Overview First Year of English Literature under National University

First year is the beginning of 4 years long, 120 credit BA (honours) course of English Literature. From this 120 credit, only 24 credits are studied in First Year. There are 6 courses included in this year: each of 100 marks and worth 4 credits (total 600 marks and 24 credits). Among these 6 courses, 4 are directly related to English literature or English Language; they are Introduction to Poetry, Introduction to Prose, English Reading Skill, and English Writing Skill. These courses are familiarly known as ‘Main’ course. And the other 2, Political theory and Sociology/Social work are called ‘Allied’ course. Both the main courses and the allied courses carry equal credit (4 credits). And GPA acquired ‘Allied subjects’ worth same as ‘main subjects’ in result calculation. Here is a detailed description of courses included in first year.

Courses/Subjects

Students study 6 courses of total 600 marks (24 credits) in the first year of their academic study of English Literature. As I’ve mentioned earlier, these courses could be divided in two groups: first is the ‘main’ subjects. They are:

Course Code	Course Tittle	Marks	Credit
1152	English Reading Skill	100	4
1153	English Writing Skill	100	4
1154	Introduction to Poetry	100	4
1155	Introduction to Prose: Friction and Non-friction	100	4

And the second group of courses which is mostly called ‘Allied’ courses includes these subjects:

Course Code	Course Tittle	Marks	Credit
6203 *****	Introducing Sociology Or Introduction to Social Work	100	4
6192	Introduction to Political Theory	100	4

Course wise description

English Reading Skill
Course Code: 1152 | Total Marks: 100 | Credit: 4 | Lectures: 60 | Exam Hours: 4 Hours

This course was included in the syllabus form from the session 2009-10, mainly intending to help student enhance their English reading skill. In this course, students have to solve different type of question form a piece of (unfamiliar) writing, thus prove his/her comprehension level thereby reading skill. The reading text is generally chosen form different type of writing like descriptive, narrative, expository, argumentative, journalistic, and academic texts e.g. History, philosophy etc. The course seeks to develop students following skills and sub skills:

* Guessing word meanings by using knowledge of word form (class), word function, word structure and formation and most importantly, contextual clues.
* Understanding ornamental expressions and tackling sentence meaning,
* Surveying text organization; Reading for specific information (skimming),
* Reading for general comprehension/gist (scanning), summarizing, predicting and interpreting.
* Recognizing, author’s position, tone and attitude, etc

English Writing Skill
Course Code: 1153 | Total Marks: 100 | Credit: 4 | Lectures: 60 | Exam Hours: 4 Hours

This course will focus on helping students develop their writing skills in English with focus on writing correct sentences, using proper punctuation marks, writing with good organization (coherence and cohesion), writing good topic sentences and concluding sentences in paragraphs, writing good introduction, body and conclusion. Students will be required to write:

a) Paragraphs using a variety of techniques such as examples, listing, cause and effect, comparison, contrast, comparison-contrast among others.
b) Descriptive, narrative, expository and argumentative essays
c) Reports
d) Formal and informal letters
e) Amplifications
f) Stories

Introduction to Poetry
Course Code: 1154 | Total Marks: 100 | Credit: 4 | Lectures: 60 | Exam Hours: 4 Hours

Introduction to poetry course is intended to introduce students with realm English poetry through giving them an overall idea of Poetry of different poets, ages and other corresponding information. There are 15 poems included in the course of several prominent poets from different ages. They are:

W. Shakespeare—Shall I Compare Thee?
John Donne—Good Morrow
Robert Herrick-- - Daylight in Disorder
W.Wordsworth—I Wondered Lonely as a Cloud
P.B.Shelley—Ozymandias
J.Keats—To Autumn
Elizabeth B.Browning—How Do I Love Thee?
Emily Dickinson—Because I Could not Stop for Death
W.B. Yeats—No Second Troy
R.Frost—Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening
D.H. Lawrence—Snake
Dylan Thomas—Fern Hill
Ted Hughes—Pike
Adrienne Rich—Aunt Jennifer’s Tigers
Kaiser Huq— Ode on a Lungi
In addition to these poems, some related Literary Terms and Prosody has also been included to make the comprehension of the poems easier. 

Introduction to Short Story: Friction and Non-Friction
Course Code: 1155 | Total Marks: 100 | Credit: 4 | Lectures: 60 | Exam Hours: 4 Hours

Introduction to Short Story course contains altogether 12 short stories. Among them 6 stories are fractious when rest 6 belongs to Non-friction category. Short stories for non-friction includes passage, address letters and autobiography. The stories included are:

Non-Fiction:

Francis Bacon—Of Studies

Abraham Lincon—Gettysburg Address

Rabindranath Tagore—Letter to Lord Chelmford Rejecting Knighthood

Gorge .Orwell—Shooting an Elephant

Nirad C. Choudhury—River & Rain (from The Autobiography of an Unknown Indian)

Martin Luther King—I Have a Dream

Fiction:

Somershet Maugham-- The Ant and the Grasshopper

James Joyce—Araby

Katherine Mansfield-- The Garden Party

Anita Desai—Games at Twilight

Edgar Allan Poe—The Tell-Tale Heart

Ernest Hemingway—Cat in the Rain

Introducing Sociology
Course Code: 6203| Total Marks: 100 | Credit: 4 | Lectures: 60 | Exam Hours: 4 Hours.

Students have to chose either of the either of the ‘Introducing Sociology’ or ‘‘Introduction to Social Work’ course to study. However, Introducing Sociology course discuss basic concept of Sociology. As this course is an ‘Allied’ course, and not directly associated with English literature, many students mistreat it as a ‘less important’ subject that have ‘nothing to do’ with study of English Literature. But whatever it is, it’s score worth same as main course’s score in GPA calculation. To as least o make a good result, this subject must be taken sincerely. This course include:
* Definition, Nature & Scope of Sociology
* Culture, Beliefs & Values
* Globalization, Culture and Society
* Urbanization and Social Formation
* Gender and Society
* Environmental Problems, Natural Disasters and Social Crisis
* Social Inequality
* Types of societies
* Deviance & Social Control
* Health, Illness and Society
To avail the detailed syllabus: click here.

Introduction to Social Work
Course Code: -----,| Total Marks: 100 | Credit: 4 | Lectures: 60 | Exam Hours: 4 Hours.

Like ‘Introducing Sociology’ course, ‘Introduction to Social Work’ course discusses the basic concept of social work too. And student’s attitude towards it is also no different from Sociology course. Just like sociology, many students count this course ‘boring and unnecessary’ too.

To view what is studied under this course, click here

Introduction to Political Theory
Course Code: 6192| Total Marks: 100 | Credit: 4 | Lectures: 60 | Exam Hours: 4 Hours.

Introduction to Political Theory is another ‘allied course’. Unlike Sociology or Social course, students are to study this course. The negative attitude towards allied course also prevails here. This course includes these topics:

Political Science : Meaning, Nature, Scope, Methods, Relations to other Social Sciences, Importance to Study Political Science.

State : Definition, Elements, State and Government, State and Individual, State and Society, Theories of the origin of the state.

Fundamental concepts : Sovereignty, Law, Liberty, Equality, Rights and Duties, Nation, Nationalism, Internationalism.

Concepts of Political Sociology : Political culture, elite theory, Max Weber and Bureaucracy

Political Thinkers : Plato, Aristotle, St. Augustine, St. Thomas Aquinas, Machiavelli, Hobbes, Locke and Rousseau.