Fall 2018

Fall 2018

  

 

5549 ENGL 202-03: Intro to Creative Writing: R. Mozer

 

 

5324 ENGL 202-04: Intro to Creative Writing: I. Stansel

This course introduces students to three genres of creative writing: poetry, drama, and fiction. Students will read a variety of works in each, analyzing and discussing the texts from a writerly perspective (discovering along the way just what that means). Students will examine the works using particular aspects of the writing craft (image, point of view, dialogue, etc.) as foundations for understanding. Then the class members will try their own hands at the creation of poems, plays, and stories. The class will discuss methods of invention and development and practice the art of revision. This is a discussion-based class and students should be ready to voice their thoughts and ideas using a developing workshop vocabulary.

10023 ENGL 202-50: Intro to Creative Writing: B. Weinberg

Welcome to the English Department’s online version of ENGL 202: Intro to Creative Writing.   Using the department’s free online course text, Cardinal Creative Writer, participants will have the opportunity to dive into the genres of fiction, poetry, and drama, exploring the nuts and bolts of craft.  Your main projects will be a short story, a series of poems, and a ten-minute play. The first part of the semester will be a primer in four areas of craft: detail/image, voice/point-of-view, character, and setting. You’ll experiment with these foundational elements in writing exercises and discuss how published writers apply them in their stories, poems, and plays. For the remainder of the semester, you’ll take a closer look at each genre in mini-units, and you’ll be introduced to the creative writing workshop, in which you’ll exchange constructive criticism of your own creative writing through written responses online.  This course is a special offering from the English Department for the fall 2018 semester.

 

8261 ENGL 250-01: Exploring Literature-AH: D. Lutz (1/2 term semester)

This course will explore literature as a complex symbolic structure. We will unravel this structure through close reading, class discussion, and then writing, but we will always keep in mind the parts of the text best left unrevealed and mysterious. Our focus for the semester will be on outsiders and outcasts—individuals or groups who are “othered,” because of gender, sexual orientation, class, race, and/or disability. We will read works by Carson McCullers, James Baldwin, Nella Larson, Angela Carter, and others. You will be required to attend every class and to write three formal essays—one a research paper. There will also be frequent pop quizzes and two exams.

 

 

9265 ENGL 250-50: Exploring Literature-AH: S. Biberman

This section of Introduction to Literature will be taught on-line.  In this course you will sample various genres, including drama, poetry, fiction, and memoir.  Our goal will be to develop the central skill of literary analysis, or ‘close reading’ and apply close reading to course texts through a series of writing assignments, both scholarly and creative.  We will analyze the content of the pieces we read and their structure, symbolism, and themes.  By the end, you should have a multifaceted lens through which to enjoy literary-based art, as well as have mastered a skill set that will be useful both in subsequent college classes and beyond.

 Probable Texts:

Sophocles, Antigone

Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet

Bernstein, West Side Story

Selected English Lyric Poems

Selected English Short Stories

Kamara, The Bite of Mango

 

 

9647 ENGL 280-01: Exploring Popular Culture & Genre—AH: K. Chandler

Intro to Children’s and Young Adult Literature

This course explores questions about popular culture and genre through a focus on children’s and young adult literature. These questions include: How does literature for young readers, which ranges from picture-book folktales to steamy social-problem novels, fit into the category “pop culture”? How does the term “genre” fit such as diverse set of texts? What does literature that is considered popular culture contribute to our society? What do we mean when we talk about popularity and culture? The course will require you to engage with popular culture texts in ways that promote critical thinking about how and what they communicate. The texts we explore may include: Imre Szeman and Susie O’Brien’s Popular Culture: A User’s Guide, Laurie Anderson’s Speak, M. T. Anderson’s Feed, Cece Bell’s El Deafo, Dr. Seuss’s The Butter Battle Book and The Cat in the Hat, Louise Erdich’s The Birchbark House, Louis Sachar’s Holes, David Leviathan and John Green’s Will Grayson, Will Grayson, Laura Ingalls Wilder’s The Little House on the Prairie, Jacqueline Woodson’s Brown Girl Dreaming, and Gene Luan Yang’s American Born Chinese. The course will require engaged participation, oral reports, quizzes, exams, and short writing assignments. This course is intended for non-English majors.

 

5550 ENGL 300-01: Intro to ENGL Studies-WR: M. Mattes

“This course will cover a range of fiction, nonfiction, poetry, and drama while introducing students to central terms and methods of literary criticism and history. In addition to giving close attention to the “internal,” aesthetic elements of texts, we will consider the social contexts in which such texts are written and read. These contexts include broader social, economic, and cultural currents in which our readings are embedded and to which they speak; changing attitudes regarding issues of art, genre, canon, and more generally, the politics of literary study; and the contributions literary studies make to conversations across disciplines.”

 

4787 ENGL 300-02 Intro to ENGL Studies-WR: M. Mattes

“This course will cover a range of fiction, nonfiction, poetry, and drama while introducing students to central terms and methods of literary criticism and history. In addition to giving close attention to the “internal,” aesthetic elements of texts, we will consider the social contexts in which such texts are written and read. These contexts include broader social, economic, and cultural currents in which our readings are embedded and to which they speak; changing attitudes regarding issues of art, genre, canon, and more generally, the politics of literary study; and the contributions literary studies make to conversations across disciplines.”

 

 

7371 ENGL 300-04: Intro to ENGL Studies-WR: S. Biberman

This course will serve as an introduction to literary genres, including lyric poetry, drama, short fiction, and the novel.  Though we read texts from various historical periods, most of our readings will center on the relationship between the individual and the community.  The class will be discussion-based and, although it will provide a foundation for future English majors, no familiarity with literature will be assumed.  Requirements will include careful reading, regular participation, a class presentation, and a few short papers.  Texts will include Shakespeare’s Merchant of Venice, Jane Austen’s Northanger Abbey, Fitzgerald’s Crack Up, as well as a range of diverse contemporary short stories and lyric poems.

 

 

4795 ENGL 301-01: British Literature I: J. Dietrich

We will read a selection of the writings of English-speaking peoples from 660 to the Restoration.  We will focus on the ways they constructed their views of the world and on the role of writing in that construction, paying particular attention to changes and continuities in cultural values.

 

9266 ENGL 302-01: British Literature II: B. Boehm

 

2626 ENGL 303-01: SCI and Tech Writing-WR: TBA

 

 

2423 ENGL 303-02: SCI and Tech Writing-WR: TBA

 

 

5629 ENGL 303-03: SCI and Tech Writing-WR: TBA

 

2201 ENGL 305-01: INT CR WR WKP: Fiction: P. Griner

Welcome to English 305, fiction.  This course is designed to help fiction writers and students interested in fiction hone their craft. I expect to see all of you improve as writers, readers and critics.  That doesn’t necessarily mean I expect you to become more polished writers; in some cases it may mean you’re more willing to take risks, while in others it may mean you’ll gain greater expertise in things you already do well.  Class participants will also be expected to deepen their reading practices and to provide thoughtful feedback on their peers’ work and insight into the work of published fiction writers. Beyond that, the most important goals are probably the ones you discover and define.  The focus of the course is student work.  We’ll read published pieces, and have various exercises, designed to help improve writing, generate ideas, etc., but the majority of class periods will be taken up with workshops. 

ENGL 305-02: INT CR WR WKP: Screenwriting: I Stansel

This course will introduce students to the techniques and conventions of screenwriting. By reading screenplays, watching films, and reading from books on the craft of screenwriting, students will learn what makes a screenplay work.

In addition, students will work on synopsizing, outlining, and starting their own feature-length script. Discussions will focus on character development, plot, scene building, and other crucial elements of craft, as well as industry-standard formatting. The class will approach writing as a process of discovery, wherein students experiment with styles and forms in order to understand their own aesthetic interests. Students will be expected to participate fully in class discussions.

 

2208 ENGL 309-02: Inquiries in Writing-WR: L. Rogers (Requires permission from dept.)

 

 

  

4630 ENGL 310-02: WRIT ABT LIT Nonmajor-WR: M. Mattes

“This course will cover a range of fiction, nonfiction, poetry, and drama while introducing students to central terms and methods of literary criticism and history. In addition to giving close attention to the “internal,” aesthetic elements of texts, we will consider the social contexts in which such texts are written and read. These contexts include broader social, economic, and cultural currents in which our readings are embedded and to which they speak; changing attitudes regarding issues of art, genre, canon, and more generally, the politics of literary study; and the contributions literary studies make to conversations across disciplines.”

 

2209 ENGL 311-01: American Literature I: S. Ryan

In English 311 we will read and consider a wide range of texts written by Americans (or, in some cases, by people who visited North America) from the early colonial period to around 1865. Along the way, we’ll pursue three main categories of investigation:

 1.  Literary analysis: To what possible interpretations do these works lend themselves?  How does textual evidence support or undermine particular interpretations?  How do different works of literature fit together or speak to one another?

2.  Contextualization:  How do works of literature speak of (and to) the historical moments in which they were produced?  What kinds of dissonances, productive or otherwise, arise when twenty-first-century readers approach these texts?

3.  Canonization:  How are certain works deemed worthy of study, while others are left out? What assumptions and decisions do we make in assigning value to works of literature? How are "classics" made and how are we, as participants in a university course, involved in that process?  What other versions of American literary history are possible or defensible?  How do the conventional periods into which we divide American literature—often related to the various wars in which the US has participated—define and perhaps limit the study of literature?

Assignments will include short response papers, reading quizzes, a midterm, and a final exam.

 

 

 

7381 ENGL 325-01: Intro to Linguistics: Cruz (Cross listed)

 

9516 ENGL 325-02: Intro to Linguistics: TBA

 

 

9253 ENGL 330-01: Language & Culture-AHD1: K. Swinehart (cross listed)

 

 

 

9267 ENGL 333-01: Shakespeare I: E. Wise

 

 

6437 ENGL 369-01: Minority Trads Amer. Lit-CD1: D. Anderson

 

 

2211 ENGL 373-01: Women & Global Literature-AHD2: K. Hadley (cross listed)

 

 

 

2640 ENGL 373-02: Women & Global Literature-AHD2: J. Adams (cross listed)

 

 

 

 9218 ENGL 373-50: Women & Global Literature-AHD2: White

 

 

 

9268 ENGL 375-01: LGBTQ Lit in US-AHD1: K. Maxwell (cross listed)

The theme of this section of LGBTQ literature is discovery, self-invention, and self-knowlege. We will be reading and discussing James Baldwin’s Giovanni’s Room, Alison Bechdel’s Fun Home, TC Tolbert’s Gephyromania, and excerpts from Lidia Yuknavitch’s Chronology of Water, along with watching and discussing recent critically acclaimed films Moonlight and Call Me By Your Name. Because this is a literature class, we will think about how we make our stories (and what stories are made for us, rejected by us, and/or accepted by us, and why). Writing in the course will include frequent Blackboard discussion posts, one presentation, and two short analysis papers (4-6 pages).

 

 

6026 ENGL 401-01: HON-LA Stories: F. McDonald (restricted to Honors)

Overlooking the vast sprawl of Los Angeles, the 44-foot tall Hollywood sign is one of the most iconic cultural landmarks in America. It appears in countless films and novels as a shorthand for glitz, glamor fame, money, and success. Scratch its glistening white surface, though, and another, uglier story falls into view: it was erected in the early ‘20s as an advertisement for “Hollywoodland,” a segregated housing development that was being built nearby. Beginning here, we will read and watch an assortment of “LA Stories” to ask how they work to reinforce or unravel the various fantasies and fictions that the “celluloid city” tells about itself.  While our focus will be on books and film, we will also take a look at famous representations of LA in a variety of other forms: news footage, videogames, music, photographs, paintings, and architecture, amongst others. We will see the city refracted through a series of imaginative genres—film noir, SF, cyberpunk, and slipstream fiction, to name but a few—but our guiding question will be this: is the “LA Story” a genre in itself? And if so, what are its social, aesthetic, and thematic dimensions? Authors and filmmakers may include: Francesca Lia Block, Octavia Butler, Raymond Chandler, Damien Chazelle, Wanda Coleman, Joan Didion, David Lynch, Walter Mosley, Salvador Plascencia, Roman Polanski, Thomas Pynchon, John Singleton, Nathanael West, Billy Wilder, and Karen Tei Yamashita.

 

 

 

4957 ENGL 403-01: Advanced CW: P. Griner

Welcome to English 403.  This course is designed to help writers hone their craft. I expect to see all of you improve as writers, readers and critics.  That doesn’t necessarily mean I expect you to become more polished writers; in some cases it may mean you’re more willing to take risks, while in others it may mean you’ll gain greater expertise in things you already do well.  Class participants will also be expected to deepen their reading practices and to provide thoughtful feedback on their peers’ work and insight into the work of published fiction writers. Beyond that, the most important goals are probably the ones you discover and define.  The focus of the course is student work.  We’ll read published pieces, and have various exercises, designed to help improve writing, generate ideas, etc., but the majority of class periods will be taken up with workshops. Please keep in mind that this is a multi-genre course.  While there is no requirement that you write in more than one genre (though you are free to do so), you will be asked to read and critique poetry, fiction, nonfiction, and perhaps drama, and you should be prepared to do so.

 

 

9264 ENGL 418-01: American Lit to 1830-WR: M. Mattes

In this course, students will delve into the wonderfully strange and unexpected world of early Louisville’s written culture. For instance, in Notes on the State of Virginia, Thomas Jefferson proclaimed, “The Ohio is the most beautiful river on earth.” Interestingly, Jefferson never saw the Ohio River. Yet, during the Age of Enlightenment, this aesthetic claim in absentia would not have seemed far-fetched. Nor would claims of Welsh Indians living near Louisville be dismissed outright. York, an African American slave owned by William Clark, is noted in the journals of the Corps of Discovery as having cast a vote regarding a pivotal decision, and Daniel Boone was not always the mythic figure depicted in the first printed history of Kentucky. By the way, John James Audubon was Haitian.

Using multiethnic, intercultural, and circum-Atlantic frameworks for understanding the local and regional literary histories of early America, students will read more famous works such as Thomas Jefferson’s Notes on the State of Virginia, the journals of the Lewis and Clark Expedition, John James Audubon’s Birds of America, and John Filson’s The Adventures of Col. Daniel Boon, as well as a range of lesser known works. These may include Gilbert Imlay’s novel, The Emigrants, and his Topographical Description of the Western Territories, Henry McMurtrie’s Sketches of Louisville, Constantine Rafinesque’s Annals of Kentucky, the poetry of Mary Holley, a range of Kentucky women’s diaries, and the letters of William and Jonathan Clark. In addition, we will bring historical context to our reading of early Louisville’s written cultures by visiting local sites pertaining to eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century America, including The Filson Historical Society and the Locust Grove Plantation. Finally, we will have the opportunity to share our findings by contributing to the UofL’s “Literary Louisville” digital project.

 

9269 ENGL 420-01: American Lit 1865-1910-WR: D. Anderson

 

 

2212 ENGL 450-01: Coop Internship: K. Chandler (requires permission)

This coop course is designed to accompany an internship that has been approved for three hours of credit. The course requires descriptive and reflective writing about the internship, in the form of weekly reports, as well as a final research project, a portfolio and evaluation by the intern’s site supervisor.

 

7373 ENGL 470-01: Digital Publishing: S. Strickley

In its history as a publisher of innovative literary and visual art, Miracle Monocle has produced ten high-impact, digital issues. This course will offer students a front-row seat to the process of selecting and editing work for publication in the journal. In addition to addressing many of the challenges specific to digital publishing—web design, social media integration, online submission management—students will also earn hands-on experience in maintaining an editorial calendar, corresponding with contributors, and building editorial consensus—skills that are directly translatable to a career in print or digital publishing. Students will also address many of the ethical and technical issues still problematizing the global shift to a digital media environment. The course will culminate in the publication of the eleventh issue of Miracle Monocle. 

 

 

4308 ENGL 491-01: INT Theory New Crit-Pres: S. Schneider

 

 

4872 ENGL 491-02: INT Theory New Crit-Pres: J. Adams

 

 

2402 ENGL 501-01: Independent Study: (requires permission)

 

 

5551 ENGL 504-01: ADV Creative Writ II-Poetry: K. Petrosino

This advanced course is for serious poets who are interested in sharpening their skills as writers, readers, and critics. Students must demonstrate familiarity with the workshop model of peer review and be knowledgeable about poetic form and meter. Successful students in this course will actively engage in a regular writing practice, and will take seriously the processes of composition, critique, and revision. We will “workshop” student poems, but we will also devote time to discussing assigned reading and to performing in-class writing exercises. Assignments will include: responses to peer manuscripts, responses to assigned poetry collections, and a final portfolio [15-20 finished poems]. Students will also be required to compose a letter [1250-1750 words] introducing the work in their portfolios.

 

 

7932 ENGL 506-01: Teaching of Writing-WR;CUE: A. Olinger

English 506 is an introduction to theories, research, and practices of teaching writing. We’ll examine perspectives on what writing is; how people develop as writers throughout their lives; and how writing can be taught. We’ll also explore various approaches to teacher and peer response, assessment, and other aspects of writing pedagogy. Ultimately, students will leave the course with the ability to connect theory and practice, a deeper understanding of their own philosophy of writing and writing pedagogy and their own literacy experiences, and materials to use in future classroom settings. 

  

 

4796 ENGL 510-01: Grad Coop Internship MA Level: S. Schneider (requires permission)

 

 

 

7383 ENGL 522-01: Structure of Modern English: Stewart (cross listed)

 

 

9514 ENGL 545-01: William Blake: K. Hadley

 

 

7377 ENGL 549-01: Stud Post-Col/Eth Lit--Immigration & US Lit.:  (mostly post-1900) K. Chandler

  

6817 ENGL 551-01: Animal Studies: G. Ridley

 

ENGL 555-01: K. Chandler

This coop course is designed to accompany an internship that has approved for three hours of credit. The course requires descriptive and reflective writing about the internship, in the form of weekly reports, as well as a substantial final research project, a portfolio and evaluation by the intern’s site supervisor.

 

 

9256 ENGL 570-01: Language & Social Identity: Stewart (cross listed)

 

 

6818 ENGL 574-01: Amer Lit Since 1960-CUE: A. Golding

In this class, we’ll look at the evolution of the mixed-genre or hybrid text in late 20C and early 21C US American literature. This focus will enable us to acquaint ourselves with some of the major and most influential work of the period, and to consider in particular how a range of writers have used hybrid forms to address questions of race, ethnicity, gender, sexuality, and class / economics. While I have not yet finalized the reading list, possible candidates include Robert Creeley, Pieces; Gloria Anzaldua, Borderlands / La Frontera; Maxine Hong Kingston, The Woman Warrior; Theresa Hak Kyung Cha, Dictee; Claudia Rankine, Citizen; Kristin Prevallet, I, Afterlife; Mark Nowak, Shut Up Shut Down or Coal Mountain Elementary; and recent work in documentary poetics.  Probable requirements for undergraduates: Some combination of regular discussion board posts, in-class essay midterm, annotated bibliography, and final research-based paper. Requirements for graduate students will include a midterm paper instead of an in-class essay and a more substantive final research project.

 

9332 ENGL 577-01 Harlem Renaissance-CUE: Logan

ENGL 581-01 Deviants, Monsters, Crossdressers: Renaissance Drama: H. Stanev

 

 

7921 ENGL 599-50: Starting Your Novel-WR;CUE: S. Strickley (grad student)

Every novel begins with a great idea, but not every great idea makes for a compelling novel. How do you know if your idea is strong enough to sustain a book-length work? What are the tried-and-true methods for transforming ideas into pages? In this online workshop, the focus will be carefully laying the groundwork for the composition of a novel. Students will pre-write their way through a cast of characters, major plot points, and thematic concerns; they'll learn the value of an outline; and they’ll experiment with voice and point of view. The course will culminate in the drafting and workshopping of a substantial novel excerpt. 

 

 

7922 ENGL 599-51: Starting Your Novel-WR;CUE: S. Strickley (UG student)

Every novel begins with a great idea, but not every great idea makes for a compelling novel. How do you know if your idea is strong enough to sustain a book-length work? What are the tried-and-true methods for transforming ideas into pages? In this online workshop, the focus will be carefully laying the groundwork for the composition of a novel. Students will pre-write their way through a cast of characters, major plot points, and thematic concerns; they'll learn the value of an outline; and they’ll experiment with voice and point of view. The course will culminate in the drafting and workshopping of a substantial novel excerpt.