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JOHN CABOT UNIVERSITY
COURSE CODE: "EN 335H"
COURSE NAME: "Literature and Psychology - HONORS (This course carries 4 semester hours of credits. A minimum CUM GPA of 3.5 is required)"
SEMESTER & YEAR:
Fall 2025
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SYLLABUS
INSTRUCTOR:
Alessandra Grego
EMAIL: [email protected]
HOURS:
TTH 11:30 AM 12:45 PM
TOTAL NO. OF CONTACT HOURS:
45
CREDITS:
3
PREREQUISITES:
Prerequisites: EN110 with a grade of C or higher.
OFFICE HOURS:
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COURSE DESCRIPTION:
This course explores the strong connections and dynamic relationship between literature and psychology. Students will examine how literary works both reflect and influence human psychology and the way literature uses psychological mechanisms to engage readers, develop characters, and structure plots. The course also explores the emotional bond formed between writers, texts, and readers. Depending on the course topic, students may analyze a variety of works—novels, short stories, poetry, and plays—through the lens of different psychological frameworks.
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SUMMARY OF COURSE CONTENT:
Theory of Mind is the branch of cognitive science that investigates how individuals interpret each other’s thoughts, feelings, and behavior: an ability which underpins all social relations. Understanding each other’s mental states is a complex operation, and the representations formed by individuals, influenced by cultural and social contexts, language, and personal experience, often lead to misreadings and projections that conflict with reality. This skill is exercised and to some extent honed by fictional texts: reading literature we interact emotionally with characters and exercise our mind reading skills by making predictions about their beliefs, intentions, and reliability.
The object of this course is to observe the way theory of mind operates in literature and to investigate the relationship between writers, characters, and readers, reflecting on the paradox of the reader’s emotional response to fiction. Students will consider the way they interact with fictional texts, the effect of inscrutable or radically alien characters, and the role of reliable, reticent, or reluctant narrators.
Finally the course will interrogate the idea that literature helps people understand each other.
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LEARNING OUTCOMES:
• Students will learn about theory of mind and the basic concepts of metarepresentation.
• Students will know how to interpret literary texts from an interdisciplinary perspective.
• Students will have the ability to formulate, research and communicate critical interpretations of literary texts.
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TEXTBOOK:
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REQUIRED RESERVED READING:
RECOMMENDED RESERVED READING:
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GRADING POLICY
-ASSESSMENT METHODS:
| Assignment | Guidelines | Weight |
| 3 research papers | Research papers (2500 words) | 50% |
| Midterm exam | | 20% |
| Final Exam | | 20% |
| Presentation | | 10% |
-ASSESSMENT CRITERIA:
AWork of this quality directly addresses the question or problem raised and provides a coherent argument displaying an extensive knowledge of relevant information or content. This type of work demonstrates the ability to critically evaluate concepts and theory and has an element of novelty and originality. There is clear evidence of a significant amount of reading beyond that required for the course.
BThis is highly competent level of performance and directly addresses the question or problem raised.There is a demonstration of some ability to critically evaluatetheory and concepts and relate them to practice. Discussions reflect the student’s own arguments and are not simply a repetition of standard lecture andreference material. The work does not suffer from any major errors or omissions and provides evidence of reading beyond the required assignments.
CThis is an acceptable level of performance and provides answers that are clear but limited, reflecting the information offered in the lectures and reference readings.
DThis level of performances demonstrates that the student lacks a coherent grasp of the material.Important information is omitted and irrelevant points included.In effect, the student has barely done enough to persuade the instructor that s/he should not fail.
FThis work fails to show any knowledge or understanding of the issues raised in the question. Most of the material in the answer is irrelevant.
-ATTENDANCE REQUIREMENTS:
ATTENDANCE REQUIREMENTS AND EXAMINATION POLICY
You cannot make-up a major exam (midterm or final) without the permission of the Dean’s Office. The Dean’s Office will grant such permission only when the absence was caused by a serious impediment, such as a documented illness, hospitalization or death in the immediate family (in which you must attend the funeral) or other situations of similar gravity. Absences due to other meaningful conflicts, such as job interviews, family celebrations, travel difficulties, student misunderstandings or personal convenience, will not be excused. Students who will be absent from a major exam must notify the Dean’s Office prior to that exam. Absences from class due to the observance of a religious holiday will normally be excused. Individual students who will have to miss class to observe a religious holiday should notify the instructor by the end of the Add/Drop period to make prior arrangements for making up any work that will be missed. The final exam period runs until __December 12, 2025__________
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ACADEMIC HONESTY
As stated in the university catalog, any student who commits an act of academic
dishonesty will receive a failing grade on the work in which the dishonesty occurred.
In addition, acts of academic dishonesty, irrespective of the weight of the assignment,
may result in the student receiving a failing grade in the course. Instances of
academic dishonesty will be reported to the Dean of Academic Affairs. A student
who is reported twice for academic dishonesty is subject to summary dismissal from
the University. In such a case, the Academic Council will then make a recommendation
to the President, who will make the final decision.
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STUDENTS WITH LEARNING OR OTHER DISABILITIES
John Cabot University does not discriminate on the basis of disability or handicap.
Students with approved accommodations must inform their professors at the beginning
of the term. Please see the website for the complete policy.
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SCHEDULE
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Week 1
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Introduction to the class: what is theory of mind
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Week 2
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Read: extracts from Hamlet. Read Crane, Mary Thomas. “Cognitive Hamlet and the Name of Action.” Shakespeare’s Brain: Reading with Cognitive Theory, Princeton University Press, 2000, pp. 116–55.
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Week 3
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The body/mind problem. Read Burke, Peter. “Representations of the Self from Petrarch to Descartes.” In Porter, Roy editor. Rewriting the Self: Histories from the Middle-Ages to the Present. Taylor & Francis Group, 1996: 17-29
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Week 4
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Credible characters.
Read: Auyoung, Elaine. “Introduction, A Novel Approach to Reading.” When Fiction Feels Real: Representation and the Reading Mind. Oxford University Press, Incorporated, 2018.
Extracts from Charles Dickens, Great Expectations and George Eliot, Middlemarch.
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Week 5
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Intersubjectivity: characters reading other characters. Start reading Viginia Woolf. Mrs. Dalloway. Read: Edmondson, Annalee. “Narrativizing Characters in Mrs. Dalloway.” Journal of Modern Literature, vol. 36, no. 1, 2012, pp. 17–36.
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Week 6
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Mrs. Dalloway continued. First home Paper due
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Week 7
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Non-human minds. Read: Kafka, Metamorphosis.
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Week 8
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Kafka, Metamorphosis continued. Read: Richard Schweickert and Zhuangzhuang Xi. “Theory of Mind and Metamorphoses in Dreams: Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde , and The Metamorphosis “ in Theory of Mind and Literature, edited by Paula Leverage, et al., Purdue University Press, 2014.
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Week 9
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Non-human minds. Read: Richard Powers. The Overstory.
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Week 10
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Powers. The Overstory continued.
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Week 11
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Read: Benedí, Pilar Martínez. “A Different Side of the Story: On Neurodiversity and Trees.” Iperstoria, no. 16, 16, Dec. 2020. iperstoria.it.
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Week 12
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Artificial Minds. Read: Mara, Martina, and Markus Appel. “Science Fiction Reduces the Eeriness of Android Robots: A Field Experiment.”Computers in Human Behavior, vol. 48, 2015, pp. 156–62
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Week 13
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Read Kazuo Ishiguro, Klara and the Sun.
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Week 14
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Read Kazuo Ishiguro, Klara and the Sun continued
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Week 15
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Final Exam
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