MA in English Literature Course Offerings

Engl 512: Studies in Fiction (Speculative Fiction)

Carrie Dickison

CRN 31275

Science fiction. Fantasy. Dystopian and utopian literature. All these genres—and more—fall under the umbrella of speculative fiction. Broadly speaking, speculative fiction seeks to envision different worlds and ways of being. This class will focus on works of speculative fiction that imagine alternative forms of community and belonging, with attention to intersections of race, gender, sexuality, and class. Assigned novels will include Parable of the Sower (1993) by Octavia Butler and Station Eleven (2014) by Emily St. John Mandel. Meets elective requirement; can be a substitution for contemporary.

 

Engl 534: Young Adult Literature

Rebecah Bechtold

CRN 31276

This special topics course explores representations of childhood as depicted in popular young adult novels published in the United States, including Horatio Alger’s Ragged Dick (1868), Louisa May Alcott’s Little Women (1868), Lois Lowry’s post-apocalyptic Gathering Blue (2000), Angie Thomas’ The Hate U Give (2017), Becky Albertalli’s Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda (2015), and Elizabeth Acevedo’s free verse novel The Poet X (2018). Meets elective requirement; can be a substitution for contemporary.

 

Fall Courses: Online

 

Engl 536A  - British Women Writers

Carrie Dickison

CRN 14457

This course focuses on literature by British women of long nineteenth century. The course will explore constructions of femininity in this period, including debates about women’s education in the late-eighteenth and early-nineteenth centuries, the evolution of the “woman question” during the Victorian era, and the emergence of the “New Woman” at the end of the nineteenth century. Readings will include works by Mary Wollstonecraft, Jane Austen, George Eliot, Sarah Grand, and Virginia Woolf. Meets elective requirement. 

 

Engl 546: Early African American Literary Traditions

Rebeccah Bechtold

CRN 14314

This course introduces students to an early history of African American literary production, including print literature and orature. More specifically, we will discuss the emergence of the African American literature canon, considering the role publishers, editors, critics, readers, and reviewers played in shaping it. Our focus will remain on prominent Black writers from the mid-eighteenth century through the Civil War, with special attention paid to Phillis Wheatly, Nat Turner, Frederick Douglass, Sojourner Truth, Harriet Jacobs, William Wells Brown, and Frances E. W. Harper, among others. Along the way we will discuss the complex racial and cultural identity that they helped consolidate while also considering the social, political, and economic forces that sought to amplify or silence their voices. English 546 is repeatable for credit; this version can be used as an elective or to fulfill an American (pre-1900) requirement.

 

Engl 728: Modern British, Irish, and Anglophone Literature

TJ Boynton

CRN 14316 

 

Engl 700

Rebeccah Bechtold

CRN 14315 

This course serves as an intensive introduction to the research and analytic methods prevalent in English Studies. It provides new graduate students with a foundation in the history, methodologies, debates, and traditions of the English discipline, including the major theoretical and disciplinary issues associated with the field. The course will provide an overview of the state of the profession, the structure of graduate studies, and the potential career options available to the MA, MFA, and future PhD student. Students will learn to navigate and practice the kinds of intellectual work commonly expected in the field, translating this acquired knowledge into academic, professional, and community environments. Required (online or in-person version) of all first-year students.

 

Fall Courses: In-Person

 

Engl 526: Romantic Literature: The British Romantic Period Novel

T 4:30-6:50pm

Mary Waters

CRN 14193

The novel has long been recognized as a genre that responds to and influences a wide range of cultural practices, but it has less often been recognized for the vital role it played in Romantic-era British politics and aesthetics.  This course will study the Romantic novel, a genre that alternately expressed a rollicking sense of humor, deep-rooted psychological fears, subversive political views, scientific skepticism, and newly emerging understandings of Great Britain as a nation of people with a shared cultural heritage.  We will read several types of novels that first emerged during the Romantic period, including the Gothic, the Jacobin, the Historical novel, and the regional novel, examining them through the lens of selections from various theories of the Romantic novel. Meets British literature and pre-1900 requirement.

 

Engl 533: Contemporary Literature

TR 11-12:15

Margaret Dawe

CRN 14194 

We’ll read American short stories and novels written since 1945 focusing on how writers craft action, character, setting, language, and theme, applying aesthetic concepts Aristotle describes in Poetics and those developed in The Scene Book. We’ll read stories written after 1970 in The Scribner Anthology of Contemporary Short Fiction. Novels we’ll read include: All the King’s Men by Robert Penn Warren; The Talented Mr. Ripley by Patricia Highsmith; In Cold Blood by Truman Capote, Beloved by Toni Morrison, and Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant by Anne Tyler. Meets post-1900 and American requirement.

Engl 580AK: Latine/x Literature

Vanessa Aguilar

CRN 14530

MW 12:30-1:45pm

Course description forthcoming!

 

Engl 680: Theory and Practice in Composition

Carrie Dickison

CRN 14196

W 4:30-6:50pm

This course is designed especially for prospective and practicing teachers. It will introduce you to theories of rhetoric and writing, major research questions in the field of composition studies, and best practices for teaching writing in schools and colleges. We will investigate writing processes, analyze varieties and examples of student writing, and hone our own writing skills by drafting, revising, and evaluating our own and others’ work. As we read significant publications in the field, we will continually consider the relationship between theory and classroom practice. Assignments will give you experience reading challenging pedagogical and theoretical texts; posing complex and worthwhile questions about the teaching of writing; performing research and synthesizing your findings; drafting course materials for current or future writing classes; and responding effectively to student writing. Topics of discussion will include teaching the writing process; developing writing assignments; teaching sentence structure and grammar; and responding to and assessing student writing. Meets elective requirement.

 

Engl 700: Introduction to Graduate Study

Rebeccah Bechtold

CRN 14197

M 2:00-4:20pm

This course serves as an intensive introduction to the research and analytic methods prevalent in English Studies. It provides new graduate students with a foundation in the history, methodologies, debates, and traditions of the English discipline, including the major theoretical and disciplinary issues associated with the field. The course will provide an overview of the state of the profession, the structure of graduate studies, and the potential career options available to the MA, MFA, and future PhD student. Students will learn to navigate and practice the kinds of intellectual work commonly expected in the field, translating this acquired knowledge into academic, professional, and community environments. Required (online or in-person version) of all first-year students.

 

Engl 705: Seminar in American Literature III -- Survey of African American Prose from the Harlem Renaissance to the Present

Jean Griffith

14198

T 4:30-6:50pm 

This seminar in American literature from the twenties to the contemporary period will focus on the African American literary tradition, particularly the prose tradition. While in the nineteenth century, non-fiction—particularly autobiography and political writing—dominated the African American literary scene, more and more writers turned to fiction in the twentieth century, especially during and after the Harlem Renaissance. At the same time, many African American fiction writers also were accomplished essayists. Our class will explore the contexts which shaped and continue to shape African American literature—from the “New Negro” Renaissance to Black Lives Matter—as well as the conventions and thematic concerns that structure this body of work. Meets post-1900 and American literature requirement.

 

Engl 713: Graduate Studies in Poetry - The Art of the Poetry Collection

Adam Scheffler

CRN 14199

R 4:30-7:00pm

Even voracious readers of poetry might choose not to spend their time reading individual poetry volumes. There are so many options for how to consume poetry—from podcasts, to readings, to social media posts, to countless print and online journals. And yet, the book, the individual slim volume that ranges from 50-100 pages, is still the primary form most poets choose to work in. And there’s something special about this form: Robert Frost reportedly said that if there are twenty-four poems in a collection, the twenty-fifth poem is the book itself. In other words, the arc of a poetry book, the way it’s organized and shaped, the way the poems speak to and refract off each other, can add up to something aesthetically satisfying, something more than the sum of its parts. In this class we will read several exceptional stand-alone poetry volumes from the last couple decades, examining and savoring the cohesiveness of their aesthetics—how their themes and arcs, their subject matter and section breaks, their ordering and epigraphs, can create a kind of magic that's just as captivating as a great poem.

(Note: this class will require purchasing or borrowing several different individual poetry volumes. Selected poets may include Sharon Olds, Ross Gay, Yusef Komunyakaa, Anders Carlson-Wee, Matthew Dickman, Louise Glück, Ilya Kaminsky, Diane Seuss, Wanda Coleman, Henri Cole, Natalie Diaz, and others.)

Meets elective requirement.

 

Engl 780: Advance Theory and Practice in Composition

Darren DeFrain

CRN 14200

T 4:30-5:45pm

For teaching assistants in English. Review of new theories of rhetoric, recent research in composition, and new promising developments in composition programs in schools and colleges. Students are given practice in advanced writing problems, situations and techniques and may propose projects for further special study. Meets elective requirement; reserved for a first-year GTAs.