English Studies, Before, In, and Beyond the Time of Covid-19: Elephant, Chameleon, and Lizard

Abstract

Focusing on English Studies in South Africa, this article considers adaptations to university teaching in a time of Covid-19 and the potential and limitations of such adaptations post Covid-19. The argument is divided into sections, “English Studies, Yesterday and Today” and “English Studies, Today and Tomorrow”, together with a coda, “English, the Language of the Modern World”. An African folktale, “Elephant, Chameleon, and Lizard”, offers a metaphor of before, in, and beyond Covid-19.

Keywords:

• English Studies
• Covid-19
• teaching
• contact
• distance

Notes

1 See Barris (2019) for an extended discussion of the issue of plagiarism among university students.

2 To download the primary text (Kafka’s stories in translation) install the free EPUB File Reader, then go to https://z-lib.org, where individual downloads do not require copyright permission.