English 2: Rhetoric and Composition 2

3 semester hours

Professor Amelia Zurcher

• 1001 MTWR 11:30-1:05           Public Literacy
• Fulfills UCCS Rhetoric requirement
• Please see First Year English brochure for course description.
• Course Learning Objectives

English 43: Introduction to Literature: Drama

Professor Virginia Chappell

• 1001 MTWR 9:45-11:20
• Fulfills UCCS LPA requirement

Course Description: An Introduction to the forms and principles of drama, often surveying its development from its origins in ancient Greece to the contemporary theater, with emphasis on techniques for analyzing the conventions, structures and styles of dramatic literature. Class will typically read works from a number of centuries and study authors from continental, British and American traditions. Classes usually include at least one play by Shakespeare. Offered every term. Prereq: ENGL 1 or equiv. and ENGL 2 or equiv.

English 185: Women’s Literature

Professor Amelia Zurcher

• 1001 MTWR 1:15-2:50

Course Description:In this course we will ask to what extent and in what ways Anglophone women writers have constructed a literary tradition distinct from men's.Of course we can't answer such an enormous question in only a few weeks, but we will consider several clusters of writers, from the medieval period to the present, as test cases. In addition to reading their writing (which will include poetry, fiction, and drama), we will reconstruct the cultural context in which they worked, exploring such issues as politics, sexuality, class, and ethnicity. Bring curiosity and an open mind.

Assignments: Several short papers, a longer paper, participation on a discussion board, and an exam.

English 298: Special Topics

Dr. John Boly

• 1001 MTWR 9:45-11:20          Two Centuries of Versification
• Fulfills Graduate Degree Requirements in either American or British Literatures

Course Description: Everyone knows that versification, the study of the “formal” or “technical” features which set poetry apart from prose, is very, very important. But amazingly few have much notion of what the main components of versification even are, let alone why they might be important. You know the symptoms. Remember all those instructors who mumbled a few cliches about the iambic pulse or rhyme scheme, and then promptly turned from (dull, tedious) versification to the pleasures of their latest thematic hobby-horse? Well, don’t worry. After this course you won’t be one of them. By the end of the seminar you will be an expert on the verse functions of stress, rhythm, grammar, syntax, diction, imagery, tone, lineation, rhyme, figuration, and metaphor. We will intensively study the use of these elements in the origins of much contemporary verse, the romantic lyric. From this trailhead we will journey through the texts of both prominent and lesser known English and American poets of the next two centuries. As a special feature of the course, students will be encouraged to examine poets of their own selection. Our main objective will be to discover how these romantic inheritors variously espouse, vex, subvert, and refine the verse practices of their creative progenitors. Although we will concentrate on Anglo-American poets of the past two hundred years, the most valuable aspect of verse analysis is that it can be readily applied to the poetry of any culture, any language, and any period. Never again will you be at a loss for something unique and creative to say about a poetic work.

English 1: Rhetoric and Composition 1

Jennifer Willacker         

• 1001 MTWRF 8:00 - 9-30          Academic Literacy
• 1002 MTWRF 9:45-11:20          Academic Literacy
• Fulfills UCCS Rhetoric requirement
• Course Learning objectives

English 42: Introduction to Fiction

Professor Kris Ratcliffe

• 1701 MW 5:30 - 9:00 PM       Competing Paradigms: Literary Periods &
• Fulfills UCCS LPA requirement                                     Ethnic Categories

Course Description: This summer we will read lots of short stories (by Dorothy Allison, James Baldwin, Charles Chestnutt, Ralph Ellison, Louise Erdrich, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Ernest Hemingway, Zora Neale Hurston, Gish Jen, Cynthia Ozick, Edgar Allan Poe, Amy Tan, Helena Viramontes, Kurt Vonnegut, and others) and a couple novels (e.g., The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie and Beloved by Toni Morrison); in the process, we will question/evaluate two paradigms used to read U.S. literature. First, we will study U.S. literary periods of Romanticism, Realism/Naturalism, Modernism, and Postmodernism not just as historical periods but as cultural threads that continue to inform contemporary U.S. literature and culture; second, we will examine muliti-ethnic categories of African American literature, American Indian literature, Chinese American literature, Latino/a Literature, (White) Suburban literature, “White Trash” literature, and (unmarked) literature not just as classifications of literary texts but as cultural threads that inform contemporary U.S. literature and culture.

• Upon completing this course, you will be able to: (1) identity elements of narrative and explain their functions in fictional texts; (2) identify and critique two paradigms for studying literature—literary periods and multi-ethnicity; (3) identify values in U.S. fiction and evaluate the merits of these values today; (4) enhance your analytical reading, writing, and speaking abilities.

Assignments: 2 position papers; 2 essays; 1 oral presentation; and one final exam.

English 155: Twentieth-Century American Literature: Modernism and American Novels

Professor Larry Watson

• 1001 MW 1:30-5:00          American Modernism in Fiction

Course Description: Although Modernism in the United States stands distinct from analogous movements in Great Britain and on the Continent, a number of the same forces shaped each. Additionally, several of the most prominent American Modernist were strongly influenced by some of the most prominent European practitioners. Although Modernism manifest itself in a range of literary genres, this course will focus on the fiction of representative figures.

Readings: Ernest Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, William Faulkner, James T. Farrell, and Sinclair Lewis.

English 240: Seminar in Twentieth-Century British Literature: James Joyce

Dr. Robert Stark

• 1701 MW 5:30 - 9:00 PM          The Works of James Joyce

Course Description:The course offers a systematic study of the development of James Joyce's aesthetic and artistic sensibilities based on examinations of the major writings in his canon from Dubliners through Ulysses. (Additional, optional sessions devoted to reading Finnegans Wake may be scheduled, depending upon the interests of the class.) While surveying the general critical responses to the works, the course will emphasize the role of the reader in the creation of meaning, and touch upon the variety of interpretive methods that one may incorporate into the act of reading.