This is 'sexual imagery' + 'english literature' in another form.
One of the useful distinctions that I was taught was the difference between 'connotation' and 'denotation'.
denotation & connotation
Denotation refers to the literal meaning of a word, the "dictionary definition."ยจ For example, if you look up the word snake in a dictionary, ...
http://www.eng.fju.edu.tw/English_Literature/terms/denotation.htm
So, if you take a poem like 'Digging' by Seamus Heaney, and you study it simply at the level of 'denotation', then you are missing a lot.
However, the moment you are talking about 'connotation' you are on 'tricky ground' because everyone's connotations are different.
I have always been a little bit frustrated by English Literature as an academic subject, because it seems so subjective. It seems as if you 'agree with the teacher' you will get a good mark. If you do not like the teacher or sympathise with their point of view, you will get a bad mark.
...and as they say in college -- sorry, university -- "If the professor wrote the textbook, then that's as close to the truth as you need to get."
I found in English classes that it wasn't so much that you had to agree with the teacher to get good grades -- you just had to be able to back up your opinion with well-constructed arguments. I often took a devil's advocate position in my classes just to make it more interesting, and as long as my reasoning was cogent and well-written, I never had a problem getting high grades on my papers.
Hi! Uriel
I was hoping to attract your attention.
My background was in 'Science', and the idea that Politics should determine educational content seems to me, to be wrong. Yet, I think that this is very how it is in practice with a sensitive subject like 'English'.
To a certain extent, talented people will always do well. What is more difficult is the 'value added' aspect. How much are students actually learning - 'taking away' - from the class?
Also: someone who is clearly talented will do well, but if you are marginally, then perhaps it is wise to agree with the teacher. It just seems rather a murky area to me; with no 'right and wrong' answers. After all, Shakespeare was careful not to critise the King (Queen?) in his Plays.
This is quite a good site.
http://depts.gallaudet.edu/englishworks/literature/poetry.html
'What is Poetry?'
To tell you the truth, the main reason why I did not do English was because I felt that my spelling was not up to it. I found it very frustratingt to find the teacher had picked up on my spelling and not what I had written.
'criticise'
Funnily enough, my spelling seems to have got better as I have got older. I think having a computer / wordprocessor helps.
<<Hi! Uriel
I was hoping to attract your attention. >>
Whoa, whoa -- down, boy! (Just kidding!)
Well, this is a treat -- someone else is on at the same time that I am!
My degree was in art, which meant that I was dragged through semester after semester of art history, which I was not a huge fan of, but was required. I wrote a lot of friggin' papers in those classes, and if you want to talk about a subjective subject, try modern art. Most of which I would classify as heinous crap. And there was no way I could fake any enthusiasm for that junk, so I had to learn to write about it both properly (there is a certain set formula for formally describing artworks in a paper and you must learn that jargon and that mode of deconstruction if you want to pass the class) and incisively -- so that I could convey my true opinions, get a good grade, AND respect myself in the morning.
Trust me, lit classes were very good training for that! And I liked them, so I took a lot of writing and literature classes. I also like the sciences a lot, and I took quite a few of those classes as well. My mom is a biologist, so I grew up reading her textbooks while she was in college and grad school. She had started out as a German major, but switched. However, she furthered her career in the science department immensely by taking basic Latin, which many scientific terms are in. I picked up a lot of that at her side, and being able to just mentally translate scientific terms into plain English really helped me in my classes later. So science and language really have a place together.
Pseud's corner
Examples
'This collection will work from the premise that public toilets, far from being banal or simply functional, are highly charged spaces, shaped by notions of property, hygiene and the binary gender division.'
http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Pseuds_Corner
Dear Uriel
I once used to work at the Arnofini in Bristol shifting chairs. I had hoped to come up with an example of an extremely ordinary film described in Arnofini language. However I settled instead with Pseud's corner.
I do hope you do not think me too familiar !!!
I once formed a very favourable impression of the lady at the other end of the telephone, only to be disappointed when I met her in person.
"After all, Shakespeare was careful not to critise the King (Queen?) in his Plays"
Criticizing the Queen may well be lethal in those times, I believe.
Okay, the art critic holding a microphone to their mouth while chewing so that the other diners could vicariously enjoy the meal through their headphones really had me floored. Out of control!