MA ENGLISH ASSIGNMENT,2015-16

Master’s Degree Programme in English

(MEG)

ASSIGNMENT

(For July 2015 and January 2016 Sessions)

Compulsory Courses of M.A. English – 1st Year)

British Poetry-01

British Drama-02

British Novel-03

Aspects of Language-04

School of Humanities

Indira Gandhi National Open University

Maidan Garhi, New Delhi-110 068

Master’s Degree in English

Assignments for 1st year Compulsory Courses

Course Code: MEG

Dear Student,

This booklet contains all the assignments of the Compulsory Courses of MA (English) 1st year

namely:

MEG-01 British Poetry

MEG-02 British Drama

MEG-03 British Novel

MEG-04 Aspects of Language

Each course will comprise one assignment of 100 marks. This assignment will be tutor marked.

Aims: The TMAs are concerned mainly with assessing your application and understanding of the

course material. You are not required to reproduce chunks of information from the course

material but to use the skills of critical appreciation that you may have acquired during the course

of study. These assignments aim to teach as well as to assess your performance. Please ensure

that you read the texts and the accompanying study guides that we have prepared for you. Let me

repeat: you must read all the texts prescribed. Do make points as you go along. If there is

anything you do not understand, please ask your Counsellor at the Study Centre for clarification.

Once you are able to do the assignments satisfactorily, you will be ready to take the exam with

confidence.

Instructions: Before attempting the assignment please read the following instructions carefully.

1 Read the detailed instructions about the assignments given in the Programme Guide for

Elective Courses.

2 Write your roll no. name, full address and date on the top right corner of the first page of

your response sheet(s).

3 Write the Course Title, Assignment Number and the Name of the Study Centre you are

attached to in the centre of the first page of your response sheet(s).

The top of the first page of your response sheet should look like this:

ROLL NO. ……………………………….

NAME: …………………………………..

ADDRESS:……………………………….

……………………………………………

COURSE TITLE:……………………………….

ASSIGNEMNT NO. …………………………….

STUDY CENTRE:……………………………... DATE:……………………………….

4 Use only foolscap size paper for your response and tag all the pages carefully.

5 Write the relevant question number with each answer.

6 You should write in your own handwriting.

7 Submission: The completed assignment should be sent to the Coordinator of the

Study Centre allotted to you by 31 March 2016 (if enrolled in the July 2015

session) and 30th Sept, 2016 (if enrolled in the January 2016 session).

MEG-01: BRITISH POETRY

ASSIGNMENT

Programme: MEG

Max. Marks: 100

Ast code: MEG-01/TMA/2015-16

Dear Student,

In a conventional class your teacher would have discussed your assignment with you,

pointed out what made a good essay and what a bad one. We have done exactly this

in Unit 52 of the British Poetry (MEG-01) course. Read it carefully and

discuss it with your counsellor and class-fellows at the Study Centre. Thereafter decide

upon a topic, i.e. a period or literary group in the history of British poetry. You may,

if you wish, select a topic from the list given in 52.2.1 (p. 70) in Block X.

Alternatively, you could write on a British poet of your choice. You may write on a poet

discussed in the units, i.e. on the syllabus, or even a poet we have not discussed in

detail such as Robert Burns, G.M. Hopkins, R.S. Thomas, Ted Hughes or Seamus Heaney.

You may have heard some of our lectures on The Movement, Philip Larkin and Ted

Hughes on the EduSat. It may now be available on e-gyankosh on www.ignou.ac.in

You have yet another choice. Write an essay on a famous poem in English literature.

Having decided upon your topic, do your research and then read section 36.5 in

Unit 36 in Block VIII for a model essay and a format for presentation. You may learn

how to present your term paper/sessional essay from 36.5. You must not quote from

unacknowledged sources.

To sum up, write an essay on a period or a literary group in British poetry or a British

poet or a British poem in about 3000 words on the model provided in 36.5 (in unit 36).

The full marks for the essay is 100.

We look forward to reading your sessional essay.

Sincerely yours

Teacher

MEG-02: BRITISH DRAMA

ASSIGNMENT

(Based on Blocks 1-9)

Programme: MEG

Ast code: MEG-02/TMA/2015-16

Max. Marks: 100

Answer no. 1 and any 4 of the remaining questions.

8x5=40

1 Explain the following passages with reference to their contexts and supply brief

critical

comments where necessary :

a. See, see, where Christ’s blood streams in the firmament!

One drop would save my soul, half a drop: Ah, my Christ.

b. Weigh oath with oath, and you will nothing weigh:

Your vows to her and me, put in two scales,

Will even weigh; and both as light as tales.

c. I hit a blow on the ridge of his Skull, laid him stretched out,

and he split to the knob of his gullet.

d. It is not in time that my death shall be known;

It is out of time that my decision is taken

If you call that a decision

To which my whole being gives entire consent.

I give my life

To the Law of god above the Law of Man.

e. Astride of a grave and difficult birth. Down in the hole, lingeringly, the grave –

diggers puts on the forceps.We have time to grow old. The air is full of our cries.

But habit is a great deadener.

2. Write in your own words a character sketch of Hamlet. 15

3. Evaluate Ben Jonson’s The Alchemist as a comedy. 15

4. According to Shaw Professor Higgins has ‘touches of Sweet’. Bring out the pathos in

Higgins’s character in the light of Shaw’s observation. 15

5. Comment on the imagery and symbolism in Look Back in Anger. 15

6. Bring out the existentialist elements in Estragon and Vladimir. 15

MEG - 03

BRITISH NOVEL

ASSIGNMENT 2015 - 2016

(Based on Blocks (1 - 9)

Max. Marks: 100

Answer all questions.

1. Trace the development of modern English fiction with specific reference to the

major shifts in literary perspective during the nineteenth century. 20

2. Attempt aMarxist reading of Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice. 20

3. What is the importance of the Fairytale mode in Great Expectations? 20

4. How is Jameson’s criticism of Conrad’s politics relevant to Heart of Darkness? 20

5. What do you understand by the term ‘Stream of Consciousness’, explain with

reference to A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man.

6

MEG-04: ASPECTS OF LANGUAGE

ASSIGNMENT

Course Code: MEG-04/TMA/2015-16

Max. Marks: 100

All questions are compulsory

1 Write short notes on the following giving examples where necessary. 20

i Problems in defining a speech community

ii The scope of Quantifiers

iii Difference between Dialect and Register

iv Blends in English morphology.

2 Discuss the general methodological principles of Saussure. Give examples to

illustrate your answer. 20

3 What is language planning? Why do we require it? Discuss the various types of

language planning. 20

4 Discuss the growth of English in India. Describe some of the features which

separate Indian English from other varieties of English. 20

5 What is the inflectional morphology and how does it differ from derivational

morphology. Give examples. 20