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Dept. of English Language & Literature What's Happening? Fall 2008 Special Course Offerings for Undergraduates ENG 301: Nonfiction Writing (Dinan) This course is designed for students who wish to advance their writing education beyond English 201. A rhetorically-oriented nonfiction writing course that emphasizes analytical and persuasive discourse, English 301 provides students with an intensive and diverse experience in audience-based writing occasions, academic occasions included. Shorter projects focus on the variety of rhetorically-oriented writing concerns and features (for example, adaptation to multiple audiences, integration of multiple purposes, demonstration of stylistic flexibility and appropriateness). Longer projects are self-selected in terms of both focus and forms of discourse, (academic/professional or otherwise) and suited to the needs/goals of individual students. English 301 serves as an alternative for non-science/technology students to English 303, “Technical Writing,” and -- especially for those wishing to acquire a de facto writing major or minor -- also serves as a complement and precursor to English 493, “Advanced Nonfiction Writing.” ENG 345: Studies in Authors (Berk) “The Works of J.R.R. Tolkien”: This course will provide an in-depth examination of Tolkien’s writing, with major emphasis on his masterpiece The Lord of the Rings. Emphasis will be placed on interpretation of its literary, mythological and legendary motifs, themes and imagery. Throughout the semester, students will be expected to: examine Tolkien's work from both critical and creative perspectives; identify major themes; and investigate the relationships and tensions between myth and history, myth and fantasy, heroism and exile, ecology and industry, scholarly and popular literature and film, language and power, race and community, wonder and loss. We will look at how Tolkien's works have been adapted and retold in popular media such as Peter Jackson's film trilogy. ENG 435: Studies in Texts (Stevenson) “Ancient Texts, Modern Reads”: This course will focus on the formal epic. We will read the Iliad, the Aeneid, and Paradise Lost. Additionally we will look at some of the contemporary uses our culture has made of these tales, for example, Jonathan Shay’s Achilles in Vietnam. ENG 460: Current Issues in English (Eke) “(Post)Apartheid South African Literature”: The course will focus on literature by South African writers during and after apartheid. The central issues that we will address are citizenship, nation/national construction/national identity, and history. What constitutes a nation? How do people define themselves as citizens of any nation? What is the role of history in such construction? We will begin with apartheid literature, but move beyond it to examine the current focus of South African writers barely more than one decade since the end of apartheid. Authors to be covered include but are not limited to two Nobel Laureates: Nadine Gordimer and J. M. Coetzee. Others are Peter Abrahams, Fatima Dike, Athol Fugard, Bessie Head, Alan Paton, Zakes Mda, Phaswane Mpe, and Zoë Wicomb. In addition to theoretical materials, course readings will include novels, drama, and poetry. We will watch a number of films about South Africa to enhance our understanding of the readings and the issues they address as well as our course discussions. ENG 460: Current Issues in English (Hicks) “21st Century Literacies”: The study of English
continues to evolve in the twenty-first century, based on changes in information
communication technologies and the underlying social relations that they allow.
Students in this course will explore print, oral, visual, digital, and critical
literacies such as blogging, social networking, web-based collaborative writing,
and multimedia authoring in relation to their own inquiry projects. “New Approaches to Chicago Writers”: Our emphasis will be on how contemporary Chicago writers are reworking a long tradition. We will read fiction (Stuart Dybek, The Coast of Chicago; Sandra Cisneros, The House on Mango Street, Cyrus Colter, The Beach Umbrella and Other Stories), plays (Sarah Ruhl, The Clean House and Other Plays), memoirs and essays (Ronne Hartsfield, Another Way Home; Robert B. Steptoe, Blue as the Lake; Sara Paretsky, Writing in An Age of Silence), as well as selections from Smokestacks and Skyscrapers: An Anthology of Chicago Writing. Further details and disclaimers about possible side effects are available at prime1rr@cmich.edu. Seminar members can expect much reading, extensive research, and a commitment to sharing discoveries with each other. ENG 539: Seminar in Major Nonfiction Writers (Schiller) This course will explore the theoretical elements of creative nonfiction and examine how they function and appear in various works including short essays and book length pieces. Students also will write short essays and a longer creative nonfiction essay on a self-selected topic.
Fall 2008 Course Offerings for Graduate Students ENG 510: Writing Center Practicum (Crawford) ENG 539: Seminar in Major Nonfiction Writers (Schiller) This course will explore the theoretical elements of creative nonfiction and examine how they function and appear in various works including short essays and book length pieces. Students also will write short essays and a longer creative nonfiction essay on a self-selected topic. ENG 570: Old English (Spruiell) ENG 571: Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages ENG 577: Introduction to Second Language Acquisition ENG 580: Literature for Young Adults (Steffel) ENG 582: Cultural Pluralism in Literature for Children and Young Adults (Dressel/Gates/ Griffith) ENG 583: The Heroic Tradition in Children’s Literature ENG 602: Research Materials and Methods (Primeau) ENG 603: Advanced Professional Communication (Kreth) ENG 614: Practicum in Teaching College Composition ENG 635D: Seminar in English Literature (Holder) “Post-Colonial Drama in Britain”: This course will examine the staging of cultural shifts and conflicts in Britain in the post-war period. Issues include the decline of Britain as a dominant global power, the migration of former colonial subjects to the "motherland," and the revision of national identity. Particular attention will be paid to the emergence of "Black British" theater. We will read works by such playwrights, critics, and theorists as John Osborn, Caryl Churchill, Kwame Kwei-Armah, Tanika Gupta, Ayub Khan-Din, Bill Ashcroft, Diran Adebayo, and Gayatri Spivak. ENG 637: Seminar in Rhetoric and Composition (Koper) “Readings in Classical and Early Modern Rhetoric”: This course will look at the rise of consciously analytical approaches to public discourse that the new capabilities associated with alphabetical literacy made possible in Athens. The thinking of Plato and Aristotle had become the school tradition of rhetoric by the first century B.C. in Rome. Early modern writers like Bacon, Descartes, and Locke are students of the grounds of persuasion who explicitly reject elements of classical rhetoric. Students in the course will read, discuss, and write about the ideas in some of the major texts at issue. Texts: Walter Ong, Orality and Literacy; Plato, Gorgias, Phaedrus; Aristotle, Rhetoric; Quintilian, The Education of an Orator; Bacon, Novum Organon; Locke, The Essay Concerning Human Understanding; Descartes, Discourse on Method Corbett, Edward P. J. Classical Rhetoric for the Modern Student (4th edition). ENG 656D: Seminar in American Literature: Modern Period (Brevda) “’For an old bitch gone in the teeth’: American Writers and the Great War”: The course will focus on how American novelists and poets portrayed World War I. Tentative reading list includes: Dos Passos, Three Soldiers and 1919; cummings, The Enormous Room; Cather, One of Ours; Eliot, The Waste Land; Boyd, Through the Wheat; Faulkner, Soldiers’ Pay, Hemingway, The Sun Also Rises and A Farewell to Arms; and March, Company K. ENG 675D: Seminar in English Linguistics (Spruiell) ENG 690: Practicum in TESOL (Forest) ENG 691: Seminar: Writing Fiction (Chinquee) ENG 692: Seminar: Writing Poetry ENG 697: Independent Study (Taylor) ENG 718: Teaching Internship (Taylor) ENG 719: Internship in Professional Communication (Taylor) ENG 799: Thesis (Taylor) Events Research & Recognitions
Assessments Each year, the English Department assesses aspects of its nine
degree programs to ensure B.S. in Education Of the 66 CMU elementary and secondary English majors and
minors who took the MTTC ESL Minor CMU had only one student take the MTTC exam last year in
this category, and that
student Assessment Committee Report, 2005-2006 (forthcoming) |
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Web Master: Melinda Kreth Page Last Updated: 03/06/2007
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