I. Course
Description and Syllabus
II. Assignments:
III. Compliance with
University Policies
D. H. Thomson, Newton 1122C x681-5779 (587-5056). E-mail: dhthom@georgiasouthern.edu
Seminar Meeting: every
Tuesday , 7:30-9:15 in
Office Hours:: TR 1:50-3:15, T 5-6:30
and by appointment. (Note that I will also always be available before and after
class for any meetings with students.)
"Plenty of subjects are going
about, for them that know how to put salt upon their tails. A man needn't go
far to find a subject, if he's ready with his salt box." Uncle Pumblechook in Great Expectations
Course Objective: The purpose of this course is to provide
graduate students in English with the bibliographic tools and research skills
to do advanced work in literary scholarship and criticism.
Texts
Parker, R.P. How to Interpret Literature:
Critical Theory for Literary and Cultural Studies.
Gibaldi, Joseph and Achert,
Walter S. MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers.
Readings, *Assignments
8/19 . . . Introduction to the
course and organizational meeting. *Assignment: Selective
Bibliography due 10/7
8/26. . . Basic strategies for literary
bibliography: discussion of the items
required for the Selective
Bibliography
9/2. . . Scholarly
occupations. Discussion of the seminar oral report. *Assignment of Scholarly
Occupation oral report
9/9 . . .
Bibliography workshop: all questions entertained and cryptically answered. For
answers to some questions, you can also consult the Purdue OWL’s
MLA Formatting
and Style Guide.
9/16, 23, 30 . . . Class reports based on one
of the "occupations" (source study, textual criticism, attribution,
influence).
10/7 . . . . Finish class reports.
Selective biblios. due. Last day to withdraw from class is
10/13.
10/14. Begin examination of the journals and
periodicals of the trade. The Philosophy of
Composition: examination and discussion of the critical essay, with various
examples. Read Nora Crook’s “Pecksie and the Elf: Did the Shelleys
Couple Romantically?” Also read via JSTOR
Elisabeth G. Gitter's "The Power of Women's Hair
in the Victorian Imagination." PMLA 99 (1984): 936-954.
10/21. . . Continue "philosophy of
composition," with special attention to documentation. Read the following doc. and
correct all these errors that you see (we will go over the essay in
class). Formatting
the Electronic Thesis. . Go here for Marc
Cyr’s helpful—and hilarious—MLA primer.
10/28 .
. . Begin discussion of critical approaches to literature. Parker, chptrs 1-4
11/4 . . . critical approaches to
literature, chptrs. 5-7
11/11 . . . critical approaches to
literature, chptrs 8-end
11/18, 12/2 . . . The final weeks find us applying the scholarly and
critical principles we have studied to a text we have chosen well
before-hand. Have read and bring to class at least one scholarly or
critical article on that text and be ready in an informal way to summarize and
present its insights to class. *Your
final assignment will be a brief critical paper/ review (4-6 page range) on
some aspect of that text which has engendered scholarly or critical
controversy. You have at least three options:
1.
Simply offer a “review” of the article you have chosen,
identifying its “critical approach,” and discussing the strengths
and limitations of its argument.
2.
Focus on a crux in the text (we’ll define a number of these), and
compare and contrast what two different critical approaches would make of this
problematic feature.
3.
Relying upon some issues of interpretation raised by the text, discuss
in a more general or theoretical way what these issues reveal about the
strengths and limitations of one of the critical approaches..
12/11. .
. Final Assignment due.
In addition to the selective
bibliography, research assignment (one of the "scholarly
occupations"), and brief paper (the bases of your grade in this course),
please draw from your library experience to argue for our ordering one new
periodical, work of criticism, or edition. Briefly justify the need for this
text; copies of your request will be forwarded to the library committee of the
English department.
Assignment #1: Guideline for
Selective Bibliography
[For an example of a
"Selective Bibliography," go here, but note that
this is a shorter one, done for an undergraduate class; yours will contain some
additional items]
Construct for text you have chosen
(in consultation with me) a selective bibliography in outline form that
contains the following items:
1. Bibliographic sources
a. primary: contains information on the
publication history of an author’s works (often in the form of a
chronological listing broken down by genre). See for an example item #4 below.
b. secondary: an index of critical
(i.e. not primary, not by the author) works about the author or the text. See
for examples #6-8.
2. Background sources:
a. biographies or sources of biographical info.
b. literary histories of the age
c. one or two good non-literary histories of the age
d. editions of the writer's correspondence
3. Any information on the author's
reading (Primary: library lists, estate book sales, etc.; secondary: books or
articles on the subject)
4. Primary sources
a. first editions with full bibliographical detail
b. standard edition (the one now used by scholars and critics when writing on
the subject). Explain briefly the authority of this edition.
c. MSS locations, editors (if any)
Also, identify any libraries or archives with especially significant
collections of material on your author.
5. Periodicals dealing with the
author, subject, or age (just list the title).
6. List five book length studies
which include significant discussion of your text.
7. List five articles on your
text.
8. List three dissertations that
include discussion of your text.
9. List two reviews or responses
to your author that are contemporary with the age in which he or she lived.
10. List two reviews of one modern
scholarly or critical book on your author. These can focus on any books you
have listed in items #1, #4b, or #6.
11. One book on your subject located
at an Ivy League university not available at Henderson.
12. One book or journal on your
subject located at a library in the Georgia University System not available at
GSU.
13. List and briefly annotate three WWW sites dealing with your author and/or historical period. See the following web page for some criteria for evaluation of web projects:
"
Critically Evaluating Web Resources"
Some major electronic databases
that will help your search include:
World Cat (on-line catalogue of
the
The National Register of
Archives (
Voice of the Shuttle (major guide to on-line literary resources and projects but a bit dated)
Brief exercise: 1) Did John Aikin, a late century educator and dissenter, write any books of poetry? 2) Who wrote Tales of Terror (1801)? 3) List the dates and publishers of the first three editions of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein. 4) Where was the first edition of WW’s and STC’s Lyrical Ballads published? 5) Where can I find the unpublished letters of Charles Watkins Williams Wynn, Robert Southey’s friend and literary agent?
Study closely the definition of
the scholarly
occupations. For this assignment
students choose one of
the "occupations" and develop a 15-20 minute report, accompanied by a
page or two handout (with, of course, a scrupulous "Works Cited"
section). You have four "occupations" to choose from and two sources
to consider:
1. an extension of
your "selected bibliography;" study some aspect of your text along
the lines of one of the four “occupations”
2. or one from the list
below:
· P. B.Shelley's "The Triumph of Life"
· any
book of Wordsworth's Prelude
· Tennyson's "The Lotos-Eaters"
· Yeats'
"Leda and the Swan"
Also:
· variant
punctuation of the ending lines of Keats' "Ode to a Grecian Urn"
· the
authorship of "Morte d'Arthur"
· Shakespeare's contributions to Henry VIII or The Two
Noble Kinsmen
· poems
of uncertain attribution thought to be by Sidney, Spenser, or Donne
· the
author of The Revenger's Tragedy: Middleton or
Touerner?
· any
good case of plagarism and the story of its detection
· a
case study of the name behind a pseudonym
· Brockden Brown on Poe or Hawthorne
· Faulkner's The Sound and the Fury
A
REMINDER ABOUT SOME GENERAL UNIVERSITY POLICIES
CLASSROOM
BEHAVIOR:
(1) Students are expected to listen attentively, take careful notes, and
participate in class discussion. There must be no talking while music is being
played. Students are expected to communicate in a civil manner at all times,
carrying out discussion in a polite, courteous, and dignified manner that is
respectful and understanding toward both peers and the instructor. Repeated
offenses will result in disciplinary action as described by the Code of
Student Conduct (see Student Guide available online at http://students.georgiasouthern.edu/sta/guide/).
(2) Students are expected to arrive on time and to remain in class until
the class is dismissed by the instructor. There are no bathroom or other breaks
except for extremely rare and dire emergencies; students who cannot meet this
requirement due to a medical condition must notify the instructor during the
first week of class. (3) All cell phones, pagers, and other noise-making
devices should be left home or turned off when in this class. Repeated problems
may result in the confiscation of the offending device. (4)Plagiarism in any
form, as defined in the Student Conduct Code, is a very serious offense
and will result in a disciplinary investigation, as specified in the Student
Guide, pp. 24–25.
Academic
Honesty Code:
Students are expected to uphold the Academic Honesty Code as published in
section 3 of the Georgia Southern University Student Conduct Code.
Americans
with Disabilities Act:
This class complies with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). Students
with disabilities needing academic accommodations must: (1) register with and
provide documentation to the Student Disability Resource Center (SDRC); and,
(2) provide a letter to the instructor from the SDRC indicating what your need
may be for academic accommodation. This should be done within the first week of
class. The SDRC is located at 805 Forest Building, 912-871-1566, TDD, phone:
912-681-0666. This syllabus is available upon request in alternative formats
for individuals with print related disabilities.
Religious
Holidays: The
University permits students, faculty, and staff to observe those holidays set
aside by their chosen religion. Students who wish to be absent for a religious
holiday must make arrangements in advance with their instructors.
Last
Date for Withdrawal:
Dropping a course is usually a bad idea, as the class must be completed in any
event in order to graduate and dropping it only lengthens your program of study
and potentially wreaks havoc with scheduling and completing future classes. In
the event you may the decision to withdraw from this course, please note the
following University regulations. Dropping a course after the last day of
registration (Drop/Add) can be done by either submitting a drop form to the
Registrar’s Office or by processing over WINGS prior to the last date to
drop without academic
penalty (this date is published in the University Calendar for each semester).
Any student who registers for a course must either complete course requirements
or officially drop before the last day to drop without academic penalty. An “F”
will be assigned to any student who discontinues attending class without officially dropping the
course before the last day to drop without academic penalty. With the proper
procedures followed by the student, a “W” grade will be
issued for any course dropped after the Drop/Add period but before the last day to drop without
academic penalty. Fees will not be reduced if the course is dropped after the
Drop/Add dates. For Fall 2006, the last date to drop without academic penalty
is October 9, 2006.