Postgraduate Course: Listening for God: Silence in Modern and Contemporary Literature (PG) (DIVI11099)
Course Outline
| School | School of Divinity |
College | College of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences |
| Credit level (Normal year taken) | SCQF Level 11 (Postgraduate) |
Availability | Available to all students |
| SCQF Credits | 20 |
ECTS Credits | 10 |
| Summary | This course investigates how a Quaker approach to communal spiritual listening can inform literary explorations of silence in twentieth- and twentieth-first-century poetry, fiction, and creative nonfiction. During an era often considered extremely loud and secular, there remains a spiritual literary yearning towards silence and its creative possibilities. Reading these texts in conversation with Quaker writing, we apply traditional literary methodologies to both literary and theological texts to open up broader discussions around the ambiguous phenomenon that is silence. Teaching weeks alternate between texts which explicitly feature Quaker characters and contexts and those which feature broader instances of spiritual silence. |
| Course description |
Academic Description:
This course investigates spiritual encounters with silence in modern and contemporary writing. Nearly half of the texts engage with Quakerism directly, while the remaining feature broader explorations of spiritual silence from a predominantly Christian perspective which can be helpfully enlightened when read alongside Quaker theological writings on the importance of silence for worship. The course introduces Quaker theology, as described by Muers and others, alongside 'literary sound studies', to explore the ways in which literary texts attempt to articulate silence - a phenomenon which is traditionally defined by a lack of articulation, akin to how God is often described as beyond comprehension. The course asks questions such as:
- What various types of silence are there, and how can literature help us identify these?
- Is silence always experienced as a private, personal experience, or can it be shared and communal?
- Are there positive meanings to be found in silence, that move beyond the traditional assumption that silence is a negative absence?
- How can Quakerism - a religious practice defined by its use of silence - help us to bring complexity to our religious and literary discussions of silence?
By addressing these questions, the course will also consider the broader implication: can literature, and the use of words more broadly, help or hinder articulations of seemingly incomprehensible concepts of silence and God? Through the course's focus on twentieth- and twentieth-first-century texts, we will also consider the more theistic and spiritual side to an era often described as intensely secular, building on work by scholars such as Barnard and Shapiro to bring religion back from the margins of modernism. To maintain suitable focus to the broad topic of silence, Christianity and its related denominations (including Quakerism, historically) will be the main faith discussed, although religious pluralism will also be considered in relation to the late twentieth-century development of the Quaker Universalist Fellowship.
Outline of Content:
This course will begin with an introductory seminar outlining the broad concept and questions of silence as understood within literary sound studies and the Quaker practice of silent worship. It will also make reference to the literary texts to be discussed over the course of the semester, providing direction to the students' future work. The following 9 weeks will alternate between longer texts which feature Quakers explicitly and shorter texts which explore the broader spiritual qualities of silence primarily within the Christian tradition, with authors such as RS Thomas, Dorothy Richardson, Mary Oliver, UA Fanthorpe, and Annie Dillard. The reason for alternating between longer texts featuring Quakers and shorter texts featuring broader descriptions of silence is twofold: (1) it encourages a dialogue between Quaker-specific practice and the broader concept of spiritual silence; (2) it maintains a more manageable reading load for students. Each week the primary reading tasks will also be paired with short secondary reading extracts to encourage dialogue between the students' primary and secondary reading while maintaining a manageable workload. The course will end with an overview and reflective discussion, allowing time for drawing connections between the texts; discussing the final assessment; and a general Q&A.
Student Learning Experience:
This course will consist of one two-hour seminar joint with Level 10 each week: the first hour will feature a semi-formal lecture from the instructor outlining key themes and concepts within the set texts, while the second hour will be more discussion-based, involving close-reading, group work, and debate. Level 11 students will have an additional contact hour every 2 weeks, wherein discussion will focus on the comparative elements across texts covered in classes so far. Students will learn the theological and practical details of Quakerism and benefit from the expertise of three lecturers located in: Religion and Literature; Theology and Ethics. They will also have the opportunity to engage with a range of modern and contemporary texts by a mix of neglected and popular authors, adding to their knowledge of canonical works whilst broadening their knowledge to texts beyond the standard literary canon. Level 11 students will submit a short formative assessment mid-semester in the format of an extract from the longer final essay. Feedback from this formative assessment will form part of the final summative assessment, which will consist of two parts: a short response to the formative feedback and a long essay covering a minimum of two texts which is developed from the formative writing. This assessment is intended to provide students with experience of an element of the 'response to reviewers' process of peer review, simulating aspects of real-world editing and feedback processes, alongside traditional research and writing skills.
|
Entry Requirements (not applicable to Visiting Students)
| Pre-requisites |
|
Co-requisites | |
| Prohibited Combinations | |
Other requirements | None |
Information for Visiting Students
| Pre-requisites | None |
Course Delivery Information
|
| Academic year 2026/27, Available to all students (SV1)
|
Quota: None |
| Course Start |
Semester 2 |
Timetable |
Timetable |
| Learning and Teaching activities (Further Info) |
Total Hours:
200
(
Seminar/Tutorial Hours 27,
Feedback/Feedforward Hours 1,
Summative Assessment Hours 2,
Programme Level Learning and Teaching Hours 4,
Directed Learning and Independent Learning Hours
166 )
|
| Assessment (Further Info) |
Written Exam
0 %,
Coursework
100 %,
Practical Exam
0 %
|
| Additional Information (Assessment) |
Writing sample on intended topic for final long essay (1,000 words): formative assessment «br /»
«br /»
Response to formative essay feedback (500 words): 10% (LO5) «br /»
«br /»
Final long essay (3,500 words): 90% (LO1, LO2, LO3, LO4) |
| Feedback |
Students will receive written feedback on the mid-semester formative writing sample, and on the final summative assessment. |
| No Exam Information |
Learning Outcomes
On completion of this course, the student will be able to:
- Demonstrate detailed knowledge of selected modern and contemporary texts and their interaction with the spiritual experience of silence.
- Demonstrate detailed knowledge of theoretical approaches to Quakerism and literary sound studies.
- Engage critically in current debates in the fields of literature and religion, literary sound studies, and Quaker studies, showing awareness of theoretical differences across disciplines.
- Discuss and identify, using relevant theoretical material, different types of silence explored in the texts studied.
- Develop transferable skills in responding to, and using, assessment feedback to develop future work further.
|
Reading List
Primary
Novels:
Dorothy Canfield Fisher, The Deepening Stream (1930)
Jacqueline Harpman, I Who Have Never Known Men, trans. by Ros Schwartz (1997)
Christopher Isherwood, The World in the Evening (1954)
Dorothy Richardson, Pilgrimage: Dimple Hill (vol. 12) (1938)
Short Stories/Creative Essays:
Raymond Carver, 'A Small, Good Thing' (1983)
Annie Dillard, 'A Field of Silence' (1982)
Zadie Smith, 'The Silence' (2025)
Poetry:
U A Fanthorpe, 'Friends Meeting House' + 'Fox Unearthed' + 'Against Speech' (2013)
Mary Oliver, 'Such Silence' (1992)
RS Thomas, 'Silence' (1995) + 'The Presence' (1981) + 'No, in the beginning was silence' (1990)
Secondary
Angell, Stephen Ward, and Pink Dandelion. The Oxford Handbook of Quaker Studies. Oxford University Press, 2013.
Bell, Alexandra. 'Listening as a Spiritual Practice'. Friends Journal, 13 Sept. 2020, https://www.friendsjournal.org/listening-as-a-spiritual-practice/.
Bindeman, Steven. 'The Body Without Organs: On Silencing the Self'. Silence and Its Derivatives: Conversations Across Disciplines, edited by Mahshid Mayar and Marion Schulte, Springer International Publishing, 2022, pp. 293-309.
Doering, Jonathan. 'An Exploration of the Existence and Utility of a Quaker Literary Aesthetic in the Poetry of Philip Gross and Sibyl Ruth'. Quaker Studies, vol. 26, no. 1, June 2021, pp. 3-110.
Felch, Susan M., ed. The Cambridge Companion to Literature and Religion. Cambridge University Press, 2016.
Finn, Howard. ''In the Quicksands of Disintegrating Faiths': Dorothy Richardson and the Quakers'. Literature and Theology, vol. 19, no. 1, 2005, pp. 34-46.
Groth, Helen, and Julian Murphet, eds. The Edinburgh Companion to Literature and Sound Studies. Edinburgh University Press, 2024.
Halliday, Sam. Sonic Modernity: Representing Sound in Literature, Culture and the Arts. Edinburgh University Press, 2013.
Hibbert, Gerald Kenway. The Inner Light and Modern Thought. Swarthmore Press, 1924.
Hobson, Suzanne, and Andrew Radford, eds. The Edinburgh Companion to Modernism, Myth and Religion. Edinburgh University Press, 2023.
Knight, Mark, ed. Routledge Companion to Religion and Literature. Routledge, 2019.
Laurence, Patricia Ondek. The Reading of Silence: Virginia Woolf in the English Tradition. Stanford University Press, 1991.
Leighton, Angela. Hearing Things: The Work of Sound in Literature. Harvard University Press, 2018.
Lewis, Alison M. Caroline Emelia Stephen (1834-1909) and Virginia Woolf (1882-1941): A Quaker Influence on Modern English Literature. Quaker Theology, no. 3, Apr. 2000.
Lindskog, Annika J. Silent Modernism: Soundscapes and the Unsayable in Richardson, Joyce, and Woolf. Lund Studies in English, 2017.
MacCulloch, Diarmaid. Silence: A Christian History. Allen Lane, 2013.
Muers, Rachel. Keeping God's Silence: Towards a Theological Ethics of Communication. Blackwell, 2004.
Muers, Rachel. 'Quaker Theology'. St Andrews Encyclopaedia of Theology, 2022, pp. 1-26.
Plugh, Michael H. 'Meaning in Silence and the Quaker Tradition'. ETC: A Review of General Semantics, vol. 69, no. 2, 2012, pp. 204-15.
Shapiro, Stephen, and Philip Barnard. Pentecostal Modernism: Lovecraft, Los Angeles, and World-Systems Culture. Bloomsbury Publishing, 2017.
Smith, Nigel. 'Back to the Light: A Fresh Approach - George Richardson Lecture 2024'. Quaker Studies, vol. 29, no. 1, 2025, pp. 1-18.
Snaith, Anna, ed. Sound and Literature. Cambridge University Press, 2020.
Sontag, Susan. 'The Aesthetics of Silence'. A Susan Sontag Reader, Farrar, Straus, Giroux, 1982, pp. 181-204.
Steere, Douglas V. Where Words Come from: An Interpretation of the Ground and Practice of Quaker Worship and Ministry. Allen and Unwin, 1955.
Sykes, Rachel. The Quiet Contemporary American Novel. Manchester University Press, 2018.
Tucker, Eva.; Dorothy Richardson and the Quakers'. Pilgrimages: The Journal of Dorothy Richardson Studies, no. 1, 2008, pp. 145-52.
Ward, Graham. 'How Literature Resists Secularity.' Literature & Theology, vol. 24, no. 1, 2010, pp. 73-8.
Wilde, Dana. 'Annie Dillard's 'a Field of Silence': The Contemplative Tradition in the Modern Age'. Mystics Quarterly, vol. 26, no. 1, 2000, pp. 31-45. |
Additional Information
| Graduate Attributes and Skills |
This course will develop the following Graduate Attributes:
- Able to communicate complex ideas and arguments in formal writing
- Interactive communicator, with enhanced verbal communication (including listening and questioning)
- Sensitive to diverse perspectives
- Able to think independently and critically when developing a scholarly argument
- Reflective approach to continuing professional development
- Independent planning, organization, and time management
- Capability to think critically and evaluate information thoroughly |
| Keywords | modern literature,contemporary literature,silence,listening,Quaker,literary sound studies |
Contacts
| Course organiser | Dr Katie Harling-Lee
Tel:
Email: k.harling-lee@ed.ac.uk |
Course secretary | Miss Olga Szekrenyes
Tel:
Email: oszekren@ed.ac.uk |
|
|
University Homepage