Courses - Fall, 2008

English Department Courses, Fall 2008 and Spring 2009

FALL SEMESTER 2008

ENGL 1000, Section 01: Introduction to Interpretation TTh 1 p.m. SHH 221
Dr. Austin Wilson

As an introduction to the English major and minor, this course is focused, as its title suggests, on “Interpretation” of literature and film. It is not merely an introduction to literature and film; I am sure you have already been introduced to literature in your previous English classes that you loved reading or you wouldn’t be considering taking this course. I do hope it will introduce you to some new poems, stories, plays, and films that are intellectually and aesthetically exciting and profoundly moving to you, but the course emphasizes the interpretation of these new works and those you are already familiar with, not just the reading of them. The focus on “Interpretation” means you will be learning a variety of interpretive strategies and you will further develop your critical vocabulary in order to analyze short stories, novels, drama, poetry, and movies in a sophisticated way. We will be reading a wide variety of what I hope you will agree are works of literature well worth your careful attention and seeing several movies worthy of consideration as works of art. We will discuss and analyze these works from such critical approaches as biographical and historical criticism, formalist criticism, psychological criticism, Marxist criticism, feminist criticism, reader-response criticism, post-structuralism, and deconstruction. A great deal of emphasis will be placed on class participation (class discussion, panel presentations, group work, and individual oral presentations) and on your writing (four papers--an explication of a poem, an analysis of a poem using a particular critical approach, an analysis of a particular aspect of a piece of fiction, an analysis of a scene from a play or a movie-- and a reading journal and perhaps some creative writing).

REQUIRED for the English major and minor.

ENGL 2010, Section 01: Introduction to British Literary History, I MWF 9 a.m. AC 222
Dr. Greg Miller

We’ll explore the diverse literary heritage of Britain, beginning with translations from Anglo-Norman French, Latin, and Old English, and ending with the the Age of Reason, reading writers such as Marie of France, Geoffrey Chaucer, Margery Kempe, Edmund Spenser, Aemilia Lanyer, William Shakespeare, Ben Jonson, John Donne, Mary Wroth, Katherine Philips, Aphra Behn, John Milton, Jonathan Swift, and William Cowper. This survey of British literature (beginnings to 1800) has several objectives: to provide an introduction to British literary history, to foster skills in close textual analysis, to encourage considered historical and aesthetic evaluations of a variety of literary genres and modes; and to build a foundation for future study.

REQUIRED for the English major and minor.

ENGL 2010, Section 02: Introduction to British Literary History, I MW 1 p.m. AC 334
Dr. Laura Franey

In this course we will study a wide variety of literary texts beginning with the origins of English-language literature in the Middle Ages through the neo-classical and proto-Romantic literature of the eighteenth century. We will examine poems, plays, and prose fiction texts in their historical contexts, but we will also analyze the aesthetics of literature, thereby enhancing our knowledge of changes in genres and styles over time and of the significance of the particular artistic choices made by writers. Some of the authors whose texts we will read include Geoffrey Chaucer, Edmund Spenser, William Shakespeare, John Donne, Aphra Behn, and Alexander Pope. Some anonymously authored texts we will consider include Sir Gawain and the Green Knight and The Second Shepherd’s Play.

REQUIRED for the English major and minor.

ENGL 2400, Section 01: Introduction to Creative Writing TTh 1 p.m. SH 267
Ms. Aleda Shirley (cap 15)

Students will study the forms, techniques, and processes of fiction, poetry, or script writing by reading models and by practicing their own writing. Students will discuss their own writing in the context of readings from traditional and contemporary works.

ENGL 3120, Section 01: Satire and Scandal in Restoration and Eighteenth-Century Lit. TTh 10 – 11:15 AC 223
Dr. Laura Franey

This class will focus on the literature of scandal and satire in the Restoration period and the eighteenth century (ca. 1660 – 1775). This era that followed the restoration of the English monarchy after the decade-long rule of Oliver Cromwell witnessed the fruition of many Enlightenment ideals that encouraged the exercise of reason as a useful and necessary check on passion. Yet there was also a strong emphasis in literature on both the productive and destructive consequences of passion, especially in terms of how those passions (in religion, sexual relationships, and politics, for example) could create scandals. And, frequently, the critique of scandalous behavior came in the form of satire.
The texts we will read likely include, but are not limited to, the following
---Alexander Pope’s mock-epic poem, “The Rape of the Lock” [1712-1717]
---Plays: Aphra Behn, The Rover (1677); William Congreve, The Way of the World (1700); and Richard Brinsley Sheridan, The School for Scandal (1777)
--Prose fiction: Eliza Haywood, “Fantomina, or Love in a Maze” (1725); Daniel Defoe, Roxana (1724); Selections from Jonathan Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels (1726); and Fanny Burney, Evelina (1778)

FOCI: Literary History or Cultural Studies
This course satisfied the pre-1800 requirement.

ENGL 3150, Section 01: American Novel: Twain to Faulkner MWF 10 a.m. MH 205
Dr. Suzanne Marrs

This study of novels by Twain, James, Dreiser, Wharton, Hemingway, Fitzgerald, and Faulkner will focus upon issues of genre and literary history. Short quizzes, a term paper, mid-term and final examinations will provide the basis for grading. Texts: Huckleberry Finn, The Portrait of a Lady, Sister Carrie, The Age of Innocence, The Sun Also Rises, The Great Gatsby, The Sound and the Fury.

FOCUS: Literary History or Genre

ENGL 3180, Section 01: Modernist Poetry MWF 11 a.m. AC 222
Dr. Anne MacMaster

In this course, focus on the revolution in literary history called modernism that occurs mostly between the two World Wars, reading the poetry of several of the twentieth century’s greatest poets: W.B. Yeats, Wallace Stevens, Ezra Pound, H.D., T. S. Eliot, William Carlos Williams, Marianne Moore, Hart Crane, W.H. Auden, and Elizabeth Bishop. We’ll work to pin point what characterizes modernism in both in form and in content, and we’ll explore the relationship between modernism and its historical context, specifically the events of World War I, the first wave of modern feminism, and the rise of fascism. We’ll trace how and why the modernist aesthetic of formal experiment in the 1920s gives way to more socially conscious poetry in the 1930s. Course work will include short papers and one longer research-paper, and a final exam.

FOCUS: Literary History or Genre

ENGL 3320, Section 01: Milton TTh 2:45 p.m. MH 201
Dr. Greg Miller

The course is designed to help students develop a greater appreciation and understanding of the revolutionary literary and political life of John Milton, reading his major lyrics, the mask, selected prose works, Samson Agonistes, and Paradise Lost within the context of British history.

FOCUS: Author
Satisfies the pre-1800 requirement.

ENGL 3500, Section 01: Romance TTh 1 p.m. Millsaps Room in Library
Dr. Eric Griffin

This course will explore one of the most important, enduring modes in world literature, the Romance. After glimpsing its (re)birth in Medieval France, we will watch the genre grow, develop, mature, and cast its spell over some of the most important works of the Renaissance, ultimately infusing both modern drama and the novel with its spirit of wonder.
We will also seek to identify relationships between key Romance works by following the rich tapestry they weave "intertextually." As we learn to identify-via some of the seminal literary criticism of the 20th century-the special mimetic languages (or discourses) of the Romance, we will see how practitioners of its art breathe new life into the genre, both by both dressing new characters in its old clothes, and by playing against the literary fashions they have inherited. And, by placing our own Romances in dialogue with those of earlier ages, re-casting and reinvigorating their conventions for a new millennium, we will seek to converse with these texts across the boundaries of time and space.
Our texts will include works by Chretien de Troyes, Thomas Malory, Geoffrey Chaucer, Ludovico Ariosto, Edmund Spenser, William Shakespeare, Miguel de Cervantes and J.R.R. Tolkien, criticism by C. S. Lewis, Erich Auerbach and M. M. Bakhtin, and films such as Excalibur, The Natural, and Monty Python and the Holy Grail, among others.

FOCUS: Genre or Literary History. This course will also be applicable to the concentration in Film Studies.
Satisfies the pre-1800 requirement.

ENGL 3540, Section 01: History of Film MW 2:45 p.m. & T. 7 p.m. SH 221
Dr. Austin Wilson

This course will focus on the historical development of motion pictures as both an art form and an industry and the development of the technical features of film-making. There will be required attendance at weekly showings of videos and dvd's of the core movies under discussion and other movies will be placed on reserve in the library for individual viewing. Instead of a movie, some Tuesday evenings will be devoted to labs exploring some element of movie making. Some of the movies that will be shown (at least in part) and discussed will be Voyage dans la lune (1902), The Great Train Robbery (1903), Chien Andalou (1928), City Lights (1931), Grand Illusion (1938), Citizen Kane (1941), The Seventh Seal (1957), Vertigo (1958), Some Like It Hot (1959), La Dolce Vita (1961), Jules et Jim (1962), Bonnie and Clyde (1967), Chinatown (1974), Blue Velvet (1986), Barton Fink (1991), The Player (1992), Magnolia (1999), Timecode (2000), and Adaptation (2002). Students will keep a viewing log and write two critical papers (a film script will be an option for those taking the course for Concentration in Creative Writing credit) and/or actually make a short film. There will be a midterm exam and a final.

FOCUS: Genre *Also available as an Intermediate Course for the Creative Writing Concentration within the English major, for students wishing to practice screenwriting. *This is also one of the foundation courses for the Minor in Film Studies.

ENGL 4900, Section 01: Senior Colloquium MW 1 p.m. AC 222
Dr. Anne MacMaster

This course, required for English majors in their senior year, is designed to help students consolidate and deepen their studies of literature. We will reflect on the history of literary genres and forms in English, literary theory and cultural studies. In addition, students will reflect on their work as English majors and as students in the liberal arts and will complete the Core 10 Reflective essay.

SPRING SEMESTER 2009

ENGL 1000, Section 01: Introduction to Interpretation MWF 10 a.m. AC 325
Dr. Anne MacMaster

This course focuses on a variety of interpretive strategies and encourages students to develop a critical vocabulary in order to analyze short stories, novels, drama, and poetry in a sophisticated way. Readings will be varied, and students will learn about different critical approaches to literature and other texts. These critical approaches include psychological criticism, biographical criticism, and feminist criticism.

REQUIRED for the English major and minor.

ENGL 1000, Section 02: Introduction to Interpretation TTh 10 a.m. AC 222
Dr. Carolyn Brown

REQUIRED for the English major and minor.

ENGL 2020, Section 01: Introduction to British Literary History, II MWF 9 a.m. AC 334
Dr. Laura Franey

This course will be a swiftly-moving but also, I hope, an edifying, run through major British literature from the poetry of the Romantics in the early nineteenth culture through the postcolonial and postmodern novels and drama of the late twentieth century. Not only will we read plays by Oscar Wilde and Tom Stoppard but we will also read two novels: one from the nineteenth century and the other from the late twentieth century, Hanif Kureishi's The Buddha of Suburbia. We will also wend our way through range of poems by such luminaries as William Blake, Robert Browning, Christina Rossetti, Gerard Manley Hopkins, and Philip Larkin as well as short fiction by such writers as D. H. Lawrence and James Joyce. The issues explored will include the development of genres, the development of particular themes such as colonialism and gender relations, and the formation of the English canon.

REQUIRED for the English major and minor.

ENGL 2020, Section 02: Introduction to British Literary History, II MW 1 p.m. CC 22
Dr. Austin Wilson

This is the continuation of English 2010. The two-course sequence is designed to introduce students to the literary history of Britain from its beginnings through the contemporary world, from Beowulf to Virginia Woolf and beyond. In the course of their journey through British Literature, students will meet many different writers and read texts representing such genres as lyric and epic poetry, romance, drama, fiction, and the critical essay. Students will also learn some of the ways in which the cultural and historical contexts shape and are shaped by literary productions and the meaning, development, and value of literary history as an approach to literary studies. English 2020 will focus on the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

REQUIRED for the English major and minor.

ENGL 2130, Section 01: American Women Writers MW 2:45 p.m. MH 111
Dr. Peggy Prenshaw

In this course we will read and discuss twentieth century writings by American women--fiction, plays and poems. Text selections include Edith Wharton's House of Mirth, Willa Cather's My Antonia, Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God, Amy Tan's The Joy Luck Club, Toni Morrison's Beloved, Dorothy Allison's Bastard Out of Carolina, and short stories by Eudora Welty, Ellen Douglas, Elizabeth Spencer, and Flannery O'Connor. As time permits, we will read poems by Anne Sexton, Sylvia Plath, and others, and we will screen the film version of Wit, the Pulitzer award play by Margaret Edson (Emma Thompson plays lead), as well as a few clips from films based on the novels we will read.
Course requirements: two papers, 4-6 pages each, to include some critical references; an oral report; several short reading quizzes; and a final examination.

FOCUS: Cultural Studies

ENGL 3150, Section 01: 19th-Cenury American Poetry MWF 11 a.m. MH 201
Dr. Greg Miller

In his “Divinity School Address,” Ralph Waldo Emerson calls for a new American literature to “cheer the waiting, fainting hearts of men with new hope and new revelation,” referring in another essay to poets as our “liberating gods.” Did poets of the nineteenth-century in America heed this clarion call? We’ll begin by reading selections from Emerson’s essays and poems, following with the religious visionary Jones Very, the popular abolitionist John Greenleaf Whitter, “fireside poets” like Henry Wadsworth Longfellow and James Russell Lowell, the romancer Edgar Allen Poe, and the embattled President Abraham Lincoln (who wrote a little-known, powerful poem about madness). We’ll also examine both Twain’s caricature of women poets in the character of “Emmeline Grangerford” and the reality of women writers like Sarah Orne Jewitt and Ella Wilcox. We’ll read Herman Melville’s sequence about the Civil War. Somehow, we’ll plan on spending roughly half the semester on those two wonderfully cracked pillars of the American house of poetry--Walt Whitman and Emily Dickinson--examining together complicated issues of manuscript transmission and textual authority as well as larger social questions of the poet’s relation to American culture.

FOCUS: Literary History or Genre

ENGL 3200, Section 01: African-American Fiction & Autobiography MW 1 p.m. AC 325
Dr. Anne MacMaster

In this course, we’ll work chronologically from the nineteenth century to the contemporary period, taking our time to study carefully two works selected from each of three historical periods. From the nineteenth century, we’ll read two slave narratives, Frederick Douglass’s Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave and Harriet Jacobs’ Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl. From the Harlem Renaissance, we’ll read Cane – Jean Toomer’s modernist collage of fiction, poetry, and drama—along with Nella Larsen’s novella Passing. And in the later half of the twentieth century, we’ll take plenty of time to explore in depth two great achievements in the African-American novel, Ralph Ellison’s epic Invisible Man and noble prize winning Toni Morrison’s Song of Solomon. We’ll read with an eye to discovering the distinctive characteristics of an African American tradition in literature, and we’ll also consider the relation of this tradition to movements within the wider Western tradition: realism, modernism, and post-modernism. Course work will consist of some short papers, one longer research paper, a final exam, and possibly a project in which each student works on a relevant text not included in course readings.

FOCUS: Genre or Cultural Studies

ENGL 3340, Section 01: Shakespeare & the Play of History TTh 2:45 p.m. Millsaps Rm.
Dr. Eric Griffin

While focusing on a selection of William Shakespeare’s history plays, this course will explore the relationship betweencollective memory and historical representation. Alongside such plays as Richard II, Henry IV, parts 1 and 2, Richard III, Henry V, and Henry VIII: Or, All is True, as well as Christopher Marlowe’s important precursor, Edward II, we will also sample primary sources such as Hall’s and Holinshed’s Chronicles, Foxe’s Book of Martyrs, Camden’s History of Elizabeth, and selections from important Roman Catholic counter-histories. The course will also feature a number of secondary readings, which will inspire us to reflect upon problems of historiography, ideology, and discourse analysis.

Cross-listed with History 3240: Topics in European Culture and History
FOCUS: Author or Genre Satisfies the pre-1800 requirement.

ENGL 3350, Section 01: Eudora Welty and Friends TTh 10, W. 12 MH 202
Dr. Suzanne Marrs

Study the fiction of Eudora Welty and works by three friends who influenced her or were influenced by her: the Anglo-Irish novelist Elizabeth Bowen, the American fiction writer Reynolds Price, and the mystery writer Ross Macdonald. Students will have the opportunity to examine Welty’s correspondence with these individuals and to look through her personal library. Texts: Eudora Welty, Stories, Essay, Memoir; The House in Paris; The Names and Faces of Heroes; The Underground Man. Grades will be based on reading quizzes, a mid-term exam, an 8-10 page paper, and a final examination.

FOCUS: Author

ENGL 3400, Section 01: Writing and Reading Fiction TTh 1 p.m. SH 267
Dr. Austin Wilson

An advanced class in the reading and writing of fiction. Stories (there will be an anthology of short fiction) and two novels will be read and discussed from the perspective of the writer, and students will write and revise several short stories that will be discussed by the class in workshops and with the instructor in individual tutorials. Prerequisite: English 2400 or permission of instructor.

Counts toward the Creative Writing Concentration.
FOCUS: Genre

ENGL 3900, Section 01: Senior Workshop in Creative Writing MW 1 p.m. MH 201
Dr. Greg Miller

Students writing in a variety of genres will work together to complete substantial creative projects.
Prerequisites: ENGL 2400 (Intro. to Creative Writing) and two courses designated by the English department as intermediate courses in creative writing, or the consent of the instructor.

ENGLISH Courses: Schedule and Descriptions 2008-2009

FALL SEMESTER 2008

ENGL 1000, Section 01: Introduction to Interpretation TTh 1 p.m. SHH 221
Dr. Austin Wilson

ENGL 2010, Section 01: Introduction to British Literary History, I MWF 9 a.m. AC 222
Dr. Greg Miller

ENGL 2010, Section 02: Introduction to British Literary History, I MW 1 p.m. AC 334
Dr. Laura Franey

ENGL 2400, Section 01: Introduction to Creative Writing TTh 1 p.m. SH 267
Ms. Aleda Shirley (cap 15)

ENGL 3120, Section 01: Satire and Scandal in Restoration and Eighteenth-Century Lit.
Dr. Laura Franey TTh 10 – 11:15 AC 223

ENGL 3150, Section 01: American Novel, Twain to Faulkner MWF 10 a.m. MH 205
Dr. Suzanne Marrs

ENGL 3180, Section 01: Modernist Poetry MWF 11 a.m. AC 222
Dr. Anne MacMaster

ENGL 3320, Section 01: Milton TTh 2:45 p.m. MH 201
Dr. Greg Miller

ENGL 3500, Section 01: Romance TTh 1 p.m. Millsaps Room in Library
Dr. Eric Griffin

ENGL 3540, Section 01: History of Film MW 2:45 p.m. & T. 7 p.m. SH 221
Dr. Austin Wilson

ENGL 4900, Section 01: Senior Colloquium MW 1 p.m. AC 222
Dr. Anne MacMaster

SPRING SEMESTER 2009

ENGL 1000, Section 01: Introduction to Interpretation MWF 10 a.m. AC 325
Dr. Anne MacMaster

ENGL 1000, Section 02: Introduction to Interpretation TTh 10 a.m. AC 222
Dr. Carolyn Brown

ENGL 2020, Section 01: Introduction to British Literary History, II MWF 9 a.m. AC 334
Dr. Laura Franey

ENGL 2020, Section 02: Introduction to British Literary History, II MW 1 p.m. CC 22
Dr. Austin Wilson

ENGL 2130, Section 01: American Women Writers MW 2:45 p.m. MH 111
Dr. Peggy Prenshaw

ENGL 3150, Section 01: 19th-Cenury American Poetry MWF 11 a.m. MH 201
Dr. Greg Miller

ENGL 3200, Section 01: African-American Fiction & Autobiography MW 1 p.m. AC 325
Dr. Anne MacMaster

ENGL 3340, Section 01: Shakespeare & the Play of History TTh 2:45 p.m. Millsaps Rm.
Dr. Eric Griffin

ENGL 3350, Section 01: Eudora Welty TTh 10, W. 12 MH 202
Dr. Suzanne Marrs

ENGL 3400, Section 01: Writing and Reading Fiction TTh 1 p.m. SH 267
Dr. Austin Wilson

ENGL 3900, Section 01: Senior Workshop in Creative Writing MW 1 p.m. MH 201
Dr. Greg Miller