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Study information

Adaptation: Text, Image, Culture

Module titleAdaptation: Text, Image, Culture
Module codeEAF2510
Academic year2024/5
Credits30
Module staff

Professor Joe Kember (Convenor)

Duration: Term123
Duration: Weeks

11

Number students taking module (anticipated)

150

Module description

The process of adapting material between media, including literary forms, such as scripts, short stories, novels and plays and visual forms, including film, television and others is one of the oldest, most dominant and most ubiquitous strategies in the creative industries. By analysing a wide range of adaptations in different forms you will be able to understand the rich and complex relationships between textual and visual media at distinct historical moments and in specific cultural contexts. This module offers you the opportunity to understand adaptation as a creative process and adaptations as cultural products.

Module aims - intentions of the module

This module aims

  • To engage you in the study of adaptations in diverse forms, genres and styles across various media. These adaptations are analysed in the light of theories of text, authorship, genre and cross-cultural exchange.
  • To develop your capacity for interdisciplinary thinking across subjects, across historical and contemporary media, and across different national contexts.
  • To give you an understanding of the creative processes and the workings of creative industries in shaping, visualising and circulating literary narratives and cultural forms.

Intended Learning Outcomes (ILOs)

ILO: Module-specific skills

On successfully completing the module you will be able to...

  • 1. Demonstrate a critical understanding of the aesthetic, theoretical and cultural questions which arise from the transformations between written and verbal texts
  • 2. Show an understanding of the critical debates about adaptation, authorship, genre and cross-cultural translation in relation to adaptations
  • 3. Understand the historical, cultural and/or industrial contexts of specific adaptations

ILO: Discipline-specific skills

On successfully completing the module you will be able to...

  • 4. Analyse films and other media of different periods and cultures and relate their concerns and modes of expression to historical and cultural contexts
  • 5. Apply your interdisciplinary skills in close formal, thematic, generic and authorial analysis of different kinds of media
  • 6. Research and evaluate relevant interdisciplinary critical and historical materials for the study of film and other media.
  • 7. Understand and analyse relevant theoretical ideas, and apply these ideas to varied media

ILO: Personal and key skills

On successfully completing the module you will be able to...

  • 8. Demonstrate advanced communication skills and an ability to work both individually and in groups
  • 9. Deploy appropriate research and bibliographic skills, an advanced capacity to construct a coherent, substantiated argument and a capacity to write clear and correct prose
  • 10. Question assumptions, distinguish between fact and opinion, and critically reflect on your learning process

Syllabus plan

Whilst the content may vary from year to year, it is envisioned that it will cover some or all of the following topics:

  • Theories of Adaptation
  • Adaptation and Authorship
  • The Practices of Adaptation
  • Adaptation and Intermediality
  • Genres in Adaptation
  • Adaptation and the creative industries
  • Adaptation as a trans-cultural process

Learning activities and teaching methods (given in hours of study time)

Scheduled Learning and Teaching ActivitiesGuided independent studyPlacement / study abroad
382620

Details of learning activities and teaching methods

CategoryHours of study timeDescription
Scheduled learning and teaching11Lectures
Scheduled learning and teaching5Workshops
Scheduled learning and teaching22Seminars
Guided independent study33Film screenings
Guided independent study33Study group preparation and meetings
Guided independent study70Seminar preparation (individual)
Guided independent study126Reading, research and essay preparation

Formative assessment

Form of assessmentSize of the assessment (eg length / duration)ILOs assessedFeedback method
Online writing/mapping taskTotal: approx. 500-750 words1-10Group feedback in person and/or online

Summative assessment (% of credit)

CourseworkWritten examsPractical exams
10000

Details of summative assessment

Form of assessment% of creditSize of the assessment (eg length / duration)ILOs assessedFeedback method
Adaptation case study 50Portfolio to total of 2,000 words 1-10Feedback sheet with opportunity for tutorial follow up
Essay502,000 words1-10Feedback sheet with opportunity for tutorial follow up

Details of re-assessment (where required by referral or deferral)

Original form of assessmentForm of re-assessmentILOs re-assessedTimescale for re-assessment
Adaptation case study Adaptation case study 2,000 words1-10Referral/deferral period
EssayEssay 2,000 words1-10Referral/deferral period

Re-assessment notes

Deferral – if you miss an assessment for certificated reasons judged acceptable by the Mitigation Committee, you will normally be either deferred in the assessment or an extension may be granted. The mark given for a re-assessment taken as a result of deferral will not be capped and will be treated as it would be if it were your first attempt at the assessment.

Referral – if you have failed the module overall (i.e. a final overall module mark of less than 40%) you will be required to submit a further assessment as necessary. If you are successful on referral, your overall module mark will be capped at 40%.

Indicative learning resources - Basic reading

Sample Reading:

  • Diane Wynn Jones, Howl’s Moving Castle (1986)
  • James M Cain, The Postman Always Rings Twice (1934)
  • Charles Dickens, Great Expectations (1860)
  • Daphne du Maurier, Rebecca (1938)
  • Daphne du Maurier, ‘The Birds’ (1952) from The Birds and Other Stories (2004)
  • F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby (1925)
  • William Shakespeare, Macbeth (1606)
  • Linda Hutcheon A Theory of Adaptation: Second Edition,   New York and London: Routledge, 2012 (also available on Kindle)

 Sample secondary Reading:

  • Timothy Corrigan, Film and Literature: An Introduction and Reader. New York and London: Routledge, 2012
  • Simone Murray, The Adaptation Industry: The Cultural Economy of Contemporary Literary Adaptation. New York and London: Routledge, 2011
  • Robert Stam and Alessandra Raengo, A Companion to Literature and Film. Oxford, Blackwell, 2007
  • Steven Price, The Screenplay: Authorship, Theory and Criticism. London: Palgrave, 2010
  • Cristina Della Colletta, When Stories Travel: Cross Cultural Encounters Between Fiction and Film. John Hopkins University Press, 2012
  • Mark Thornton Burnett, Shakespeare and World Cinema. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012 

Sample Films:

  • The Great Gatsby (Baz Luhrmann, 2013)
  • The Masque of the Red Death (Roger Corman, 1964)
  • The Birds (Alfred Hitchcock, 1963)
  • Great Expectations (David Lean, 1946)
  • Rebecca (Alfred Hitchcock, 1940)

Indicative learning resources - Web based and electronic resources

  • ELE2 site

Indicative learning resources - Other resources

Key words search

Interdisciplinary, adaptation, film, literature, tv, graphic novel, creative industries, multimedia, cross cultural, translation

Credit value30
Module ECTS

15

Module pre-requisites

None

Module co-requisites

None

NQF level (module)

5

Available as distance learning?

No

Origin date

06/01/2013

Last revision date

09/02/2024