Course Description
The language and literature of England before the Norman Conquest, with reading of selected texts.
Additional Requirements for Graduate Students:
Graduate students will be responsible for a more extensive syllabus, for secondary reading, and for more ambitious, sophisticated writing.
Athena Title
Old English
Prerequisite
LING 2100 or LING 2100E or LING 2100H or ENGL 3030 or two 2000-level ENGL courses or (one 2000-level ENGL course and one 3000-level ENGL course) or (one 2000-level ENGL course and one 2000-level CMLT course)
Semester Course Offered
Offered fall
Grading System
A - F (Traditional)
Course Objectives
A basic introduction to the language and culture of the Old English period. Students will develop a reading knowledge of Old English in various genres of writing, and an understanding of the place of Old English within the historical development of the Germanic languages.
Topical Outline
The choice and sequence of topics will vary from instructor to instructor and semester to semester. The topics will consist of selected works by various authors, to be read outside of class and discussed in class, examined individually and comparatively.Periodically during the semester, students will perform a number of graded tasks, including some combination of tests and out-of-class papers. A possible series of topics and assignments might resemble this: Elementary morphology and phonetics Elementary principles of historical linguistics Old English noun, pronoun, and definite article declensions Old English verb conjugations Germanic and Old English sound changes Old English vocabulary Elementary principles of manuscript orthography
Syllabus