Ways of Reading: Influence, Imitation, Invention
ENGL 201H
Fall 2024
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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 "Ways of Reading" course will consider how works of literature respond to one another, imitating and departing from what has come before. We will learn to identify a writer's stylistic, rhetorical, and generic commitments, and we will develop a set of technical and conceptual approaches to reading to generate a facility and ease with the practice of close reading. At the same time, we will remain alert to the influence of historical, geographic, and social contexts on the production and reception of works of literature. As responsible readers, we will combine attention to a text's formal properties with an awareness of its situatedness within worlds--and literary histories--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
Charlotte Brontë, JANE EYRE
Homer, THE ILIAD (trans. Robert Fagles)
Jean Rhys, WIDE SARGASSO SEA
Seamus Heaney, THE CURE AT TROY
Derek Walcott, OMEROS
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Examinations and Assignments:
Six essays |
Additional Requirements and/or Comments:
Gateway course for English major. Priority enrollment will be given to prospective English majors during Drop/Add. |
| Instructor(s): Saint,Lily Leopold Times: .M.W... 02:50PM-04:10PM; Location: CRT285; |
| Total Enrollment Limit: 15 | | SR major: 0 | JR major: 1 | | |
| Seats Available: 2 | GRAD: X | SR non-major: 0 | JR non-major: 0 | SO: 13 | FR: 1 |
| Drop/Add Enrollment Requests | | | | | |
| Total Submitted Requests: 2 | 1st Ranked: 0 | 2nd Ranked: 2 | 3rd Ranked: 0 | 4th Ranked: 0 | Unranked: 0 |
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