As we make sense of what we read, we construe meaning using the cultural technique of interpretation. Only rarely do we actually reflect this process: what are the means that help us understand literary texts? How does interpretation work? And how has our increasing use of electronic devices changed the way we read and interpret literature? This free online course addresses these questions as it introduces you to a variety of ways of interpreting literary texts. We will look into time-tested methods such as close reading and will also address more recent practices such as computer-based distant reading . By the end of the course, you'll be able to... This course is for people from all walks of life who enjoy reading literature and would like to know how literary scholars interpret texts in the digital age. If you are a student looking for an introduction to literary analysis, ‘Literature in the Digital Age’ will help you find it. The only requirement is that you like to read and love to reflect your experience and discuss it with others.

Topics Covered

• The various media in which we read literature in the digital age
• The strengths and weaknesses of different reading strategies
• The core method of literary studies: close reading
• The various strategies you use on a daily basis as you read online texts
• A cooperative form of online reading called social reading
• Forms of historical readings of literary texts: historical and literary-historical contextualization
• Uses and limitations of distant reading, a recent scholarly approach to literary texts that relies on big data and computer analysis
• Approaches to literary texts that do not seek to interpret them but focus on their surface and materiality