UNDERGRADUATE COURSE DESCRIPTIONS, Spring 2015
Transcription
UNDERGRADUATE COURSE DESCRIPTIONS, Spring 2015
English Department, 260 Allen Hall, www.english.lsu.edu UNDERGRADUATE COURSE DESCRIPTIONS, Spring 2015 See schedule booklet or web page for updates. Go to the LSU catalog for course descriptions not listed here. Course/Sect. 1001 (multiple sections) Course Title English Composition I Course Description Introduction to writing in forms of expressive and informative discourse. Placement by department. 1004 (multiple sections) English Composition for International Graduate Assistants Same as ENGL 1001, with emphasis on usage and idiom problems specific to international students. Required during the first semester of residence for all international students (graduate, undergraduate, and transfer students) who demonstrate on the placement examination need for work in English, but not at the intensive level of English 0004. Graduate students graded pass/no credit. Prerequisite: ENGL 0004 or placement by department. For international students only. 1005 (multiple sections) English Composition for International Graduate Assistants Spoken English for International Graduate Assistants Same as ENGL 2000, with continued work on problems specific to international students. Graduate students graded pass/no credit. Prerequisite: ENGL 1004 or placement by department. For international students only. English Composition II Students will learn to write academic arguments and conduct research beyond the beginning level. 1051 (multiple sections) 2000 (multiple sections) Developing spoken English skills (pronunciation, stress, intonation, rhythm); improving overall comprehensibility through tasks/activities, drills, and videotaped oral presentations. Graduate students graded pass/no credit. Prerequisite: Oral interview and permission of program coordinator. For current and potential international graduate assistants only. May be taken for a maximum of 9 sem. hrs. credit. There are over 100 sections of ENGL 2000. Only those sections of ENGL 2000 with special emphases are posted below. 2000-006 1:30-3:00 TTH 2000-007 10:30-12:00 TTH 2000-017 9:00-10:30 TTH 2000-018 3:00-4:30 TTH Rohloff, J English Composition Music and Culture Students will explore and write about the intersection of music and culture. The major assignments will move the students from focusing on their own experiences as “consumers” of music to broader considerations of the interplay between music and race, gender, sexuality, law, economics, etc. 2000-024 11:30-12:30 MWF Granger, S English Composition Icons, Adverts, Shopping, and Gaming Students focus on writing to explore the impact media icons, advertising, online media, and gaming have on the current American culture and themselves as individuals. Note: This course is laptop-friendly. 2000-005 9:00-10:30 TTH McCaughey, D English Composition Cultural Exchanges This service-learning course investigates the ongoing phenomenon of globalization through hands-on experience. Students partner with ESL graduate students and share their experiences on a class blog. 2000-008 10:30-12:00 TTH 2000-012 1:30-3:00 TTH 2000-026 3:00-4:30 TTH Witherow, J English Composition Responsibility, Ethics, & Culture in a Globalized World Strategies in research and composition, focusing on complexities inherent in our globalized world and how decisions based on responsibility and ethics can empower us to improve our world. We will study current global issues through various perspectives found in mainstream news sources and journals, and develop arguments based on fair and responsible assessments of the most responsible courses of action. 2000-055 9:00-10:30 TTH Armistead, Christina English Composition Cultural Exchanges 2000-025 10:30-12:00 TTH 2000-045 9:00-10:30 TTH 2000-084 3:00-4:30 TTH Turner, M English Composition Nutrition and Industry Students will investigate the ongoing phenomenon of globalization through both academic research and hands-on experience. Not only will you read, discuss and write about global issues, but you will also partner with an international student for weekly conversation to gain insight into life in other cultures. Through partner meetings, writing, and class discussions, you will consider how actively engaging with various cultural perspectives improves a writer’s ability to successfully appeal to a multicultural audience. Students will delve into America’s food industry. We will begin with a realistic look at the average American diet and how it compares to healthy guidelines for optimal living. We will then look at the many industries that influence our food choices, dictate them, and are a possible effect of them—such as the agricultural industry, FDA, pharmaceutical industry, diet industry, farmers’ markets, grocery associations, school lunch programs, etc. Students will become knowledgeable on this topic as we study current research, organization, web sites, biographies, and documentaries. 2000-034 2:30-3:30 MWF 2000-047 10:30-11:30 MWF 2000-110 9:30-10:30 MWF Pulliam, J English Composition Teaching and Learning Students will consider how their formal educations have variously facilitated and thwarted their ability to synthesize and formulate knowledge in order to become critical thinkers. Our exploration of how we become critical thinkers will include consideration of topics as varied as single sex education, on-line degree programs, and even Montessoristyle education and schools that don’t give grades. While there will be a lecture component to this class, writing instruction will be primarily done in a workshop setting that better resembles Friere’s “Problem-Posing Model of Education,” where teacher and students are critical co-investigators rather than the more traditional “Banking Model of Education,” where students merely regurgitate facts in order to demonstrate their mastery of the course material. 2000-065 10:30-12:00 TTH 2000-101 3:00-4:30 TTH 2000-111 1:30-3:00 TTH Andrews, S 2000-089 11:30-12:30 MWF Hill, D English Composition Writing for Community Action & Advocacy This service-learning course focuses on the use of language, especially written language, as a tool for empowerment within the community. Students will be challenged to think about their roles in the community and the use of writing to persuade, inspire and create change. English Composition Manifestos and Argument A manifesto is a public declaration of intentions, opinions, objectives, or motives, as one issued by a government, sovereign, or organization. We will use manifestos to study written and spoken argument and rhetoric. We will explore issues from a variety of vantage-points: cultural, political, social, economic, racial, ethnic, gender-based, etc. Our goal is to write a researched argument essay that examines a contemporary issue of your choice and argues your position related to that issue. We will read a variety of manifestos, and the issues that you choose to write about will emerge from these texts. You will also write your own manifesto and other writing assignments that will prepare you for the final researched argument essay. We will read a variety of authors, ranging from the Founding Fathers, to Malcolm X, and study cultural manifestos from sources as diverse as the book of Genesis to modern Hip Hop music. 2005-001 12:00-1:30 TTH Nelson, J Introduction to Writing Short Stories This course is composed of these elements: exercises designed to explore various forms of fiction writing and elements of craft; reading, discussing, and learning from a variety of contemporary short stories; writing your own original short fiction to be submitted for workshop; and honing your ability to respond critically to the work of your peers. 2005-002 9:30-10:30 MWF Drummond, L Introduction to Writing Short Stories In this participation- and workshop-focused class, students will read a variety of short stories, complete a number of craft exercises, and compile a portfolio of their original work. 2007-001 12:30-1:30 MWF Krieger, D Introduction to Writing Poetry Students will (1) write poems both of their own invention and in response to assigned prompts; (2) experiment with a variety of poetic forms, styles, traditions, and writing methods; (3) engage in compassionate but constructive workshop-style criticism of each other’s work; and (4) learn to read and analyze a wide range of recent and contemporary poetry in order to hone critical thinking skills, improve the quality of workshop discussion, and grow into more knowledgeable and historically relevant artists. 2007-002 12:00-1:30 TTH Wilson, A Introduction to Writing Poetry Investigate and create. This poetry workshop centers on generation of original creative work. We look at student work, contemporary poetry collections, sound poetry, visual-poetic hybrids, and poetic artifacts. Reading and discussion stimulate invention and expand our understanding of the methods and the madness of poetic practice. 2009-002 9:00-9:00 T Kornhauser, M Introduction to Writing Screenplays 2025-001 1:30-3:00 TTH Turner, M Fiction Southern Literature 2025-004 12:00-1:30 TTH Feifer, M Fiction 21st Century Postcolonial Literatures 2025-005 10:30-12:00 TTH Sandiford, K Fiction Fictions of The Caribbean We will watch films and discuss the language of character driven screenplays, as well as learn the 3-act structure of a feature length film. You will keep a log of the films and scripts you read outside of class and write a series of exercises, which culminates in the writing of the first act of your feature length screenplay. This general education course will focus on literature that is distinctively Southern. Through unique southern settings and southern characters, we will explore issues of race, gender, war, education, and marriage as we study a variety of writers from the 19th and 20th centuries. Particular emphasis will be placed on Mark Twain, Kate Chopin, Flannery O'Connor, Tennessee Williams, Ernest Gaines, and Toni Morrison. What is post-colonial literature? What are the cultural contexts within which post-colonial literature is produced? Why are the activist efforts and literary works of post-colonial writers so important? What arguments within post-colonial theory resonate today? Through the multi-genre readings of major texts within twenty-first century postcolonial literature (Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Sherman Alexie, Teju Cole, Edwidge Danticat, Junot Diaz, Cristina Henríquez, Randa Jarrar) our class will explore post-colonial topics including: border crossings, globalization, nationalism and transnationalism, diaspora and migration. Through the close analysis of post-colonial themes present in the various texts, students will develop the skills of close-reading the literal and figurative meanings within literary passages, creating analytical and argumentative claims about themes within a text, and engaging in critical dialogue about the socio-political importance of twenty-first century post-colonial literatures. The focus is on major fiction from the Anglophone Caribbean communities. Students will first be trained in skills for reading fiction and then apply those skills to a selection of Caribbean short stories and novels drawn from George Lamming, V.S. Naipaul, Samuel Selvon, Michael Thelwell, and others. Themes include historical experiences, cultural values, class struggle and religion. Projects designed to connect the literary texts with the music and festivals of the region (calypso, reggae, carnival, Rastafari). 2025-006 9:00-10:30 TTH Witherow, J Fiction A Historical Perspective Through Literature on Louisiana’s Diversity The focus is on literature of the unique cultural diversity in Louisiana, from the antebellum to the present eras. Discussions will address such issues as slavery, racism, class distinction within African-American, Cajun, and Creole cultures, and change effected through civic action. We will examine various cultures, their interrelated struggles, triumphs, and contributions. 2025-008 11:30-12:30 MWF White, D Fiction 19th Century Horror Fiction Students will explore the horror genre and its role in 19th century literature. Authors including Mary Shelley, Edgar Allan Poe, and Bram Stoker will be studied as an introduction to this popular genre and the role of fiction. 2025-012 9:30-10:30 MWF Rezaie, A Fiction Postcolonial Literature This course covers a range of narratives that deal with issues relating to cultures and cultural differences from 19th century to the present. 2025-013 4:30-6:00 MW Alexius, N Fiction LSU Fiction 2027-001 1:30-3:00 TTH McCaughey, D Poetry Hero in Poetry Students will read the work of well-known and critically acclaimed short story writers and novelists who enrolled at LSU as students, served on the faculty, or staffed the university's esteemed literary journals. The impressive 70-year span of LSU's literary history enriches our study of fiction. Hero in Poetry focuses on the hero in poetry from Homer to the present. Works include “The Iliad,” “The Odyssey,” “Dante’s Inferno,” and “Paradise Lost,” as well as lyric poems that comment on Greek and Roman heroes. The course explores how a poet shapes a culture’s understanding of itself through the depiction of its heroes. 2027-003 9:00-10:30 TTH Andrews, S Poetry Social Issues and Poetry of Witness This course is designed as a study of selected poets, poems, and poetry movements as "poetry of witness," with a dominant focus on specific social issues, including early historical influences, protest poems, specific themes of poverty, race and class, violence, gender, family and relationships. Includes a service-learning requirement and is also certified as “Communication Intensive.” Students will work collaboratively to produce a deliverable that "bears witness" to the experiences they encounter through our community partner. 2027-006 11:30-12:30 MWF Horacek, J Poetry This course covers basic approaches to reading and interpreting poetry. Students will learn to analyze form, identify themes, and place poems in a larger cultural context. The readings will include a variety of genres, forms, and time periods with an emphasis on modernism and poetry in translation. 2029-001 12:30-1:30 MWF Rosell, C Drama Disguising Identity What does it mean to wear a mask? How can disguise both reveal and conceal identity? How do we perceive fictional characters who impersonate others, mask their intentions, or even cross-dress? This course will explore the dramatic use of literal and figurative disguises through a range of plays from antiquity, the early modern period, and the twentieth-century. We will develop skills for reading and writing about drama, while studying generic conventions and critical perspectives. 2123-001 9:30-10:30 MWF Nohner, L Studies in Literary Traditions and Themes Contemporary Horror: Making Meaning of Our Monsters Studies in Literary Traditions and Themes The Art of Resistance Horror has long been a space for exploring popular fears and cultural anxieties. This course will focus on novels and short stories, but will also include movies and music. We will read contemporary horror fiction from a collection of subgenres: ghost, evil child, carnival monster, vampire, slasher, robot, and zombie. These readings will be supplemented with compelling critical essays which serve to help students understand the genre's history and context. Can literature lead to change? If so, how? We will analyze how contemporary English-language novels dramatize, reflect upon, and act as tools of, resistance. We will read novels which thematically lend attention to pressing global issues (primarily based on gender, race, and economics) and formally lead us to question their ability—as objects of art—to intervene in these issues. Ultimately, these novelists—including Morrison, Coetzee, Atwood, Zadie Smith, and David Foster Wallace—allow readers to consider the power, and purpose, of art. Shakespeare The Best of the Best: An investigation into the wit and wisdom of one of literature's superstars. We will examine Shakespeare's time, his language, his genres, and his works, noting how specific works (both plays and sonnets) contribute to the current discussion on defining the boundaries (or lack of boundaries) between leadership and tyranny, male and female, revenge and justice, art and life. 2123-002 12:30-1:30 MWF Bergholtz, B 2148-007 3:00-4:30 TTH Viguerie, M.P. 2173-001 12:00-1:30 TTH Bibler, M Louisiana Literature Strange and True Available to students of all majors, this course examines fiction, poetry, essays, and films that highlight Louisiana’s unique place in the American imagination. We will focus on fantasies and mythologies that make Louisiana look “strange,” but we will also look at the state's history and culture to ask how these mythologies are, at the same time, strangely “true.” 2270-001 10:30-11:30 TTHF Kennedy, G Major American Authors 2593-001 12:00-1:30 TTH Jeansonne, C Images of Women 2710-001 11:30-12:30 MWF Smith, J Descriptive Grammar of English (Large lecture with weekly breakout session.) This course builds intellectual confidence, critical understanding, and cultural awareness in a fast-moving tour of literary America from the colonial era to our own time. Readings feature such well-known authors as Franklin, Hawthorne, Poe, Douglass, Dickinson, Twain, Chopin, Faulkner, Hemingway, and Morrison. This will be a flipped" classroom”: lecture content will be available on Moodle before class; course time will focus on intensive discussion of student-defined interpretive issues. This course is designed for General Education and English majors. It presents an opportunity to explore the rhetoric around constructions of our concepts of “woman,” “women”. Students will define and deconstruct various images of women in their critical readings of texts and culture. This is offered as a Communication-Intensive (C-I) Course "and will be identified as such on transcripts if students meet all of the requirements for a C-I Course." This course involves the use of linguistic theory to examine what every native speaker of English has internalized about the structure of phrases and sentences in English. 2823-001 3:00-4:30 TTH Armistead, C Honors Literary Themes and Traditions Adolescence in Narrative Television Students will define and deconstruct the genre of "teen TV." Can such a genre be said to exist? If so, what are its parameters? How does it influence society's understanding of adolescent experience? We will explore answers to these questions by watching samples of popular "teen TV shows" from the 1990's until now. Through readings, class discussion, and writing assignments, students will think critically about how genres are formed and what they reveal about social norms and expectations. 2824-001 12:30-1:30 MWF Geheber, P Honors: Critical Analysis of Literature Contemporary Irish Literature 3020-001 12:00-1:30 TTH Barrett, C British Literature I: Middle Ages, Renaissance & 18th Century 3020-002 10:30-11:30 MWF King, E British Literature I: Middle Ages, Renaissance, & 18th Century 3022-001 10:30-11:30 MWF 3022-002 10:30-12:00 TTH Crump, R 3072-002 12:00-1:30 TTH Lavender, I British Literature II: Romantics, Victorians and Moderns American Literature II: Coming of Age Potential Americas An introduction to critical approaches that aims to begin building a student's critical toolkit and honing their critical eye. We'll examine recent Irish fiction, film, poetry, drama, and comics using a variety of perspectives, like psychoanalysis, Marxism, feminism, queer theory/gender studies, and post-colonialism. Course emphasizes practical application of theories in reading and writing about literature leading students to more deeply question, analyze, and understand our contemporary world. A whirlwind tour of a thousand years of English literary experiments. We’ll cover some of the most famous and most thrilling poetry in English, with attention to the often surprising historical context of these works and authors (who was a spy, who had a hand fungus, and whose still unopened tomb has dozens of original poems locked inside it). Emphasis on developing close reading skills and on considering how these texts continue to resonate today. Tracing the evolution of British literature over one thousand years, this course attends to changing conceptions of sovereignty. Questions that will guide us include: What are the rights afforded to and responsibilities of subjects and their sovereigns? How might desire, sexuality, and gender extend or foreclose one’s personal sovereignty? How do we account for advocacy for personal liberty alongside the realities of British imperialism and its slave trade? Survey of British literature from the French Revolution through the Industrial Revolution into the 20th century. In the post-Civil War period, America understands itself as a place where anything can happen—in good ways, and in bad. In effect, America is a place of shifting possibilities. We will read and respond to a variety of foundational, canonical, and non-canonical works as we consider several of these potential Americas. We will examine Realism, Naturalism, Modernism and Post-Modernism in addition to exploring the alternative voices of women, African Americans, Native Americans, and others. 3084-001 12:30-1:30 MWF King, E Modern Criticism Mic Check: Theorizing Resistance, Revolution, and Social Transformation This course interrogates modes of revolution and resistance in its introduction to contemporary critical theory. Examining canonical texts from the fields of structuralism, Marxism, deconstruction, postmodernism, postcolonialism, cultural studies, and gender theory, we will engage with the following questions: How might critical theory and the ways in which we read it constitute a revolution? And how might critical theory simultaneously reveal the limits of that revolution? 3202-001 3:00-4:30 MW Bickmore, S Dynamics of Learning in the English Classroom Prereq: EDCI 3001 and ENGL 3201. Concurrent enrollment in EDCI 3002. Dynamics of learning in middle school and high school English classes, including methods of small group and whole class interaction and instruction, including integration of technology. 3223-001 3:00-4:30 TTH Pulliam, J 3301-001 12:00-1:30 TTH Bridwell-Bowles, L Adolescent Literature Critical analysis and survey of literatures with adolescents as main characters and written for adolescent and adult audiences. The history of writing as a technology (clay tablets, alphabets, the codex, the printing press, digital media) is interwoven with the history of pedagogies. What can a retrospective look at the history of writing and writing instruction teach us about today's literacy? What is "new" about the ways we teach and learn to write in the 21st century? Not only will we read and talk about these questions, but we will experiment with different approaches. Of special interest to Rhetoric, Writing & Culture, English Education, and Literature concentrations. 3310-001 8:30-9:30 MWF Wingenbach, J Historical Perspectives on Language Issues The Language of Chaucer & Shakespeare We will look at how the English language established itself in the British Isles before focusing on the language of Chaucer and Shakespeare, the two most frequently read and influential authors who wrote before the eighteenthcentury. Students will learn to understand the nuances of Chaucer’s English which get lost in modern translation, and appreciate how Shakespeare’s English can sound so modern and so archaic at the same time. 3716-001 12:30-1:30 MWF Smith, J Dialects of English This course focuses on the examination and analysis of differences in pronunciation, vocabulary, and syntax of the major American English dialect regions. 4005-001 12:00-1:30 TTH Davis, J Short Story Writing This course offers an in-depth study of the fundamentals of fiction writing (narrative voice, structure, plot, theme, dialogue, setting, point-of-view, character development), with a primary emphasis on the short story. Students will read craft essays and contemporary short stories, as well as write and workshop their own short stories. Students will learn what effects are produced by the stylistic moves in their writing and in the writing of others, and students will leave the course as confident editors of their own work. 4007-001 2:30-3:30 MWF Wilky, A Writing Poetry Digital Media & Hybrid Genres 4008-001 1:30-3:00 TTH Euba, F Writing Drama Advanced Playwriting Workshop In this course we’ll be experimenting with and examining the ways in which form is also content. To do so: a) digital mediums will be briefly introduced at the start of the semester (web-based, audio, and video techniques); b) we will be “reading” text-, performance-, installation-, sound/audio-, video/film- and web-based work, as well as artists books; c) we will write (with pens, pencils, camera lenses, microphones, keyboards; on paper, computers, memory cards, film, servers, www, databases). Designed to organically stimulate the creative potential and equip the student with the techniques of writing good drama. 4009-001 6:00-9:00 M Kornhauser, M Advanced Screenwriting Workshop Writing: Practice, Pedagogy and History From clay tablets to the Internet: The past, present and future of writing and writing instruction Prereq: ENGL 2009. Practice in advanced screenwriting; students will be required to write a feature length screenplay, critique each other’s work, and present an analysis of the films watched over the semester. 4050-001 3:00-4:30 TTH Sandiford, K Studies in the Restoration & 18th Century Bling! Sex, Love, Fame, Wealth, and Society in 18th century England 4060-001 12:00-1:30 TTH Rovee, C Studies in the Romantic Movement Jane Austen and Romantic Fiction Capstone Seminar in Literature W. E. B. Du Bois and William Faulkner 4104-002 10:30-11:30 MWF Moreland, R Readings focused on the causes and effects of wealth expansion in the period (Wealth of Nations; Fable of the Bees; Moll Flanders). Some texts related to the loosening of sexual mores at Charles II’s court, and the impetus he and certain nobles gave to the prevalence of womanizing, drinking, gambling, and other lusts of the flesh (The Libertine, “The Maimed Debauchee,” The Man of Mode). Other texts illustrating ranges of reactions to these trends: Pope’s conservative panic (Epistle to Burlington), Hogarth’s comic satirical eye (The Rake’s Progress), and Johnson’s philosophical moralism (Rasselas). Group projects assigned to include movies and multi-media content on such topics as period food, fashion, household furnishings, sports, entertainments, advertisements and certain addictions. Intensive readings of Jane Austen's major novels, combined with a rich historical understanding of British Romantic fiction and the revolutionary events that gave rise to it. These two major American writers focused on similar questions and similar historical periods, yet their writing could hardly be more different. Reading them together in this capstone seminar will pull together a wide range of what we’ve practiced and learned in the literature concentration. A service-learning project will help us reflect on how all this might translate into life after LSU. 4720-001 10:30-11:30 MWF Shport, I Second Language Acquisition How are second languages learned? Why are some learners more successful than the others? Do bilinguals have perfect knowledge of their languages? This course provides a survey of key issues in second language acquisition (SLA) research and theory, including the effects of age, native language, linguistic environment, cognitive, and social factors on language learning. 4104-001 12:00-1:30 TTH Massé, M Capstone Seminar in Literature Stories to Live By: Gender, Age, and the Novel of Formation In tracing the shift from innocence to experience, the novel of development weaves fictions about what identity means as characters learn about life, love, and work. We will look at the differences sex and age make, not only in the stories we choose to tell ourselves, but also in how we tell them. Reading will include novels such as Little Women, Huckleberry Finn, Sons and Lovers, Quicksand, The Praisesong for the Widow, and Gilead. 4105-001 1:30-3:00 TTH Davis, J Capstone Seminar in Writing Fiction This course will provide students with the sophisticated tools necessary to write polished, effective, and affecting fiction. Students will produce and workshop new work, with an emphasis on the creative research often required to create complex and nuanced characters and plots. Students will also engage in an in-depth study of the process of revision. Ideally, students will leave the course with at least one polished short story or novel excerpt suitable for submission to graduate schools or literary journals. 4147-001 9:30-10:30 MWF Nardo, A Studies in Milton 4148-001 12:00-1:30 TTH Richardson, M Studies in Shakespeare Shakespeare and History We will focus on Paradise Lost. We will investigate whether or not Milton was a visionary, even a proto-feminist, who reimagined human sexuality and marriage. In collaboration with two undergraduate classes and a graduate seminar, we will read the entire poem together on two festive spring nights—with costumes, sets, music...perhaps even a real serpent. Corruption. Betrayal. Weak leaders. Regime change. Negative campaigns. As usual, the Big Guy got there first. Reading and viewing Shakespeare’s History plays, with a glance in the mirror. 4148-002 10:30-11:30 MWF Percy, L Studies in Shakespeare Shakespeare & the Other Discover how race, ethnicity and sexuality generate tension in five Shakespeare plays. 4204-001 TBA Friday Weinstein, S Capstone Seminar in English Education Prereq: EDCI 4003 and ENGL 4203. Concurrent enrollment in EDCI 4004 and EDCI 4005. For English majors in the Secondary Education Concentration. Independent research project. Course topics will vary. Usually offered in spring semester only. Advanced seminar in which students consolidate their knowledge in English and obtain a perspective on the significance of the knowledge. 4220-001 9:00-10:30 TTH Euba, F Drama of Africa and African Diaspora A study of the form and characteristic features of drama as expressed by playwrights in Africa and African diaspora in the New World. 4231-001 4:30-6:00 MW Maciak, P Studies in Literature & Film American Spectacle: Visual Culture at the Turn of the Century The American turn of the century was a crucial moment in the histories of literary and cinematic realism, but it was also a boon time for hoaxes, humbugs, frauds, and fantasies. The eye that relished realist depictions of the urban scene also looked for scenes of magic and monstrosity. We’ll encounter novels, films, and a bizarre array of visual cultures that offered spectacles of the real, the unreal, and everything in between. 4323-001 9:00-10:30 TTH Gourdine, A Studies in Caribbean Literature Touring Identity & Culture in Narrative Across linguistic differences and competing nationalist impulses, the rhizomatic mangrove biome unites the Caribbean. This course explores this unique ecosystem as a discursive formation, which, along with food and music, revises “creoleness” and defines a Caribbean literary ecology. We will read novels, short stories and poetry. In addition to traditional research the course will make use of social and popular media representations of the Caribbean environ and includes a Spring Break Excursion to Guadeloupe. 4713-001 3:00-4:30 TTH Weltman, J Syntax Basic principles of syntactic structure; topics include constituency, subordinate clauses, coordinate structures, question formation, topicalization and the passive. All other brief course descriptions can be found online at http://catalog.lsu.edu. Scroll down to the bottom of the page and click on Courses of Instruction in the left panel. Refer to the online schedule booklet for additional ENGL course listings. This document is on the English department's website, www.english.lsu.edu.