General Literature Courses Fall 2024


ENGL 203: Literature of Sports

Instructor: Philip Wedge
15680 | By Appointment | Online

In the Literature of Sports course students will study and write essays on a significant body of sport literature, examining such topics as sports as character-building, sports hero types, hero-worship in fans, violence in sports, corruption in sports, the translation of sport literature to film, and so on. Required coursework consists of 3 major Essays and a revision assignment (50%), and a comprehensive Final (20%). Homework (30%) includes group work and short writing assignments. Class participation is also of considerable importance. TEXTS: Eric Greenberg, The Celebrant; Clifford Odets, Golden Boy; Angie Abdou, The Bone Cage; Anne Lamott, Crooked Little Heart; August Wilson, Fences; F.X. Toole, Million Dollar Baby; H.G. Bissinger, Friday Night Lights.

photo of sports books

ENGL 309: The British Novel

Instructor: Anna Neill
26516 | By Appointment | Online

If you like true crime, fantasy, horror, comedy, or romantic drama, then you are already interested in the history of the novel. From 17th-century romance to the “social problem” fictions of the 19th century, novels catered to their readers’ longing for adventure and mystery, their desire for social justice, their pleasure in seeing virtue rewarded with love, and the thrill of being transported vicariously to another world. In depicting the desires, terrors, and sensational fortunes or misfortunes of their characters, novels dramatized the historical forces that shaped these lives and those of their readers. Novels could be complicit with structural inequities and abuses, but they could also invite criticism of the social and political forces engendering cruelty or injustice. Texts: Aphra Behn, Oroonoko; Daniel Defoe, Moll Flanders; Horace Walpole, The Castle of Otranto; Fanny Burney, Evelina; Jane Austen, Northanger Abbey; Emily Brontë, Wuthering Heights; Charles Dickens, Oliver Twist. (All texts will be freely available online.)

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ENGL 312: Major British Writers to 1800

Instructor: Geraldo Sousa
22361 | TuTh 11:00-12:15 PM | Wescoe 4035 – Lawrence

This course will focus on major writers in a survey of British literature from Beowulf to Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein. Some recurring themes emerge: heroes and villains, boundaries of the human, the politics of the normal, monsters and the monstrous, empirical reality and supernatural possibility, adventure and self-discovery, the pursuit of happiness, and journeys of self-discovery. We will read, analyze, discuss, and write about medieval and early modern texts from different genres and authors. In the process, we will have an introduction to literary history, scholarship, and exciting new critical approaches.

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ENGL 322: American Literature II

Instructor: Randall Fuller
26518 | TuTh 2:30-3:45 PM | Wescoe 4076 – Lawrence

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ENGL 340: Early Indigenous & African American Literature

Instructor: Laura L. Mielke
26557 | TuTh 9:30-10:45 AM | Wescoe 4076 – Lawrence

African American and Indigenous authors prior to the twentieth century produced a wealth of literature, including novels, plays, speeches, life writing, and poetry. The scope and richness of this work—which continues to be recovered—defies racist discourse of the period that associated members of both groups with illiteracy. It also defies conceptions in our own day of Indigenous and African American expression as limited to accounts of trauma. In this course, we will approach the rich and varied legacy of early Indigenous and African American literature through the works of eight writers from the nineteenth century: Jane Johnston Schoolcraft, William Apess, Maria Stewart, William Wells Brown, Frances Ellen Watkins Harper, Gertrude Simmons Bonnin (Zitkala-Ša), Charles Eastman, and Charles Chesnutt. Students will read works closely, be introduced to critical concepts from Black Studies and Indigenous Studies, participate in class discussions, and complete papers and exams.

Inside of book; left page is drawing of author, right page text reads "a son of the forest, the experience of William Apes, a native of the forest, written by himself"

ENGL 570: The American Fascist-Takeover Novel

Instructor: Joseph Harrington
26525 | TuTh 11:00-12:15 PM | Wescoe 4020 – Lawrence

Ever since the birth of the Republic, Americans have worried that a tyrant or oligarchy would bring our democratic “experiment” to an end. US writers in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries have explored this anxiety in the form of speculative novels that imagine a takeover of all or part of the United States by an authoritarian, especially fascist, regime. We will read and examine seven of these dystopian tales, as well as writings about actual historical fascism in Italy, Germany, and the United States. By studying fiction, we can gain a better understanding of the relation of literature to political culture in the modern U.S. and help us put our current uncertainties and anxieties into historical perspective.

Men marching down stairs holding American flags