Tales of ghostly appearances and haunted houses have had an impact whether told round a fire or read in a cosy armchair. The aim of the course is to introduce students to a wide range of traditions about ghosts and to the genre of the written ghost story. The course will trace the development of ghostly narratives from classical and medieval sources through Gothic tradition and the Victorian ghost story, through to feminist and contemporary writing. Thematic issues to be considered include: changing attitudes to the supernatural, gender and identify in Victorian and contemporary ghost fiction.

The ability to work with original sources, and to analyse critically the materials studied

-The ability to present the results of a personal study

- an understanding of attitudes to ghosts and supernatural in different historical periods

-The ability to analyse the way in which ideas about ghosts and the supernatural have shaped contemporary culture

- Understand aspects of the history and development of ideas about magic and witchcraft

-Knowledge of the ways in which ghostly experiences have been incorporated into works of gothic literature and art

-The ability to evaluate ideas, and to carry out a personal study

The module will be delivered through ten two-hour evening sessions. Students will be invited to read relevant material for each session. These will include short stories and poetry, as well as historical accounts of ghosts and hauntings. Learning and teaching are undertaken by means of lectures and PowerPoint presentations which will provide the basis for student comment and discussion. This is a 10-credit course, with in two-hour meetings once a week (20 contact hours in all).

• The ability to communicate ideas and arguments effectively, whether in class discussion or in written form
• The ability to work effectively with others in groups and to learn collaboratively through discussion and interaction
• The ability to think critically, analyse sources, evaluate arguments, and challenge assumptions.
• The ability to formulate and justify students’ own arguments and conclusions and present appropriate supporting evidence
• The ability to locate relevant resources in the library and online and use them appropriately in academic work
• The ability to use a range of information technology resources to assist with information retrieval and assignment presentation
• The ability to independently organise study methods, manage time effectively, and prioritise workload to meet deadlines

Type of assessment % Contribution Title Duration (if applicable) Approx. date of Assessment

Assignment 1 (Source Assessment) (Summative) 30% Exact nature of task will vary from year to year 600 words Week 5

Assignment 2 (Essay) (Summative) 70% Exact nature of task will vary from year to year 1200 words Week 9

Students who fail one or both assessment elements will be given the opportunity to re-submit coursework in response to different titles over the summer once the exam board has met

1. Introduction to ghost lore and the ghost story
2. Classical and medieval ghosts – the origins of the ghost genre – selections from classical and medieval sources
3. Ghosts and archaeology – M.R. James ‘A Warning to the Curious’
4. Revenants E.A. Poe ‘Ligeia’
5. Ghostly poetry The Supernatural Ballad [also one or two modern ghost
6. Photographing ghosts Spiritualism and Society
7. Ghost walks and Legend tripping Perhaps meeting to ‘Lady in White’?
8. Ghosts on film
9. Comic ghost  and the comic ghost film – ‘The Canterville Ghost’ Oscar Wilde
10. A Visit to the  Special Collections Library

Recommended

Julia Briggs, Night visitors: the rise and fall of the English ghost story. (London: Faber 1977).

Andrew Joynes, Medieval Ghost Stories: An Anthology of Miracles, Marvels, and Prodigies (Woodbridge, 2001).

Anthony Mandal, Scott Brewster, Luke Thurston, The ghost story and the Victorian Literary marketplace (Routledge 2017).

Andrew Smith, The ghost story 1840-1920: a cultural history (Manchester University Press 2010).

Jeannie Banks Thomas (ed), Putting the Supernatural in its Place Folklore the hypermodern and the Ethereal University of Utah Press 2015

Michiko Iwasaka, and Barr Toelken, Ghosts and the Japanese University of Utah Press1994

Diane E. Goldstein, et. al., Haunting experiences: ghosts in contemporary folklore Logan, Utah State University Press, 2007

María del Pilar Blanco & Esther Peeren, The Spectralities Reader: ghost and haunting in contemporary cultural theory. Bloomsbury Academic 2013.

Shane McCorristine, Spectres of the self: thinking about ghosts and ghost-seeing in England, 1750-1920 Cambridge : Cambridge University Press 2010

Background Reading

Laura Gowing, ‘The Haunting of Susan Lay: Servants and Mistresses in Seventeenth century England’, Gender & History, Vol. 14(2), 2002.

Gabriel Moshenska, ‘M.R. James and the archaeological uncanny’, Antiquity, Dec 2012, Vol.86 (334), p.1192 1201

Alex Owen, The Darkened Room: women, power, and spiritualism in late Victorian England (University of Chicago Press,2004).

Jacqueline Simpson, “‘The Rules of Folklore’ in the Ghost Stories of M. R. James.” Folklore, vol. 108, 1997, pp. 9–18.

 _________, “Repentant Soul or Walking Corpse? Debatable Apparitions in Medieval England.” Folklore, vol. 114, no. 3, 2003, pp. 389–402.

Marina Warner, Phantasmagoria: spirit visions, metaphors, and media into the twenty-first century (Oxford University Press, 2006).

Nancy Caciola, ‘Wraiths, Revenants and Ritual in Medieval Culture’ Past & Present, No. 152 (Aug., 1996), pp. 3-45

Theo Brown, The Fate of the Dead, Folklore Society Press, 1979

In ghostly Japan by Lafcadio Hearn.Prentice-Hall 1971.

Richard Peyton  ed. The Ghost now standing on platform one: A collection of railway ghost stories by Dickens, Kipling, Scott Fitzgerald, Ray Bradbury, Robert Bloch etc, London Futura 1991.

Catherine Crowe, The night side of nature: or ghosts and ghost seers edited Gillian Bennett; Folklore Society Wordsworth Editions 2000.

Katherine A. Fowkes, Giving up the ghost: spirits, ghosts, and angels in mainstream comedy films. Wayne State University Press,1998.

Kathleen Brogan, Cultural haunting: ghosts and ethnicity in recent American literature. University Press of Virginia, 1998.

William L. Andrews and Nellie Y McKay ed. Toni Morrison's Beloved: a casebook. Oxford University Press 1999