Professor Marc C. Conner

Payne 32B, x8924

connerm@wlu.edu

Office hours: Monday 1-3, Tuesday 9-10, 1-3, Thursday 9-10, 1-3, and by appointment

COURSE DESCRIPTION: This course examines a number of works that all deal with the process of coming of age--the fundamental human movement from youth to adulthood, immaturity to maturity, ignorance to knowledge, innocence to experience. Through class discussions, informal writings, and formal essays, we will study the tensions, aspirations, pains, joys, myths, and realities of this transition. We will pursue such questions as the following: what are the crucial stages involved in coming of age? How do such issues as authority, rebellion, and conformity affect coming of age? In what ways does the process differ between men and women? What roles do sexuality and desire play in the process? What larger patterns--mythic, religious, economic, social--are reflected in the individual's coming of age? How is coming of age related to love? to death? Is there a "normal" pattern for coming of age? What happens if this pattern is broken? Finally, why is this so often a painful process? What makes this necessary?

COURSE OBJECTIVES: The guiding purpose of this course is two-fold: to introduce students to the advanced study of literature, and to train students to read critically and to write effectively. These objectives are inseparable. The craft of writing will be taught as a dual process: students will learn creative strategies to help them produce writing with as little censoring as possible; and they will learn critical and analytic strategies to help them sharpen and hone their writing into cogent and effective argument. We will examine a number of models for the essay form, and will focus intensively on questions of grammar, language mechanics, and form. The process of revision will be a major component in our study of writing. We will also examine the three major genres of modern western literature--the novel, poetry, and the drama--and the structures and elements that define these genres.

COURSE STRUCTURE AND ASSIGNMENTS: There are three dimensions of written work for the course: formal writing assignments, which include eight essays and revisions; web-based writing assignments, which include student discussion forums, five one-page responses to guiding questions, and the student web-page project; and informal and in-class writing, which include in-class writing exercises, peer review workshop responses, and four quizzes based on Strunk and White's Elements of Style. Final grades are determined as follows: 60% for the formal writing component; 20% for the web-based writing component; and 20% for class participation, including all in-class writing. (Note: web-based writing assignments are explained fully at the end of this syllabus.)

Required Texts (all available at W&L bookstore): Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet & Twelfth Night (Signet); Austen, Pride and Prejudice (Penguin); Yeats, The Collected Poems (Simon & Schuster); and Swift, Gulliver’s Travels (Norton); also Hacker's A Writer's Reference, 4^th ed. (St. Martin's) and Strunk and White's The Elements of Style (MacMillan).

F 9/7 Introduction to the Course: Coming of Age

M 9/10 Introduction to Shakespeare; Romeo and Juliet, Act I

W 9/12 Romeo and Juliet, Act II; web orientation training (Tucker Multi-Media Center)

F 9/15 Romeo and Juliet, Act III

M 9/17 Romeo and Juliet, Act IV

W 9/19 Romeo and Juliet, Act V

F 9/21 Romeo and Juliet, conclusion

1^st question/response due by 5 p.m.

M 9/24 Introduction to Austen; Pride and Prejudice, pp.5-51

Essay #1 due (3 pages, on Romeo and Juliet)

W 9/26 Pride and Prejudice, pp.52-109

F 9/28 Pride and Prejudice, pp.113-172

M 10/1 Pride and Prejudice, pp.173-253

2^nd Discussion Forum questions and topics due (9 a.m.; responses due by W 10/3 at 9 a.m.)

W 10/3 Pride and Prejudice, pp.254-313

F 10/5 Pride and Prejudice, conclusion

2^nd question/response due by 5 p.m.

M 10/8 Twelfth Night, Acts I & II

Essay #2 due (5 pages, on Pride and Prejudice)

W 10/10 Twelfth Night, Acts III & IV

F 10/12 no class: reading day

M 10/15 Twefth Night, Act V

3^rd Discussion Forum questions and topics due (9 a.m.; responses due by W 10/17 at 9 a.m.)

W 10/17 Twelfth Night, conclusion (Professor Eric Wilson)

F 10/19 Twelfth Night, conclusion (Professor Eric Wilson)

M 10/22 no class

W 10/24 Introducing Yeats; Yeats, poems

F 10/26 Yeats, poems; Web Page Construction Tutorial, Computer Lab

Strunk and White Quiz #2 (pp.15-33) at start of class

M 10/29 Yeats, poems

4^th Discussion Forum questions and topics due (9 a.m.; responses due by W 10/31 at 9 a.m.)

W 10/31 Yeats, poems

F 11/2 Yeats, poems

M 11/5 Yeats, poems

W 11/7 Yeats, poems

Essay #4 (5 pages) due (draft for workshop)

F 11/9 Yeats, poems

M 11/12 Yeats, poems

W 11/14 Yeats, poems

Essay #4 due (revised version)

F 11/16 Yeats, poems

Strunk and White Quiz #3 (pp.34-65) at start of class

M 11/26 Gulliver’s Travels, Part I (pp.3-59)

5^th Discussion Forum questions and topics due (9 a.m.; responses due by W 3/28 at 9 a.m.)

W 11/28 Gulliver’s Travels, Part II (pp.63-124)

F 11/30 Gulliver’s Travels, Part III (pp.127-187)

M 12/3 Gulliver’s Travels, Part IV (pp.191-260)

Essay #5 due (draft version for workshop)

W 12/5 Gulliver’s Travels, conclusion

Strunk and White Quiz #4 (pp.66-85) at start of class

F 12/7 Gulliver’s Travels, conclusion

Essay #5 due (revised version)

There are three web-based assignments for this course. Each is described below, with brief instructions on its workings. There will be two web instructional training sessions during the first few weeks of the semester, and students will receive additional instruction as needed. These assignments are an integral component of the course, including discussion work, probing general questions, and a group project on the development of a web-site for a classic coming-of-age poem. The web-based component of the course constitutes 20% of each student's final grade.

The course web-site is at http://home.wlu.edu/~connerm/ENG105A01/index.html. Each web assignment can be accessed by the students from this site. You should bookmark this site on your computer for easy access.

For each of the five sections of the course, four students are assigned to develop a series of questions and topics that will generate discussion and lead to a more penetrating reading of the material. Each of the four students will post two questions related to the material, and also suggest two passages from the text that we might consider in our discussions of the material. These questions will be posted on the designated dates (generally the Monday of the second week on the assigned material), and the rest of the students in the course must respond briefly (at least 3 good sentences, though longer responses are certainly encouraged) to these questions and topics within 2 days of the posting (generally by the Wednesday of that week). The Discussion Forum tool is accessed via the course web-site.

At the start of each of the five sections of the course, I will post a general, overarching question related to that section's readings. At the end of the section, by 5 p.m. on the Friday concluding, each student will respond to the question with a one-page reaction. The response is less formal than an essay, but more formal than a mere journal entry. Each response will be placed in the "turnin" folder on the "L" drive for this course. Go to the L drive and open the ENGL folder; then open the 01fall folder (contains folder for all English courses in the fall of ’01), and open the ENGL105A.01 folder (our course). Open the turnin folder and copy or drop your document in. These questions and responses will then be placed by the instructor in the Question and Response section of the course home page, and made accessible to all members of the class. At the end of the term each student's responses will be combined into a single 5-page "reading" of the major ideas of the course. Important: Title your responses as follows: your last name, the response number, e.g.: "Smith.Response1.doc."

Students will work in groups of 4 on developing web-pages devoted to one of the following classic "coming-of-age" poems by Yeats: "In Memory of Major Robert Gregory," "Easter 1916," "Among School Children," "Under Ben Bulben," and "The Circus Animals’ Desertion." The format, content, style, and presentation of these web sites will be entirely up to the students. I have produced an example, on Yeats's "A Prayer for my Daughter," as a loose model for students to study (and improve upon!). The final web sites will be posted on the course web site, and may also be published on the Washington and Lee University Irish Studies Web Portal.

 All web-based assignments will ultimately be placed on the standing course web-site and made accessible to the public at large.