WAYLAND BAPTIST UNIVERSITY
San Antonio
Spring 2008
Instructor Information: Maia Adamina, MA. email address: freshcomp1@mailcity.com
Course Number and Title: ENGL 2301 English Literature SA 01
Catalog Course Description: Selected studies in important works of English literature
beginning with Beowulf
Prerequisite: English 1302
Required Textbook: The Norton Anthology of English Literature 8th ed.
Course outcome competencies: Upon the conclusion of this course, students actively engaged
in learning will be able to:
1. Discuss a representative selection of canonical British literary works.
2. Analyze these works’ themes.
3. Differentiate the cultural and historical contexts (periods) in which the works were
written.
4. Demonstrate comprehension of limited scholarship on an assigned literary work.
5. Articulate this comprehension in a research essay.
The more the student puts in the course, the higher his or her outcome competencies will be.
Course Requirements and Means of Assessment:
8 in-class writings = 40%
1 oral presentation done in pairs (10 minutes) = 30%
Individual Essay (3-4 pages, double spaced) = 30%
Attendance: As stated in the Wayland Catalog, students enrolled at one of the University’s
external campuses should make every effort to attend all class meetings. All absences must be
explained to the instructor, who will then determine whether the omitted work may be made up.
When a student reaches that number of absences considered by the instructor to be excessive, the
instructor will so advise the student and file an unsatisfactory progress report with the campus
dean. Any student who misses 25 percent or more of the regularly scheduled class meetings will
receive a grade of F in the course. Additional attendance policies for each course, as defined by
the instructor in the course syllabus, are considered a part of the University’s attendance policy.
Additional attendance policies: If you are absent the day an assignment is due, you are still
expected to turn it in by the deadline, but do not e-mail essays to me without prior permission.
Late papers will not be accepted. In-class assignments may not be made up.
Instructor's Policy on Academic Dishonesty: First incident will result in an F for the
assignment; second instance will result in an F for the course.
Statement: It is University policy that no otherwise qualified disabled person be excluded from
participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subject to discrimination under any educational
program or activity in the University. Students should inform the instructor of existing
disabilities at the first class meeting. (Documentation of disability may be required.)
Course Outline or Schedule: Please make a point of also reading the introductions to the
authors in the text
Week 1 February 27 Orientation to course. For next week review rules for writing about
literature – specifically pages 15-19
http://www.dianahacker.com/writersref5e/pdf/WritingAboutLit-REF.pdf
Week 2 March 5 Have read Beowulf (31-64) and sign up for oral presentations
Week 3 March 12 Finish Beowulf
Week 3 March Have read The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer “The General Prologue”
(170), Summary of “The Knight’s Tale” (190), “The Miller’s Prologue and Tale” (191), and
“The Nun’s Priest’s Tale” (250). If you like, check out my essay on “The Nun’s Priest’s Tale”
published in the journal Trickster’s Way at
http://www.trinity.edu/org/tricksters/trixway/current/Vol%204/Vol4_1/adamina.pdf
Week 4 March 19 –Off but check out the following Power Point on Comedy
www.geocities.com/absasso@snet.net/comedy.ppt
Week 5 March 26 Have read William Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night (510) 12 and Edmund
Spenser’s “Epithalamion” (434)
Week 6 April 2 First round of Oral Presentations *Individual Essay Due for First Round
Week 7 April 9 Have read Jonathan Swift’s A Modest Proposal (1114) and Alexander Pope’s
The Rape of the Lock (1136)
Week 8 April 16 Have read William Wordsworth “Ode: Intimations of Immortality” (1539),
Lord Byron’s “She Walks in Beauty” (1676), and John Keats’ “La Belle Dame Sans Merci”
(1840), “Ode to a Nightingale” (1845)
Week 9 April 23 Have read Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s “The Cry of the Children” (1922),
Robert Browning’s “My Last Duchess” (2058), and Christina Rossetti’s “In an Artist’s Studio”
(2141) and “Goblin Market” (2143)
Week 10 April 30 Have read Oscar Wilde’s “The Importance of Being Earnest” (2221)
Week 11 May 7 Have read William Butler Yeats’ “The Second Coming” (2402), James Joyce’s
“Araby” (2503), and T.S. Elliot’s “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” (2610)
Week 12 May 14 Second Round of Oral Presentations *Individual Essay Due for Second
Round
Proposed authors for oral presentations
First Round
Medieval Literature
Marie de France
Middle English Literature
Margery Kempe
Second Round
The Restoration and Eighteenth Century
Henry Fielding
Jane Austen
The Romantic Period
Sir Thomas Malory
Percy Shelley
The Sixteenth Century
Mary Shelley
Christopher Marlowe
The Victorian Age
Sir Walter Ralegh
Charles Dickens
The Early Seventeenth Century
Charlotte Bronte
John Donne
John Milton
The Twentieth Century
Virginia Woolf
Dylan Thomas