English 126B: Genre-Studies in Literature: Writing, Reading, Life, and Meaning
Welcome to the seminar, to the University, and to the beginning of your college career.
My office: Wyatt Hall, 336
My office-hours: Monday and Wednesday, 2:00-3:45 p.m., and by appointment.
Telephone: x3434 (my office number); x3235 (number of English-Department secretary).
Electronic Mail: ostrom@ups.edu
Home Page: www.ups.edu/faculty/ostrom/ A copy of this syllabus will be posted on the home page. Information about my academic background, publications, and other work also appears there.
The University of Puget Sound does not discriminate in education or employment on the basis of sex, race, color, national origin, religion, creed, age, disability, marital or familial status, sexual orientation, Vietnam-era veteran status, gender identity, or any other basis prohibited by local, state, or federal laws. This policy complies with the spirit and the letter of applicable federal, state and local laws, including Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972, Sections 503 and 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, and the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990. Questions about the policy may be referred to the University's Director of Human Resources and Affirmative Action (253-879-3116) or the Office of Civil Rights, Department of Education, Washington, D.C. 20202.
We will study works from several different literary genres, including poetry, short fiction, the novel, and nonfiction (essay and book). However, in constructing the course, I did not assume that you intend to become English majors or English minors; indeed, I assumed that most of you may focus your studies outside of English. A main objective, then, is to use literature as a lens through which to perceive questions, topics, problems, and crises that are important regardless of what major you intend to pursue. A second objective is to examine arguments that works of literature implicitly advance and to improve our own capacity to speak and write arguments—reasoned claims supported by evidence and tailored to an audience.
Your college studies will be composed mainly of such arguments. In this case, the word “arguments” doesn’t mean squabbles or shouting matches but refers to claims people make about something and support with evidence, information, reasoning, and thoughtful presentation. Whatever you study, you will be encountering arguments of this kind. You will want to or be asked to analyze these, and you will want to or be asked to make your own arguments. One of the books we will use, They Say, I Say: The Moves That Matter in Academic Writing, demystifies this world of academic arguments.
If you complete it successfully, the seminar will also give you experience in some kinds of writing, speaking, and analysis you’ll be asked to do in college in the next few years and in the civic arena during and after your college career.
No doubt your writing, speaking, and analysis have developed substantially already in your dozen or so years of formal education. This course builds on that progress. Learning to think critically and creatively, to write well, and to speak effectively is a lifelong process. This course is one episode in the process.
The word “seminar” springs from a word that means “seed plot” or “garden.” Probably we won’t get around to any gardening this term, but in a figurative sense we’ll work closely together to cultivate ideas, arguments, and interpretations. Regular attendance, productive participation, and cooperation are essential to a seminar and to college, as they are to gardening.
One of several myths I hope we can dispel is that writing is a solitary act. You are responsible for what you write and when you turn it in, but experienced writers know that their work involves collaboration: seeking advice and knowing what to do with it; testing ideas and altering them; taking a piece of writing through several revisions; keeping the process flexible. The same can be said of speakers and the processes that lead to effective presentations.
EXPECTATIONS, PREFERENCES, THE WAY THINGS WORK
1. Come to class every session, and please come on time. Missing class can affect your grade severely and even result in dis-enrollment. This is simply the way things work at Puget Sound.
2. I prefer that you don't eat in class; every professor has his or her pet peeves; this happens to be mine. The occasional cup of coffee won't disturb me.
3. Listen well--to each other, to me, to someone whose ideas may be different from yours. You do not need to agree or even pretend to agree. Express opinions. But listen, too.
4. Keep up with the reading and contribute to class discussions. I can offer only so much inducement in the form of quizzes, tests, and making "participation" a significant determiner of your grade. The rest is up to you.
5. Make the most of essay assignments; temperamentally, some of you will like the earlier assignments more than the later ones, and vice versa. But one aim of the course is to give you the tools to negotiate kinds of writing with which you feel uncomfortable at first, so remain receptive. Take DUE DATES FOR DRAFTS as seriously as you take those for final versions. And take peer review seriously.
6. If you get behind in class, or feel overwhelmed by an assignment, or by your coursework in general, or if you do not understand something we have discussed, please see me sooner rather than later. Feeling confused or overwhelmed at college is not a weakness; in fact, it's fairly common, especially in the first semester. Missing class is one of the worst things you can do. Also, when you are under stress, do not allow yourself to be tempted to plagiarize.
7. If you bring a cell-phone to class, turn it off. Never send text-messages with or play games on the phone in class.
THE WRITING CENTER
The Center for Writing, Learning, and Teaching (Howarth Hall) is a service for all Puget Sound students who are working on papers. Its purpose is to help you get started, organize ideas, revise, and think about the rhetorical situation. It is certainly not a remedial center for so-called "problem" writers; it exists because all writing-project have problems that need solving.
I expect all of you to use the Center to help develop each essay, and the Center will also have consultants available to help you with oral presentations. Make visiting the Center part of your college routine. Don't expect your first visit to work miracles. It may take several visits to get used to the consultations. To make an appointment, visit the Center or call X3404. Toward the middle and end of the term, call well in advance.
Library
I strongly encourage you to familiarize yourself as early as possible with the library. Pay a visit to the reference section and chat with a reference librarian. Familiarize yourself with how to check out books and other materials. Learn how to navigate the in-house cataloging system (SIMON) and the system for getting materials from other libraries (ORBIS). Go to the “research gateway” online and explore some of the databases. Practice different ways of searching, particularly by Keyword, Title, and Author. The library’s research gateway should be your main portal to online research. Google, et al., should not be your main portal to online academic research.
Reading Out Loud
Often in class I will ask someone to read a passage or a poem out loud. Chiefly this is simply one way to focus our attention as we analyze a piece of writing and pursue a close-reading. It is not meant to put anyone on the spot, and we all understand that no one reads out loud perfectly. It’s just a task all of us, including me, will do.
As we build on what you already know and try to develop your writing, your grasp of rhetoric, and your oral presentations, we’ll spend time considering the following specific elements:
1. The need to consider interpretations, controversies, and issues from multiple perspectives—that is, to see complexities.
2. Persuasive strategies—including audience-analysis, solid reasoning, effective use of evidence, anticipating opposing arguments, and effective organization of ideas & topics.
3. Methods of evaluating arguments and texts. In many cases, using these methods will result in our having to change our minds. In other cases, we might be examining logical fallacies—intended or accidental mistakes in reasoning. And in still other cases, we will refine strategies for overcoming an initial resistance to a certain text. For example, what are some effective ways of analyzing a work that, initially, confuses or dissatisfies us?
4. Important conventions of standard written English—including a few aspects of grammar, punctuation, and diction (choice of words) that may still seem unclear to you.
5. Various oral and written composition strategies—ways of putting together successful essays and presentations. We’ll improve upon what you already know about drafting, revising, and editing. We’ll look at different ways to express a significant thesis or point of view, develop it clearly for a particular audience, and support it effectively using different narrative, expository, analytical, and persuasive modes. You’ve done much of this in high school already, so again, we’ll be moving from where you are now in your writing toward where you will need to be later in college.
6. Using source-materials in rhetorically effective ways and becoming more familiar
with appropriate, academically honest uses of sources. For example, how do
we determine which sources on the Internet are reliable and which ones aren’t? How
can we avoid not just obvious plagiarism but also unintentional plagiarism?
Writer’s/Reader’s Notebook
Please purchase a notebook that you will keep separate from your basic class-notebook. This writer’s/reader’s notebook will include short pieces in response to readings, pieces written in class (often exploratory or experimental), and pieces that are part of the process leading to essays. This notebook is evaluated on a Satisfactory/Unsatisfactory basis. Bring this notebook to class every day.
Approximate Breakdown of Grading
Participation: Attending class regularly and on time is a basic requirement of the class. Multiple absences and/or chronically arriving late to class may induce me to ask you to drop the course or to ask the Registrar to remove your name from the course-roster.
Active participation of the sort expected in college also amounts to about 20 per cent of your course grade. Such participation includes contributing to class-discussion, working in pairs and small groups, coming to class prepared, and so on. The writer’s/reader’s notebook will contribute to this participation-grade.
Essays: The essays you write will constitute 50 per cent of your grade, total. I will give you a written assignment for each essay, but for now, please know that you will need to submit essays in a manila folder. You will need to include all your rough drafts and notes (a “paper trail”); otherwise, I will not read your essay.
Oral presentations: The oral presentations you create and deliver will constitute 20 per cent of your grade.
Tests and quizzes will constitute approximately 10 per cent of your grade.
Required Texts
You must purchase these books, complete the assigned reading in them on time, and bring them to class on the appropriate days.
Gerald Graff and Cathy Birkenstein, They Say, I Say: The Moves That Matter in Academic Writing. New York: W. W. Norton, 2006.
Albert Camus, The Stranger (a novel), translated from the French by Matthew Ward. New York: Vintage, 1989. First published in 1946.
R.S. Gwynn, editor, Literature: A Pocket Anthology. New York: Pearson/Longman, 2006. Third edition.
Barbara Ehrenreich, Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America. New York: Owl Books, 2001.
Jane E. Aaron, The Little, Brown Compact Handbook. New York: Pearson/Longman, 2007. Sixth Edition.
Schedule of Class-Meetings, Assignments, and Topics
Please bring a copy of this syllabus to class each time, in case we need to make changes. Please bring the appropriate books and materials to each session, and always bring your Writer’s/Reader’s Notebook.
Monday, August 28. Overview of the course. Please read the syllabus carefully and begin to decide whether you want to remain in the course. Tuesday, September 5, is the last day to add a section of the Writing and Rhetoric Seminar, should you decide to drop this section. Writing and discussion, in class.
Wednesday, August 30. Beginning today and continuing for a while, we will read some poems carefully, partly to pursue the practice of analyzing complex language, but also to examine the arguments that poems make. We will also look at how writers use comparison, analogy, and allegory to advance arguments. For today, in Gwynn, please read “Sonnet 18” by William Shakespeare, “Garden,” by Thomas Campion, “The Pulley,” by George Herbert, “Brain,” by Emily Dickinson, “Design” and “The Road Not Taken,” by Robert Frost, “Next, Please,” by Philip Larkin, and “Litany,” by Billy Collins.
Friday, September 1. Continue discussing poems. For today, also read, in They Say, I Say, the “Preface” and “Introduction.” Be able to summarize the main objectives of the book. Also read the essay by Graff in the book, “Hidden Intellectualism,” which begins on p. 142. What is his main thesis? What are his other points?
Monday, September 4. Labor Day. No class-meeting.
Wednesday, September 6. Conclude the discussion of poems assigned on August 30. Essay assigned, discussed, begun. A discussion of the Center for Writing, Learning, and Teaching, and a discussion of plagiarism. For today, go to The Logger, on-line, and read the section on Academic Honesty, focusing especially on the Plagiarism section.
Friday, September 8. For today, in They Say, I Say, please read pages 15 through 27. Bring in several pages of material for your essay—notes, free-writing, mind-mapping, lists of topics, and/or possible thesis statements. Between now and next Wednesday, start and continue to write a draft of your essay. Feel free to visit me in my office and/or to visit the Writing Center as you develop your draft.
Monday, September 11. For today, in They Say, I Say, please read pages 28 through 48. Also read the essay by David Zinczenko, “Don’t Blame the Eater,” which begins on page 139.
Wednesday, September 13. For today, please bring a complete rough draft of your essay, word-processed, double-spaced.
Friday, September 15. Starting today and continuing for a while, we will look at poems that concern exclusion and assimilation. For today, in Gwynn, please read “American Classic,” by Louis Simpson, “Incident,” by Countee Cullen, “Theme for English B,” by Langston Hughes, “Noted,” by Maxine Kumin, “Ethics,” by Linda Pastan, “Orientation,” by Daniel Orozco, and “American Society,” by Gish Jen.
Monday, September 18. First oral-presentation assigned. Continue discussion of poems assigned on the 15th. First essay due in class, at the beginning of class.
Wednesday, September 20. A couple of classic short stories for today: Please read, in Gwynn, “A Rose for Emily,” by William Faulkner, and “The Lottery,” by Shirley Jackson. In They Say, I Say, please read pages 49 through 63.
Friday, September 22. For today, please read two sections in The Little, Brown Compact Handbook: “Argument,” pages 95-112, and “Oral Presentation,” pages 122-125. I am going to give you a quiz on this material.
Monday, September 25. Three presentations today.
Wednesday, September 27. Three presentations today.
Friday, September 29. Three presentations today.
Monday, October 2. For today, in They Say, I Say, please read pages 64-89. Also read the essay, “The Empire of Images in the World of Our Bodies,” by Susan Bordo, which begins on page 149. Be ready to provide a detailed assessment of Bordo’s argument, including the following: her sense of audience; the different ways she negotiates the process of “They Say/I Say”; her thesis; her other claims; her logic and reasoning; the evidence she offers; how she organizes the essay; how she anticipates objections to her views.
Wednesday, October 4. Essay assigned, discussed, begun. Photocopy of “Letter From Birmingham Jail” distributed.
Friday, October 6. For today, please read “Letter From Birmingham Jail.” Analyzing King’s essay and his argument in detail, paragraph by paragraph.
Monday, October 9. Continue analyzing King’s essay, discussing his sense of audience, his rhetorical strategies and tactics, his process of reasoning.
Wednesday, October 11. Rough draft of essay due.
Friday, October 13. More work on the draft.
[Fall Break]
Wednesday, October 18. Essay due.
Friday, October 20. The sentence, a quick overview: In The Little, Brown Handbook, please read pages 188-193; 213-220; 221-256; and 263-276. You will be quizzed on this material.
Monday, October 23. Please read the first 4 chapters of The Stranger. Questions to consider: What interests you about this novel? What confuses you, or what about it do you find yourself resisting? How does it match your expectations of what a novel should be? What’s the main character like? Are there any ways in which he is like you? Identify very specific scenes, lines of dialogue, and other details you believe to be important.
Wednesday, October 25. Quiz on the material studied on October 20.
Friday, October 27. Please read The Stranger through page 81. Focus on key scenes and how you interpret them.
Monday, October 30. For today, please finish reading The Stranger. “They say” The Stranger is one of the most important novels of the 20th century. List reasons why one might agree with “them.” How would you make the case? Then list reasons why you might not agree with that judgment. Essay assigned, discussed.
Wednesday, November 1. Poetry, writing, and language itself. For today, in Gwynn, please read the poems on pages 535, 650, 660, 709, 724, and 770.
Friday, November 3. Second oral-presentation project/assignment introduced. Continue discussing poems from November 1.
Monday, November 6. Draft of Camus essay due in class.
Wednesday, November 8. Beginning today, we will begin our “unit” on work and poverty. For today, please read Nickel and Dimed, through page 50. Questions: What do you think of the way Ehrenreich went about her project? How does she anticipate and deal with objections to her project? To what extent is she self-critical—almost from the very first moment? What did you learn from the first 50 pages? Does the book make you think of jobs you have held?
Friday, November 10. For today, read Nickel and Dimed, pages 51 through 121.
Monday, November 13. For today, please finish reading Nickel and Dimed. Consider some of the questions beginning on page 227.
Wednesday, November 15. Oral-presentation topics due.
Friday, November 17. For today, in Gwynn, please read the stories “A & P,” by John Updike, and “Shiloh,” by Bobby Ann Mason. There might be a quiz on the reading. Essay assigned, discussed.
Monday, November 20. For today, pick two poems from Gwynn that we have not read before (for class) and that you like.
Wednesday, November 22. To be announced.
Monday, November 27. Presentations. During this week, feel free to come to my office hours to discuss the progress of your last essay, and feel free, of course, to visit the Writing Center.
Wednesday, November 29. Presentations.
Friday, December 1. Presentations.
Monday, December 4. Presentations.
Wednesday, December 6. Essay due in class.