The Scottish Invention of English Literature

Explores the international dimension and Scottish origins of the founding of English literature as a university subject.

The Scottish Invention of English Literature explores the origins of the teaching of English literature in the academy. It demonstrates how the subject began in eighteenth-century Scottish universities before being exported to America and other countries. The emergence of English as an institutionalised university subject was linked to the search for distinctive cultural identities throughout the English-speaking world. This book explores the role the discipline played in administering restraints on the expression of indigenous literary forms, and shows how the growing professionalisation of English as a subject offered a breeding ground for academics and writers with an interest in native identity and cultural nationalism. This book is a comprehensive account of the historical origins of the university subject of English literature and provides a wealth of new material on its particular Scottish provenance.

Introduction Robert Crawford; 1. From rhetoric to criticism Neil Rhodes; 2. Adam Smith, Samuel Johnson, and the institutions of English Ian Duncan; 3. The prerequisites of power: Blair, belles lettres, and law Rajit Dosanjh; 4. Blair's Ossian, Romanticism, and the teaching of literature Fiona Stafford; 5. The origins of the university teaching of the novel Paul Bator; 6. William Greenfield: gender and the transmission of literary culture Martin Moonie; 7. The impact of Scottish literary teaching in North America Franklin E. Court; 8. Scottish academia and the invention of American studies Andrew Hook; 9. The influence of Scottish rhetoric on the formation of English studies in nineteenth-century English universities Linda Ferreira-Buckley; 10. The impact of Scottish literary teaching in Australasia Chris Worth; 11. Scottish writing and English studies Robert Crawford; Bibliography Linda Ferreira-Buckley; List of bibliographical essays.

An international team explores the Scottish origins of the teaching of the university subject of English literature in the academy and demonstrates its importance in the search for distinctive cultural identities throughout the English-speaking world. This comprehensive account provides new material on this international dimension.