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Degree/Diploma in English

E-seminars

E-seminars will now be running from November 2011 to March 2012. E-seminars are e-mail discussion groups monitored by members of staff. They will enable students to discuss a pre-set topic amongst themselves, and receive guidance, where relevant, from a tutor. To sign up and view the programme please see relevant links.

Regulations

The Nature of the E-seminars

1. E-seminars will last for seven days from Wednesday morning (British time) through to Tuesday afternoon the following week on dates specified in advance and advertised on the programme below.
2. Members of staff will propose a series of topics for consideration, which are posted on this site so that students may decide which groups they wish to join.
3. Students may be required to do some reading prior to the E-seminars, and should be prepared to debate a specific topic suggested by the group E-tutor. (plenty of advance warning will be given to allow for reading time).
4. E-seminars will enable students to: a) ask relevant questions, b) respond to the questions asked by others, c) make literary-critical statements, d) suggest or ask for information on further reading materials, e) consider examination tactics for the subject area in question.
5. In order to make discussions manageable the length of each e-mail contribution should be no more than 300 words, preferably less, and each member of the group should try to send only a few e-mails per day. These measures are not designed to limit your contribution, but to ensure that discussion may flow easily, and to ensure that questions, observations and responses are manageable and it will make it easier for the member of staff to monitor discussion (since it will be possible to follow the history of an argument without opening all e-mails). If an argument string becomes too long, however, it may be necessary to start a new e-mail.
6. Clear indication of the topic of an e-mail in the subject box will facilitate discussion, i.e.: ‘Rushdie Group - Question about Saleem's Unreliability’
7. All e-mails contributing to the E-seminars should be sent to the whole group, even if they are in response to a single questioner (though if you wish to continue the discussion with individual students after the conclusion of the week, you are encouraged to do so).
8. Students should take care to express themselves clearly so that they may be understood by others.