Goldsmiths, University of London, MA, Comparative Literary Studies (Literature of the Caribbean and its Diasporas)

This pathway aims to introduce you to a wide range of texts and issues in the literature of the Caribbean and the Caribbean diaspora to highlight significant movements relative to the social, political and historical contexts impacting upon these new literatures; in particular, the core course at the centre of this pathway (literature of the Caribbean and its Diasporas), traces the developments within the main forms of literary and artistic expression in the literature of the Caribbean to study how literary texts, forms and genres veered between consolidation and experimentation from beginnings marked by the slave narrative; the preoccupation with history and memory and the close affinity of the literary with the aural/ oral will also be examined, alongside the influence and textual embodiment of intellectual and cultural developments in the region's literature and that of its diaspora, including the impacts of Colonialism, post-Colonialism, Negritude, and Globalisation; these developments are studied through the analysis of representative texts either in English or in English translation students pursue wider interests by studying 3 options from the large provision of the department, choosing at least 1 of these in an area that is relevant to the Caribbean and its Diasporas; students further develop their interest in the Caribbean and its Diasporas through a 15,000-word dissertation to be submitted at the end of the programme.