Ways of Reading: Influence, Imitation, Invention
ENGL 201H
Fall 2017
| Section:
01
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Ways of Reading courses introduce students to the characteristics thought of as literary and the methods for studying them. This is a gateway course into the English major. Only one of the ENGL201 series may be taken for credit.
Ways of Reading courses develop strategies for careful and close reading, and techniques for the analysis of literary forms such as poetry and drama, and prose narratives such as novels and short stories. They familiarize students with some of the protocols of the literary-critical essay, examine the idea of literature as a social institution, and explore ways of connecting textual details and the world beyond the text. The ways of reading learned in the course are powerful tools for critically assessing discourses that expand far beyond the realm of literature. So while students will become adept literary critics, they also will learn quickly that to be a literary critic is to read critically and carefully all the time: in poems, novels, and plays, but also in political speech, in popular culture, and in the discourses that shape everyday life.
This course will consider how texts respond to one another and to the world, imitating and rebutting what has come before. Looking particularly at how authors deploy generic and stylistic strategies to do this, we will examine works that use realism to imitate the world as well as those that break with such ways of seeing. As we read, we will develop a set of technical and conceptual approaches to various literary genres to generate a facility and ease with close reading. At the same time, class materials will demand we recognize the influence of historical, geographic, and social contexts on the production and reception of works of literature. Therefore, as responsible readers, we will combine attention to a text's formal properties with an awareness of its relations to worlds outside the text. |
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| Credit: 1 |
Gen Ed Area Dept:
HA ENGL |
| Course Format: Discussion | Grading Mode: Graded |
| Level: UGRD |
Prerequisites: None |
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Fulfills a Requirement for: (ENGL) |
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Past Enrollment Probability: 50% - 74% |
| SECTION 01 |
Major Readings: Wesleyan RJ Julia Bookstore
Homer, THE ILIAD
Walcott, OMEROS
Loraine Hansberry, A RAISIN IN THE SUN
Bruce Norris, CLYBOURNE PARK
Charlotte Brontë, JANE EYRE
Jean Rhys, WIDE SARGASSO SEA
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Examinations and Assignments:
5 essays |
| Instructor(s): Saint,Lily Leopold Times: ..T.R.. 08:50AM-10:10AM; Location: FISK414; |
| Total Enrollment Limit: 15 | | SR major: 0 | JR major: 1 | | |
| Seats Available: 0 | GRAD: X | SR non-major: 0 | JR non-major: 0 | SO: 13 | FR: 1 |
| Drop/Add Enrollment Requests | | | | | |
| Total Submitted Requests: 1 | 1st Ranked: 1 | 2nd Ranked: 0 | 3rd Ranked: 0 | 4th Ranked: 0 | Unranked: 0 |
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