Module overview
The module examines the way in which culture has interrogated the relationship between money and America. It explores a wide range of novels, short stories, films and art works: from Frank L. Baum's 'The Wizard of Oz' and F. Scott Fitzgerald's 'Diamond as Big as the Ritz' to recent Science Fiction and NFTs. It reads all of these texts through ongoing debates about what money is and what money does. It explores how money facilitates modernity, freeing us from the constraints of time and space. It also explores the ways in which money creates an atomized and uneven social sphere. The module starts with the first 'Gilded Age' of America and ends in our own moment, a time of bitcoins and golden elevators.
Aims and Objectives
Learning Outcomes
Cognitive Skills
Having successfully completed this module you will be able to:
- contrast different theoretical models for reading money and assess their relevance for different kinds of literary texts
- make use of contemporary critical writing to inform your thinking about the issues raised in the module
- draw upon the different kinds of understanding generated by a range of literary and non-literary texts
- analyse the pressures and influences which shaped the meaning of the American dollar from the late 19th Century onwards
Subject Specific Practical Skills
Having successfully completed this module you will be able to:
- use electronic sources and a variety of library holdings effectively
- read a variety of texts in an historically relevant way
- employ research skills and initiative in identifying additional relevant source material
- develop analysis and discussion based on a range of sources, both published and electronic
Knowledge and Understanding
Having successfully completed this module, you will be able to demonstrate knowledge and understanding of:
- the distinctions between a range of literary, cinematic and visual forms (the gothic, realism, modernism, postmodernism and genre forms such as the thriller and the documentary) and their significance in terms of the politics and possibilities of representation
- what money does: the social, political and economic functions that money has played in a variety of different historical contexts and the role that cultural texts and theory have played in exploring and critiquing these functions
- what money is: what money has represented in a variety of different social contexts and the role that both cultural texts and theory have played in exploring and critiquing these representations
- the importance of the dollar to America, in terms of both national and international identities and politics, from the late 19th Century to the contemporary
Syllabus
The module will introduce you to key literary texts from American literature, from the late nineteenth to the early twenty first century. Authors to be examined include Edgar Allan Poe, Edith Wharton, F Scott Fitzgerald, Nella Larsen and Don De Lillo. The module explores the two theoretical traditions that have tried to understand money’s complex cultural and social roles. The first approach explores what money is by looking at money as a form of representation: it asks what it means to read money as a social, political and aesthetic text. The module uses this approach as it explores the different ways in which money has been represented in a range of cultural forms, including naturalism, realism, modernism, postmodernism, and genre fiction, visual art, popular cinema and documentaries. The second approach, which asks what money does, focuses on the role which money has played in broader political and economic systems. The module will draw on this approach as it explores the significance of ‘finance capitalism’ in American political and cultural life from the late nineteenth to the late twentieth century.
Learning and Teaching
Teaching and learning methods
-Lectures
-Tutor-led seminars
-Small group work within seminars
-Individual research opportunities
-One to one tuition around assessment and feedback
This module includes a Learning Support Hour. This is a flexible weekly contact hour, designed to support and respond to the particular cohort taking the module from year to year. This hour will include (but not be limited to) activities such as language, theory and research skills classes; group work supervisions; assignment preparation and essay writing guidance; assignment consultations; feedback and feed-forward sessions.
| Type | Hours |
|---|---|
| Preparation for scheduled sessions | 117 |
| Lecture | 24 |
| Seminar | 24 |
| Wider reading or practice | 21 |
| Teaching | 12 |
| Completion of assessment task | 81 |
| Follow-up work | 21 |
| Total study time | 300 |
Assessment
Summative
This is how we’ll formally assess what you have learned in this module.
| Method | Percentage contribution |
|---|---|
| Written assignment | 50% |
| Written assignment | 50% |
Referral
This is how we’ll assess you if you don’t meet the criteria to pass this module.
| Method | Percentage contribution |
|---|---|
| Essay | 100% |
Repeat
An internal repeat is where you take all of your modules again, including any you passed. An external repeat is where you only re-take the modules you failed.
| Method | Percentage contribution |
|---|---|
| Written assignment | 100% |
Repeat Information
Repeat type: Internal & External