Title: LITERARY STUDY: RESEARCH AND CRITICISM

PRQ:

In lecture and discussion, ENGLISH 200 teaches students how to think and write systematically about English literature by engaging in research, reading, writing, and talking, not about literature, but about the formal and historical viewpoints from which we study literature in its genres: poems, plays, short stories, and novels.

In particularly, English 200 introduces students to the history of the language and its developments from Old to Middle to Modern English and acquaints them with the different historical periods of literature written in English. It aims to inform students about the methods and theories of literary and cultural analyses. Most crucially, it provides them with continued training in critical writing about literature by means of the REQUIREMENTS listed below.  English 200 is a methods course; it is not a course in literature. No poetry, no stories, and no novels here, alas. It studies the tools we use when we study literature, but it does not study literature itself. Fie. This is not an appreciation course, as so many benighted students imagine. Nor is it an introduction to the genres of poetry, drama and prose.

Midterm and final examinations will call for full-length essays and short, factual answers. Two papers (each five pages long) on subjects assigned by the instructor will be required. The first paper will exemplify a formalist approach; the second will illustrate an historical viewpoint. Sample papers will be posted, during the semester, on the course web board under the conference for this class. Late papers will not be accepted.

Either M. H. Abrams, Glossary of Literary Terms. Current edition. Holt, or the Bedford Glossary of Critical and Literary Terms, Bedford, which is less costly but not as strongly recommended.  Joseph Gibaldi, MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers. MLA. Current edition.