American Literature and Composition
Spring Semester, 2015 - 2016
CLASS WEEK
LITERATURE “Themes”
Weeks 1-2:
Twain’s “Gilded Age”, James’
January 6-15,
Pragmatism, Carnegie’s
2016
philanthropy; Hurston’s Their
Eyes Were Watching God
Week 3:
“Civil Rights” – James’ Daisy
January 19-22
Miller, Chopin’s “The Storm”,
Capote’s Breakfast at Tiffany’s
Week 4:
“Civil War” – Alcott’s Little
January 25-29
Women, Brooks’ March, Uncle
Tom’s Cabin, and John Brown
Weeks 5-6:
“Lost Generation” – Fitzgerald,
February 1-12
Hemingway, Faulkner; Williams
and cummings
Weeks 7-10:
“Depression and Dustbowl” –
February 16 –
Agee and Evans; Egan’s The
March 11
Worst Hard Time; Steinbeck’s
The Grapes of Wrath
Week 11:
“Nature Writing” – Silko;
March 14-18
National Parks
Week 12:
Sonntag’s On Photography
March 21-25
Dillard’s Pilgrim at Tinker Creek
Weeks 13-14:
April 4-15
Tentative Schedule for Course
COMPOSITION Literary Movements
Realism
American Philosophy
Folklore and Anthropology
Feminist literary theory
Seneca Falls Declaration 1848
Grammar Pre-test
Civil Rights Cases, 1883
Letters in realistic fiction; Folk Songs
Second Paired Novel Assignment
Modernism American literary style:
note-taking, journalism, stream-ofconsciousness; imagist poetry
Depression era movies: Grapes of
Wrath, The Wizard of Oz, Citizen
Kane; Staged Adaptations
Grammar Post-test
Romanticism Natural description and
author’s voice; Romantic landscapes
Denver photography project
Empirical writing; Honors
Assignment on Tortilla Curtain
Koyaanisqatsi as model of pastoral
and industrial conflicts
Burn’s Brooklyn Bridge
Transcendentalist Art Project
Regionalism
Postmodernism
Postmodern surface reality
“American Renaissance” –
Whitman’s Leaves of Grass and
“Lilacs”; Emerson, Thoreau,
Hawthorne, Dickinson
Week 15
“The Frontier” – “Frontier
April 18-22
Thesis”; Cather’s O Pioneers!
and Proulx’s Accordion Crimes;
Chief Joseph
Weeks 16-17:
“Chaos Theory” – GenreNew storytelling techniques
April 25-May 6
splitting in If on a winter’s night
Literary movement novel groups
a traveler, Rant, House of Leaves Second Paired Novel Assignment Due
Stories by Moore, Garcia
Marquez, Gordimer, Kincaid
Weeks 18-19:
“Memoirs” – Baldwin’s Notes
Compare and Contrast memoirists
May 9-20
of a Native Son; Didion’s White
Digital Storytelling – Individual
Album; Rodriquez’s Hunger of
Memoirs
Memory
Group presentations
Weeks 20-21:
Review of “Themes,” Theories,
District Finals
May 23 – June 2 and Movements
Class Final
The scope and sequence of some of the included topics may be expanded, reduced or
shifted to accommodate class needs.