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ETexts:
The Norton Anthology of American Literature, Shorter 7th Edition, Vol 2.
Earnest Hemingway, The Sun Also Rises, Scribner, 2006.
Don DeLillo, White Noise, Viking Critical Library, Penguin Books, 1998.Leaving Kansas, DuckNuts Inc., 2007.
Aims:
- To gain familiarity with a wide sampling of diverse American works and authors from the Civil War to the present. We'll skim-read many for their general flavor; others we'll read and discuss very closely.
- To gain an introductory understanding of the history of ideas as represented in the Civil War-to-Postmodern canon.
- To gain an introductory understanding of ongoing arguments about the canon itself.
- To gain practice applying a variety of literary critical lenses.
- To challenge your critical thinking and intellectual growth.
- To build on your understanding and enjoyment of literature generally.
Grades and Required Coursework
Final grades are based on a simple tally of points earned for completed semester assignments. Each assignment includes its own criteria. The final point scale looks like this:
88-100 pts. = A
75-87 pts. = B
62-74 pts. = C
49-61 pts. = D
| Note: a very strong or weak Blackboard Thursday record (see below) may result in some adjustment of your numerical score. I.e., I may raise or lower your grade. (You'll be contacted early on if you're in danger of a lower grade due to weak Thursday work.) |
Each component of the course represents a distinct way of engaging the semester readings.
Critical Essay: 30 pts., 30%
The essay will require sustained attention to a particular work, author, or topic in the study of American literature. It will help you to engage course readings through well-organized, well-developed, and polished formal argument. It will also give you practice applying particular critical lenses to literature. Click here for full instructions.
Learning Log: 30 pts., 30% (aprx. 2 pts. per daily entry)
You will compile, over the course of the semester, a "log" of class notes for each Tuesday class session. For the first 5-15 minutes of each class, you'll write "sign-in notes," and for the final 5-15 minutes, you'll write "sign-out notes," based on specific instructions for any given session. You'll keep these compiled religiously in a folder.
The learning log will help you to reflect on, retain, and otherwise digest class lecture and discussion from week to week. It will also provide a record of your attendance and committment to reading assignments. AND: it will always provide you with something to say during discussion.
From time to time you'll hand in a given day's sign-in or sign-out notes to help me prepare for the next class and to see how you're doing with a particular subject. You'll also hand in your whole log once or twice during the semester for my feedback, then again with your portfolio at the end of the term.
Sign-in notes will typically include the following:
a) a summary of key points and activities from the previous week's class; and
b) some form of report and reflection on the current day's reading assignment.
Sign-out notes will typically include:
a) some form of reflection and report on that day's lecture and discussion (e.g., what was clearest, what is still fuzzy, questions you may have, ideas you are mulling, etc.); and
b) tasks you will set yourself for the coming week.
Note: it's important that you keep these sign-in/sign-out notes neatly compiled and dated throughout the term. If you miss a class, it's your responsibility to contact a couple classmates for help writing your learning log notes. Be sure, however, to strictly use your own words and to credit any help.
Blackboard Thursday: 20 pts., 20%
Portfolio: 20 pts, 20%Each student will be given a thread in the Blackboard Thursday Forum. This is where you'll post work completed on Thursdays, when we do not meet face-to-face. Blackboard Thursday work will typically be contemplative and exploratory. It is intended to help you grapple with and become absorbed in course readings through "all-over writing" (kind of like Jackson Pollock's "all-over painting" or action painting...well, sort of): micro essays, worksheets, exercises, freewriting, brief research, asynchronous discussion, creative writing, reverse-ekphrasis, and/or any number of looney but legal lollapaloozi. Some collaborative group work may be included. You'll receive a check for each assignment, then a score later in the term (see below). You'll also receive my feedback in the form of thread replies at intervals throughout the term.
A very strong or weak record of Thursday work may result in my adjusting your numerical score for the semester. I.e., I may raise or lower your grade. (You'll be contacted early on if you're in danger of a lower grade due to weak Thursday work.)
At the end of the semester you'll hand in a hardcopy portfolio which includes: 1) your completed essay; 2) your learning log; 3) a selection of your five best Blackboard Thursday pieces; and 4) a reflective letter to your instructor. Each item will receive its content score (see above), plus 5 points each for presentation in the portfolio. The letter will in a sense function as your "final exam." Full instructions are forthcoming.
Course Policies
A Word to English Majors!Saying something is important in this class. Click here for more info.
Attendance and participation are also extremely important . If you MUST miss a class, FIRST contact at least two classmates for full notes and instructions. (You'll need this information for, among other things, your sign-in notes at the next class meeting.) Then contact me if you have any specific questions.
Please arrive on time. Late arrivals are intrusive and inconsiderate, and will cause you to miss or write incomplete sign-in notes (among other things). If you MUST arrive late, be sure to get full notes and instructions from a classmate after class for the time you missed. Note also that, if you arrive late, you will have to stop work on that day's sign-in notes by the announced end-time along with everyone else.
Departmental Attendance Policy:
In compliance with NDSU University Senate Policy, Section 333: Class Attendance and Policy and Procedure, located at <http://www.ndsu.nodak.edu/policy/333.htm>, the English Department has established the following attendance policy. All English Department courses require active learning. Students are expected to speak, listen, and contribute. Therefore, prompt, regular attendance is required. Students who miss more than four weeks of class during the standard academic semester (e.g. twelve 50 minute classes, eight 75 minute classes, or their equivalent) will not pass the course. Moreover, each student is accountable for all work missed because of absence, and instructors have no obligation to make special arrangements for missed work. Additional attendance requirements may be implemented at the discretion of the individual instructor.
During their senior year, English majors generally enroll in the English Capstone course (Engl 467), during which they assemble a portfolio containing representative written work from NDSU English courses. The English Department evaluates these portfolios to assess its undergraduate programs, analyzing how student work meets departmental outcomes. In order to facilitate the preparation of senior portfolios, English majors are encouraged to save copies of their written work (in electronic and hard copy) each semester.
Special Needs
Students with disabilities or special needs: please speak with me ASAP so that I can assist you.
Reading and Study Habits
Though poetry assignments may seem short in number of pages, you are unlikely to understand and fully appreciate any poem until you have read it at least three times. An apparently short poetry assignment of three pages may actually take you longer to read fully than a 20-page prose assignment. Read with your pen in hand, take notes, underline and look up unfamiliar words, and note questions and ideas you want to run by us all in class at a later point. If you have trouble understanding something, mark the point at which you first became confused.
For every hour you spend in class, you're expected to do 2-3 hours work, reading, and preparation outside of class to meet course expectations. These numbers are considered average at the university level. If you are to receive an excellent or above average grade in this course, this at-home work is critical.
English Liberal Arts Major Outcomes
- Outcome 1: English majors will be able to write and speak effectively for a variety of purposes and audiences in a variety of genres and media.
- Outcome 2: English majors will be able to read (analyze, interpret, critique, evaluate) written and visual texts.
- Outcome 3: English majors will be able to conduct research effectively using a variety of research strategies and sources and documenting their sources according to standard guidelines.
- Outcome 4: English majors will be able to manage sophisticated writing and research projects, planning, documenting, completing, and assessing work on-time and within the constraints of the project.
- Outcome 5: English majors will be familiar with a variety of theoretical lenses, learning to recognize them at the 200-level and learning to use them by the 400-level.
- Outcome 6. English majors will be familiar with literatures as culturally and historically embedded practices. This outcome includes goals such as familiarity with major writers, genres, and periods, and technologies of writing.
- Outcome 7: English majors will develop professionalism exhibited in such qualities as self-direction, cooperation, civility, reliability, and care in editing and presenting the final product.
Code of Conduct
All work in this course must be completed in a manner consistent with NDSU University Senate Policy, Section 335: Code of Academic Responsibility and Conduct. Click here for full details.
Any instances of deliberate plagiarism in this section of English 271 will result in an F for the course.
Disclaimer! I believe in the creative as well as practical value of spontaneity. I also believe that disorder is always there, lurking in any plan or scheme no matter how carefully devised— especially my own! I therefore reserve the right, if the occasion warrants it, and with ample notice to you, of course, to alter some of the details on this page as the semester progresses. Fundamental aims and requirements will remain unchanged.
Paper-Writing Resources (Grammar, Style, Manuscript Formatting, Documentation)
"No iron can pierce the heart with such force as a period put just at the right place" (Isaac Babel, qtd. by Carver, "In Writing").
Bedford St. Martin's Research and Documentation Online (click on "Humanities," and then select from the drop-down box what you'd like to read, such as "MLA Manuscript Format" or "MLA In-Text Citation." Explore around--everything you need to know about finding and documenting sources is here, as well as paper conventions.)
Peer Critique Form for Critical Essay Drafts
Guide to Grammar and Writing Online
Other Resources
Basic Conventions for Writing Essays About Literature
Glossary of Literary Terms (free, through GaleNet)
| Prepared by Cindy Nichols Last modified: April 20, 2010 |
