Autumn 1998 300-level ENGL courses

Course Descriptions (as of 9 September 1998)
The following course descriptions have been written by individual instructors to provide more detailed information on specific section sthan that found in the General Catalog. When individual descriptions are not available, the General Catalog descriptions [in brackets] are used. (Although we try to have as accurate and complete information as possible, this schedule remains subject to change.)

304 A (History of Literary Criticism & Theory II)
MW 12:30-2:20
Weinbaum
This course will introduce students to several ongoing debates within contemporary theory and literary study. It will provide an overview of structuralism, and examine the challenge posed to structuralist thought by various forms of deconstruction, Marxism, feminism and psychoanalysis. Emphasis will be placed on close and careful reading of texts and on understanding the connections-or dialogues-among them. Questions that will guide our discussion included: What is theory? What guises does theory come in? What are the social, political and intellectual stakes involved in different kinds of theorizing? What use is theory to the reader of literature? Readings will include selections from Raymond Williams, Walter Benjamin, Roland Barthes, Barbara Christian, Jacques Derrida, Michel Foucault, Louis Althusser, Sigmund Freud, Jacques Lacan, Luce Irigaray, Helen Cixous, Melanie Klein, Gayatri Spivak, and Lisa Lowe. Text: Photocopied course packet.

310 A (The Bible as Literature)
Dy 9:30
McCracken
An introduction to the Bible, with emphasis on its literary forms, especially narrative (biblical story), but also biblical poetry, oracles, epistles, apocalypse. There will be some outside readings on history, geography, and culture, but the main focus is on reading the Bible as narrative and vision. A good portion of each class session will be devoted to discussion of particular topics or study questions. Daily preparation (reading the assigned text and background material, and thinking through literary problems), attendance, and active class participation are required. Grades based on discussion, exams, and writing assignments, including short, in-class essays. Texts: The New Oxford Annotated Bible with Apocrypha (New Revised Standard Version); Gable, Wheeler & York, The Bible as Literature: An Introduction, 3rd ed.

311 A (Modern Jewish Literature in Translation)
MW 10:30-12:20
Alexander
This course deals with the literary interpretation of modern Jewish experience, which includes the break-up of a cohesive religious culture, mass migrations of unprecedented magnitude, the destruction of European Jewry by National Socialism during World War II, and the effort to reestablish a national existence in the Jewish homeland of Israel. Readings include such classic Yiddish authors as Sholom Aleichem and I. L. Peretz, and more recent Yiddish writers, among them I. B. Singer and Jacob Glatstein. At least two writers who did not write in Jewish languages, the Czech Franz Kafka and the Italian Primo Levi, will also be studied. Among the Israeli authors in the syllabus are Agnon, Hazaz, and Appelfeld. Considerable attention will also be given to the play of competing ideas that form the background of the imaginative literature. Texts: Howe & Greenberg, eds., Treasury of Yiddish Stories; Appelfeld, Badenheim 1939; Levi, Survival in Auschwitz, Hellord, ed., The Basic Kafka.

320 A (English Literature: The Middle Ages)
Dy 10:30
Mussetter
The purpose of this course is to introduce you to the literature of medieval England. This means reading a selection of Old and Middle English texts (excluding Chaucer), mostly in translation. The first part of the course will focus on the warrior culture of the Anglo Saxons and the epic/heroic literature it produced. The second part of the course will focus on the romantic culture of the later period and its literary production. We will do a bit of the original language, especially in the latter part of the course, a bit of the wider European contexts of English literature (mostly Norse and French), and a bit of visual arts. In addition to the readings, there will be two pretty hefty papers, two short "quizzes" (factual identifications mostly), and a weekly e-mail "paper" on a topic relevant to class discussion. Some of our texts will be bought, others are available on the Net. English majors only, Registration Period 1.Texts: Chickering, ed., Beowulf; Hamer, A Choice of Anglo-Saxon Verse; Palsson, tr., Hrafnkelssaga; Marie de France, Lais; Borroff, tr., Gawain and the Green Knight; Malory, Morte D'Arthur.

321 A (Chaucer)
Dy 12:30
Mussetter
Introduction to Chaucer's Canterbury Tales and other poetry in Middle English, with attention to Chaucer's historical and social context. English majors only, Registration Period 1. Text: Chaucer, Canterbury Tales (ed. Kolve & Olson).

323 A (Shakespeare to 1603)
MW 12:30-2:20
Atchley
[Shakespeare's career as dramatist before 1603 (including Hamlet). Study of history plays, comedies, and tragedies.] English majors only, Registration Period 1. Texts: Evans, ed., The Riverside Shakespeare; optional: Tillyard, The Elizabethan World Picture; Briggs, This Stage-Play World: Texts and Contexts, 1580-1625; Greenblatt, REenaissance Self-Fashioning: From More to Shakespeare.

323 YA (Shakespeare to 1603)
MW 7-8:50 pm
Webster
(Evening Degree)
Added 5/11/98; sln: 8856.
The goal of this course is to make you a better informed and more active reader of Shakespeare's earlier plays. We'll do this by reading five plays closely, starting with the first of the Henry IV plays (my candidate for the best-certainly the funniest-of his histories) and moving on through two comedies (Much Ado About Nothing, Twelfth Night) and two tragedies (Troilus and Cressida, and Hamlet). Depending on the play, we'll follow Shakespeare's conversations on such themes as power, love, gender, identity, and corruption. Three midterm papers-at least one a take-home-along with regular short response papers. Evening Degree students only, Registration Periods 1 & 2. Texts: Shakespeare, 1 Henry IV; Much Ado About Nothing; Twelfth Night; Troilus and Cressida; photocopied course packet.

324 A (Shakespeare after 1603)
TTh 8:30-10:20
Atchley
[Shakespeare's career as dramatist after 1603. Studies of comedies, tragedies and romances.] English majors only, Registration Period 1. Texts: Evans, ed., The Riverside Shakespeare; optional: Lovejoy, Great Chain of Being: A Study of the History of an Idea; Burke, Popular Culture in Early Modern Europe; Harris, Popular Culture in England, c. 1500-1850.

TTh 1:30-3:20
LaGuardia
Shakespeare's career as dramatist after 1603. Studies of comedies, tragedies and romances. English majors only, Registration Period 1. Texts: Shakespeare, Antony and Cleopatra; Othello; Measure for Measure; Macbeth; King Lear; Winter's Tale; The Tempest.

325 A (English Literature: the Late Renaissance)
TTh 1:30-3:20
Fuchs
Literary Worlds of the Early Seventeenth Century. This course explores the transformation of English literature in the period from the Elizabethan models, closely based on courtly forms, to the representation of multiple spaces in the culture. How do theatrical forms such as the Jacobean masque contrast to the "city comedy" of an emerging bourgeoisie? In the poetry of the period, how does social satire coexist with new kinds of self-questioning? Some of the larger questions we will be discussing include: How does the role of an author develop and change in the period, given the first stirrings of commercial authorship? What are the connections between gender and nation, given how these literary texts define the England of their time? Finally, what can the increasing recourse to images of trade and expansionism tell us about the "literary worlds" we are exploring? Texts will include James I's "Trew Law of Free Monarchies," Shakespeare's A Winter's Tale and The Tempest, Ben Jonson's Bartholomew Fair and selected masques, Middleton and Dekker's The Roaring Girl, Bacon's Essays, and selected poems by Jonson, Donne, Herbert, and others.

326 A (Milton)
TTh 10:30-12:20
LaGuardia .
Milton's early poems and the prose. Paradise Lost, Paradise Regained, and Samson Agonistes, with attention to the religious, intellectual, and literary contexts. English majors only, Registration Period 1. Text: Orgel & Goldberg, eds., John Milton (Oxford Authors).

329 YA (Rise of the English Novel)
TTh 4:30-6:20 pm
Lockwood
The beginnings of the English novel in modern form, vividly illustrated in works by Defoe, Richardson, Fielding, and Burney. This course aims to give students a detailed appreciation of six classic novels of the eighteenth century, along with some understanding of this history of fiction at a crucial moment of change, and a picture of the social and cultural background. Short papers, two tests, and lots of reading. (Evening Degree students only, Registration Periods 1 & 2.) Texts: Defoe, Moll Flanders; Richardson, Pamela; Clarissa; Fielding, Joseph Andrews and Shamela; Burney, Evelina; Eliza Haywood, Love in Excess.

331 YA (Romantic Poetry I)
TTh 7-8:50 pm
Brown
As an introduction to the period, this course will emphasize techniques for reading early Romantic poetry. What makes these poems powerful and influential? How do they communicate? What do they mean? The principal readings will be short and medium-length poems by Blake, Wordsworth, and Coleridge, together with excerpts from Wordsworth's long autobiographical poem "The Prelude." We will also look at selections from women writers of the period. Philosophical issues will form an important context, with brief readings by Rousseau and Kant. Among the other topics to be discussed will be Romantic psychology (memory, imagination, love, the literature of terror), ecology (nature, the sublime, the beautiful and the picturesque), and social concerns (women, the lower classes, the French Revolution). There will be an ungraded weekly response paper, a 4-7 page critical essay, and a final. You will also be asked to memorize a few lines of poetry from the assigned readings and discuss your choice in class. Evening Degree students only, Registration Periods 1 & 2. Texts: Duncan Wu, ed, Romanticism: An Anthology; William Blake, Marriage of Heaven and Hell.

333 YA (English Novel: Early & Middle 19th Century)
MW 7-8:50 pm
Dunn
The readings for this course divide into two sets of fictions: Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice, Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, and Emily Brontë's Wuthering Heights as novels of society and its discontents; Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre and Charles Dickens' David Copperfield as fictional autobiographies. Midterm, paper, and final exam. (Evening Degree students only, Registration Periods 1 & 2.)

335 A (English Literature: The Age of Victoria)
TTh 10:30-12:20
Goodlad
A cross-disciplinary approach to surveying (early-, mid- and late-) Victorian literature with special emphases on poetry and prose. We look closely at works by (among others) Carlyle, Tennyson, E. B. Browning, Arnold, C. Rossetti, Darwin, Pater, Swinburne, du Maurier and Wilde. The historical contexts we consider revolve especially around crises of identity and authority especially as they relate to sexuality, art, religious faith, democracy, liberty and to the ideological work of class, race, nationality and gender. English majors only, Registration Period 1. Texts: Gordon S. Haight, ed., The Portable Victorian Reader; George du Maurier, Trilby; Walter Pater, The Renaissance; photocopied course packet.

336 A (English Literature: The Early Modern Period)
TTh 1:30-3:20
Burstein

Heart of Darkness

Women in Love

The Modernist Body. This class is a reading course in British modernism that focuses on tropes of embodiment: what constitutes a "self," a psyche, and/or a body for these various authors? Do the characters bleed, or do they crackle with electricity? What is at stake in such distinctions? We will read both fiction, emphasizing narrative technique as well as the context of the works, and modernist poetry. Recommended readings include recent synthetic studies of modernism such as Christopher Butler's Early Modernism (1994), and Peter Nicholls's Modernisms: A Literary Guide (1995) in order to highlight the placement of British modernism in an international context. The student will be expected to have a general acquaintance with literary or pictorial modernism. The emphasis will be on historical interpretation, grounded in close reading and formal analysis. Active participation is mandatory, and your body must be in the classroom. Readings will include Joseph Conrad, Heart of Darkness, T. S. Eliot, Poems; James Joyce, Dubliners; Ezra Pound, Selected Poems; Wyndham Lewis, Tarr; Virginia Woolf, Jacob's Room; Mina Loy, The Lost Lunar Baedeker; D. H. Lawrence, Women in Love; Katherine Mansfield, The Short Stories of Katherine Mansfield; and Evelyn Waugh, Vile Bodies.

338 A (Modern Poetry)
MW 12:30-2:20
Brenner
This will be a class in modern poetry, concentrating upon T. S. Eliot, Wallace Stevens, Marianne Moore, W. B. Yeats, Robert Frost, and others. Expect weekly writing. You will choose four of the weekly papers for revision and inclusion in a portfolio for the grade. Text: Ellman & O'Clair, eds., Norton Anthology of Modern Poetry, 2nd ed. English majors only, Registration Period 1.

343 A (Contemporary Poetry)
TTh 11:30-1:20
Donahue
This course offers a survey of contemporary American poetry in avant garde traditions from the 1970s to the present. Familiarity with the poetry of the Beats, Black Mountain, and the New York School is recommended but not required. Topics for discussion will include the relation of poetry to magic and the occult; to painting, movies and music, to ritual forms, nonsense, and "the unspeakable visions of the individual." Authors to be discussed include Susan Howe, Nathaniel Mackey, Alice Notley, Michael Palmer, Gustaf Sobin, and John Yau. Texts: Photocopied course packet. English majors only, Registration Period 1.

344 YA (20th-Century Dramatic Literature)
TTh 7-8:50 pm
Streitberger
Modern and contemporary plays by such writers as Shaw, Singe, O'Casey, O'Neill, Yeats, Eliot, Becket, Pinter, and Albee. (Evening Degree students only, Registration Periods 1 & 2.) Text: Coldewey & Streitberger, eds., Drama, Classical to Contemporary.

345 A (Studies in Film)
MW 2:30-4:50/TTh 2:30-3:20
Shaviro
This class is a general introduction to film. We view two films a week, mostly classic Hollywood cinema, with some more recent films and some films from other countries. One short paper, a midterm, and a long take-home final. No texts. (Meets with C LIT 357.)

352 A (American Literature: The Early Nation)
Dy 8:30
J. Griffith
We'll read and discuss an assortment of novels, stories, poems and essays by American writers in the period preceding the Civil War. Students will be expected to attend class regularly, keep up with reading assignments, and take part in open discussion. Written work will consist entirely of a series of between five and ten brief in-class essays written in response to study questions handed out in advance. Texts: Baym, et al., eds., The Norton Anthology of American Literature, Vol. 1; Harriet Beecher Stowe, Uncle Tom's Cabin; Herman Melville, Moby-Dick; James Fenimore Cooper, The Prairie.

353 A (American Literature: Later 19th Century)
TTh 10:30-12:20
Shulman
Our post-Civil War writers engaged the creative and destructive energies of an America that was moving from the village communities of the 1830s to the incorporated nation and the culture of consumption of the early twentieth century. In recognizably different accents, our writers created a literature of realism to do justice to the social and psychological surfaces and depths, challenges and conflicts inseparable from America's emergence as a world power. Chesnutt, Twain, and DuBois explore the tensions of racial violence and interracial sexuality. From our 1990s vantage point the dilemmas and achievements of women, of African Americans, and of representative men seem especially compelling in the American literature of the late nineteenth century. This formative period also challenges us to do justice to the intertwining of literature and social and political history and culture.English majors only, Registration Period 1. Texts: Twain, Puddn'head Wilson; Chesnutt, Marrow of Tradition; Wharton, House of Mirth; DuBois, Writings; Sinclair, The Jungle; Zinn, People's History of the United States.

354 A (American Literature: The Early Modern Period)
Dy 10:30
J. Griffith
We'll read and discuss an assortment of novels and short stories by American authors writing in the first half of the twentieth century. Students will be expected to attend class regularly, keep up with reading assignments, and take part in open discussion. Written work will consist entirely of a series of between five and ten brief in-class essays written in response to study questions handed out in advance. Texts: William Faulkner, Go Down, Moses; Zora Neale Hurston, Their Eyes Were Watching God; Ernest Hemingway, For Whom the Bell Tolls; Richard Wright, Uncle Tom's Children; John Steinbeck, The Long Valley; Sherwood Anderson, Winesburg, Ohio; Eudora Welty, Thirteen Stories; Sinclair Lewis, Elmer Gantry.

354 YA (American Literature: The Early Modern Period)
MW 4:30-6:20 pm
Wald
[Literary responses to the disillusionment after World War I, experiments in form and in new ideas of a new period. Works by such writers as Anderson, Toomer, Cather, O'Neill, Frost, Pound, Eliot, Cummings, Hemingway, Fitzgerald, Faulkner, Stein, Hart Crane, Stevens, and Porter.] Evening Degree students only, Registration Periods 1 & 2. Texts: Nathaniel West, Day of the Locust; Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby; Hemingway, In Our Time; Yezievska, Bread Givers; Larsen, Passing & Quicksand; photocopied course packet; selected films.

358 A (Literature of Black Americans)
TTh 1:30-3:20
Eversley
This course will consider developments in the writing by African Americans produced after World War II. In addition to questions of race, we will explore considerations of gender, literary representation, and history. We will read texts within their historical contexts, relevant literary criticism, and against other developments in art and in film. Among others, we will study works by Richard Wright, James Baldwin, Chester Himes, Alice Walker, Gordon Parks and Gayle Jones. In addition to reading assignments, there will be a few film screenings. Students will be expected to participate in class discussions, group work, a reading journal as well as a mid-term and a final. (Offered jointly with AFRAM 358.) English majors only, Registration Period 1. Texts: James Baldwin, Giovanni's Room; The Evidence of Things Not Seen; Ralph Ellison, Shadow and Act; Richard Wright, Black Boy; Chester Himes, Lonely Crusade; James McPhearson, Elbow Room; optional: V.Smith, Not Just Race, Not Just Gender; S. Hartman, Scenes of Subjection; A. Rampersad, Race Consciousness; P. Beswick, Issues of Blackness; C. W. Mills, Blackness Visible; S. Delaney, Silent Interviews.

359 U (Contemporary American Indian Literature)
MW 5-6:50 pm
Colonnese
American Indians have been portrayed in thousands of books and movies and many or most of these portrayals have been unsympathetic, culturally biased, and inaccurate. During this century, American Indian authors have used the artistic form of the novel in an act of resistance to regain Indian identity. This course will examine some of these novels in terms of the statements each makes about Indian identity. The course will involve two in-class tests, a short analysis assignment, and a small group presentation. Meets with AIS 377U. English majors only, Registration Period 1

363 A (Literature and the Other Arts & Disciplines)
MW 9:30-11:20
Crane
American Cultural Jurisprudence in the Early Republic. In this course we will be considering notions of justice, citizenship, and public discourse in the early republic. We will examine such texts as The Federalist Papers, Thomas Paine's Common Sense, Thomas Jefferson's Notes on the State of Virginia, and the U.S. Constitution. Much of our investigation will focus on the rhetoric of civic virtue and political membership. Texts: Hamilton, et al., The Federalist Papers; Jefferson, Notes on the State of Virginia; Gates, The Classic Slave Narratives; Walkes & Garnet, The Appeal; Paine, Common Sense, The Rights of Man, and Other Essential Writings; photocopied course packet.

370 A (English Language Study)
MW 9:30-11:20
Tollefson
This course is an introduction to major issues in English language study, with an emphasis on issues that are important for English teachers. We will especially focus on the links between language and society. Major topics will include language varieties in school settings (including the Ebonics controversy); the official English movement; language acquisition; gender and language; and language change. Text: Virginia P. Clark, Paul A. Eschholz, & Alfred F. Rosa, eds., Language: Introductory Readings.

(Note: In Winter 1999, ENGL 370 will be taught in conjunction with ENGL 373; concurrent enrollment in both ENGL 370 and 373 will be required. Students wishing to take ENGL 373 in Winter should not take ENGL 370 in Autumn, but wait and sign up for both ENGL 370 and ENGL 373 in Winter.)

381 A (Advanced Expository Writing)
MW 8:30-9:50
Chait
Writing Beyond the Academy. This course focuses on the transference of rhetorical strategies and stylistic techniques from the classroom to the "working" world outside. We will study the particular requirements of expository writing in Journalism, Education and Public Relations and explore the applicability to these fields of skills gained in producing standard research papers in the university. With this latter operation under our belt, we then will add the new skills specific to textual practice in each discipline. We will concentrate especially on tailoring texts to individual audiences and devote class time to honing the mechanical and argumentative techniques needed to reach them. This accretion of past to present skills should prepare students well for writing beyond the academy. No texts. English majors only, Registration Period 1.

381 B (Advanced Expository Writing)
TTh 12:30-1:50
Freind
The subject around which this class will revolve is the Vietnam War. Instead of focusing on purely historical texts, we'll be examining a range of sources, including films, personal narratives, poems and short stories. Likewise, instead of examining the conflict from an exclusively American point of view, we'll be looking at the experiences of the Vietnamese leadership, refugees, African-American soldiers, reporters and others. This will help to provide a context for discussing of how the "history" of the Vietnam War has always been much closer to a "story," that is, to a narrative with clearly defined heroes and villains, and with a variety of lessons and morals. That will provide a productive context for working toward the main goal of this class, which is to hone your writing skills. Assignments will consist of four short papers of at least a page, two papers of at least five pages, and a final research paper of eight pages. English majors only, Registration Period 1. Texts: Tim O'Brien, The Things They Carried; photocopied course packet.

383 A (Intermediate Verse Writing)
MW 1:30-2:50
Dunlop
No writing class can provide the essentials (of imagination, eyes and ear, etc.), but this one will try to encourage them. What a class can provide is improved technique, but this can only be acquired by practice: one learns by doing. Therefore, there'll be a lot of writing--in the shape of specific exercises as well as original work. No heavy seriousness: light verse (which depends for its success on technical dexterity) much encouraged. Prerequisite: ENGL 283. Text: Hollander, Rhyme's Reason.

383 B (Intermediate Verse Writing)
TTh 11:30-12:50
Fuhrman
Intensive study of the ways and means of making a poem. Further development of fundamental skills. Emphasis on revision. Prerequisite: ENGL 283. No texts.

384 A (Intermediate Short Story Writing)
MW 1:30-2:50
Stoberock
ENGL 384 continues and extends your ongoing practice in the writing and close readings of short stories. The course format is a writing workshop and focuses on the process of writing and revising the short story form. Each student will be asked to complete two short stories and a final revision of one of those stories, to write peer critiques for each story that is workshopped in class, to prsesent a story from The Art of the Tale, and to write a final self-evaluation. Prerequisite: ENGL 284. Text: Daniel Halpern, The Art of the Tale.

384 B (Intermediate Short Story Writing)
TTh 3:30-4:50
Johnson
[Exploring and developing continuity in the elements of fiction writing. Methods of extending and sustaining plot, setting, character, point of view, and tone. Prerequisite: ENGL 284.] Texts: John Gardner, The Art of Fiction; Delbanco & Goldstein, eds., Writers and Their Craft; Northrop Frye, The Educated Imagination.

AUTUMN 1998 300-Level Courses

AUTUMN 1998
300-Level Courses