College Lit Syllabus

Course Title: College Literature

This course addresses the following critical thinking skills: identifying and differentiating questions, problems and arguments; evaluating the appropriateness of various methods of reasoning and verification; identifying and assessing stated and unstated assumptions; critically comparing different points of view; formulating questions and problems; constructing and developing cogent arguments; discussing alternative points of view; evaluating the quality of evidence and reasoning.

CMU General Education Goals: Students successful in English 150 and 132 will be able to:

• • think critically and creatively

  • communicate effectively in the English language.

  • reflect on some of the great moral, ethical, and philosophical questions that have endured through the ages

  • evince some knowledge of the origins of their culture and the existence of others

  • appreciate the contributions of literature to our perception of ourselves and our world.

CMU English Department Goals: Students in English 150 and 132 will receive instruction and practice in the writing process (including idea generation, pre-writing, revision, and editing); understanding audience and voice; composing an essay around a significant point; using specific details and examples to develop an idea; understanding the structure and organization of paragraphs and essays; writing good introductions and conclusions; summarizing articles and essays; producing essays free of distracting mechanical errors; and using MLA style.

Grading:

I do not grade individual pieces of writing. My feedback will give you guidance for revision and editing. We will correspond about each piece of writing you do, and you will collect them into a portfolio which will comprise 40% of your grade, determined each at midterm and end of semester.

You'll write each day in your journal. I will collect that and scan it periodically. It amounts to 10% of your grade.

We write a reading response every couple of weeks. This amounts to 10% of your grade.

The remaining 40% comes from tests and quizzes, homework and classwork.

Grades are determined on the conventional 100 point scale:

100 A 90 B 80 C 70 D 60 F

Course Expectations:

This is a college-level course. The demands are great, and they are variable according to the fluency with which you read and write. The course demands a similar volume of work to that which you will encounter in a college course, a similar level of commitment. An average student should expect to put in an hour each night, sometimes more. Students who are not doing the work may be removed from the class at the discretion of the instructor. But you have chosen this class because you desire the fun and challenge of intellectual work and play. Enjoy! and, at all times, respect and take care of yourself and each other in the often exhilarating, sometimes frustrating process of learning and growing. Be here, on time and prepared. Put your heart and soul into the work, and find the joy in doing so.

Some assignments—reading logs, for instance—are regularly scheduled and ongoing. Some are isolated and one-of-a-kind. But most assignments—reading an act of a Shakespeare play, for instance, or writing a draft of a paper—are cumulative, leading to larger assignments. It is very important to keep up. You will receive 10 points for homework completed satisfactorily by the start of class, 8 points for homework completed by 3:50 pm on the due date, or 6 points for homework completed before 8:30 am the next morning. After that, you still need to do it, but you don’t get the free points for keeping up. In cases of excused absence, show me the homework outside of class time if possible; missed quizzes can be made up during the homeroom immediately following the quiz.

If you bomb a quiz or test or miss a homework (it occasionally happens), take immediate advantage of the EXTRA CREDIT policy: attend a play, poetry reading, or other teacher-approved cultural event, write a review, attach the ticket and/or program if you have it, and earn up to 10 points. I will give you guidelines for your review. No limit on this extra credit!

Materials:

You will need the following supplies with you every day:

Journal Looseleaf section Relevant texts

Pen or pencil Chromebook

Integrity:

Your grade makes very little difference in your life in the long term. Your integrity makes every difference. I take very seriously those rare instances when a student is not entirely honest with me. Academic dishonesty, cheating, plagiarism, cribbing from Cliff or Sparky or other simplistic resources—all these phenomena short-circuit your process of learning and sabotage our relationship. Do not compromise. Be scrupulously truthful.

Plagiarism means an automatic zero for the assignment, with possible further disciplinary consequences. In college a first offense can get you kicked out of school. We will certainly discuss how to avoid it.

Schedule:

Consult Schoology and the course website, which will be maintained with all assignments, resources, and due dates: https://sites.google.com/site/englishouray/courses-of-study/college-english

An outline of the year, by semester. Each assignment will be presented in much greater specificity as we go, but in general, expect to be writing about four formal essays of 800-1500 words each semester, in addition to regular in-class essays and journal entries. Also, we’ll write informally about literature in various modes: annotating, reflecting, conversing online, and so on.

English 150: Introduction to Literature

Six informal Reading Responses.

Meanwhile:

I. What is literature? Why does it matter? (texts: The Book of Job, Oedipus Rex)

A discussion centered on the literary tradition, universal themes, questions of translation. An introduction to the problem of interpretation.

Essay 1: According to these texts, what function does suffering serve?

II. How do we read? What is interpretation? (texts: poetry from the Bedford anthology)

An introduction to the vocabulary of interpretation, and an overview of critical approaches.

Essay 2: A close reading of a poem.

III. Why read hard stuff? (texts: King Lear and As You Like it)

A look at how structure works to shape meaning. Application of the various critical approaches.

Essay 3: “the world in a grain of sand”: how does one passage illuminate the themes of the whole?

Essay 4: How are similar themes presented differently through comic and tragic lenses?

(Mini-unit: using your voice in college and scholarship essays... essay 5 - Personal Essay)

IV. Roland Barthes asserted that “literature is the question minus the answer” Are there answers? (texts: Our Town and The Death of Ivan Ilyich)

Considering the process by which we use literature to construct understanding.

Essay 6: What answers do Wilder and Tolstoy suggest about the meaning of life?

English 132: Survey of Western World Literature II

Six informal Reading Responses.

Meanwhile:

V. Defining four eras: Renaissance, Reason (Enlightenment, Neoclassicism), Romanticism, and Modernism (texts: poetry and short fiction from the Bedford anthology and the web)

A conversation on questions of technique. A close look at choices authors make, and how they reflect the currents of their respective eras.

Essay 7: Explication of a poem or story in terms of its era. (750-1250 words).

VI. What is the function of literature? (texts: The Tempest, Candide, Frankenstein and Heart of Darkness) A discussion of political, social, and individual causes and ends of literature. Integrating critical voices.

Essay 8: What is the function of one of these texts, and how did the author make that happen? Research and citation. (1250-1750 words).

VII. Connections: Living as a literate human. (texts: Brave New World and/or All the King's Men)

A discussion of the conversations great books are having with each other, and with us.

Project: In creative OR critical mode, in prose OR poetry or any other medium, reflect on how two great authors are responding to each other, and show where they push your own thinking.

VIII. Independent work: One significant text from one era, with critical articles corresponding to chosen text

Applying critical approaches, and evaluating one’s personal critical bent. Join the conversation that has been raging for the past few hundred years.

Essay 9: Critical survey: what do critics say about this book, and how do they affect your thinking? Arrive at a significant thesis, and support it in dialectic with professional critics. (2500-3500 words).

Essay 10: Final exam... Write an essay in which you show—WITHOUT TELLING—one deep, important lesson or change that has taken place in you anytime over the past three or four years. Use NARRATIVE, IMAGERY, and METAPHOR. Quote at least two of the books you read for this class (so, ALLUSION as well!), integrating those quotations into the story you’re telling, and citing them gracefully. (1000-1500 words).