Discovering Literature

L111 — A&H
11:15a-12:30p TR (3 cr.)

In this class you’ll learn to how to read literature with understanding and pleasure, how to do literary analysis, and how to write interpretive essays for college classes. The class is designed to teach you the vocabulary and skills necessary for interpreting complex texts.

Experiencing World Cultures through Literatures in English

L112 — A&H
(3 cr.)

In this online class, we will read literary works in English by writers who hail from different regions of the Caribbean archipelago.

Introduction to Drama

L203 — A&H
5:45P-7:00P TR

Acquaints students with characteristics of drama as a type of literature through the study of representative significant plays. Readings will include plays from several ages and countries.

Introduction to Fiction

L204 — A&H

This course provides an introduction to reading and writing about fiction.

Introduction to Poetry

L205 — A&H

Introduction to Prose

L206 — A&H
11:15A-12:30P TR

Varieties of nonfictional prose, such as autobiography, biography, and the essay. Representative works from several periods and countries.

Women and Literature

L207 — A&H
1:00p-2:15p TR (3 cr.)

In this course, we will read selected works from the 19th century to the present, examining how women authors use writing similarly and differently to represent women’s lives, particularly their domestic, creative, and professional work.

Topics in English and American Literature and Culture

L208 — A&H
2:30p-3:45p TR (3 cr.)

In this class, we will read diaries old and new, known and unknown, as we consider writing as a form of counting the days and being in the world.

Literary Masterpieces

L214 — A&H
2:30p-3:45p TR (3 cr.)

This course will examine the topic of what it means to "fit in" and to fail (or refuse) to fit in.

Introduction to Shakespeare

L220 — A&H
11:15A-12:30P MW

We will read 10-12 of Shakespeare's plays, paying particular attention to his development as an artist and the relation of his plays to 16th and 17th century English culture.

Literature and Public Life

L240 — A&H
4:00p-5:15p TR (3 cr.)

America has become a confessing culture, as individuals use social media to disclose information, and celebrities and politicians are increasingly compelled to publicly apologize for their behavior.

Representations of Gender and Sexuality

L249 — A&H DUS
1:00p-2:15p TR (3 cr.)

This course will examine the ways in which gender and sexuality are explored as they transgress social norms in works of fiction, including drama, poetry, short stories, and novels, as well as graphic novels.

Introduction to Advanced Study of Literature

L260 — A&H
(3 cr.)

This course introduces students to advanced methods of literary interpretation using a range of texts and criticism that address the theme of nightlife.

American Film Culture

L295 — A&H
1:00P-2:15P MW

In this course we will define science fiction film as a genre, explore the story-telling potentials of special effects and their meaning, and investigate the impact of futurist or exotic design on narrative.

Middle English Literature

L306 — A&H
9:30a-10:45a TR (3 cr.)

Despite what most people think, queerness didn’t begin in the twenty-first century. Medieval literature from Europe poses plenty of challenges to our modern categories of gender and sexuality, in part because it did not have categories of hetero- or homosexuality, nor were its sexualities built on binarisms.

Literary History I: Beginnings through the Seventeenth Century

L310 — A&H
1:00p-2:15p MW (3 cr.)

This course will introduce you to important authors, influential texts, and historical and cultural contexts of English literature from its beginnings through the seventeenth century.

Literary History 2

L312 — A&H
(3 Cr.)

This course offers a broad overview of British and American literature in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries – an era of empire, industry, and revolution, which produced modern democratic states and modern notions of selfhood.

Early Plays of Shakespeare

L313 — A&H
1:00p-2:15p TR (3 Cr.)

As English majors know, Shakespeare is no longer a requirement for the major.But believe me, Shakespeare is a requirement for your life!

Literary History 3: 20th and 21st Centuries

L316 — A&H
4:00p-5:15p TR (3 Cr.)

This course surveys major works in twentieth- and twenty-first century Anglophone literatures.

Literary History 3

L316 — A&H
11:15A-12:30P MW

You can’t go home again. Or can you? This class thinks about home, loss, and that pleasurably achy feeling of nostalgia from the early twentieth century to the present.

English Poetry of the Early 17th Century

L317 — A&H
11:15a-12:30p TR (3 cr.)

Beauty. Love. Sex. Revolution. Death. 17th-century poets wrote about all these topics in ways that still define how we understand them today.

20th Century British Fiction

L346 — A&H
2:30p-3:45p TR (3 Cr.)

This course provides a broad overview of English prose literature of the second half of the twentieth century.

British Fiction before 1800

L347 — A&H
2:30p-3:45p TR (3 Cr.)

This course seeks to understand the connection between these two profoundly influential movements. Is it simply that Gothic terror represents the polar opposite of Enlightenment thought?

Late Victorian Fiction

L348 — A&H
1:00p-2:15p TR (3 Cr.)

Fictional realism was brought to unsurpassed sophistication and popularity by such mid- and late-Victorian novelists as Anthony Trollope, Charles Dickens, and George Eliot. In the final decades of the nineteenth century, however, literary realism began to change -- mutating, fracturing, and adjusting to social, political and cultural change.

Literature of the Bible

L367 — A&H
10:10a-11:00a MWF (3 Cr.)

The Bible has long been recognized as the most important source of the Western literary tradition, the "Great Code of Art," as William Blake called it.

Critical Approaches

L371 — A&H
Lecture; TR 2:30-1:10p, Discussion; F 9:05-9:55a, Discussion; F 12:20-1:10p,

The aim of this course is to familiarize students with some of the leading problems and debates comprising the field of literary theory.

American “Coming of Age” Stories: The Multi-ethnic Bildungsroman

L374 — A&H DUS
2:30p-3:45p MW (3 cr.)

Nearly every school-age child in the United States learns of America as the great “melting pot,” a land of equal opportunity where different cultures combine into a national society.

Studies in Women and Literature

L378 — A&H
11:15a-12:30p MW (3 Cr.)

Focusing on contemporary American memoirs, this course explores the contributions of women writers.

Recent Writing

L381 — A&H
9:30A-10:45A MW

This course examines the role that race plays in contemporary science fiction.

Studies in African American Literature and Culture

L396 — A&H
11:15a-12:30p TR (3 Cr.)

Exploring music, visual art, film, and literary fiction, we will interrogate the various ways that contemporary African American artists have responded to political events such as the 9/11 attacks, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the drug war, Hurricane Katrina and other natural disasters, the 2008 financial collapse, and the Black Lives Matter movement.

SEMINAR: British and American Authors

L450
4:00p-5:15p TR (3 Cr.)

From Fifty Shades of Grey (film version): "Was it Charlotte Brontë, Jane Austen, or Thomas Hardy who first made you love literature?" "Hardy."

Literary Form, Mode, and Theme

L460 Seminar
4:00p-5:15p TR (3 Cr.)

This seminar is for students interested in advanced study of fictional techniques, including students who are creative writers themselves.

Literature and History

L480
1:00p-2:15p TR (3 Cr.)

Of all cultural forms satire aspires to be the most directly activist in its commentary on current politics and social issues, its attempt to expose and ridicule, to provoke reaction and action through appeals to wit and values, and to do justice, with or without mercy for its target.

Topics in Rhetoric and Public Culture

R209 — A&H
1:25p-2:15p MWF (3 Cr.)

Professional Speaking focuses exclusively on teaching students the speaking skills necessary to succeed in professional and non-profit environments.

Topics in Rhetoric and Public Culture

R209 — A&H
2:30p-3:20p MWF (3 Cr.)

Science, Communication, and the Public asks the question “How can scientists better communicate their research and concerns to the public?”

Introduction to Digital Rhetoric

R210 — A&H
1:00p-2:15p TR (3 Cr.)

Digital technologies have fully saturated our culture. From smartphones to smart-homes, fitbits to tablets, our everyday lives are digitally infused.

Deliberative Democracy – Group Communication

R222 — A&H
9:30a-10:45a TR (3 Cr.)

How does a group of people (a committee, a team, a family, a community) decide together fairly and effectively what to do in any given situation?

Persuasion

R224 — A&H
11:15A-12:05P MWF

Motivational appeals in influencing behavior; psychological factors in speaker-audience relationship; contemporary examples of persuasion. Practice in persuasive speaking.

Argumentation and Public Advocacy

R228 — A&H
4:00p-5:15p TR (3 Cr.)

Argumentation techniques are powerful tools that can be used for pure self interest and consolidating power or promoting policies that help people and serve the greater good.

Public Memory in Communication and Culture

R355 — S&H
11:15A-12:30P TR

This course takes a rhetorical perspective on the contested nature of public memory in the United States.

The Study of Public Advocacy

R396 — S&H
1:00P-2:15P TR (3 Cr.)

This class will examine controversial high-profile public issues such as sexual violence on university campuses, mandatory paid maternity leave, transgender identity and representation, the pink tax, and beauty culture.

Introduction to Creative Writing

W103 — A&H

This is a course for budding poets and fiction writers and for those that have never written poetry or fiction but would like to give it a try.

Creative Writing

W203 — A&H

W203 is an exploration of creative writing, including craft concepts and the workshopping of students' own original poetry or fiction.

Professional Writing

W231

Designed to develop research and writing skills requisite for most academic and professional activities.

Writing Fiction

W301
2:30p-3:45p TR (3 cr.)

The question guiding our workshop will be: Why do we tell stories? Each of you will consider what kinds of stories your most attracted to; what kinds are most difficult; what do you tend to write; what do you wish you could write; what kinds of stories make you nervous, uncomfortable?

Writing Creative Nonfiction

W311
2:30p-3:45p MW (3 cr.)

In this class, we will explore creative nonfiction, a genre that utilizes the devices and techniques of fiction (plot, character, setting, etc.) to tell a true story.

Advanced Professional Writing

W321
1:00p-2:15p TR (3 Cr.)

Over the summer of 2017, several purported zombie attacks have occurred throughout the country.

Advanced Expository Writing

W350 — IW
09:30a-10:45a TR (3 cr.)

This course asks students to select a grounding artifact and to explore that focal element through four modes of engagement (personal, visual, informative, and multimodal).

The Craft of Poetry

W381
2:30p-3:45p MW (3 Cr.)

Building upon your prerequisite experience in W203 or 303, this course will provide an in-depth look at the various elements of craft in poetry, including form, imagery, musicality, narrative, the lyric, etc.

World Englishes

G208 — GCC
10:10a-11:00a MWF (3 Cr.)

The status of English around the world suggests that the world is "shrinking," that more and more people are "speaking the same language." Paradoxically, though, this is only possible as English develops more varieties aligned with the historical, cultural, and linguistic situations of particular places and people, most of which are not English in heritage, though they are often formerly (occasionally even currently) colonies, territories, or protectorates of English-speaking countries like England or the United States (once a colony of England, itself).