260-115 (03) Humanities Core 1  

REVISIONS TO THE SYLLABUS FOR 2012 IN PROGRESS

Time:  TTh 10:30-11:50  214 LH                                          Instructor: Dr. Hollis Robbins

I.  Course Objectives:

This course will help you to develop reading and writing skills, to expand your understanding of aesthetic and rhetorical principles, and to introduce you to the art of interpretation.  You will learn how to read and interpret poetry, short fiction, novels, drama, and film.   You will be introduced to traditional interpretive approaches and theories and learn to be active (as opposed to the passive) readers.  You will develop a critical vocabulary to help to articulate your own points of view, and locate your own positions within current theoretical debates.  This course will help you to improve your paper-writing skills for all future classes at Peabody.

II.  Course Requirements:

Attendance

Weekly writing exercises (1-2 pages)

Four analytical papers (3-4 pages)

You will be required to read and be prepared to discuss all of the assignments.  The schedule below indicates the date by which particular works should be read and the amount of reading to be done each day to stay current with class discussion.  Bring the text to class each week.

You will be required to write a midterm paper and a longer final analytical paper.  I do not accept late papers unless there is a compelling reason for missing the deadline. 

Attendance for this class is critical.  Much of what you will learn in this course will be the result of class exercises and discussion.  Discussion and debate are crucial to the learning process.  You are expected not only to attend but also to participate.  Three absences (excused or not) will begin to push your final grade downward.  

Grade: Your grade will be calculated as follows:

Class Participation:  includes attendance, paper-reading, possible quizzes, contributions to class discussion, individual and group conferences:  25%

Weekly response postings:  10 papers; top 7 will count for a grade:  25%.

Four papers: (50%)   

Writing Policy:           

All papers should be double-spaced, numbered, with your name on every page.  Neatness and excellence in punctuation, spelling, and grammar should always be a goal.   You will be asked to read your weekly papers aloud to the class and you should be prepared to discuss your work, defend your work, and accept both criticism and praise from your fellow students.

All written work should be your own.  This means that either: A) you are telling me what you think, or B) you are telling me what you think about what someone else thinks—which means you will tell me where you found this person’s opinion, when and where he/she expressed it, and how it is related to your own opinion.  You may embrace someone else’s opinion, but you cannot pass it off as your own.  This is called plagiarism and it is wrong.

A note about my grading on papers and essays:

A grade of A means you have produced a paper exemplary in almost every way. You have presented your thesis coherently, you have organized your thoughts effectively, and you have supported your interpretations meticulously.  An A paper is also one that is excellent in style and voice or tone.  And in an A paper, attention to form (spelling, punctuation, grammar, documentation) is as rigorous as it is to the content.  Your work on the paper is superior.

A grade of B means you have gone beyond the minimum requirements of the assignment and have successfully balanced description with analysis. You express yourself more clearly, meaningfully, and imaginatively than in a C paper.  Your work on the paper is good.

A grade of C means you have successfully completed the minimum requirements of an assignment.  Your paper has no major problems of any kind, but there is still much for you to do to better your grade.  Your work on the paper is fair.

A grade of D means your work is seriously deficient in some way.

A grade of F means your work has failed to meet the minimum requirements.

III.  Required Texts:

Shakespeare, William.  Twelfth Night. 

Nabokov, Vladamir.  Lolita (1955)

Course Reader

Recommended Works/Websites:

Lanham, Richard A.  A Handlist of Rhetorical Terms.  Berkeley:  UC Press.  1991.

http://www.press.jhu.edu/books/hopkins_guide_to_literary_theory

http://rhetoric.byu.edu/

IV.  Schedule and Reading

Week 1     Introductions 

Th Sept   1          Willa Cather, “Coming Aphrodite” 

                            Course expectations, Discussion Board, Weekly papers etc.

Intro to Concepts: Text, Domain of Analysis, Thesis, Evidence (Reader)

Week 2      Rhetoric and Poetry 

T  Sept 6      Discussion board due  

Class discussion, “Coming Aphrodite!”

Th  Sept 8     “Art of Poetry” (Reader). 

Genres, poetic forms, stanzas, rhyme schemes                                  

Week 3      Analysis of a Single Text 

T  Sept 13     Reading poetry: Yeats’ “Second Coming” 

Morin “Egg Ministry”  (Reader)

Th  Sept 15     Discussion board due: 

                     “Crazy Jane Talks with the Bishop”  

                       William Wordsworth, “Nuns Fret Not” 

9/16  FIRST PAPER DUE (On Interpretation)

Week 4     Working with Form:  The Sonnet

T  Sept 20      Siegfried Sassoon “Glory of Women” 

 “Does it Matter” 

Th  Sept 22      Discussion board: “Rites for Cousin Vit”

W.H. Auden “Musee des Beaux Arts”  

Week 5   Single Text:  Poetry and Play             

9/26 FIRST REWRITE DUE 

T  Sept 27    Matthew Arnold, “Dover Beach” 

Anthony Hecht (Reader)

Th  Sept 29            Shakespeare, Twelfth Night

Week 6   Single Text:  The Play             

T  Oct 4       Discussion:  Shakespeare, Twelfth Night

Th  Oct 6       Shakespeare, Twelfth Night 

Friday 10/7 SECOND PAPER DUE (on Twelfth Night)

Week 7   Single Text:  The Play 

T  Oct 11                NO CLASS                           

Th  Oct 13               Film:  Twelfth Night

Week 8   Working with Two Texts:

T  Oct 18     Discussion board due

                  Wilfred Owen “Dulce et Decorum Est” 

Th  Oct 20    Randall Jarrell’s “The Death of the Ball

                   Turret Gunner” (Reader)

                             “Go Tell It”  “Eighth Air Force”  

10/20 SECOND REWRITE DUE (on Twelfth Night)

Week 9    Working with Two Texts 

T  Oct 25       Phillis Wheatley “On Being Brought from

                     Africa to America”

Paul Dunbar “The Poet”

Th  Oct 27   “Danse Africaine,” “Lenox Avenue”

                              For Tuesday:   Lolita

T  Nov 1        Discussion board due  Lolita

Th Nov 3              Lolita

11/4  THIRD PAPER DUE  (on Lolita)

Week 10    Single Text:  The Novel

T  Nov 8       Discussion board due  Lolita

Th  Nov 10      Lolita

Week 12   [WEEK OF COURSE SELECTION FOR SPRING SEMESTER]             

OPERA:  The Rake’s Progress 

T  Nov 15             Lolita/Rake’s Progress

Th  Nov 17             Lolita/Rake’s Progress

11/18  THIRD REWRITE DUE (on Lolita) 

Week 13    Film         

T  Nov 22       Film:  Lolita

Th Nov 24             NO CLASS

Week 14   Single Text:  The Film

            T Nov 29        Last discussion board due

                        The Big Lebowski                       

Th Dec 1            The Big Lebowski   

Week 15    Text and Author

12/5  FINAL PAPER DUE  (Comparison of Two Texts)

            T Dec 6        Flannery O’Connor “A Good Man is Hard to Find” (Reader)

            Th Dec 8        Flannery O’Connor, “Good Country People” (Reader)             

Week 16

T Dec 13             Readings 

12/15  FINAL REWRITE DUE