ENC 1102: Literary Analysis

Spring 2003

Prof. Green

Phone Contact: 305-348-2874

Office: 258A DM

Office Hours: 12:30-2:00, T/R
or by appointment

Course Description

ENC 1102 builds upon the reading, writing and thinking that are emphasized in ENC1101. In this fashion, 1102 is the intensified version of 1101, continuing to prepare students for the academic thinking and writing which will challenge them at higher levels in the university. But there are a few additions. One is the content reading for the course, which is titled “Literary Analysis” and therefore the content of ALL readings will be literary or textually based. With this is mind, all essays written for this course will concern texts read and experienced. Research is expected for this course so research skills will be refreshed and highlighted throughout the semester as it pertains to the essays being constructed.

Reading, discussing, analyzing and writing about text are valuable skills for students to master in order to be successful at higher levels of the university—as many of the upper division courses require students to apply the same skills, to texts that may be literary or not.

Although we will be spending some time discussing what you are reading and thinking about as you go through your texts and the semester, 1102 is primarily a writing course. Therefore, a great deal of time will be spent interacting with your peer editors as well as with your professor discussing your writing and thinking skills. All students should be prepared to have their writing complemented and critiqued by not only each other, but your professor as well. Likewise, students should be prepared to critique the writing of other students in the class.

Texts and Materials

There is ONE official text for the course and it is listed below:

Troyka, Lynn Quitman. (2001). Quick Access: Reference for Writers (3^rd Ed.).

Prentice Hall, New Jersey.

The rest of the texts used in this course are up to you. I have provided a reading list attached to the back of this syllabus in case you are stuck in choosing something to read and think about. I have no problems with you reading something you read in high school or in another writing or literature class. My list is NOT mandatory, only suggestive. You must read at least 2 major works/3 minor works throughout the course of the semester.

You will also need a 3 ring notebook with 7 dividers, a duotang folder with 3 rings and 2 pockets, and one file folder or spare Duotang.

Attendance

This class is only as good as its members are, meaning that I take attendance every class session and it is difficult to catch people up when they are chronically late and absent. Plus, we do not get the pleasure of hearing your voice and thoughts during a discussion or within your peer-editing group. Students are allowed 3 UNEXCUSED absences for the whole semester before their grade is lowered half a letter grade. (A to an A-, B+, B..etc.) UNEXCUSED means I do not know where you are and you do NOT contact me either by phone message or email about what is going on.

Tardiness is something that, on occasion, cannot be controlled. A word of advice—this class is only 1 hour and 15 minutes long. If you are going to be more than 30 minutes late, DO NOT COME. It is rude to both myself and to this class to roll in when half of the class time is gone.

Both of these areas contribute to your Classroom Participation points.

Cell Phone and Text Messaging

Please turn off your cell phones and do not text message during class time.

Requirements and Grading

You will be writing 4 essays during the course of this class. All essays must be 3-5 pages, typed with 12 pt font, New Times Roman style, MLA format, with a title page that includes your name, the date it is due, a title and ENC 1102-Prof. Green. You also must have QUOTES and a WORKS CITED page for every essay (min. 3 sources for each paper):

· Ultimate Albums—an essay on a whole album (or genre of music) analyzed for its lyrical content and musician(s) who created it. Find a theme that you believe centers the album and break down that theme in terms of WHY and HOW it is important to the social world we live in and also why it stands out among other music of its time and/or genre.

· Mindings Collage—2 essays will come out of this semester long project. Both essays will be about texts you are reading, authors you are focusing on, themes you are exploring, or whatever floats your boat about the text(s) you are involved in. Each essay comes at a different time so it is important to keep this up as we go along. You will be required to write in this collage 3 times a week for a minimum of 15 minutes each time. I will be checking your work by asking for a sample from this collage periodically. Please see the handout on this to gather a more specific idea on what this assignment is. Watch the calendar for the due dates so you can decide what you want to give me to review.

· Contemporary Text/Author Review—this essay will be on a text or an author that you, as a reader, believe still has relevance today. This essay can be a critique, an informational review, a narrative on your experience with this text, or whatever style suits what you want to say about this text/author and its connection to how we live now. Think of this as something that you could give to someone who has not read the text you are focusing on. What would you tell them to either convince or put off or share with about this text/author?

Grading:

Ultimate Album Essay 15pts

Mindings Collage Essay #1 20pts

Mindings Collage Essay #2 20pts

Contemporary Text/Author Review 30pts

Classroom Participation 15pts

100pts

Scale:

96-100 A

90-95 A-

87-89 B+

83-86 B

79-82 B-

74-78 C+

70-73 C

Plagiarism—Plagiarism will NOT be tolerated under any circumstances. Borrowing (stealing) someone else’s words without acknowledging them properly, either verbatim or by paraphrasing, is a serious offense. This violation can be grounds for immediate failure of the assignment and/or the entire course. I strongly advise you to consult your handbook for an in-depth explanation of this serious offense. Consider yourself sufficiently warned.

Readings List

Fiction

Flannery O’Connor Good Country People

Sandra Cisneros House on Mango Street

Isabel Allende House of Spirits

“” Paola

Richard Wright The Man Who Was Almost a Man

“” Black Boy

Shirley Jackson The Lottery

Amy Tan Two Kinds

“” Kitchen God’s Wife

Chinua Achebe Marriage is a Private Affair

Alice Walker Everyday Use

“” The Color Purple

Toni Morrison The Bluest Eye

“” Song of Solomon

Jamaica Kincaid Girl

“” Jasmine

Sherman Alexie This is What It Means to Say Phoenix, AZ

“” Class

Raymond Carver What We Talk About When We Talk About Love

Katy Anne Porter The Jilting of Granny Weatherall

Tim O’Brien The Things They Carried

Leslie Marman Silko The Man To Send Rain Clouds

Dr. Suess The Lorax

“” The Cat in the Hat

Non-fiction

Langston Hughes Salvation

Lars Eighner On Dumpster Diving

Judith Ortiz Cofer American History

Martin Luther King, Jr. Letter from a Birmingham Jail

Randall Robinson Can a Black Family Be a Legal Nuisance?

Zora Neale Hurston How it Feels to Be a Colored Me

Melvin I. Urofsky Two Scenes from a Hospital

Mark Twain Little Bessie Would Assist Providence

Poetry

John Donne Death Be Not Proud

Matthew Arnold Growing Old

A. E. Housman To an Athlete Dying Young

Edwin Arlington Robinson Richard Cory

Robert Frost Stopping By a Woods on a Snowy Evening

James Fenton God, a Poem

e.e.cummings if everything happens that can’t be done

May Sarton AIDS

Carolyn Kizer Bitch

Sharon Olds Sex Without Love

Gary Soto Oranges

Mary Karr Revenge of the Ex- Mistress

M. Carl Holman Mr. Z

Judith Ortiz Cofer Latin Women Pray

Nikki Giovani Dreams

Bruce Bennett The True Story of Snow White

Drama

Tennessee Williams The Glass Menagerie

August Wilson Fences

Lorraine Hansberry A Raisin in the Sun

Shakespeare Othello

“” A Midsummer Night’s Dream

“” Taming of the Shrew

Samuel Beckett Endgame

Harvey Fierstein On Tidy Endings

Sophocles Antigone

Calendar

Week One

1/7/03-Intro. To Course/Syllabus/Grading System/Welcome to 1102/Diagnostic Essay Brainstorming—How Do I Define My Literary Critic? —As of right now, how do you see yourself as a reader and thinker about text and all of its potential messages?

1/9/03- Time for Mindings Collage/Reading (MCR); Peer Editing Groups for Diagnostic Essay (Instructor will bring in analysis sheets), Review of Basic Grammar/Structure Rules

Week Two

1/14/03- Final Copy of Diagnostic Essay Due; MCR; What is Literary Criticism? —Review of the Schools of Literary Criticism that we will be using to formulate papers in this course with examples of each major school

1/16/03- Placement of Quotes/Paraphrases Review; MCR; Where Do I Find. . . ?-Students will bring in 2 resources that they have used in the past for analyzing literature or any other type of text; Brainstorming—What Makes an Ultimate Album? /Bring in ONE of your favorites plus ONE review of it that you agree/disagree with

Week Three

1/21/03- Peer Editing Groups for Ultimate Album Essay (Bring Rough Drafts and Group Review sheet); MCR

1/23/03- Which School for Which Subject? —How many ways can you look at a specific literary piece? - Students will determine which perspective of criticism is best used in order to analyze writing; MCR

Week Four

1/28/03- Final Copy of Ultimate Album Essay DUE; MCR; Turn in section of Mindings Collage for feedback; Library work on Finding the Critics—use of the library to locate sources for literary review. Students will meet in the library, 1^st flr, behind the stairway.

1/30/03- MCR; Paraphrasing Practice—students will use one of the copies of critique to change from literal quote to usable paraphrase.

Week Five

2/4/03- MCR; Brainstorming for Mindings Essay#1-how to pick and choose ideas for what you see happening or NOT happening in a piece of text/what defines a “classic” piece of work? —Student will bring in their Mindings Collage to share where they are and collect ideas from the class on where to begin.

2/6/03- MCR; Peer Editing Groups for Mindings Essay#1(Bring Rough Drafts and Group Review sheet)

Week Six

2/11/03- MCR; Which genres lend themselves to certain schools of thought? —Students will evaluate which types of text lend themselves to certain schools of literary criticism.

2/13/03- Final Copy of Mindings Essay#1 DUE; MCR; Authors and Characters—How and What do you use to define a well rounded character? How does your author do it? What tools do they use? (metaphor, hyperbole, emotions, scenarios) –Students will select ONE character to talk about in terms of their text and bring their own description to class of who they THINK the character is and is going to be.

Week Seven

2/18/03- MCR; Contextual Themes—What themes does your author use to draw you into their work? Are they obvious about it or not so obvious? Can you see a theme that is NOT explicitly stated? What is it and how do you know? —Students will draw out one or more themes from their text to explain and/or define for the class.

2/20/03- MCR; Turn in section of Mindings Collage for feedback; Writing On a Specific Technique—Students will comment and begin to analyze the referent point for their author’s story and its characters and themes. Why does this story need to be told? What about it holds its place in textual reference?

Week Eight

2/25/03- MCR; Language and Proper English—Do you have a text that is not considered to be in the “norm” of writing? What about it makes it “abnormal” and challenging to the status quo of its creation time and now OUR time?—Students will comment and share in their peer editing groups any seemingly outlandish or off the beaten path text after defining what the “acceptable” canon is.

2/27/03- MCR; Vocabulary and its Place in your Critique—Use of advanced vocabulary in defining a criticism or enhancing a point. Students will select one simple referent words and then hunt down as many words as they can to highlight different directions for comment. How can this fit into our next essay?

Week Nine

3/4/03- MCR; Brainstorming for Mindings Essay #2—What have YOU found out about text and you the reader? —share some entries from your Mindings Collage with Peer Editing Groups and come together as class to share what we are thinking about in regards to texts we are finishing, starting, and in the middle of.

3/6/03- MCR; Peer Editing Groups for Mindings Essay #2(Bring Rough Drafts and Group Review sheet)

Week Ten

3/11/03- One to One’s with Prof. Green-If you would like to have some time with me to go over ONE part of your essay before you turn it in, this is the day to do it! Students will bring in their rough draft typed up and the critique sheet from their peer editing group; MCR

3/13/03- Final Copy of Mindings Essay #2 DUE; MCR; TBA

3/17-3/21 SPRING BREAK

Week Eleven

3/25/03- MCR; Schools of Literary Thought that Blend—Students will analyze why and how different school of literary criticism work together to create a “3-D” analysis. Students will bring in sample texts they are working with.

3/27/03- MCR; Working with Outside Sources—sources not readily thought of when doing literary analysis and how to work them into YOUR final critique.

Week Twelve

4/1/03- MCR; Turn in section of Mindings Collage for feedback; Bring in Thesis and Three Major Points of Contemp. Review for feedback from Peer Editing Groups—Do these fit together and are they in an order that is the most effective? What improvements and/or complements would you make?

4/3/03- MCR; Introductory Paragraphs that Work—Students will bring in Intro. Paragraph of Contemp. Review for discussion on how to give your critique paper a strong opening.

Week Thirteen

4/8/03- MCR; TBA

4/10/03-Peer Editing Groups for Contemp. Review (Bring Rough Drafts and Group Review sheet); MCR

Week Fourteen

4/15/03-Final Copy of Contemporary Text/Author Review DUE