ENG 153 Syllabus Fall 2013 English 153: Introduction to Women Authors Questioning Womens Literature ENG 153-001

TR: 12:40-2:30 C302 Snyder Hall Ms. Laura McGrath Office: Wells Hall, C710 Office Hours: TR, 3:00-4:00 or by appointment mcgrat85@msu.edu @lbmcgrath Course Description As a introductory English course, ENG 153 will teach students techniques for literary study within the context of literature by women. Students will develop skills essential for literary study through intensive reading and writing practices. In this course, we will approach literature with the understanding that thoughtful writing begins as a careful reading practice, that reading and writing are inseparable activities, and that both good reading and good writing begin with asking good questions. This is a course about asking big questions about the relationship of womens literature and womens identity. It is designed to familiarize you with the contributions of women writers throughout the 20th Century, and ask some of the questions that have occupied scholars throughout the 20th Century. Throughout the semester, we will consider the following questions: What is womens literature? How do women write? Why do women write? How can and should we read womens literature? What can womens literature doand for whom? We begin with the understanding that none of these questions has one easy answer; indeed, these questions are incredibly complex. As the basis of close reading, analytical writing, and humanistic inquiry, the Question itself is more important than the answer. Course Objectives The core objectives for ENG 153: Intro to Women Authors are: 1. To develop close and critical reading skills. 2. To ask good research questions. 3. To begin to write analytically. 4. To appreciate difference and complexity in a range of experiences.

What I Expect from You Simply put, this course will require a lot of work. It is designed to be a reading course, giving you as much exposure possible to major authors and texts in Womens Writing. You should expect to read approximately 100 pages a week (give or take), and you should expect to discuss it in class.

ENG 153 Syllabus Fall 2013 What You Can Expect From Me Simply put, I will work hard for this course. I will come to class ready to listen to you. I will create a hospitable and equitable classroom environment. I will strive to make discussions engaging, and encourage you to be creative. I will be available during office hours (and by appointment) to help you through whatever struggles you may have with this class. I will provide timely feedback on your written work. I value risk over perfection, and improvement over mastery. Required Texts Bechdel, Alison. Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2007. Print. ISBN: 9780-618-87171-1 Chopin, Kate. The Awakening. New York: Dover, 1993. Print. ISBN: 978-0-486-27786-8 Hurston, Zora Neale. Their Eyes Were Watching God. New York: Harper Perennial Modern Classics, 2006. Print. ISBN: 0-06-093141-8 Morrison, Toni. The Bluest Eye. New York: Vintage International, 2007. ISBN: 978-0-307-27844-9 Plath, Sylvia. The Bell Jar. New York: Harper Perennial Modern Classics, 2005. Print. ISBN: 0-06017490-0 Selected readings uploaded to D2L. Note: We will be reading some hard novels, short stories, poems, and theory this semester. Content may include triggers, or be offensive to some readers, including scenes of pedophilia, rape, suicide and self-harm, and severe mental illness. Additionally, much of the content of the course will be sexually explicit. Students who do not wish to participate fully may wish to enroll in another English course. Required Technology You will be required to create a Twitter account for the purpose of this course. Twitter accounts are free, and can be created at www.twitter.com. Once you have created your account (which you are required to do by Tuesday, September 3rd), please fill out the following Technology Survey: http://bit.ly/19fCvqP. You may tweet at me with quick questions throughout the course of the semester (Ill respond via Twitter quicker than email), and you should use hashtag #ENG153. We will be using Desire2Learn regularly throughout the semester. You should familiarize yourself with the platform as quickly as possible.

ENG 153 Syllabus Fall 2013 Major Assignments Essay 1. 10% (100 pts.) Essay 2. 15% (150 pts.) Essay 3. 15% (150 pts.) Essay 4. 15% (150 pts.) Final Exam 20% (200 pts.) Participation 20% (200 pts.) Critical Questions 5% (50 pts.) Essays 10%, 15% You will write four short essays over the course of the semester. Essays will respond to the critical question posed in each major Unit; you are to select and analyze one important quotation from the text of your choosing, and demonstrate how their quotation of choice can provide an answer (not the answer, of course) to the Unit Question. You will respond to the Unit One Question; after Unit One, you may choose which three Unit Questions to answer. In other words, there will not be an essay due for each Unit. Essays will be at least 750 words, but will not exceed one page (font must be at least 10 point, margins can be as small as your printer allows). A more detailed assignment description will be distributed in class. Final Exam- 20% A cumulative, final essay exam will be distributed on the final day of class (December 5), and will be submitted electronically by 2:45pm on December 10. Participation- 20% Youre busy, Im busy: our lives are complicated. Part of being a college student is learning how to negotiate your competing responsibilities graciously. Students will be expected to participate at a high level in order to succeed in this discussion-oriented class. This means that you are expect you to do the reading and come to recitation prepared to talk. Being prepared also means bringing all relevant materials with you to class. Participation will be assessed in regards to quality as well as quantity. I will actively track both quality and quantity of each students comments. You will receive a Participation Grade for every day that you are present in class; each daily Participation Grade will be averaged to determine your final Participation Grade.

In order to be awarded a 2.0: Student does not speak in class and nominally participates in all class activities. In order to be awarded a 2.5: Student speaks some of the time in class and participates in all class activities. Student is generally prepared for class. In order to be awarded a 3.0: Student speaks most of the time in class and participates actively in all class activities. Student is consistently prepared for class. Comments are good. In order to be awarded a 3.5: Student speaks in each class session and participates enthusiastically in all class activities. S/he is an active listener. S/he comes prepared for class, and comments are thoughtful. In order to be awarded a 4.0: Student participates in each class session at a high level, is an active listener, interacts with her/his peers, and is a leader in all class activities. S/he comes prepared for class. 3

ENG 153 Syllabus Fall 2013 Critical Questions- 5% The class will be divided into groups of four or five. Three times during the semester, you will be responsible for providing one Critical Question for the class. [NOTE: you are not working as a group; the groupings are merely a way to organize responsibility]. You will be required to Tweet their Critical Question to by 10 pm the evening prior to class, using the hashtag #ENG153. Course Policies and Housekeeping Office Hours Students should make an appointment to meet with me during office hours; this is as simple as sending an email so that I can expect you. You are always welcome to stop by my office without an appointment; however, such instances will be handled on a first-come, first-serve basis with priority given to students who made appointments. If you wish to speak to me about a specific assignment, it is important that you contact me at least one week before the assignment is due. Given less time, I cannot promise you a meeting time. If you wish to review a draft (which I am happy to do), please send me a draft at least 24 hours prior to our scheduled meeting. I am also happy to hold office hours over Skype or G+. Contacting Me I do not check email after 5:00 at night or on the weekends. I cannot guarantee an immediate response. Expect at least a 48-hour turnaround on email. You are not my only student: you must include your name and section number in your emails. Be sure to identify what your email is regarding. Consider each email that you write like a telephone call: business hours apply and manners count. Make sure the tone of your emails is respectful and professional. Ask yourself, would I send this email to my boss? As this is an introductory English course, grammar and punctuation count, too. Attendance Students are allowed up to four absences; more than four absences will result in a failing grade for the course. I do not differentiate between excused and unexcused absences. Please note, however, that Participation amounts for 20% of your final grade, and that you will be assigned a daily Participation grade. Students who are absent will receive a 0 for Participation, unless their absence is documented. Students who read, do homework, are excessively tardy, texting, or are otherwise occupied during class will receive a 0 for their daily Participation grade. Late Assignments Late papers will not be accepted. However, I reserve the right to extend deadlines in special cases if the student has discussed it with me far in advance. Look at your syllabi at the beginning of the semester and look for likely conflicts; I will happily reward your responsibility with a reasonable 4

ENG 153 Syllabus Fall 2013 extension. Dont kill off a grandparent for extra time. Written assignments will be printed, stapled, and turned in hard copy. If you are reading this, highlight my office hours on the first page of this syllabus. I will not accept papers via email. I will not accept papers that are not stapled. Papers must be written in MLA format: please look it up if youre unsure. Dont improvise. Grades All written assignments will be turned in at the beginning of class on the due date to be considered on time. I am happy to discuss grades. However, I ask that each student wait at least 24 hours before discussing grades with me. This gives you the time to really examine your paper or exam and formulate specific questions about the grade you received. I will not discuss your assignment via email or in the classroom; you must come to my office. Conduct We will speak kindly and respectfully to one another. No hateful or derogatory speech will be tolerated. Students who are unable to abide by this statement of conduct will be given a warning. If you are unable to abide by this policy, I will respectfully ask you to leave. Resources Student Support Services and Accommodations Students requiring special accommodations, services, or resources should contact the Resource Center for Persons with Disabilities (RCPD) in Room 120 Bessey Hall (tel. 517884-7273). Students who wish to improve their writing skills should contact the MSU Writing Center in Room 300 Bessey Hall (tel. 517-432-3610). Students may make appointments online at http://msuwriting.mywconline.com/ English Language Learners who wish to improve their English skills should visit the English Language Center in Room A714 Wells Hall (tel. 517-353-0800). I am always willing to discuss your progress, improvement, and ways to assist you in doing your best. Please feel free to make an appointment and drop by my office. Academic Integrity One of the most important principles in higher education is academic integrity. Quite simply, if you use someone else's words, ideas, text, images, music, etc., you must cite your source. When in doubt, cite the source. Purdues Online Writing Lab defines plagiarism as buying, stealing, or borrowing a paper (including, of course, copying an entire paper or article from the Web); hiring someone to write your paper for you; and copying large sections of text from a source without quotation marks or proper citation. In addition, gray areas such as using the words of a source too closely when paraphrasing (where quotation marks should have been used) or building on someone's ideas without citing their spoken or written work also constitute plagiarism for the purposes of this 5

ENG 153 Syllabus Fall 2013 course. I take this very seriously, and chances are good that I will catch you if you attempt to plagiarize some or all of your papers. Therefore, Students should properly cite in MLA format. Students should avail themselves to appropriate resources for citation and academic integrity information, such as Purdue OWL, http://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/ Bedford/St. Martins Research and Documentation Online, http://bcs.bedfordstmartins.com/resdoc5e/ For instance: Stolley, Karl and Allen Brizee.. "Is It Plagiarism Yet?" The Purdue OWL. Purdue U Writing Lab, 4 April 2010. Web. 12 January 2012. My enforcement of MSU's academic integrity policy may include an automatic failure of the course. MSU also states that we must refer you to the dean of your college. Don't cheat. Procedures for responding to cases of academic honesty and other possible repercussions are outlined in Spartan Life: Student Handbook and Resource Guide. Course Schedule Date R, August 29 T, September 3 Reading Due Assignments Due Unit One: What Is Womens Literature? Introduction to the Course Syllabus Create Twitter Account and Woolf, Shakespeares Sister from A Room of Complete Technology Survey: Ones Own; Professions for Women, and The http://bit.ly/19fCvqP Death of the Moth [D2L] Group 1 Unit Essay Assignment Sheet Group 2 Chopin, The Awakening, 1-61 Chopin, The Awakening, 62-116 Group 3 Gilman, The Yellow Wallpaper Group 4 Gilbert and Gubar, Infection in the Sentence: The Woman Writer and the Anxiety of Authorship. [D2L] Unit Two: How Do Women Write? Hurston, Their Eyes Were Watching God, 1-77 Unit One Paper Due Group 5 Hurston, Their Eyes Were Watching God, 78-129 Group 6 Hurston, 130-193 Group 7 Robinson, Treason Our Text: Feminist Group 8 Challenges to the Literary Canon [D2L] Stein, The Gentle Lena [D2L] Group 9 Loy, Feminist Manifesto [D2L] Rhys, Manequin [D2L] Group 1 6

R, September 5 T, September 10 R, September 12

T, September 17 R, September 19 T, September 24 R, September 26 T, October 1 R, October 3

ENG 153 Syllabus Fall 2013 T, October 8 R, October 10 T, October 15 R, October 17 T, October 22 R, October 24 Unit Three: Why Do Women Write? Cixous, The Laugh of the Medusa [D2L] Unit Two Paper Due Group 2 Plath, The Bell Jar, 1-62 Group 3 Plath, The Bell Jar, 63-127 Group 4 Plath, The Bell Jar, 128-183 Group 5 Plath, The Bell Jar, 184-244 Group 6 Nin, Birth [D2L] Group 7 Barnes, How It Feels to be Forcibly Fed [D2L] Unit Four: How Can/Should We Read Womens Literature? Morrison, The Bluest Eye, 1-58 Unit Three Paper Due Group 8 Morrison, The Bluest Eye, 61-131 Group 9 Morrison, The Bluest Eye, 132-206 Group 1 Morrison, Forward to The Bluest Eye Group 2 Lorde, Age, Race, Class, and Sex: Women Redefining Difference [D2L] Clifton, admonitions, the lost baby poem, Group 3 if our grandchild be a girl. Poem to my Uterus, To My Last Period [D2L] Manifestos [D2L] Group 4 Unit Five: What Can Womens Literature Do? (And for whom?) Bechdel, Fun Home, 1-120 Unit Four Paper Due Group 5 Bechdel, Fun Home, 120-232 Group 6 Rich, When We Dead Awaken: Writing as Group 7 Revision [D2L] THANKSGIVING Grahn, Common Woman [D2L] Group 8 Nussbaum, Difficult Women: How Sex and the Unit Five Paper Due by City lost its Good Name [D2L] Midnight, Sunday, December 8 Nussbaum, Its Different for Girls [D2L] Group 9 Quart, The Age of Hipster Sexism [D2L] FINAL EXAM, 12:45-2:45 pm

T, October 29 R, October 31 T, November 5 R, November 7 T, November 12 R, November 14 T, November 19 R, November 21 T, November 26 R, November 28 T, December 3 R, December 5

T, December 10