Reading/Writing/Texts
Course Description:
The course introduces you to interpretive and rhetorical theory and practice through selective study of deconstructive, feminist, new historicist, and psychoanalytic criticism. Through substantial writing, close reading, and much discussion, you shall also explore the forms and functions that distinguish poetry, drama, and fiction, as well as strategies and conventions that guide research and scholarship in English textual and literary studies. You will learn to write interpretive, critical, and scholarly essays. You may also experiment with imitating differerent literary forms and revising specific works. Our class discussion will include your participation on a newsgroup forum to share your responses to course material and others' ideas. Written work will entail a couple of short papers and a couple of longer essays (or the option of a critical project), and at least eight journal entries (about 125 words each) on the newsgroup, covering selected texts and topics. There are no graded exams.
Our readings include older and contemporary poetry; a popular late 18th-century British epistolary novel about the "history of a young lady's entrance into the world" by Jane Austen's precursor, Frances Burney; recent prize-winning short stories; a powerful sexual and political drama by a world-renowned Chilean playwright; and a prize-winning contemporary novel about love, cultural strife, identity, law, and death involving suspicious circumstances, set in the Puget Sound. You'll explore a lot about reading, writing, culture, and the self (yourself!) in this class. I expect lively conversations and hope you'll join in.
Required Texts:
Green, Keith and Jill LeBihan. Critical Theory and Practice: A Coursebook. Routledge, 1996.
Schakel, Peter and Jack Ridl. Approaching Poetry: Perspectives and Responses. St. Martin's P, 1997.
Burney, Fanny. Evelina. Ed. Edward A. Bloom. Oxford, 1982.
Guterson, David. Snow Falling on Cedars. Vintage, 1995.
Dorfman, Ariel. Death and the Maiden. Penguin, 1991.
Prize Stories 1995: The O. Henry Awards. Ed. William Abrahams. Anchor/Doubleday, 1995.
Requirements:
1. Participation in class and group discussion (including informal writing). Please take advantage of the opportunity small groups may provide to discuss your reactions, share your insights and research, and to listen and reply to others' ideas. I shall call regularly upon groups to facilitate class discussion, with each group leading off discussion (10 minutes) on specific texts and critical readings three times during the term. On these days I expect the group scheduled for that day to be prepared to lead off our discussion by presenting their positions on the material (with some brief summary, focus on key points in the reading, perhaps some incorporation of secondary criticism or historical research), or you might consider the pedagogical or practical implications of what we're discussing. I hope this strategy will enable you to move the class in directions you find most helpful, give you opportunities to develop critical skills through collaboration, and prevent me from dominating class discussion while still providing occasions for sharing my perspectives with you.
2. Participation via local online discussion newsgroup, with special emphasis upon focused journal entries posted to the newsgroup. I encourage you to contribute a paragraph or more to the conversation once a week, posting your entry on the current week's texts and topics by 10 a.m. each Wednesday morning. You are expected to post eight succinct yet substantive journal entries (approximately 125 words each) on selected figures/works over the course of the semester. I will evaluate and grade four entries by midterm, and evaluate the rest just before the end of the semester.
3. Four double-spaced essays (may include one critical project): the first, 1100 words, the second, 1300-1400 words., then 1800-2000 words and 2500 words respectively for the last two. More on these later, but in general these essays enable you to explore an interpretive/contextual problem, try out a critical approach/hypothesis, and help to express ideas prompted by your reading and discussion of a work from our syllabus or course texts. I am interested in seeing the ways that you select, define, and engage questions and contradictions, and I attend to the clarity, imagination, and grace that you demonstrate in presenting your topic, thesis, and argument. I do not always expect an essay to conclude by "solving" such problems or by "proving" your thesis; I do hope that you address an interesting topic in thoughtful and useful ways. I welcome discussing other possibilities for completing this assignment. Please feel invited to confer with me during the writing process.
4. Prospectus (approx. 400 words, single-spaced) for Essay 4--ungraded, but potentially useful and important for consulting with me on your final major assignment.
5. Due dates: All required work is due at the beginning of class on the due date--work turned in later will be marked late and graded accordingly. All required graded written work will be downgraded one notch (for example, B+ to B, converted to points for each assignment) for each weekday late (not just days classes meet but counting just one day for a weekend). Work more than a week late will not be accepted. I will grant short extensions for medical and family emergencies--but talk with me as soon as possible to request an extension. ALWAYS KEEP EXTRA COPIES OF YOUR WORK.
6. Attendance is required--your in class participation is a crucial part of a collective learning experience. Excellent attendance is rewarded; poor attendance is penalized. If you have no absences by the term's end (excused or not), you will receive five bonus points. With one absence you will receive three extra points. Two to four absences will not affect your semester grade. But five unexcused absences will lower your semester total by thirteen points with eight point reductions for each additional absence (for example, six absences=minus 21 points and so on). Almost all absences will be counted--excused or not--if something extraordinary occurs, talk to me.
7. Grades: Eight Newsgroup journal entries (5 pts each, but I'll assign up to 20 points collectively for the first five, and up to 20 pts. for the last five; Essay 1 (50 points); Essay 2 (75 points); Essay 3 (100 points); Essay 4 (125 points). These required assignments add up to a maximum of 390 points. Thus 351-390 points equals an A, 312-350 equals a B, 273-311 equals a C, 234-272 equals a D, and anything below 234 merits an F. I shall also reserve a potential five bonus points based on my perceptions of the strength of your participation and efforts over the semester.
8. Office hours. I encourage you to confer with me--especially before assignments are due--to talk about your interests, intentions, and writing strategies. We shall arrange to meet at least once during the semester, probably in March or early April, to discuss your progress. My office is not accessible to the handicapped, so please let me know if you need to meet me elsewhere. If you cannot make my regular hours, we can usually arrange another time. I also welcome communicating with you by e-mail (sflores@uidaho.edu, or just sflores if you are on any Nest machine, e.g., Raven).
English 210.03 Spring 1997 Syllabus
January
13 "Tropism XVIII"; poems (handout)
15 "Language, linguistics, and literature" (Critical Theory & Practice 2-25); consider questions i-ii (21), moreover, does "literary" language differ from "ordinary" language?
17 Ch. 1 cont'd. (CTP 25-43); questions ii-vi (35-36) and also question i (37): define the word "bachelor."
22 Newsgroup entry #1 due; "Structures of literature" (CTP 50-75);
24 Ch. 2 cont'd. (CTP 76-87)
27 Ch. 1, Approaching Poetry
29 Ch. 12, (AP 222-47); "Writing Short Papers About Poetry" (AP 454-68); recommended: Poger, "Responding to Poetry" (Reading, Writing, and the Study of Literature 42-58--on reserve)
31 "Literature and history" (CTP 92-116); Greenblatt, "Culture" (Critical Terms for Literary Study 225-32--on reserve; recommended: Kavanagh, "Ideology" CTLS 306-20)
February
3 Peer-edit Essay 1(two copies to share); Ch. 3 cont'd. (CTP 116-36); recommended: Warhol, "Writing Critical Essays" (Reading, Writing, and the Study of Literature 95-111)--on reserve)
5 Newsgroup entry #2 due; Ch. 2 (AP 21-33)
7 Essay 1 due (on poetry, 1100 words); Ch. 5 (AP 65-80)
10 "Subjectivity, psychoanalysis and criticism" (CTP 139-61)
12 Ch. 4 cont'd. (CTP 161-77); Dorfman, Death and the Maiden
14 Death and the Maiden (film); recommended: Meltzer, "Unconscious" (Critical Terms for Literary Study 147-62--on reserve)
19 Newsgroup #3 due; "Reading, writing and reception" (CTP 183-206); Death and the Maiden cont'd.
21 Ch. 5 cont'd. (CTP 206-221); Death and the Maiden cont'd.
24 "Feminism, literature and criticism" (CTP 228-253); Nixon, "The Women Come and Go" (Prize Stories 1995 1-19); recommended: Nixon, "Risk" (Prize Stories 1993--on reserve)
26 Newsgroup #4 due; Ch. 6 cont'd. (CTP 253-65); Baker, "Loving Wanda Beaver" (Prize Stories 1995 260-74); recommended: Baker, "Better Be Ready 'Bout Half Past Eight" (Prize Stories 1994--on reserve)
28 Jehlen, "Gender" (Critical Terms for Literary Study 263-73--on reserve)
March
3 Peer-edit Essay 2; Guterson, Snow Falling on Cedars
5 Snow Falling on Cedars
7 Essay 2 due (1300-1400 words, on play, or poetry, short fiction, critical theory); Snow Falling on Cedars (have at least chs. 1-15 read by now)
10 Snow Falling on Cedars
12 Newsgroup #5 due; Snow Falling on Cedars
14 Snow Falling on Cedars (have novel finished by now)
24 "Cultural Identity, literature, criticism" (CTP 271-95); SFC cont'd.
26 Ch. 7 cont'd. (CTP 295-305)
28 Burney, Evelina
31 Evelina
April
2 Newsgroup #6 due; Evelina (have Volume 1 read by now)
4 Evelina ; Ch. 14 (AP 266-92)
7 Peer-edit Essay #3; Evelina
9 Evelina (have Volume 2 read by now)
11 Essay #3 due (1800-2000 words, either this essay or the last essay must address one of the novels in this class)
14 Epstein, "Evelina: Protecting the Heroine" (Ch. 3, The Iron Pen: Frances Burney and the Politics of Women's Writing--book on reserve)
16 Newsgroup #7 due (abstract and response to a critical essay on Evelina or Burney)
18 Evelina; Montrose, "New Historicisms" (Redrawing the Boundaries 392-418--on reserve)
21 Clayton, "Talking to Charlie" (Prize Stories 1995 20-36)
23 Newsgroup #8 due; Hardwick, "Shot: A New York Story" (Prize Stories 1995 37- 51)
25 Adams, "The Haunted Beach" (Prize Stories 1995 64-79)
28 short fiction--TBA, your choice
30 poetry--TBA, your choice
May
2 short fiction--TBA, your choice
5 Peer-edit Essay 4
7 poetry--TBA
9 Essay 4 due (2500 words, on a novel if Essay 3 wasn't on a novel)
14 Final meeting, 1-3pm
Advice on Journal Entries Writing Assignment for Essay 1 An Example of Essay 1:"Consequences of Enslavement" by George Williams An Example of Essay 1:"Just Suppose, Juxtapose" by Clark VanVooren An Example of Essay 1:"[on Olds' poem The Victims]" by Holly Riedelbach Writing Assignment for Essay 2 An Example of Essay 2:"Transexuals, the Eternal Feminine, and the Birth of Zoe" by Carissa Neff Click here to access the newsgroup for this course (uidaho.class.eng.210.sf). Available only to users on the UI campus, and intended for those enrolled in this class. Go to Stephan Flores' Home Page.