Introduction to American Literature
Times
Monday 6 pm - 8 pm
Instructor Information
M. Cobb
Course Description
This course will be just a taste of major American writings that will introduce you to some large themes, ideas, ideologies, preoccupations, and aesthetics that inform the formal study of American literature: among many possible topics, we’ll likely encounter the Frontier; the Great Outdoors; American exceptionalism; the inheritances of chattel slavery; violent displacements of indigenous populations; industrialization; capitalism; struggles for social and legal equality among minority and gendered populations; and the erotics and toxicities of technology and new media.
Required Readings
- Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Scarlet Letter
- Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass
- Herman Melville, "Bartleby, the Scrivener"
- Nella Larsen, Passing
- James Baldwin, Go Tell It on the Mountain
- Leslie Marmon Silko, Ceremony
- Toni Morrison, Beloved
- Sandra Cisneros, The House on Mango Street
- Tony Kushner, Angels in America, Parts 1 and 2.
First Three Authors/Texts
- Hawthorne
- Whitman
- Melville
Methods of Evaluation
- Mid-Term Test (35%)
- Participation (20%)
- Final Essay (45%)