Times and locations of class meetings are subject to change. Consult the UF Schedule of Courses for official class times and locations and an explanation of the class period abbreviations.
Summer 2020
Upper Division (3000–4000) Courses
Note: Course numbers listed in the table are linked to course descriptions below.
Summer A
| Course # | Class # | Time(s) | Room | Course title | Instructor |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| AML 4453 | 17698 | MTWRF 2 | WEB | Reimagining the American Renaissance | Srimayee Basu |
| ENC 3312 | 17756 | MTWRF 3 | WEB | Advanced Argumentative Writing | Jacqueline Elliot |
| ENG 4133 | 17757 | MTWRF 4 MW 6-7 | WEB | Masters of the Modern Moving Image | Zach Shaw |
| ENL 4273 | 17758 | MTWRF 5 | WEB | Britain’s “Lost Generation”: British Writing Between World Wars | Heather Hannaford |
| LIT 3003 | 14725 | MTWRF 6 | WEB | Forms of Narrative Throughout the Black Atlantic | Kedon Willis |
Summer B
| Course # | Class # | Time(s) | Room | Course title | Instructor |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| AML 3285 | 17759 | MTWRF 2 | MAT 0113 | Reading Contemporary Latinx Literature | Jonathan Hernandez |
| ENC 3310 | 17760 | MTWRF 3 | MAT 0118 | Advanced Exposition | Ayanni Cooper |
| ENL 3251 | 17761 | MTWRF 4 | MAT 0113 | Victorian Literature | Claire Karnap |
| LIT 4334 | 17762 | MTWRF 5 | MAT 0113 | Golden Age of Children’s Literature | Mary Roca |
| LIT 4930 | 17763 | MTWRF 6 | MAT 0113 | Crime and Mystery Adaptation in Comics | Spencer Chalifour |
Course Descriptions
AML 4453
Reimagining the American Renaissance
Srimayee Basu
The term “American Renaissance” was first used by scholar F.O. Matthiessen to denote the period between 1830 and 1860, which he terms the “age of Emerson and Whitman.” This period is believed to be one where American Literature came into its own and developed a distinct national character. However, what literary historians have often overlooked is that this period also coincided with the Abolitionist and Suffragist Movements, and the exclusion of the literatures produced by key writers of these movements produces a narrow if not flawed understanding of the period’s zeitgeist. This course will revisit the American Renaissance and attempt to reconstruct it as a vexed, polyphonous literary period. We will both expand our understanding of the American literary canon by reading critically neglected works from the nineteenth century by suffragist, African American, and Native American writers, and reconsider works by canonical writers of this period through contemporary theoretical paradigms. Our objective will be to think about the relationship between literary and national longing for form and self-determination and the possibility/desirability of retrieving and reclaiming canons from their original contexts.
The texts included in the course are as follows:
Toni Morrison, Playing in the Dark: Whiteness and the Literary Imagination
Ralph Waldo Emerson, “The American Scholar”
Edgar Allan Poe, The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym
Frederick Douglass, The Heroic Slave
Catharine Maria Sedgwick, Hope Leslie
Herman Melville, Benito Cereno
William Apess, A Son of the Forest
Harriet Wilson, Our Nig
Fanny Fern, Ruth Hall
ENC 3312
Advanced Argumentative Writing
Jacquelin Elliot
It’s Alive! Rhetoric and the Technology of Monstrosity
In the introduction to the 1831 edition of Frankenstein, Mary Shelley “bid [her] hideous progeny to go forth and prosper,” and, since its publication in 1818, her novel certainly has with Victor Frankenstein and his Creature becoming icons of the Western cultural mythos and their story being replicated and remixed again and again in everything from movies to comics to boxes of children’s breakfast cereal.
By performing rhetorical analyses of Frankenstein and a collection of its intertexts from a number of different periods and genres (Blade Runner, Young Frankenstein, Black Mirror), this class invites students to consider the ways in which an iconic cultural figure like Frankenstein’s Creature serves as a technology of monstrosity – that is, a rhetorical vehicle in which out-dated forms of otherness/sociological metaphor can be interchanged as needed. Further, this class will examine a number of subjects that are both relevant to Frankenstein as a text and to contemporary ethical debates, including the pro/cons of technological/scientific progress, eugenics, racism, artificial intelligence, and representations of the posthuman, the monstrous, and normalcy.
Because our course is, first and foremost, centered on composition and argumentation, we will also be considering what it means to create an argument and the ways in which a piece of writing, like Frankenstein’s Creature himself, is an assemblage of disparate parts. We will explore the power and limitations of rhetorical strategies such as pathos, logos, alogos, parody, and remix, as well as the importance of mode, genre, and technology when stitching together our own “monstrous progeny.”
This course fulfills part of the University Writing Requirement. Students who complete all assignments will earn 6000 words towards the University writing requirement.
ENG 4133
Masters of the Modern Moving Image
Zach Shaw
In the modern world of ubiquitous screens and with the cultural prominence of cinematic media, it is evident that a large part of how we organize the world visually comes directly from the cinema, and in particular, from its masters of cinematography. If cinematography is so crucial, who are its true masters and have other visual thinkers of the cinema played equally integral roles in modern visual design? Which of these prominent figures may be considered auteurs of the cinema, and how does the work of editors play a role in the creation of cinematic media? The Masters of the Modern Moving Image course will explore the critical works of cinematographers and moving image creators who have had profound societal impacts, drawing from film theory to consider how meaning is made through camera techniques, colors, and lighting. We will analyze the evolution of the “invisible” cuts from Hitchcock’s Rope (1948) to this year’s award-winning film for cinematography: 1917 (2019). We will also investigate theories of avant-garde media with Bruce Conner’s A Movie (1958). In analyzing movement in the cinema, we will consider animate imagery, from animated digital cinema with Toy Story (1995) to illustrative movement in The Wind Rises (2013). The latter embodies Miyazaki’s breathless full animation and conveys movement through the painstaking process of creating sequential imagery. Finally, the cinematography of both In the Mood for Love (2000) and The Handmaiden (2016) evidences Laura Mulvey’s psychoanalytic theories of gazes and desire. Among a few other critical films, these exemplify the significant advances, changing techniques, and graphic organization from the cinema’s greatest visual minds.
ENL 4273
Britain’s “Lost Generation”: British Writing Between World Wars
Heather Hannaford
As we have entered into 2020, we are looking back at the excitement and youth culture of the 1920s with a fond eye. Popular shows, like Downton Abbey, have explored the changes that took place between World War I and II as the old regime began to crumble and what we see as the modern world began to take shape. The devastation wrought by World War I on British society echoed through the halls of the once great English country houses and signaled a major change in the old ideas of aristocracy, class, and politics. Class divides were put in sharp relief and the remains of a feudal society were confronted with the loss of a traditional way of life that had seemed so secure before the war. These ways of life were central to both the wealthy and the poor, and the change rippled through all classes. Literature produced between World War I and World War II often deals with the decline of this way of life and the growing sense of disillusionment that was felt by this “lost generation” trapped between two significant wars. It also examines the struggle of people and society with the consequences of the horrors of war and how different political ideologies were informed by the inter-war period. This period was defined by youthful 1920s caprice, nihilism, and a deep sense of real change. This struggle defined what we now term the rise of Modernism, a loss, a change, a new society.
In this class we will examine how some of the writers of this period grappled with war, the fall of the aristocracy, and the growing threat of fascism. These range from nostalgia for a lost England, satire of the foibles of the aristocracy, and deep introspective meditations on class and war. We will read works from Nancy Mitford, Evelyn Waugh, T. S. Eliot, Virginia Woolf, and Muriel Spark, among others. As we celebrate the centenary of the beginning of the 1920s, we will return to the era to further understand why we are so fascinated by this time and the intense transformations that took place during that time period that define the modern world.
LIT 3003
Forms of Narrative Throughout the Black Atlantic
Kedon Willis
The role of narrative, the very basic act of storytelling, has been crucial to the recognition of the Black experience in the Americas since the advent of European settlement in the region. This course will engage with a variety of written works from African-descended authors in the Americas to investigate the forms, techniques and ideas that unite them, despite differences of history, culture and time. The historical scope of the course also traces the evolution of literary forms, movements and genres to examine how these changes respond to the shifting realities of African-descended subjects “in the West.” In line with this investigation, students will engage with questions such as: how was the autobiographical form suited to the purposes of Black antebellum authors? What are the postmodern elements of certain Harlem Renaissance texts and what is the breakdown of literary conventions meant to reflect? How do we rationalize the growing dystopian current in contemporary works from the Caribbean? The selection of works will introduce students to writings from a range of locations, including Barbados, Canada, Haiti, Martinique, Panama, Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Possible texts include: The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano (1789), Cane (1923), Macho Camacho’s Beat (1980) I, Tituba, Black Witch of Salem (1986) and A Mercy (2008). Possible assignments include short response papers, a book review written in the narrative style of the author, a panel presentation and a critical analysis paper.
Summer B
AML 3285
Reading Contemporary Latinx Literature
Jonathan Hernandez
This January, Jeanine Cummins’ novel, American Dirt, was roundly criticized upon its publication by critics, Latinx authors, and readers in general for its stereotypical representations of Mexican immigrants. And while this situation highlights the continued lack of proper representation and support for Black people and people of color in the publishing industry in general, it also provides us with an opportunity to explore (or survey, if you will) contemporary literary texts that center Latinxs and the various issues and challenges they face today.
Of particular interest to us will be the way Latinx authors use a wide range of genres and forms, including novels, short stories, plays, poetry, and essays, to write about their own lives and their experiences with race, gender, class, sexuality, etc. We will also determine the accuracy of Raphael Dalleo and Elena Machado Sáez’s claim in The Latino/a Canon and the Emergence of Post-sixties Literature that a “commonsense periodization has emerged in Latino/a literature,” in which the “marginalized but politically committed writers of the 1960s and 1970s” has given way to the “market success of the literary professionals from the multicultural post-Sixties era” (2).
This will involve interrogating who is included and excluded in the category of contemporary Latinx literature, both in terms of authorship as well as narratives “authorized” to represent this category. This is particularly important as works of literary fiction are commonly celebrated over more popular works that are deemed to lack “literary merit”. In addition, we will also identify the different degrees to which works of contemporary Latinx literature and their authors seek to engage their readership politically in order to determine how “politically committed” today’s authors are.
By the end of this course, students are expected to have not only a greater understanding of the plurality of experiences of Latinxs, but also a sense of how the publishing industry and the literary market shapes readers’ tastes for particular narratives. This includes acknowledging the political advantages of panethnic identifiers, including Latinx, as well as the ways in which these terms can potentially erase or flatten individuals’ identities.
Course texts will consist of a combination of scholarly and literary texts, which may include the following:
Jennine Capó Crucet, My Time Among the Whites: Notes from an Unfinished Education
Junot Díaz, Drown
Josefina López, Real Women Have Curves
Ernesto Quiñonez, Bodega Dreams
Gabby Rivera, Juliet Takes a Breath
Lara Rios, Becoming Americana
Richard Rodriguez, Hunger of Memory: The Education of Richard Rodriguez
Class assignments will consist of short response papers, presentations or projects with a creative component, and a final research paper.
ENC 3310
Advanced Exposition
Ayanni Cooper
In our current era, it is essential for writers of all disciplines to understand various methods, or modes, of communication in order to reach their audiences. This course works with various methods of multimodal composition to teach digital literacy and digital creativity. Students will compose multimodal documents in order to convey creative, well-researched, carefully crafted, and attentively written information that can be circulated through both digital and non-digital platforms. Though projects like podcasts, zines, and personal websites, students will practice and explore digital writing and research central to academic, civic, and personal expression.
ENL 3251
Victorian Literature
Claire Karnap
This course will examine a wide range of Victorian texts to examine how the authors of the period incorporated Gothic tropes into their works. We will consider how both the environment and characters create haunting and supernatural suspense for the reader, in addition to examining the texts’ reception among the time-period. Students will be introduced to works about psychological states, such as madness and melancholia, the supernatural, violence in the workhouses concerning class and the job market, science, and environmental conditions during the period.
Class discussions will include how these gothic tropes were used to examine Victorian environments and conditions for the working class. Other discussions might include how representations of environments conflicted and/or embraced the Victorian Age’s social and political expectations, how Victorian authors situate the gothic in an urbanized environment, and who are the perpetrators/villains in these texts and whether these portrayals are a social critique. Some texts that we will read include but are not limited to Tennyson’s poetry, Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre, Emily Brontë’s poetry, Stevenson’s The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde (1886), Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s “The Yellow Wallpaper”, Browning, Wilde, G.M. Hopkins, and Arnold. We will also explore letters, poetry, and short stories about the gothic, such as accounts of workhouses. Assignments will most likely include quizzes, online discussion posts, a short paper, and a final research paper with a presentation. Students are expected to read the required texts for each class period and arrive to class prepared to contribute to the discussion.
LIT 4334
Golden Age of Children’s Literature
Mary Roca
Beginning in the mid-nineteenth century, the “Golden Age” of children’s literature produced some of the most recognizable U.S. and British child protagonists, many of whom are still popular today: Carroll’s Alice (1865), Alcott’s Jo March (1868), Twain’s Tom Sawyer (1876), and Barrie’s Peter Pan (1911), among others. Such works aimed to entertain and delight, marking a shift away from the explicit didacticism of earlier materials for children. And yet in writing about and for children, these authors still intervened in broader conversations about childhood ideals, appropriate behavior, and acceptable norms. Although we often discuss the Golden Age as ending in the early twentieth century, many of these works continue to be reproduced and reimagined today—from modern updates like Black Sails (2015) and Peter Rabbit (2018) to period pieces like Anne With an E (2017) and Little Women (2019). With its canonical status and ongoing cultural presence, the Golden Age of children’s literature continues to influence the ways we conceptualize and understand childhood today.
In this course, we will examine canonical children’s literature produced during the “Golden Age” and put it into conversation with archived materials as well as contemporary adaptations. We will investigate how children’s literature both reacts to its cultural contexts and informs conceptions of childhood, while also reflecting on our own preconceived notions about childhood. Throughout the semester, we consider such questions as: what do these works suggest about children and childhood in their own moments? How are these representations and ideals impacted by gender, race, class, nationality, and age? What are the ways in which these texts, as well as the child protagonists and childhoods they represent, continue to resonate in the twenty-first century?
This course will engage with a variety of texts, including but not limited to literature, visual culture, film, academic scholarship, and cultural commentary. Assignments will include a brief presentation, short analysis papers, and a research project using materials from UF’s Baldwin Library of Historical Children’s Literature.
LIT 4930
Crime and Mystery Adaptation in Comics
Spencer Chalifour
After Russ Kick edited three volumes of comic book literary adaptations in The Graphic Canon and the single volume of adaptations in The Graphic Canon of Children’s Literature, the next installment in the series focused on a single genre: crime and mystery. As Kick states in the introduction to the first volume of The Graphic Canon of Crime & Mystery, “So many great works deal with crime in some way. The red thread winds through ancient Greek tragedies and biblical tales, Victorian sensation novels and contemporary thrillers.” In addition to its deep history, the crime genre is also rife with visual adaptations. From Sherlock Holmes’s deerstalker cap to Philip Marlowe’s fedora, illustrations, films, and other visualizations of literary works have shaped the popular image of the crime genre.
The medium of comics allows creators to create adaptations that can retain some of the alphabetic text while imbuing the original work not just with new visuals, but a whole new visual vocabulary for conveying the narrative. Adaptations can become more than just retelling a familiar story again, but can fundamentally change the way we envision or understand the adapted work. This effect becomes especially emphasized with adaptations in the crime and mystery genre, where creators do not only consider how to re-tell a familiar or unfamiliar story but also how to convey in another medium the intrigue and suspense the original author creates.
In this class, we will use The Graphic Canon of Crime & Mystery as our central selection of comics adaptations while comparing these works to the original narratives, including stories by Franz Kafka, James M. Cain, Patricia Highsmith, Agatha Christie, and Arthur Conan Doyle. Through the various reading and writing assignments, we will attempt to answer questions like: How does the process of adaptation affect our understanding of the themes or aesthetic concerns of the original? What new themes emerge from the adaptation? What makes some adaptations more “successful” than others, and how do we measure that success? Does success just mean fidelity to the original, or is this issue more complicated?