DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH
CASE WESTERN RESERVE UNIVERSITY
Fall 2012
COURSE DESCRIPTIONS
Robert Lowell left Harvard University to study poetry with John Crowe Ransome at
Kenyon College in Gambier, Ohio. Lowell published seventeen books of poetry and
translation, receiving many prestigious awards such as the Pulitzer Prize, the
National Book Award, the Bollingen Translation Prize, and the National Book
Critics Circle Award.
Department of English
Case Western Reserve University
Course Listing Fall Semester 2012
Tentative Course Descriptions (subject to additions, deletions and revisions at a later date.)
* Check Registrar’s listing for course times
For courses listed as “300/400,” undergraduates should list only the “300” number on their registration
forms; graduate students should list only the “400” number.
Organized courses and tutorials for non-undergraduates are available to those for whom English is a
second language. These are offered by permission of the Writing Center Director only. Contact Dr. Megan
Jewell at the Writing Center, 104 Bellflower Hall (368-3798) or at the English Department, 220 Guilford
House (368-3799).
English 148
Introduction to Composition
Staff
TBD
English 148 is an introductory, three-credit course designed to help students develop basic
academic writing skills. The course is appropriate for both native speakers and those for whom English is
not a first language. Students will develop strategies for reading texts critically, and effectively
communicating their views in writing. Course goals include acquiring greater ease in organizing, focusing,
and developing ideas. Classes are small and a great deal of individual tutorial work is provided along with
formal instruction. There is a limited enrollment of 12 in each section.
ENGL 148 (for non-undergraduates)
Introduction to Composition
Staff
MWF 3:00—3:50
See description above. This section is reserved for graduate students, staff, and faculty.
Enrollment is by permit only. For more information, e-mail writingcenter@case.edu.
ENGL 150
Expository Writing
Staff
MWF 3:00—3:50
As a course in expository writing, English 150 requires substantial drafting and revising of written
work. The goals of English 150 are:
• To give students guided practice in forming compelling and sophisticated claims for an academic
audience and in supporting those claims with appropriate evidence;
• To help students recognize, formulate, and support the kinds of claims prevalent in academic
writing;
• To help students internalize the standards for strong academic prose;
• To teach students the academic conventions for quoting, summarizing, and citing the words and
ideas of other writers and speakers;
• To guide students in locating, evaluating, and using different kinds of research sources;
• To improve students’ abilities to read and respond critically to the writing of others;
• To help students develop coherent strategies for the development and organization of arguments;
• To foster students’ awareness of the importance of stylistic decisions; and
• To provide students with effective techniques for revision, and to cultivate habits of comprehensive
revision.
Topics, readings, and writing assignments vary across individual course sections. Students enrolled in
SAGES are not required to complete the English 148/150 sequence. Enrollment limited to 20 in each
section.
ENGL 150
Expository Writing
MWF 9:30—10:20
See above.
ENGL 155
Introduction to Rhetoric and Public Speaking
MW
9:00—10:15
Staff
`
Doll
In this course you will learn how to develop and deliver different kinds of speeches, becoming familiar
with theories of rhetoric and with the arts and skills of delivering oral presentations. The assignments will
a) Introduce you to the traditions and core principles of "canons of rhetoric," from Aristotle's Rhetoric to Cicero
to Kenneth Burke
b) Sharpen your public speaking skills, but also your research and writing and
c) Give you opportunities to practice several different types of speeches, both as a speaker and as a
professional speechwriter would for a client in business or politics.
ENGL 180
Writing Tutorial (1 credit)
Jewell
TBA
English 180 is a one-credit writing tutorial class designed to develop students' expository writing
skills through weekly scheduled conferences with a Writing Resource Center Instructor. Goals are to
produce clear, well-organized, and mechanically acceptable prose, and to demonstrate learned writing
skills throughout the term. Course content is highly individualized based on both the instructor's initial
assessment of the student's writing and the student's particular concerns. All students must produce a
minimum of 12 pages of finished writing and complete other assignments as designed by the instructor to
assist in meeting course goals.
ENROLLMENT: Course times are based on both the student's schedule and instructor availability.
After enrolling, students are responsible for contacting the Writing Resource Center to begin the scheduling
process. Students may e-mail writingcenter@case.edu, or call the Director, Dr. Megan Swihart Jewell, at
216-368-3799.
ENGL 181
Reading Tutorial (1 credit)
Olson-Fallon
TBA
English 181 is a one-credit individualized tutorial that students can take for a total of three
semesters. Enrollment does not have to be continuous. Students enrolled in English 181 may work on
sharpening their critical reading strategies as well as other related academic strategies that increase
reading efficiency and effectiveness. Students enrolled in English 181 must come to the Educational
Support Services office the first week of class to select the time for meeting weekly with the
instructor. English 181 is offered only in the fall and spring semesters. Questions about English 181
should be directed to Judith Olson-Fallon, Director of Educational Support Services (Sears 470,
http://studentaffairs.case.edu/education/about/contact.html).
ENGL 183
Academic Writing Studio (1 credit, offered Pass/Fail only)
Staff
M 12:30—1:20
This course offers practice and training in various aspects of academic writing in a small group
workshop environment. This course provides supplementary instruction to help students meet First
Seminar writing objectives. Please note: only one semester hour of English 183 will count toward a degree,
but the course may be repeated. English 183 is offered each semester – for more information, please
contact writing@case.edu.
ENGL 184
Research Writing Studio (1 credit, offered Pass/Fail only)
Staff
M 12:30—1:20
This course offers practice and training in various aspects of research writing in a small group
workshop environment. This course provides supplementary instruction to help students meet SAGES
University Seminar writing objectives. Please note: only one semester hour of English 184 will count toward
a degree, but the course may be repeated. English 184 will be offered each semester – for more
information, please contact writing@case.edu.
ENGL 200
Literature in English
Staff
MWF 3:00—3:50
This course introduces students to the reading of literature in the English language. Through close
attention to the practice of reading, students are invited to consider some of the characteristic forms and
functions imaginative literature has taken, together with some of the changes that have taken place in what
and how readers read. Recommended preparation: Concurrent enrollment in ENGL 150 or USFS 100.
ENGL 203
Introduction to Creative Writing
Staff
M 3:00—5:30
This course aims to introduce students to the subtleties of the craft of writing poetry and prose
while also giving students practice in critical reading, thinking, writing, and discussion of such creative
works. Because successful writers of all types read avidly, in this course we will read a variety of poetry and
short fiction, and discuss the specific creative writing techniques and characteristics the writers employ in
their works. One of the goals of such reading and discussion is to not only to engage with these texts but
also to understand how they function in order to draw from these texts for our own work.
ENGL 204
Introduction to Journalism
Sheeler
MW 9:00-10:15
Students will learn the basics of reporting and writing news stories, but also the traditions behind the craft
and the evolving role of journalism in society. Instruction will include interviewing skills, fact-checking, word
choice and story structure—all framed by guidance on making ethically sound decisions. Assignments could
include stories from a variety of beats (business, entertainment, government, science), along with deadline
stories and breaking news Web updates, profiles and obituaries.
ENGL 213
Introduction to Fiction
Umrigar
M 3:00—5:30
In this class, students will study the fundamentals of writing a successful short story. We will pay
attention to elements of writing such as plot and character development, point of view, sense of place,
dialogue writing etc. Students will read and critique each other's work, as well as discuss stories written by
professional writers and featured in anthologies such as The Vintage Book of Contemporary American Short
Stories. They will also produce short stories of their own. This is a writing-intensive and reading-intensive
class. Recommended preparation: ENGL 150 or USFS 100.
ENGL 214
Introduction to Poetry Writing
Gridley
Th 2:45—5:15
This is a course for students who are new or relatively new to the practice of poetry. Its purpose is to
engage students critically and creatively with the primary elements of a poem: its form, music, syntax, diction,
tone, imagery, and tropes. It is designed to function as a workshop, which means student poems will be the
focus of weekly critical attention from peers. The work for this course involves writing and critiquing poems; inclass writing exercises; the close study of poetic models; readings in poetic craft and theory; memorization
and recitation; a midterm project; and a final portfolio. Students will receive regular feedback in the form of
written comments and conference sessions. Grading determined by portfolio evaluation.
ENGL 257A
The Novel
Stonum
MWF 2:00—2:50
How most rewardingly to enjoy, discuss, and write about narrative fiction. The reading list will consist
of six or seven literary novels from the 1800s to the 2000s, including as wide as possible a variety of styles,
themes, and techniques. Anchoring the list will be McEwan's Atonement, Pyncheon's Crying of Lot 49, and
Faulkner's As I Lay Dying. Other candidates to be drawn from such as Jane Eyre, The Secret Agent, The
Turn of the Screw, The Age of Innocence, Their Eyes Were Watching God, Passage to India, and The Brief
Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao.
Writing requirements: two short (5-page) analytic essays, discussion questions for at least two
novels, and contributions to a course blog.
Current and prospective English majors obviously welcome, but the class is meant for anyone who
likes to read.
ENGL 300
British Literature to 1800
Siebenschuh
MWF 11:30—12:20
This course introduces students to a broad spectrum of British literature from the Middle Ages to the
end of the eighteenth-century. We will read selections from Chaucer, Shakespeare, Donne, Milton, Dryden,
Pope, Swift, Johnson, the early novelists—and a number of others along the way. One focus of the course
from start to finish will be the changing ideas about what constitutes literature, what the creative process
involves or should involve, and what the role of literature and the writer are in the culture. Another will be the
way in which historical factors like changing levels of literacy and the coming of print culture influence all of
the above. Requirements for the course include regular attendance, participation in discussion, two five to
seven page papers, a mid-term and a final.
ENGL 305
Playwriting
Seremba
TTh 11:30—12:45
We shall start with the rudiments: Aristototle's Poetics.This will, however, not be a course married to a
single school of playwriting. Apart from the theoretical and other needs, the course will take a workshop
format in which emphasis will be put on writing and rewriting, with page in hand readings/stagings of the final
drafts. Texts may include Antigone by Sophocles, The Island and Master Harold and the Boys by Athol
Fugard, Riders to the Sea by J.M. Synge, Come Good Rain by George Seremba.
ENGL 307
Intermediate Writing Workshop
Feature/Magazine Writing
Sheeler
W 2:00—4:30
In the prerequisites for this class, you’ve learned the inverted pyramid. You know how to write a
traditional news article and to condense the crucial information into a paragraph. All those skills are important
to good feature writing.
After all, you have to know the rules of story structure in order to break them.
This class will focus on techniques for crafting stories – not articles, but true stories, with a
discernable beginning, middle and end, stories that take readers places they’ve never been, introducing
readers to people they’ve never met and places they’ve never been, teaching them lessons they didn’t know
they needed to know. Assignments will include short "front of the book" magazine pieces along with longer, indepth features. Guest speakers will include magazine editors, award-winning journalists and authors of long
form nonfiction from across the country.
ENGL 308
American Literature
Stonum
MWF 10:30—11:20
Drawing exclusively on writers from the United States (d'oh!) and foregrounding the literature's
attention to national and cultural identity, the class will chiefly be devoted to enhancing broad literary
acumen. With respect to the course title, "literature" and whatever that might mean, entail, or offer will be
more important than "American."
The poems, narratives, and non-fiction we read will be drawn mainly from four key periods in US
literary history: 1840-1865 (aka the American Renaissance), 1880-1900 (aka, the age of realism), 1914-1940
(aka modernism), and 1960-2010 (aka our post-modern era of American cultural hegemony).
Written work will include two medium-length papers, at least one class presentation, contribution to a
course blog, and perhaps some quizzes.
ENGL 330
Victorian Literature
Nineteenth-Century Literature and Psychology
Vrettos
TuTh 11:30—12:45
This course will examine a wide array of British literature written during the nineteenth century. In
particular, we will focus on how Victorian writers represented the workings of the human mind, and we
will trace the development of what was sometimes called “the psychological novel” over the course of the 19th
century. Our readings will include novels such as Charlotte Bronte’s Jane Eyre, Charles Dickens’ Great
Expectations, George Eliot’s Mill on the Floss, Oscar Wilde’s Picture of Dorian Gray, Robert Louis
Stevenson’s Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, and Thomas Hardy’s Return of the Native. We will also study selected
poems by Robert Browning, Alfred, Lord Tennyson, and Christina Rossetti, and non-fiction prose by Matthew
Arnold, Walter Pater, and Charles Darwin, as well as some excerpts from nineteenth-century psychology and
philosophy. Through these works, we will study issues such as the Victorian interest in childhood
development; the representation of subjectivity; the interaction between self and society; the relationship
between memory and identity; the power of emotion and desire; obsessive and compulsive behavior,
monomania and other forms of insanity; multiple personality; wandering attention and reverie, and theories of
consciousness (including the emergence of the term “stream of consciousness”). Requirements for the course
include attendance and active participation in discussion, three papers of varying lengths, and a take-home
final exam. This course is intended as an introduction to nineteenth-century literature, and is appropriate for
both majors and non-majors. Prerequisite: either ENGL 150 or USFS 100.
ENGL 343
Language & Gender
MW 12:30-1:45
Emmons
Do women and men use language differently? Is the English language sexist? How does language
use enact gendered identity(ies)? This course will explore questions like these (and many others) as they
relate to the interdisciplinary study of language and gender. Feminist scholars – from fields such as
anthropology, psychology, sociology, English, and linguistics – view gender as a central category for analysis.
This course will explore some of the historical and current theories about how gender and language interact.
We will outline the progression of language and gender studies from Robin Lakoff’s 1975 Language and
Women’s Place to the current proliferation of research on the topic. This course will explore a variety of
methodologies and theoretical frameworks for studying language and gender. Assignments will include a
weekly dialog journal, several (~2-3 page) research reports and/or book reviews, and a final research
project/seminar paper (~12-15 pages).
English 365Q/465Q
Postcolonial Literature
Writing Black Britain
Koenigsberger
TR 1:15-2:30
This course explores writing by and about “Black Britain,” a phrase that defines British subjects of
African, Caribbean, and South Asian descent. We will read some early writing by Black Britons (Olaudah
Equiano and Mary Prince) before moving on to read twentieth-century novels by writers such as Buchi
Emecheta, Colin MacInnes, Beryl Gilroy, Salman Rushdie, Hanif Kureishi, Monica Ali, and Caryl Phillips.
Requirements will include several in-class reports and contextual projects. There will be no exams;
writing assignments include several analytical papers and a final research paper, along with an electronic
course portfolio.
ENGL 367/467
Introduction to Film
Spadoni
TTh 10:00 to 11:15 (class)
T 7:00to 9:30 (film viewing)
An introduction to the art of film. Each week we take an element of film form (editing, cinematography,
sound, etc.) and ask how filmmakers work with this element to produce effects. Most weeks we’ll also screen
a whole film and discuss it in light of the week’s focus. Films to be screened include masterworks of the silent
era, foreign films, Hollywood studio-era classics, and more recent US cinema. Students write two essays (5-6
and 8-10 pages) and take a scheduled quiz, a midterm, and a final exam. Grad students write a longer
second essay and, in connection with this, submit a proposal and bibliography.
ENGL 368C
Topics in Film:
Dance on Screen
Ehrlich
MW 12:30—1:45 (class)
Tu 7:00 to 9:30 (film viewing)
The course will explore images of movement across a wide spectrum of cultures and performance
styles, Films analyzed each week will represent a variety of national cinemas, historical periods, and artistic
styles—from Fred Astaire to Japanese Noh drama, and from Pina to Dirty Dancing. Esp. appropriate for
students in Dance, Film Studies, Music, Theatre…and any dance and film enthusiasts!
English 373/473
Studies in Poetry
American Poetry
Clune
TTh 2:45—4:00
In this course we will explore a wide and deep selection of the most significant American poetry of the
past two centuries. We will investigate the diversity of responses in this period to such basic questions as
what poems are, what kinds of knowledge they convey, what forms of relationship they imagine, and what
images of the nation they project. Poets studied include Walt Whitman, Emily Dickinson, William Carlos
Williams, Gwendolyn Brooks, Sylvia Plath, and Rae Armantrout. Written work will consist of several short
response papers, and two longer papers.
ENGL 378
Topics in Visual & New Media Studies
The Graphic Novel
Grimm
TuTh 1:15—2:30
An exploration of the graphic novel as a newer genre/form of expression: an inquiry into how it fits
within the larger literary context. Readings will include works by authors/artists such as Neil Gaiman, Harvey
Pekar, Allison Bechdel, Art Spiegelman, Marjane Satrapi, Frank Miller, and others. The class will include
collaborative endeavors, response papers, and an end-of-semester project.
ENGL 380
Department Seminar
Happenstance: Crossings of Chance and Intention
Gridley
TuTh 10:00—11:15
What is the relationship between happenstance and meaning? How do we conceptualize crossings of
chance and intention? In this departmental seminar we will look at why and how poets, artists, and film
makers engage chance operations, and/or “depersonalizing” patterning formulae, in the production of their
compositions. We will also study fictional works that thematize happenstance, with special attention to forms
of paranoia regarding coincidence and—more broadly—fate. Requirements include 5-6 page lyric essay and
10 page research essay (preliminary to which students will clear a proposal and turn in a first-stage
bibliography). Presentations also required. We will draw from the following sources:
“Aleatory Poetics” & Eunoia /Christian Bök
alphabet / Inger Christensen
The Anthropology of Magic / Susan Greenwood
Believing in Magic: the Psychology of Superstition / Stuart A. Vyse
The Book of Divination / Ann Fiery
The Castle of Crossed Destinies / Italo Calvino
The Crying of Lot 49 / Thomas Pynchon
experimental films by Stan Brakhage and Nathaniel Dorsky
Li: Dynamic Form in Nature / David Wade
Max Ernst and Alchemy: a Magician in Search of Myth / M.E. Warlick
Lolly Willowes: or the Loving Huntsman / Sylvia Townsend Warner
Rivers and Tides (film) / Andrew Goldsworthy
Sleeping with the Dictionary / Haryette Mullen
The World as Will and Representation / Schopenhauer
ENGL 385
Special Topics in Literature:
The History of the Book
Woodmansee
M 5:30 - 8:00 p.m.
An exploration of the history of the book as a material as well as textual object. Focus will be on the
development of "print culture" in the West, with particular attention given to the evolution of the book trade in
Britain. Topics will include the development of technologies of printing and paper making, of trade customs
and laws, including copyright, to support and regulate an expanding book industry, the rise of a profession of
authorship, the spread and differentiation of literacy, and the evolution of new genres such as the novel and
magazines.
The seminar will meet in Special Collections in Kelvin Smith Library to facilitate regular scrutiny of the
objects of study, and there will be several guest lectures and field trips to investigate other local resources in
book history.
Readings will include a comprehensive survey of book history, two novels, and selected scholarly
articles (available online or posted on Blackboard) aimed at familiarizing students with the course focuses and
with the standard and newer (including digital) methodologies being developed in bibliography, textual
criticism, cultural history, etc. for research in book history generally.
In addition to energetic and informed participation in class discussion, seminar participants will be
expected to work with the instructor to identify a research topic reflecting their individual interests, present
their research in class, and develop it in a substantial term paper.
ENGL 392
Classroom Teaching
Tutoring Writers
Jewell
English 392 is an experiential-learning class that offers students the opportunity to earn three
course credits by tutoring in the Writing Resource Center (WRC). In addition to serving 5-6 hours per week
in the WRC, students will conduct readings relevant to their pedagogical interests, attend meetings with an
assigned faculty mentor, and occasional WRC staff meetings. Students will write a final essay reflecting on
their experiences. For more information, please contact writingcenter@case.edu .
ENGL 395
Senior Seminar
MW 12:30—1:45
Umrigar
In this class, students will work on their individual projects as a capstone for their educational careers at
Case. The project can be research-based or creative. Early in the semester, students will consider different critical
approaches that can be taken in the examination of a text. Later, the bulk of the semester will be devoted to working on
your project. You will also be required to present your project. Prereqs: ENGL 300 and ENGL 380.
ENGL 398
Professional Communication for Engineers
Staff
MW 9:30—10:20
MW 10:30—11:20
MW 11:30—12:20
MW 2:00—2:50
MW 4:00-4:50
TTh 10:00—10:50
TTh 1:15—2:05
TTh 2:45—3:35
TTh 4:30—5:20
English 398 introduces principles and strategies for effective communication in both academic and
workplace engineering settings. Through analysis of case studies and of academic and professional
genres, this course develops the oral and written communication skills that characterize successful
engineers. Students will prepare professional documents that focus specifically on communicating
academic and technical knowledge to diverse audiences. Because such documents are always situated
within professional, social, and rhetorical contexts, this course also requires students to explain and justify
their communicative choices in order to become adept in navigating the rhetorical environments they will
encounter as professional engineers. As a SAGES Departmental Seminar, English 398 also prepares
students for the writing they will do in Capstone projects.
ENGL 506
Professional Writing: Theory & Practice
Th 5:30—8:00
Fountain
English 506 is a graduate seminar in professional & technical communication theory and pedagogy, created
originally to support the teaching of engineering communication and medical writing. It is required of all graduate
students who wish to teach Disciplinary Writing Courses at Case: e.g., English 217B (“Writing for the Health
Professions”) and English 398 (“Professional Communication for Engineers”).
Throughout the seminar, we will attend to the historical development, research methods, and workplace and
pedagogical practices that constitute the field of what is often termed “technical communication.” Our pedagogical focus
will center on the influence of disciplinarity, the acquisition of genre knowledge, and the development of expertise. Our
historical and workplace investigation will seek to understand the ways technical communication practices are caught up
with issues of ordering, power distribution, and knowledge formation. Lastly, we will explore the scholarly conversations
going on at the national level as well as the pedagogical tools available in our local context.
Possible course texts include Collins and Robert’s Rethinking Expertise (2007), Longo’s Spurious Coin: A
History of Science, Management, and Technical Writing (2000), Tardy’s Building Genre Knowledge (2009), Winsor’s
Writing Power (2003), and Dubinsky’s collection Teaching Technical Communication (2004).
ENGL 510
Research Methods
Memory and Consciousness
Vrettos
Th 2:45—5:15
This course focuses on methods and resources for research in English and invites students to
develop professional approaches to the study of English language and literature. Our primary goal for the
semester is to understand and work with the academic genres of writing and presentation characteristic of
criticism and scholarship in English Studies. The historical, thematic, and literary focus of the course will be
on the intersections between literature and emerging theories of memory and consciousness in the nineteenth
century. The majority of our time will be spent on the final decades of the century, examining some of the
philosophical and psychological debates that have been linked to the development of psychological realism in
the Victorian novel and the advent of literary modernism. Although our readings will be focused on this
historical period, students will be encouraged, whenever possible, to examine the seminar topic in relation to
their own areas of interest when pursuing different forms of academic writing for the course. This course is
required of all new M. A. and Ph.D. students. Please note that this course does not serve as a substitute for
English 487 (Literary and Critical Theory) and that it is unlikely to recapitulate research methods courses at
other universities.
ENGL 517
American Literature Classics
Seminar on U. S. Literature of 1920s
Tu 4:30—7:00
Marling
An American Studies style seminar on the literature of the 1919-1929 period in relation to other artistic, social,
and political formations. Works covered will include: Crowland, The Jazz Singer; Allen, Only Yesterday; Walter Benn
Michaels, Our America and Waldo Frank, Our America ; Sinclair Lewis, Babbitt; Hemingway, In Our Time; Cather, The
Professor’s House; Williams, Spring and All; Dos Passos, Manhattan Transfer; Mina Loy; The Lunar Baedaker;
Toomer, Cane; Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby; Eliot, The Wasteland; LaFarge, Laughing Boy; Jeffers, Roan Stallion;
and Faulkner, The Sound and the Fury.
Everyone will write a close reading, a critical summary, a research paper, and a short report on one of the
following:
1. Thomas Dixon, The Clansman, Red Rock.
2. Lothrop Stoddard, The Rising Tide of Color Against White World Supremacy
3. James Weldon Johnson, Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man
4. Nela Larsen, Quicksand
5. Iola Leroy
6. Passing
7. Zane Gray, The Vanishing American
8. Ellen Glasgow, Barren Ground
9. Sherwood Anderson, Dark Laughter
10. Carl Van Vechten, Nigger Heaven
11. Alain Locke, The New Negro
12. Hemingway, Torrents of Spring
13. Cather, A Lost Lady
14. Death Comes for the Archbishop
15. Ursula Parrott, Ex-Wife
Research papers will be published, so please acquaint yourself with the work of previous editions of this class:
http://www.williammarling.com/VSALM/mod/index.html
Also at: http://www.cwru.edu/artsci/engl/VSALM/mod/
ENGL 524
SEM: Autobiography & Biography
Siebenschuh
W 4:30—7:00
Using mainly modern autobiographies the focus of the course will be the many issues raised by the
form and the nature of the autobiographical act. These issues will include the relationship between concepts
of identity and autobiographical form; the many possible motives of the writer; the implications of using
fictional techniques in a presumably factual genre, and the nature of autobiographical "truth." Possible texts
include selections from St. Augustine’s and Rousseau’s Confessions, Gosse’s Father & Son, Kingston, The
Woman Warrior, Stein, The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas, Nabokov, Speak Memory, Doris Lessing, Alfred
& Emily, Tashi Tsering, The Struggle for Modern Tibet, and Julian Barnes, The Sense of an Ending. Students
will be expected to participate in class discussion, make occasional presentations to the seminar, and
complete 15—25 page research essay.
ENGL 526 (with HSTY 526, ARTH 526)
The History of the Book
Woodmansee
M 5:30 - 8:00 p.m.
An exploration of the history of the book as a material as well as textual object. Focus will be on the
development of "print culture" in the West, with particular attention given to the evolution of the book trade in
Britain. Topics will include the development of technologies of printing and paper making, of trade customs
and laws, including copyright, to support and regulate an expanding book industry, the rise of a profession of
authorship, the spread and differentiation of literacy, and the evolution of new genres such as the novel and
magazines.
The seminar will meet in Special Collections in Kelvin Smith Library to facilitate regular scrutiny of the
objects of study, and there will be several guest lectures and field trips to investigate other local resources in
book history.
Readings will include a comprehensive survey of book history, two novels, and selected scholarly
articles (available online or posted on Blackboard) aimed at familiarizing students with the course focuses and
with the standard and newer (including digital) methodologies being developed in bibliography, textual
criticism, cultural history, etc. for research in book history generally.
In addition to energetic and informed participation in class discussion, seminar participants will be
expected to work with the instructor to identify a research topic reflecting their individual interests, present
their research in class, and develop it in a substantial term paper.