Special Topics - Fall 2012
HE360: How to Tell a True War Story: The Fiction of Tim O'Brien
LCDR Bill Bushnell
"That's
what fiction is for. It's for getting at the truth when the truth isn't
sufficient for the truth." --Tim O'Brien
This course will seek the many
truths suggested by Tim O'Brien's stories. It will survey the body of his work
and examine his legacy not only as a writer known primarily as a chronicler of
the Vietnam War, but as a prominent figure in contemporary American literature.
We will look at his eight major publications, most likely in chronological
order; however, I keep flirting with a reverse chronology or, in tribute to the
author, a complex web of meta-chronologies.
"And in the end, really, there's
nothing much to say about a true war story, except maybe "Oh." --from "How to
Tell a True War Story"
HE463: Readings from the Best of Charles Dickens
Associate Professor Eileen Johnston
Marking the two hundredth anniversary of Charles Dickens' birth, this seminar
addresses three of the author’s long masterpieces—David Copperfield,
Bleak House, and Our Mutual Friend. While all three novels
appeared in serialized parts, they differ significantly in their narration.
David Copperfield, a semi-autobiographical Bildungsroman, is told
from a first-person point of view. It was, by the way, the novel closest to
Dickens’ heart ("Of all my books, I like this the best"). Bleak House
may be unique among Victorian novels in featuring two very different narrators,
Esther Summerson, who is one of the main characters, and an unnamed third-person
omniscient narrator. The contrasts in tone, outlook, sensibility, and degree
and kinds of awareness between the two narrators are compelling. Our Mutual
Friend, Dickens' last finished novel, is a multiplot novel told by a single
third-person omniscient narrator. Students will explore Dickens' choices about
structure and narration; his famous methods of characterization; his
increasingly severe critiques of aspects of Victorian society, particularly its
obsession with class and wealth and its faulty social and political
institutions; and his evocative use of figurative language and symbolic
settings. The course aims to develop students' understanding of the art of
fiction, the world of Victorian England, and the nature of what has come to be
called "Dickensian".
HE462: Historias: Representing History in Chican@ Literature
Assistant Professor Monica Hanna
Chican@ literature is an important resource for understanding the history of
Mexicans, Mexican Americans, and Chican@ in the United States. This results in
part from the fact that Chican@ history has often been overlooked or only
partially explored in traditional histories of the United States. This body of
literature oftentimes seeks to fill in some of those historical gaps. "Historia"
in Spanish means both "history" and "story," signifying the important connection
between the two. The course will consider Chican@ texts that engage with
critical historical moments in US and Mexican histories, and consider the role
of Chican@s in both of those national histories. Texts to be read might include
"recovered" texts such as Maria Amparo Ruiz de Burton's 1885 novel The Squatter
and the Don and Daniel Venegas's Don Chipote; or When Parrots Breastfeed (1928);
Chicano Movement literature like Luis Valdez's Zoot Suit and Oscar "Zeta"
Acosta's Revolt of the Cockroach People; and post-movement texts by authors such
as Gloria Anzaldua, Ana Castillo, Guillermo Gomez-Pena, Sandra Cisneros, and
Salvador Plascencia. In examining this wide variety of texts, the class will
look at both continuities and ruptures in historical philosophy and literary
form.
HE503: Slavery and American Culture
Associate Professor Mark McWilliams
From the first literature by African Americans to epic treatment by some of
America's greatest writers, from work songs and field hollers to gospel and the
blues, from minstrelsy to recent films, slavery has haunted the imagination of
the United States. In this course we will examine how writers, musicians,
artists, and thinkers have explored this central tragedy of American history.
