COURSE DESCRIPTIONS
Here are the course descriptions for some of the Graduate English courses to be taught in Spring 2011. Descriptions will be added as faculty make them available.
ENG 514: English Medieval Literature
Instructor: Patrick McBrine
This course offers a selective survey of late Medieval Literature from a variety of texts and genres. We will begin the semester with a two-week overview of Old English literature and the transition to the Middle English period. This introductory context will provide a clear sense of how Middle English is 'different' from Old English in terms of its language and subject matter. These Old English texts will be read in translation. From Week Three we will enter into a study of late Medieval English literature, beginning with religious and secular lyric (i.e. the Virgin Mary vs. 'Jolly Jankin') and then move on to a variety of other writings that will include the anonymous ballads, Chaucer's Troilus and Criseyde, Sir Gawain and the Green Knight and Malory's Morte d'Arthur, which concerns Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table. Language expectations: No previous knowledge of Middle English is expected or required, but we will read all texts in the original. That said, our readings will be graded for difficulty and we will begin with a review of Middle English grammar followed by some relatively 'easy' texts.
ENG 538: Victorian Novel
Instructor: Nicole Fluhr
This course provides an introduction to novels of the Victorian era (1832 - 1901), a period when the novel was the most popular literary form in England. We will read Victorian novels within their cultural context, asking questions about the social, political, scientific, and religious forces that helped to shape this literature. Rising literacy, innovative publication techniques, and the circulating library meant that nineteenth-century novelists had bigger audiences than ever before, and writers used the form to intervene in political debates, celebrating or censuring their rapidly changing society. Our efforts at textual analysis and interpretation will draw on a range of critical, historical, and theoretical approaches to this literature. The class will be equally committed to exploring the novels' social and political investments and to examining their formal features and innovations. The Victorian era was a period of enormous certainties and enormous doubts; the texts we will read not only offer substantial (in more senses than one!) pleasures to readers, but also allow us to trace the genesis of literary, social, political, and ethical debates that continue to be hotly contested today. Authors we will read may include Emily Bronte, Charles Dickens, Wilkie Collins, George Eliot (Marian Evans), Olive Schreiner, and Thomas Hardy.
ENG 562: Early American Novel
Instructor: Scott Ellis
At the core of many early American novels is an attention to citizenship, settlement, and land ownership. As a new country, the United States was in a constant state of self definition, and as the novels from this period demonstrate, authors viewed this process and these issues from a variety of perspectives. In our course, we will examine how early American novels shaped and were shaped by the debates over citizenship and settlement, particularly as these issues relate to experiences of American Indians. To do so, we will examine novels from such writers as Charles Brockden Brown, Washington Irving, James Fenimore Cooper, and Catherine Maria Sedgwick.
ENG 579: Comparative Studies of the Essay Spring 2011, Mondays 5:00 - 7:30 p.m. Instructor: Dr. Holly Crawford - Dean, School of Graduate Studies
Christopher Hitchens (British-American, 1948-present), essayist, biographer, critic, journalist, and observer, has, over the past four decades, produced a large body of written work that not only celebrates the richness of the English language, but also has earned him the honor of being named one of the world's 'top public intellectuals' by Foreign Policy and Prospect magazines.
This course uses Hitchens' work as a focal point to examine not only the genre of the essay, but also other genres (e.g. commentary, article, memoir) in an effort to gain an understanding of the role and nature of the essay in the latter 20th/early 21st centuries and how the use of the essay contributed to Hitchens' ascendency to 'public intellectual.' Lastly, the essays/works of other writers (past and present), including but not limited to Chomsky, Greer, Hemingway, Reed, Carlisle, Rushdie, Orwell, and Kristeva will also be considered for comparative, contextual, and historical purposes.
As this is a seminar course, students will be expected to read widely and contribute significantly to weekly class discussions. Students will be assessed based on the following tasks:
Active participation: 15% Online postings (6-500 word posts): 30% (5% for each post) Seminar paper proposal: 5% Seminar paper: 50%