Department of English | University of Hawai‘i at Manoa
ENG 633B: Theories and Methods of Literary Study
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John Zuern |
Office: Kuykendall 219 Office Phone: 956-3019 zuern@hawaii.edu Office Hours: Thursday 12:00 - 3:00 and by appointment http://www.english.hawaii.edu/633B/ |
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Class Web Site |
Objectives This course is designed to provide students with a grounding in the fundamental concepts of literary theory, the history of literary criticism, techniques of literary research, and strategies for scholarly writing in the field. Within its broad representation of current approaches to literary scholarship (along with their historical antecedents), the course will give students opportunities to identify their own orientations within the domain of literary studies and to develop the research methods, interpretive procedures, and conceptual frameworks that are most conducive to the critical projects they plan to undertake. In addition to developing students' expertise as professional researchers and writers, the course also encourages them to become confident, critical readers of philosophical and theoretical materials. Discussions will emphasize the rhetorical and aesthetic dimensions the texts of theory alongside their conceptual content. Through this close reading of theoretical discourse, I hope to encourage students to view philosophical, metacritical speculation on the nature of language, textuality, culture, and the human subject as a creative pursuit in itself, one that cannot be easily separated from literary production as we typically recognize it. Throughout the semester, our discussions will address the problems attendant upon "applying" theoretical concepts to the individual texts or objects we study.
The seminar will be devoted primarily to discussion of the issues raised by the assigned reading, facilitated in part by student presentations and reports on research. In addition to a term paper (which will be read in draft by myself and class members) and a formal in-class presentation of the research project, you will produce a brief review essay as part of an exercise in research methods. You will also develop a set of learning materials on a particular theoretical tradition or an individual theorist and employ them in an in-class presentation. We will conduct a great deal of our work in an online environment. One of the goals of the course is to produce a hypertext documentation of the individual contributions of seminar participants as well as our group discussions. Required Texts Leitch, Vincent, gen. ed. The Norton Anthology of Literary Theory and Criticism Norton, 2001. Kanae, Lisa. Sista Tongue. Honolulu: Tinfish, 2001. a course reader from Campus Copy in the UH-M Student Center Gibaldi, Joseph. The MLA Style Manual and Guide to Scholarly Publishing. MLA, 1998. (recommended)
You will need to have access to the Internet via a current browser equipped with current plug-ins for Flash, Shockwave, and Real Audio. The Critique Lab (Kuy 411) is available for your use, but the schedule of open lab times may be limited. You will also need an active email account.
In-class presentation and teaching materials related to a particular theory or theorist (20%), an in-class presentation related to your research project (20%), research methods exercises (20%), a one-page written proposal for the term paper (10%), and a term paper 20-25 pages in length (30%).
Assignments are due on the day on which they appear in the schedule. All assignments must be completed to receive a passing grade. You are expected to attend this seminar regularly and on time. If circumstances arise that make it difficult for you to come to class or to complete your assigned work, please inform me immediately. Don't wait until the end of the semester, when it will be harder to make accommodations. You must complete all assigned work to pass the class. I will give incompletes only in cases of medical or family emergencies, for which I will require written documentation. I also expect you to adhere to the Interim Policy for Responsible Computing and Network Access and the Critique Lab Policies.
Web Site Your written exercises and assignments will be compiled on a class web site that will not be made available to the general public. Your work will be available for other members of the class to read, comment on, and connect with. The site will document our discussions and the development of our ideas. |
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(subject to change; NATC = Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism)
January 15 introduction to the course preliminary definitions
January 22 Reading Hans-Georg Gadamer, "Praise of Theory" (NATC 1320).
Catherine Belsey, "Criticism and Common Sense," from Critical Practice. (packet)
Michèle Barrett, "Words and Things," from Imagination in Theory: Culture, Writing, Words, and Things. (packet)
Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari, "What is a Concept" and "Conceptual Personae" from What is Philosophy? (packet)
Assignment Identify three key concepts that guide your thinking about literature. Write a paragraph about each of them explaining their significance to you. Bring your paragraphs to class in a digital format (on diskette or FTPed to your UNIX account.
January 29 Reading Augustine, from On Christian Doctrine (NATC 188) and Concerning the Teacher (packet)
Friedrich Nietzsche, "On Truth and Lying in a Non-Moral Sense" (NATC 874)
Ferdinand de Saussure, from A Course in General Linguistics (NATC 960)
Assignment Revise your paragraphs about your key concepts to include basic historical information about them. Where do we get our words for these concepts? From what disciplines are these concepts derived? February 5 Reading Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, from Phenomenology of Spirit and Lectures on Fine Art (NATC 630)
Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, from Economic and Philosophic
Manuscripts of 1844, The German
Fredric Jameson, from The Political Unconscious: Narrative as Socially Symbolic Act (NATC 1937)
Assignment Formulate two questions that guide your thinking about literature. Tie them to a specific, clearly defined examplea poem, a passage from a novel, a scene from a play, or some other small-scale, focused piece of writing. Ideally, the excerpt will be a part of whatever project you will be pursuing throughout the semester.
February 12 Reading Sigmund Freud, from The Interpretation of Dreams (NATC 919) and "Fetishism" (NATC 952)
Jacques Lacan, "The Mirror Stage," from "The Agency of the Letter in the Unconscious," and "The Signification of the Phallus" (NATC 1285)
Assignment Revisit your key concepts and your questions. Try to determine (in writing) the position of the human subject (mind, consciousness, emotion, and also the body) in relation to your concepts and questions. How does the social dimension (interpersonal relations, institutions, laws) intersect with your concepts and questions?
February 19 Reading Simone de Beauvoir, from The Second Sex (NATC 1406)
Louis Althusser, from "Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuses" (NATC 1483)
Monique Wittig, "One is Not Born a Woman" (NATC 2014)
Annette Kolodny "Dancing Through the Minefield" (NATC 2143)
Assignment Draw graphical diagrams of your key three key concepts, either representing each of them individually or indicating the relationships among them. Make sure your diagrams are bold enough to be successfully digitized, as they will be included in the class site.
Submit a one-page proposal outlining your research project. February 26 Reading Michel Foucault, from The History of Sexuality and "Truth and Power" (NATC 1636)
Susan Bordo, "Unbearable Weight: Feminism, Western Culture, and the Body" (NATC 2362)
Judith Butler, from Gender Trouble (NATC 2488)
Assignment Find a short citation (or small set of citations) from a text that connects in some way to one or more of your key concepts. Convey the connection in at least two pages of writing. You may use the materials you used for the assignment on February 5. Again, it will be a good idea to draw from your research project.
March 5 Reading Dante, from De Vulgari Eloquentia (packet)
Ngugi wa Thiong'o, "Literature and Society" (packet)
Lisa Kanae, Sista Tongue
Assignment Use the two pages of writing from last week to develop an introduction to an essay. Your introduction should both introduce the particular subject of your study and frame the theoretical concerns that guide it. It should be no more than two pages long.
March 12 Reading Franz Fanon, from The Wretched of the Earth (NATC 1578)
Chinua Achebe, "An Image of Africa: Racism in Conrad's Heart of Darkness" (NATC 1783)
Gloria Anzaldúa, from Borderlands/La Frontera: The New Mestiza (NATC 2211)
Assignment Write a two-page analysis of a section of text (or some other dimension of your primary materials) that directly cites at least two theorists and/or makes reference to at least two concepts that can attributed to a particular theorist. Use MLA style conventions to document your citations, and include a properly formatted list of Works Cited with the pages.
March 19 Reading Edward Said, from Orientalism (NATC 1991) Houston A. Baker, Jr. from Blues, Ideology, and Afro-American Literature: A Vernacular Theory (NATC 2227) Assignment
March 26 Spring Break Assignment You should also use this time to work in earnest on your own papers and to get a jump on the reading for April 9.
April 2 No class April 9 Reading Claude Lévi-Strauss, from Tristes Tropiques (NATC 1419)
Plato, from Phaedrus (packet)
Jacques Derrida, from Of Grammatology, Dissemination, and Plato's Pharmacy (NATC 1822)
Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, "The Setting to Work of Deconstruction" (packet)
April 16 Reading Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, from The Critique of Postcolonial Reason (NATC 2197)
Fujikane, Candace, "Sweeping Racism under the Rug of 'Censorship': The Controversy over Lois-Ann Yamanaka's Blu's Hanging" (packet)
Paula Gunn Allen, "Kochinnenako in Academe: Three Approaches to Interpreting a Keres Indian Tale" (NATC 2108) Assignment Submit a complete draft of your research project.
April 23 project presentations
April 30 project presentations
May 7 Reading Ngugi wa Thiong'o, Taban Lo Liyong, and Henry Owuor-Anyumba, "On the Abolition of the English Department" (NATC 2092)
Gerald Graff, "Taking Cover in Coverage" (NATC 2059)
May 14
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