English, Foreign Languages, and Journalism / LAS / Missouri Western State College

INSTRUCTOR: Professor Anna Leahy

OFFICE: JGM 309-H / 271-4316

OFFICE HOURS: Tuesday 3:30-5:00, Wednesday 1:00-3:00, Thursday 3:30-5:00

COURSE DESCRIPTION

Literature of Gender and Ethnicity explores a variety of literary and cultural concepts. Certainly, the course will address concerns of literary genre, issues of language, and literary history. But this course also asks that we look at the culture of the assigned texts and the concepts of identity that the texts overtly or subtly discuss.

Whereas the term sex refers to a biological category, the word gender refers to a cultural category, to ideas of femininity and masculinity, and to the ways in which sex and society interact. Likewise, ethnicity is an elusive term that calls to mind traits and behaviors shared by large groups of people. We might (and probably will) add other "identity" terms to this list: race, religion, geographic location, class, sexual orientation.

This course, then, has particular goals, including the following:

• to examine the role of gender and ethnicity in specific literary works
• to examine issues of gender and ethnicity within and across literary works
• to come to a better understanding of how the "otherness" of gender and ethnicity is valued and marginalized in relation to canonical literature
• to come to a better understanding of a text’s cultural and historical context
• to develop particular ways of reading texts in relation to cultural concepts

In addition, as participants in a 300-level course, students will attempt the following tasks:

• analyze the works of writers in light of their cultural backgrounds
• study the influence of texts on the wider culture
• formulate both oral and written arguments about texts
• locate and determine the usefulness and reliability of primary and secondary sources in print and electronic formats
• compose, revise, and edit a scholarly essay which blends textual evidence, secondary materials, and informed, personal interpretation into a coherent argument

So, this course involves reading texts (it could be almost any texts) with attention to the ways in which cultural identity concepts play out. We will look at the genders and ethnicities of characters as well as authors and also discuss the cultural contexts in which authors write and characters develop. As such, the reading assignments are varied and numerous, including critical books by a historian and a psychologist along with novels, stories, and poems from several centuries.

REQUIRED TEXTBOOKS:

The Creation of Feminist Consciousness by Gerda Lerner

Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë (Norton critical edition)

Rite of Passage by Richard Wright

The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien

Driving the Body Back by Mary Swander

The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan

Wide Sargasso Sea by Jean Rhys

Additional readings will be available on reserve at the library or in handouts.

GRADING:

Final grades will be determined based on the following components of the course:

Handout & Presentation

Mid-Term Exam

Critical Analysis (Paper)

Final Exam

Participation (regular attendance, group work, quizzes, discussion, etc.)

Each component is weighted equally (20%) in the calculation of the final grade. All five components must be completed.

A late Critical Analysis or Handout & Presentation will not be accepted, except in the most dire circumstances. Mid-Term and Final Exams will not be rescheduled, except in the most dire circumstances. More than four absences (for whatever reasons) will result in a failing grade.

Note that a "C" represents average, college-level work and that merely doing the assigned work does not guarantee a "C." Grades of "A" or "B" represent work above the basic, minimum expectations for a 300-level course, whereas grades of "D" or "F" indicate an inability to complete minimally acceptable work.

OTHER POLICIES:

As part of this course, you are required to attend a reading by writer Mary Swander on Wednesday, April 4 at 4pm. Please adjust your schedule accordingly. Mary Swander may also visit our class the following day. You will read her book Driving the Body Back in preparation for her visit to campus.

Wide Sargasso Sea, one of the assigned texts, will not be extensively discussed in class. Instead, it will serve as the primary source for your Critical Analysis. You might consider looking ahead toward this assignment and reading the book earlier in the course to allow more time for research and drafting your essay.

All assigned work must be completed before the class meeting for which it is due, and written work must be available to be turned in at the beginning of the class meeting. All out-of-class writing must be typed, unless otherwise indicated. Late participation work is not accepted and lowers your participation grade; not all written exercises/responses are collected, but many are. Any late Presentation and Handout or Critical Analysis lowers your final course grade by a full letter and receives no written or workshop comments; lack of enough copies is treated the same as lateness.

While some guided collaboration is encouraged, plagiarism is not tolerated and will result in a zero for the assignment for any individuals involved. A zero is calculated as less than an F and will make it mathematically difficult for a student to pass the course. Refer to your student handbook or to the instructor for more information.

Students with disabilities that inhibit work in this course should notify me in writing within the first two weeks of this semester so that accommodations can be considered.

No food or beverages (except water) are allowed in carpeted areas of most buildings.

Other relevant policies are covered in your student handbook.

For Thursday: Read "The Complexity of Identity" (Tatum). Write a one-page (single-spaced, typed) statement about your own identity and what categories define you.

In class: Discuss concepts of identity.

For Tuesday: Read "Self-authorization" (Lerner) and Hildegard of Bingen. Write a one-page summary (no response) of the reading’s main points.

In class: Discussion of reading.

For Thursday: Read "The Way of the Mystics-2" (Lerner) and Sojourner Truth.

In class: Discussion of reading.

For Tuesday: Read "Authorization through Motherhood" (Lerner) and TBA. Write a one-page definition of motherhood and/or fatherhood based on the reading.

In class: Discussion of reading and of parental roles.

For Thursday: Read "Authorization through Creativity" (Lerner), Mary Collier, Emily Dickinson, and selections from contemporaneous male poets. Write a poem that makes a statement about your gender role(s).