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Graduate Course Descriptions

Spring Semester 2016 Department of English and Comparative

Literature

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BRITISH LITERATURE

ENGC 7068 001-Approaches to Anglophone

Literatures and Criticism Call Number: 603425 R 05:00pm 07:50pm

Instructor: Tsang

The Concept of Community

What is community? Is it a concept universal to all cultures and societies? Or is it

always historically specific? Is community something we strive to build and to

which we attach positive values? Can one choose one’s communities? These

questions lie at the heart of this seminar, in which we examine the different

meanings of community in a wide range of literary and philosophical works. In

particular, we will ponder the intersection of community with individuality,

religion, nationhood, revolution,

history, exile, and most

importantly for our purposes,

literary aesthetics. Readings

may include Plato’s Republic,

Paul’s letters to the Galatians

and Romans, Shakespeare’s The

Winter’s Tale, Wordsworth’s

Prelude, Marx’s Communist

Manifesto, Eliot’s Silas Marner,

Joyce’s Portrait of the Artist as a

Young Man, and Sebald’s The

Emigrants, in addition to

theoretical and critical texts.

This seminar will feature a

number of guest speakers from

our department and elsewhere.

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COMPARATIVE LITERATURE

ENGC 7006 001- Approaches to Literary Theory Call Number: 603412 R 2:00-4:50

Instructor: Mok

Mimesis

Imitation. Representation. Expression. From its ancient to contemporary

definitions, mimesis names the complicated relationship between life and art, the

real and the fictive. This course examines mimeticism as a theoretical puzzle,

considering its importance to literature, aesthetics, theatricality and performativity,

desire, technological reproducibility, political economies, imperialism, and racial

politics. Beginning with Aristotle and Plato, moving through the rise of naturalism

and the advent of media like film and photography, we will chart the shifting

nature of mimesis and theories of representation. In addition, the course will

approach articulations of subject and object that are at stake in most considerations

of mimesis. We will conclude

the semester by

considering our contemporary

moment, when mimesis seems

to function alongside the viral

and alternative modes of

belonging and becoming.

Readings include Plato,

Aristotle, Marx, Mulvey,

Girard, Freud, Adorno,

Benjamin, Auerbach, Chow,

Spivak, Taussig, and Ranciere.

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AMERICAN LITERATURE

ENGL 8095 001- Contemporary American Fiction Call Number: 605556 M 1:25-4:20

Instructor: Glaser

Comics and Graphic Novels

Why are comics and graphic novels so popular? What is their history and how does

this history converge with and diverge from that of the novel? This course will focus

primarily on long-form comics in order to explore topics including: how to define

comics; how comics shed light on questions of race, gender, and representation;

comics and censorship in America; and where to place comics in the genealogy of

other visual and narrative media. Artists treated in this course may include Alison

Bechdel, Lauren Redniss, Chris Ware, Gilbert and Jaime Hernandez, Art

Spiegelman, Mat Johnson and Warren Pleece, Ho Che Anderson, Lynda Barry,

David Small, Allan Moore, and Phoebe Gluckner.

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RHETORIC & COMPOSITION

ENGC 7030 001- Teaching College Writing Call Number: 603421 R 11:00-1:50

Instructor: Carter

Teaching College Composition addresses the practice of writing instruction as it has

evolved in higher education since the late 1970s. The class will proceed by engaging

with forty years of Chairs’ Addresses at the Conference on College Composition and

Communication, and it will feature a series of Braddock Award-winning articles

that sometimes complement and sometimes diverge from the views of the chairs. As

we follow that scholarly dialogue, we take up such issues as composing process

theory, the writing-to-learn movement, critical pedagogy, the politics of language

standards, writing across the curriculum, program assessment, and multimodal

rhetoric. We conclude the semester by reflecting on the long-range significance of

writing instruction both for students’ educational careers and for their participation

in public discourse. With such participation in mind, we examine Writing Across

Contexts: Transfer, Composition, and Sites of Writing by Kathleen Yancey, Liane

Robertson, and Kara Taczak and Technologies of Wonder: Rhetorical Practice in a

Digital World by Susan H. Delagrange. Course tasks include discussion board

postings, leading class dialogue, a teaching demonstration, and a scholarly essay.

COMPARATIVE LITERATURE

ENGC 7054 001- The History of the Novel Call Number: 611031 W 4:40-7:30

Instructor: Schiff

Not so much a historical survey as an investigation of an extraordinary collection of

novels. Or to put it another way, These are the novels you’ve always wanted to read.

Our approach will be diverse: at times academic and theoretical, at other times craft

based and/or aesthetic. Our focus will be on major works and novelists, and we will

examine the history, practice, theory, and reception of the novel. We will likely

pursue such questions as: What do novels do or provide for us? What kinds of

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categories are most effective in accounting for the differences and variations in

novels? How has the form evolved? Why has it lasted so long and how does it renew

itself? Texts will be in English, though we will read translated works as well.

Readings will be determined in part by student interest and could include some of

the following works: examples of earlier genres that evolved into the novel (e.g., the

epic, satire, and romance--perhaps Petronius’ Satyricon), Heliodorus’s An Ethiopian

Romance, Part I of Cervantes’s Don Quixote, Mme. De Lafayette’s Princesse de

Cleves, Sterne’s Tristram Shandy, Austen’s Emma, Bronte’s Wuthering Heights,

Dickens’s Great Expectations, Flaubert’s Madame Bovary, Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina,

Norris’s McTeague, Kafka’s The Trial, Woolf’s To the Lighthouse, Nabokov’s Lolita,

Garcia Marquez’s One Hundred Years of Solitude, Kundera’s Unbearable Lightness

of Being, McCarthy’s Blood Meridian, Updike’s Rabbit Is Rich, Atwood’s The

Handmaid’s Tale, and Everett’s Erasure. Theorists may include: Northrop Frye,

Georg Lukacs, Mikhail Bakhtin, Ian Watt, Nancy Armstrong, Henry James,

Virginia Woolf, Linda Hutcheon, Steven Moore, James Wood, et al.

ENGC 7038 001- Topics in Composition Call Number: 603423 T 9:30-12:20

Instructor: Durst

Writing Program Administration

What is the intellectual work of writing program administration? How do the

position responsibilities compare with those of other administrators in higher

education? How do these efforts relate to the non-administrative work of

composition and rhetoric faculty? By examining WPA’s and others’ representations

of the complexities involved in leading a college-level writing program, this course

will explore from a variety of perspectives the roles of a writing program director

within the larger context of academia. The course will examine issues of

preparation for the position, curriculum development, assessment, communication

with a wide range of stakeholders at different levels of academia’s hierarchy, and

public representation of the program. Through careful reading of WPA scholarship

and programmatic discourse, experiential learning, reflective activities, group

discussion, and a series of writing assignments, the course will move toward an in-

depth understanding of what one needs to know and to do in order to function

effectively as a writing program administrator.

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ENGC 7041 001- Rhetoric of Emotion Call Number: 609219 W 4:40-7:30

Instructor: Micciche

In this class we’ll be interested in how emotion adheres to

the production, consumption, and circulation of writing.

Framing this focus will be interdisciplinary theories that

emphasize emotion as mediated by language, body, and

culture. This work will lead us to topics such as postmodern

“emotional cool”; emotion rules and behaviors; emotional

“stickiness” and contagion; the feminization and

racialization of emotion and its consequences; and pedagogy as emotion instruction.

To ground these ideas, our study will likely span online sites like Virtual Memorial

and PostSecret, the Black Lives Matter movement, literary and pedagogical texts,

and works by rhetorical, feminist, and antiracist theorists and practitioners.

Whatever our object, we’ll explore the following sorts of questions: How does writing

embody and enact emotion? How does writing move us emotionally? As readers,

what do we do with emotions triggered by writing? How does emotion factor into

writing processes, writing sites, and public and private writing? Assignments will

include short writing assignments, leading discussion, and a conference-length final

paper.

This class fulfills the Critical Theory requirement, Rhetoric & Composition area

requirements, and/or may be counted as a free elective.

ENGL 9010 001- Interdisciplinary Dissertation Workshop (7 week course; 1 credit hour tuition cost will be covered by the Graduate School)

Call Number: 609902 W 11:00-2:50

Instructor: Micciche

This class is an intensive pass/fail workshop for doctoral students in any discipline.

It is premised on three basic ideas: writers benefit from being in an environment in

which writing is prioritized; sustained motivation and consistent progress can be

helped by peer accountability; a structured schedule and set of flexible writing

strategies can together contribute to successful writing sessions. Participants will

spend the majority of their time writing in a shared space. The group will break

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periodically for discussions on topics of common interest, such as motivation, goal

setting, time management, and successful writing habits and rituals, as well as for

brief movement exercises and writing activities. Assessment will be based on

consistent participation as well as a written reflection describing progress made

during the workshop, strategies learned that will affect subsequent writing

activities, and projected writing goals for the next three months.

CREATIVE WRITING

ENGC 7036 001- Methods of Teaching Creative Writing Call Number: 603422 T 2:00-4:50

Instructor: Drury

In this course, we’ll consider various approaches to designing and teaching creative-

writing workshops. In addition to reading and responding to texts about how to

teach poetry and fiction, we’ll discuss how to apply various theories, ideas, and

approaches in the actual classroom. Our discussions will range from the speculative

(How do writers develop? What is poetry?) to the practical (How do you grade

creative work? How much should you intervene during class discussions? How much

of a creative-writing course should be devoted to workshops? How do you teach

creative writing online?). We’ll consider issues such as grading, attendance policies,

requirements, texts, conferences, and

assignments. We’ll find ways to help

fiction writers teach poetry workshops

and poets teach fiction. Finally, we’ll

explore how a creative-writing

instructor’s own poetry or fiction

informs and energizes the workshops

he or she teaches.

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ENGL 6011 001- Senior Writing Seminar: Fiction Call Number: 605478 W 12:20-3:25

Instructor: Iversen

Secrets and Surprises

“Man is not what he thinks he is, he is what he hides.”

― André Malraux

The secret to a good story is a character who is complex and often conflicted. What

does a character have to hide—and why? What fears and regrets lurk in a

character’s heart? How does a secret become the heart of the story? In this reading

and writing class, we will read, discuss, and analyze fiction beginning with writers

Oscar Wilde, Mark Twain, Henry James, and Guy de Maupassant and then move to

contemporary authors including Deborah Eisenberg, Elizabeth Hardwick, Charles

Baxter, and Ann Beattie. Students will write, read, and critique fiction at an

advanced level, analyzing various elements of fiction including plot, dialogue,

setting, pacing, and particularly character development. Students will write two

short stories.

ENGL 6017 001- Senior Writing Seminar: Poetry Call Number: 605514 M 1:25-4:15

Instructor: Lindenberg

This semester in the advanced undergraduate poetry writing seminar, we will be

looking closely at a series of young, contemporary poets’ first books representing a

wide range of voices, styles, and compositional strategies. This will give us an

opportunity to discuss some of the range and diversity of contemporary North

American poetries, and provide many opportunities for considering the craft and

concept not only of individual poems but also of the collection as a sustained

enterprise. Each week, we’ll consider a new poet’s book. In addition, in the

beginning of the semester we will workshop several individual poems from the

students in the class; in the latter half of the semester we will workshop substantial

groups of poems for, among other things, their relationship to each other as a

manuscript. Students should expect to complete a chapbook-length collection by the

end of the semester, for which they will be expected to write a rigorous introduction,

squarely locating their work in the context of contemporary North American

poetries.

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ENGL 7011 001- Graduate Fiction Workshop Call Number: 605516 W 1:25-4:15

Instructor: Bachelder

The graduate fiction workshop requires students to produce new writing and to

respond thoughtfully to the writing of peers. The emphasis throughout the course

will be on rigorous, observant, generous reading of both student and published

writing. The latter will likely include fiction by writers visiting campus during

spring semester: Paul Beatty, Tom Drury, Ander Monson, and Leah Stewart.

ENGL 7017 001- Graduate Poetry Workshop Call Number: 605524 W 1:25-4:15

Instructor: Lindenberg

This semester, the graduate poetry workshop will focus its inquiry around the

question: How does poetry intervene in conflict? We will approach this concept

through a wide range of texts, canonical and contemporary, from a diverse array of

voices. And we will consider “conflict” in many different contexts, including but not

limited to: War, human rights, the individual contending with her society and her

time, interior conflicts of the self, personal or domestic conflict, and conflicts that

exist or arise between different intellectual schools or aesthetic movements. Poet

laureate Juan Felipe Herrera has said, “Poetry is a call to action, and poetry is

action.” We’ll talk about different approaches to social poetry, and a history of

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responses to social poetry, and the nature of those responses. We’ll also look at the

poem itself as a site where problems are solved and conflicts resolved, and the

productive creative tension that arises for both poets and readers in texts that

address themselves to conflict in some way. Students will be encouraged to write

poems that engage with the conversation as it unfolds. Carl Phillips, the Elliston

Poetry Fellow in spring 2016, will join the class a couple of times during the

semester.

ENGL 7021 001- Graduate Nonfiction Workshop Call Number: 605550 M 4:40-7:30

Instructor: Iversen

“It makes more sense to write one big book - a novel or nonfiction narrative - than to

write many stories or essays. Into a long, ambitious project you can fit or pour all

you possess and learn.” –Annie Dillard

Do you agree or disagree with Dillard’s statement? Let’s find out! Students in this

advanced writing and reading course will explore the notion of moving from short

form to long form writing. We will begin by writing short essays and other forms of

creative nonfiction and then discuss how to expand this into longer works of linked

essays or long narrative nonfiction. We’ll discuss the work of writers including John

McPhee, Katherine Boo, Edwidge Danticat, and Michael Ondaatje. We will also

address the issue of truth versus imagination in creative nonfiction and fiction, as

well as how the voice, style, and aesthetic sensibilities of the writer bear upon the

writing itself.

This course emphasizes student work in a workshop setting with the goal of

further developing the particular voice and style of each writer. Each week’s class

will be divided into brief lectures, discussion, and workshops in which students will

evaluate and critique the creative work of peers. Students will be expected to

complete three substantive creative writing assignments and will also be

encouraged to send work out for potential publication. A final portfolio with a self-

evaluation is due at the end of the semester.

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PROFESSIONAL WRITING

PWRT 6022 001- Promotional Writing Call Number: 605561 T 4:40-7:30

Instructor: Larkin

This course introduces students to the theory and

practice of writing promotional copy for print and

digital media. Promotion copy is writing that sells

and promotes. Students will learn to write

promotional copy that commonly appears in

advertising packages and web design packages.

Students will understand how to write copy for

radio, television, and display ads, and for direct-

mail promotion. In particular, students will learn

to create promotional copy for display ads,

posters, brochures, and website and create a

strategic marketing plan for real-world clients.

Students will plan and execute a promotional

campaign within the constraints of our client's needs, schedule and budget. Course

readings will include the theories of social psychology as they impact attitude

formation and on demographic and psychographic variables among audiences.

Students will become familiar with branding for business and for non-profits and

work with clients to produce copy that has impact and reflect brand awareness.

Past clients have included the Kidney Foundation, Anderson Publishing Company,

the Taft Museum, OBZ Design, Words' Worth, the Cincinnati Youth Collaborative,

and the Irish Heritage Center, among others.

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PWRT 7029 001- Content Management Call Number: 605564 W 6:00-8:50

Instructor: Meloncon

Regardless of where you find yourself working, odds are you’ll need to leverage your

strong writing and communication skills into “managing content” for your

organization. Content Management will help you understand different technologies

and processes necessary to manage the wide variety and kinds of content found in

today’s professional work environments. Professional writers and communication

specialists are often asked to manage digital content (promotional to technical

content that includes images, video, & sound) from creation to collection to

publication and to understand how this content matches strategic business goals.

This course will help you understand the processes and the technologies and give

you practice writing and managing in client, project driven environments. This

course fulfills the PW technology course requirement. Contact Lisa at

meloncon@tek-ritr.com for additional information or with questions.

PWRT 7030 001- Internship Call Number: 605571 TBA

Instructor: Debs

Supervised experience in the professional work force. For PA/MA students.

Permission of Professional Writing Director is required.

PWRT 7040 001- Rhetoric Call Number: 605572 M 6:00-8:50

Instructor: Debs

This course provides an intensive introduction to classical rhetoric, particularly

Aristotle’s Rhetoric and selections from other classical writers, as a background for

current practices in professional writing and related fields. We will explore how

theories of classical rhetoric can apply in studying audiences, genres and social

situations, as well as in creating and managing text and content. While students

from other tracks are welcome, please note that this course is directed to the often

very practical interests of the professional writing graduate students; it is not a

review of the history of rhetoric and it does not extensively examine contemporary

theories of rhetoric, although we will discuss such issues as the role of rhetoric in

society, ethical argumentation, knowledge and science, and the problem of trust.

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PWRT 7095 001- Professional Writing Capstone Call Number: 605579 R 4:40-7:30

Instructor: Arduser

The capstone course is required for students completing the English Department's

MA in Professional Writing. This course is your opportunity to demonstrate mastery

and integration of the skills, principles, and knowledge gained from your

coursework. It requires the application of that learning to a field project that will be

evaluated by faculty and others. The course is open only to graduate students in

this program who are at the end of their coursework.

PWRT 9096 001- Professional Practice Call Number: 604990 TBA

Instructor: Debs

Formal recognition of work done by graduate students conducting projects under

the terms of graduate Administrative/Research Assistantships.