ENGLISH DEPARTMENT COURSE OFFERINGS: SPRING 2014
For more information, please visit the Department website.
http://www.brandeis.edu/departments/english/courses/index.html
Gateway Course
ENG 1a
Introduction to Literary Studies
Thomas King
MWTh 10-10:50
This course is designed to introduce students to basic skills and concepts needed for the
study of Anglophone literature and culture. These include skills in close reading;
identification and differentiation of major literary styles and periods; knowledge of basic
critical terms; definition of genres. Usually offered every semester.
Courses Pre-1800
ENG 13b
Thinking About Shakespeare
Martin Moraw
MW 3:30-4:50
Explores Shakespearean drama, eighteenth and nineteenth century responses, and the
larger questions raised in both. We will read five plays alongside texts by Voltaire,
Lessing, Goethe, A.W. Schlegel, Hegel, Heine, Marx and others. The course investigates
how influential modern ideas about art, culture, subjectivity, and history took shape in
encounters with Shakespeare, and explores the ways in which his works simultaneously
allow us to query these ideas.
ENG 43a
Major English Authors,
Chaucer to Milton
Michael Booth
TF 9:30-10:50
A survey of major English authors from the Middle Ages through the Renaissance,
including Chaucer, Wyatt, Spencer, Marlowe, Shakespeare, Sidney, Donne, Herbert,
Marvell, Milton. No prior experience in medieval or Renaissance literature is required.
ENG 103a
Exploring the Self in 17th
Century Poetry
William Flesch
TF 12:30-1:50
Examines the poetry of Donne and his contemporaries, including George Herbert,
Richard Crashaw, and Andrew Marvell. These "metaphysical poets" will be read
alongside critical accounts by Samuel Johnson, T. S. Eliot, and others.
Courses Post-1800
ENG 35a
Separated by a Common Language David Razor
TF 9:30-10:50
Explores both the English and American fictional traditions. Although these traditions
were specific, authors on both sides of the Atlantic were aware of each other and
developed related concerns in distinct ways. This advanced course focuses on the 19th
century novel to explore the strong and self-conscious connections that tie George Eliot's
Adam Bede and Middlemarch to Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter, and Henry
James's The Portrait of a Lady.
ENG 38a
How to Be Human in the
Mechanical Age: Organic
Technologies in Science Fiction
Erin Erhart
TTh 5-6:20
A critical examination of contemporary and Victorian science fiction. Focuses on
defining the roles science, technology, and nature in the depiction of the "human." Will
feature technical and critical sources, fiction, and film. These include H.G. Wells,
Norbert Wiener, Isaac Asimov, Katherine Hayles, Ray Bradbury, Octavia Butler and
Philip Dick, among others.
ENG 38b
Race, Region, and Religion
in the 20th-century South
John Burt
MW 3:30-4:50
Twentieth century fiction of the American South. Racial conflict, regional identity,
religion, and modernization in fiction from both sides of the racial divide and from both
sides of the gender line. Texts by Chestnutt, Faulkner, Warren, O'Connor, Gaines,
McCarthy, and Ellison.
ENG 55b
Romanticism and the Supernatural Laura Quinney
TTh 2-3:20
Study of Romantic poetry and prose about the Gothic and supernatural. What is at stake,
psychologically and aesthetically, in the representation of supernatural seduction,
temptation and desire? Figures include Prometheus, Faust, Frankenstein and the vampire,
Christabel. Texts include Frankenstein and Northanger Abbey, as well as poetry by
Wordsworth, Coleridge, Keats, Byron and Blake.
ENG 130b
Writing the American Self:
American Autobiography from
Ben Franklin to Dave Eggers
Kathy Lawrence
W 5-7:50
As a genre inextricably intertwined with individualism, autobiography has developed as
an expression of American identity since the inception of the republic. Setting iconic
personal narratives in the context of history and theories of life-writing, we will study
works from Ben Franklin's autobiography and Frederick Douglass' "Narrative of the Life
of a Slave" to Mary McCarthy's "Memoir of a Catholic Girlhood" and Dave Eggers' "A
Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius."
ENG 145b
Just Jane Austen: Gender,
Susan Lanser
Justice, and the Art of Fiction
MWTh 1:00-1:50
Explores the novels of Jane Austen in historical context, with particular attention to the
ways in which they engage ethical questions, address the economic and social
implications of gender, and negotiate tensions between social justice and narrative form.
ENG 147b
20th Century Bestsellers
John Unsworth
TTh 2-3:20
Bestselling fiction opens a window on publishing, narrative production, and popular
culture in 20th-century America. Students will contribute five original research
assignments on one bestseller to an online database; midterm and final exams are based
on assigned reading.
ENG 157a
Contemporary Poetry
Laura Quinney
TF 11:00-12:20
An introduction to recent poetry in English, dealing with a wide range of poets, as well as
striking and significant departures from the poetry of the past. Looks, where possible, at
individual volumes by representative authors.
Film/Media
ENG 70a
Magic Lanterns to Movies:
The Origins of Narrative Film
John Plotz
TF 12:30-1:50
Explores the birth of moving pictures, from Edison and Lumiere's experiments to "Birth
of a Nation" and "The Jazz Singer". Traces film's roots in the photographic experiments,
visual spectacles and magical lanterns of late nineteenth-century France, England, and
America, and its relationship to the era's literary experiments. Filmmakers include:
Georges Melies, Abel Ganz, Sergei Eisentein, D W Griffiths, Charlie Chaplin.
ENG 160a
Digital Media and Culture
Kyle Stevens
MWTh 11-11:50
Studies the history and development of digital media, with an emphasis on modes of
literature and entertainment. We will examine the digitial revolution's effect on such
concepts as narrative, politics, aesthetics, identity, knowledge, and humanism.
Theory
ENG 151a
Queer Studies
Aliyyah Abdur-Rahman MWTh 10:00-10:50
Recommended preparation: An introductory course in gender/sexuality and/or a course
in critical theory. Historical, literary, and theoretical perspectives on the construction and
performance of queer subjectivities. How do queer bodies and queer representations
challenge heteronormativity? How might we imagine public spaces and queer
citizenship?
ENG 61b
Philosophical Approaches
to Film Theory
William Flesch
TTh 3:30-4:50
Studies a philosophical approach to film theory, examining both what philosophy has to
say about film and what effects the existence and experience of film can have on
philosophical thinking about reality, perception, judgment, and other minds.
Multicultural Literature / World Anglophone
ENG 167a
Decolonizing Fictions
Ulka Anjaria
TF 11:00-12:20
An introduction to basic concepts in postcolonial studies using selected literary works
from South Asia, Africa, and the Caribbean. Specific themes covered include the colonial
encounter; colonial education and the use of English; nationalism; gender, violence, and
the body; and postcolonial diasporas.
COML 117a
Magical Realism and
Modern Myth
David Sherman
MWTh 12-12:50
An exploration of magical realism, as well as the enduring importance of myth, in
twentieth and twenty-first century fiction and film from the United States, Latin
American, and beyond. authors include Toni Morrison, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, and
Salman Rushdie; films include Wings of Desire and Hero.
Electives
ENG 10b
Poetry: A Basic Course
John Burt
MWTh 11-11:50
Designed as a first course for all persons interested in the subject. It is intended to be
basic without being elementary. The subject matter will consist of poems of short and
middle length in English from the earliest period to the present.
Creative Writing Foundational Course
ENG 10b
Poetry: A Basic Course
John Burt
MWTh 11-11:50
Designed as a first course for all persons interested in the subject. It is intended to be
basic without being elementary. The subject matter will consist of poems of short and
middle length in English from the earliest period to the present.
Creative Writing Courses
Offered exclusively on a credit/no credit basis. Students will be selected after the
submission of a sample of writing, preferably four to seven pages. Please refer to the
Schedule of Classes for submission formats and deadlines within registration periods.
May be repeated for credit. This is an experiential learning course.
ENG 109a
Directed Writing: Poetry
Elizabeth Bradfield
W 2-4:50
A workshop for poets willing to explore and develop their craft through intense reading
in current poetry, stylistic explorations of content, and imaginative stretching of forms.
ENG 109b
Directed Writing : Short Fiction
Stephen McCauley
M 2-4:50
A workshop for motivated students with a serious interest in pursuing writing. Student
stories will be copied and distributed before each class meeting. Students' stories, as well
as exemplary published short stories, will provide the occasion for textual criticism in
class.
ENG 119a
Directed Writing: Fiction
Stephen McCauley
Th 2-4:50
An advanced fiction workshop for students primarily interested in the short story.
Students are expected to compose and revise three stories, complete typed critiques of
each other's work weekly, and discuss readings based on examples of various techniques.
ENG 119b
Directed Writing: Poetry
Olga Broumas
T 2-4:50
For those who wish to improve as poets while broadening their knowledge of poetry,
through a wide spectrum of readings. Students' poems will be discussed in a "workshop"
format with emphasis on revision. Remaining time will cover assigned readings and
issues of craft.
ENG 129a
Writing Workshop
Colin Channer
W 5-7:50
Offered exclusively on a credit/no credit basis. Students will be selected after the
submission of a sample of writing of no more than five pages. Please refer to the
Schedule of Classes for submission formats and deadlines within registration periods.
Students will learn how to use a wide range of literary techniques to produce factual
narratives drawn from their own perspectives and lives. Creative assignments and
discussions will include the personal essay, the memoir essay and literary journalism.
ENG 139b
Intermediate Screenwriting
Marc Weinberg
T 6:30-9:20
Prerequisites: ENG 129b or ENG 79a. Offered exclusively on a credit/no credit basis.
Students will be selected after the submission of a sample of writing of no more than five
pages. Please refer to the Schedule of Classes for submission formats and deadlines
within registration periods.
In this writing-intensive course, students build on screenwriting basics and delve more
deeply into the creative process. Participants read and critique each other's work, study
screenplays and view films, and submit original written material on a biweekly basis. At
the conclusion of the course each student will have completed the first draft of a
screenplay (100-120 pages).
Graduate Courses
Signature of dept. representative required for enrollment in all 200-level English courses.
ENG 257b
Modernism's Broken Worlds
David Sherman
M 2:00-4:50
Seminar on literary modernism as it imagines experiences of brokenness and reparation,
involving questions of trauma, collective memory, secularization, and historical justice.
Work by Woolf, Eliot, Joyce, Faulkner, Stein, Barnes, Beckett are studied, as well as
theoretical writing by Benjamin, Adorno, Freud, and others.
ENG 213a
Milton
Ramie Targoff
T 2:00-4:50
Considers the writings of John Milton in terms of the revolutionary world of midseventeenth century England. We will focus on Milton's active engagement in political
and religious controversy, as well as his extraordinary innovations as a poet. Works to be
read include major poems and prose.
ENG 230a
Realism
Ulka Anjaria
F 2:00-4:50
An intensive study of literary realism. Students will trace how critics and authors have
defined realism, and explore its vexed history in relation to naturalism and modernism.
Readings will consider contemporary debates around peripheral realisms and the future
of realism.
GSAS 250c
Rethinking the
Age of Revolution
Susan Lanser
Th 5:00-7:50
and Jane Kamensky
Note: This is a year-long course. It will meet every other week for two semesters.
Studies the seismic political upheavals of the late eighteenth century, creating new
nations, new understandings of rights, and new cultural practices. Focusing centrally on
the American, French, and Haitian revolutions, this interdisciplinary faculty-grad seminar
explores the multifaceted contours of the era and its aftermath.