read it and translate it into modern English.

So it's cool if you want to learn about the historical context (spoiler: they were scared of everything), or if you want to see (not necessarily learn why) English progress into something intelligible (that part was kind of entertaining).

Devolution to minor rant:
But as literature it's really not that good. Academia's fetishized "the old" simply because it's old. Chaucer made fart jokes. Fine. Because he did it 600 years ago doesn't make them better objectively. Beowulf's a prototype for modern fantasy? Okay, doesn't that inherently mean modern fantasy refined it? You apply the whole "literature is a process and you have to learn it's roots" justification to anything else and it doesn't hold up. Making a cake is a process, but we don't put the worms that make it possible on a pedestal. Actually, my favorite is what they say about Shakespeare: it's still relevant today! 1. That's fucking depressing. 2. Any chance you're curriculum has a smattering of self-fulfilling prophecy?
tl:dr I don't like old stuff and find reading it counterproductive. And I say that as I lie in bed, dicking around on the interwebz.

I was arguing with somebody about this while drinking last night. I agree, contextually it's important but it's not the fucking be all and end all of english academia. Recently there was a massive bust up in my old college. Apparently an email leaked out from the president discussing the idea of closing down my colleges Classics department, one of the department heads sent the email to a Classics internet forum (full of professors and classics department heads in classics). The forum members ended up petitioning the college president into reversing the decision. It worked anyway.

Normally I wouldn't fucking care but the department has something like 3 or 4 lecturers in it and probably the lowest class numbers in the whole college.Seems a bit silly that there's so much emphasis placed on it.

[Iommic Pope]

Yeah that's sort of strange. When I was doping Philosophy the were in the middle of downsizing Humanities, but classes were chockers so, who knows? Uni has become a real corpoate thing down here over the past decade or so. Government won't cough up the cash to keep unis open, so they rely on international students (whom they charge more to) instead, over time they've cut down the amount of domestic students places in favour of internationals, and I imagine in the future it will be very difficult for an Australian Citizen to get into an Asutralian University. There's also an entire real estate industry in my town that is built around getting cashed up Chinese (and other international) student's parents to shell out big bucks for inner city apartments aimed at "student living". No slumming it in a share house with 2 minute noodles and breakfast bongs for them.

My interest in it stems from the historical content (and context), certainly not from the quality of the literature itself. We did Sir Gawain and the Green Knight in a unit last semester and I loved it because it was a real insight into that crossover period between the old pagan beliefs and the incoming Christian morality, the cult of chivalry around both and how that defines morality, gender roles etc. It was surprisingly a really culturally diverse period, even though it is often portrayed as oppressive and monotonous.

[goroth]

The number of internationals at an Australian university has nothing to do with the amount of commonwealth funded places. You've got your government to thank for them, or the lack of them. In some cases I ternationaks are providing the critical mass that allows departments or courses to stay open (thus increasing opportunity for local students). As to the cost of recruiting 1 international vs 1 local - there are many additional costs that have to be covered with ibternational recritment and in the end students pay for that themselves. Internationals aren't necessarily the cash cow they appear.

</rant>

I got a lot out of studying that literature. It's a good point you make about diversity etc - there's a movement to ditch the terms medieval and dark ages etc as they simply have little to do with the reality if that era. Haven't taken enough history to comment, but it's interesting.

[D.o.S.]

The number of internationals at an Australian university has nothing to do with the amount of commonwealth funded places. You've got your government to thank for them, or the lack of them. In some cases I ternationaks are providing the critical mass that allows departments or courses to stay open (thus increasing opportunity for local students). As to the cost of recruiting 1 international vs 1 local - there are many additional costs that have to be covered with ibternational recritment and in the end students pay for that themselves. Internationals aren't necessarily the cash cow they appear.

You've got your government to thank for them, or the lack of them. In some cases I ternationaks are providing the critical mass that allows departments or courses to stay open (thus increasing opportunity for local students).

In some cases I ternationaks are providing the critical mass that allows departments or courses to stay open (thus increasing opportunity for local students).

I ternationaks

I, Ternationaks!

[goroth]

Me fail English? That's unpossible. You can keep your quotey quotes, D.o.S... If that is your real name

[D.o.S.]

My real name is Ternationaks, obviously.

I'm a barbarian.