The staff on the YSJU English Literature Programme have put together a very special farewell video for the Class of 2020. The video is introduced below by Third Year Level Co-ordinator, Dr Jo Waugh. 

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It is a truth almost universally not acknowledged that sometimes endings can feel a bit anticlimactic. This year, however, that feeling must be especially powerful: this was never how it was supposed to be.

We’d have liked to be doing this in person, but we’ve tried our best to express in this video how proud we are of you, how sorry we are to see you go, and how much we hope you’ll carry with you the things you’ve learnt during your time as a Literature student at YSJU.

So let us take you, just for 43 minutes, to a place of virtual celebration. If you want to recreate the atmosphere, you could place some pizza and chips nearby, but forbid yourself from queuing for them until the speeches are over. Pour yourself a glass of wine, grab a bottle of beer, or whatever you might have been drinking. When you’ve finished watching, you could play some jungle music (Fraser’s playlist last year), and imagine you’re either hiding when the camera comes near you or posing for it with your arms round your friends. Endings are important, and you should mark this one while you also think about the new beginnings that are opening up in front of you.

CURRENT STUDENTS CAN CLICK HERE TO WATCH THE VIRTUAL CELEBRATION ON MICROSOFT STREAM

Every day right now, something is happening that requires – demands – you to use the skills in critical thinking and analysis that we hope you’ve honed in the last three years. There are narratives circulating all around us, many with holes, gaps, and ambiguities that desperately need people like you to question and interrogate them.

This is what a degree in English Literature does for you, and this is why the world really does need you, a Literature graduate, so urgently. Recognize and embrace your power and your privilege here: as a critic, as someone who’s read about historical precedents for some of the dynamics we’re seeing unfold  right now (cough Sick Novels), who’s studied the ways in which forms of power and oppression intersect, and been invited and encouraged to question everything – and keep on questioning, arguing, thinking, critiquing, all your life.

Dr Jo Waugh, Level 6 Coordinator

The YSJ Big Summer Read short-list is here!

Continue reading “Vote for the YSJ Big Summer Read 2020”

As the sun blazes over York, it is almost time to begin this year’s Big Summer Read!

Continue reading “Nominate this year’s Big Summer Read!”

Literature in Lockdown is a special blog series in which our students share what they’re doing whilst face-to-face teaching is suspended at YSJU. In our latest post, Shakespeare: Perspectives student Estela Green shares her review of The Show Must Go Online’s Zoom production of The Taming of the Shrew. She watched this in lieu of our cancelled trip due to the closure of theatres back in March. There are silver linings after all. 

(The Show Must Go Online Taming of the Shrew is available for free on YouTube here. Donations also welcome.)

Continue reading “Literature in Lockdown: Zooming Through The Taming of the Shrew (Estela Green)”

Literature in Lockdown is a special blog series in which our students share what they’re reading whilst face-to-face teaching is suspended at YSJU. In our third post, recent YSJLit Graduate (of both our undergraduate and postgraduate Literature programmes!) Silje Tunes shares her reading experience of Holly Black’s The Darkest Part of the Forest, as well as talking about which TV-series she is currently watching.

Continue reading “Literature in Lockdown: Holly Black’s The Darkest Part of the Forest”

The teams behind the Beyond the Walls anthology have some very important information regarding their student showcase, which was scheduled to take place in March.

Continue reading “Postponement Beyond the Walls”

BA Creative Writing student Emily Green reflects on what online publications mean for young writers, and how Wattpad, an online community, has helped young writers to become published later on.

Continue reading “What Internet Publishing Means to Young Writers”

Today, on Thursday the 12th at 6.00 in HG 101 there will be a creative writing evening themed around Autism Awareness to help generate ideas for the next Autism Awareness Day on the 4th of April, 2020 – please come along and get involved.

The following week on Thursday the 19th at 6.00 in HG 101 there will be a more general evening for queries and questions about the event and any ideas people want to discuss for it.

People can submit their work to autismsuccesspathway@yorksj.ac.uk. 

When the booklet is made they will receive a electronic copy.

Could people only submit either pdfs or word documents. 

Thank you!

In this week’s instalment of Dissertation Corner,  Rose Kirby tells us about her project on political lesbianism and fetishisation in early twenty-first century fictional realism.

 

What is the topic of your dissertation?

Political lesbianism, orientalist, sexuality and fetishes. A lot! 

How did you choose the texts for the project?

I studied both of my dissertation books at different stages of my education. One was at AS-level Literature and Language, and the other I came across whilst I was studying ’Ecopoetics’ (ecocriticism, scientific papers and literature on the environment) on my exchange abroad in Stockholm.

Has your dissertation changed much since submitting your proposal?

Definitely! It’s expanded to include more ideology and methodology than I thought at first.  

What have you enjoyed most and what have you struggled most with?

 I have most enjoyed the freedom to research and get stuck-in with the subject matter surrounding my topics, and realising how much I love it! This is a double-edged sword though, it has been a challenge to keep on top of both researching independently and being a third year student with other commitments. 

What has it been like working closely with an academic supervisor?

It has been really engaging and reassuring, to be able to have an intellectual conversation, where you are able to be influenced and encouraged by their expertise and support has been invaluable.