ENGLISH SPRING 2025 COURSE OFFERINGS
ENGLISH SPRING 2025 COURSE OFFERINGS
100 level courses
124. Intro to Poetry
NO SENIORS Does poetry tend to baffle you, although you know there's something enticing about it that you'd like to understand better? Or have you enjoyed poetry before and would like to learn more about it? This is the course for you. We will explore many of the ways poets make art out of language, including the visual vistas, soundscapes, and mind-opening ideas that poems can give to their readers. Occasionally we'll try out some of their creative techniques ourselves, but our consistent focus will be on appreciation and enjoyment.
190. Fairy Tales
“Mirror, mirror, on the wall, / Who’s the fairest one of all?” As anyone who has read the Brothers Grimm knows, the answer is “Snow White.” With skin as white as snow, lips as red as blood, and hair as black as ebony, she surpasses her wicked stepmother in beauty and therefore seals her death warrant. But why does the stepmother sit around talking to a mirror? Why does Snow White have to escape from her stepmother by moving in with seven dwarfs? And why must she die before she can meet her prince? What’s really going on in fairy tales? We will answer such questions by analyzing a range of fairy tales, from classics (such as the Grimms’ “Snow White”) to new hybrids (such as the graphic novel series Fables) to film adaptations (such as Maleficent). In doing so, we will explore what a fairy tale is, how fairy tales change to meet the needs of different cultures, and why fairy tales continue to appeal to us. Assignments will include critical essays, a group research project and presentation, and the creation of your own fairy tale. No Seniors.
200 Level Creative Writing Courses
201. Journalism
A general study of journalistic principles and methods, as well as extensive practice in the gathering and writing of news. In the first half of the semester, students learn to analyze and compose basic types of stories in a style particular to new media, with an emphasis on accuracy, clarity and efficiency. In the second half of the semester, students practice and refine their reporting skills in an atmosphere closely resembling the conditions of a modern newsroom. They cover actual events of local, state, national and international importance as they unfold in real time-all under the pressure of real deadlines. Fulfills ARTS Distribution.
209. Athlete Media Relations
PERMISSION ONLY COURSE. Internships in Sports Writing. This internship course is designed for students who are interested in gaining real-world experience writing about sports. Students will learn how to track statistics while covering a game, write game stories and feature stories, and will cap the semester with an in-depth piece that explores an issue that affects collegiate student-athletes here at St. Lawrence. Reading assignments will be primarily from The Athletic and The Best American Sports Writing series, and exemplary student work may be featured on the Saints Athletics website. The small-group setting allows for intensive peer group review and students should expect to participate in a collaborative editing process. The internship counts as a creative writing course and is completed in addition to the five courses required for the introductory level of the major.
241. Techniques of Fiction
NO SENIORS In this introductory course on the basics of writing prose fiction, we will read and analyze a variety of short stories with an eye toward becoming better fiction writers ourselves. By reading diverse authors, periods, and approaches to storytelling, we will become more adept at important techniques such as narrative form, characterization, and point of view. We will compose a series of short exercises that may be reviewed in workshop for possible inclusion in a portfolio of significantly revised and polished work.
242. Techniques of Poetry
Techniques of Poetry. An introductory study of prosody and poetics. Class attention is divided among student writing, theory and published models. Weekly writing assignments address a variety of technical issues connected with both traditional and experimental verse, while reading assignments providing examples to follow or possibilities for further study. Matters of voice, affect, intuition, chance and imagination are given as much attention as those analytic skills necessary for clear communication. All students are required to share their oral and written work for group discussion and critique.
200 Level Literature Courses
200. Your Favorite Books
Your Favorite Books - What is your favorite book? Why? How did it affect your understanding of yourself, our world, and/or your relationship to it? These are some of the questions we will consider in our seminar focused on books selected by you and the other students in our class. By starting with your interests, we will create an opportunity for you to reread and clarify the meaning of these texts for you. By discussing them with others, you will also deepen your understanding of their significance in relation to questions central to a liberal arts education: questions about your rights as individuals, your responsibilities as members of our society, and the possibilities of shaping your own life story. After registering for the course, each of you will submit a list of your top three books (including plays, epics, etc.) with brief descriptions of why they matter. Books may be anything by anyone: Dr. Seuss's The Lorax, Nikolai Gogol's Dead Souls, Suzanne Collins's The Hunger Games, Shakespeare's King Lear, etc. The point is to start with your interests. I will then compile a list of these books, and you will vote on your top choices. I will make the final selections based on number of votes and length of texts (if you all want to read War and Peace, we won't have time to read ten more novels!). I will order the books at the Bookstore and send you a list before the end of the semester.
225. English Literature I
Survey of English Literature I. In this course, students will learn about the history of British literature from the 8th through the 17th centuries. The course invites students to explore developments in British literature through the lens of history and its relation to the development of the concept of the individual as well as competing philosophies of religious, political, and social life. Within this context, the course traces literary movements and the evolution of literary forms. It features a variety of drama, poetry, and some fiction and nonfiction from writers whose gender, class, and cultural outlook vary widely from historical era to era. Some of the texts we read are by famous authors like Chaucer, Shakespeare, or Milton; others are composed by less well-known and even anonymous authors. Some of the texts we read are in languages other than English, so we'll read those in translation, with the exception of Chaucer, whom we'll discover in his original middle English; others employ syntax that, though the same as our modern English, differs in exciting and beautiful ways. With each new text, students will gain a deeper appreciation of the volume, breadth, and variety of written work created in the British archipelago from the Medieval Period to the Restoration. Students contemplating graduate study in English are strongly recommended to take this course.
226. English Literature II
Survey of English Literature II. In this course, students will learn about the history of British literature starting at about 1700 and extending into the twentieth century and beyond. The course invites students to explore developments in British literature through the lens of history and its relation to competing philosophies of political and social life. Within this context, the course traces literary movements and the evolution of literary forms. It features a variety of fiction, nonfiction, drama, and poetry from writers of different social classes, genders, and cultural traditions. Some of the texts we read are by famous authors like Jane Austen or T. S. Eliot; others are composed by less well-known authors. Students contemplating graduate study in English are strongly recommended to take this course.
237. American Literature I
In this course, we'll study a variety of American literature written between the founding of the Jamestown colony and the U.S. Civil War. Historically, these two events book-end a dramatic period of cultural contact, political conflict, scientific enlightenment, and artistic production in the transatlantic world. To give shape to our survey of American literature, we'll focus on a few primary issues-colonialism, race and slavery, and gender politics-and consider how these issues shaped literary expression in this era. We'll revisit some famous "American" legends, encounter the major thinkers of the "American Enlightenment," and read several works by the canonical writers of the "American Renaissance." We'll also discuss how writers from different backgrounds invoked the idea of "America," how they represented the "American" project, how (or if) a distinctly "American" literature emerged, and why the notion of "America" continues to carry so much cultural baggage.
General course description for ENG 250: Methods of Critical Analysis
This course introduces students to a range of scholarly methods used to interpret literary works. While each section may focus on a different theme or group of primary texts, all sections encourage students to recognize and to apply a variety of literary critical methods. In addition, students learn the citation and formatting conventions most commonly employed in the field of literary study. Topics vary according to instructor and semester, so please view specific sections to find the different section descriptions.
250-01. Poe Poe Poe Poe Poe Poe Poe
This section of English 250 will feature the fiction of Edgar Allan Poe, a nineteenth-century American writer who has long fascinated (and disturbed) readers with his tales of psychological obsession, murder and madness, torture and persecution. While exploring the irrational dimensions of the human mind and the moral problem of evil, Poe pioneered new forms of science fiction and detective fiction. Experimenting with craft, style, and genre, his most sophisticated work displays an ironic, self-reflexive awareness well ahead of its time. To reach audiences, Poe navigated a tumultuous literary marketplace characterized by an expanding magazine industry and a transatlantic book trade that flouted intellectual property rights. Even as these conditions created financial uncertainty for writers like Poe, a political climate of sectional conflict, antislavery activism, imperial expansion, and social reform exerted additional influence over his works. We will read Poe’s short and long fiction, interpret it through multiple critical lenses, situate it in historical context, and ponder its relevance to our own time.
250-02. The Making of James Joyce
In this section of English 250, we will read three works by James Joyce—Dubliners (1914), A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man (1916), and selections from Ulysses (1922)—tracing how the same characters and setting evolve through different genres, styles, and a complex publication history. Alongside, we will read critical texts that have shaped Joyce studies, evaluating their arguments for Joyce's literary contribution to feminism, postcolonial studies, Marxism, and queer theory to name a few. Your papers will respond to both critical and textual scholarship.
284. Queer Feelings
Is it high time we lean into our unpleasant feelings: exhaustion, loneliness, shame, melancholy, anxiety? Can interrogating our feelings help us better know, even see through, the world as it exists? How do we navigate society, relationships, our own selves with and against feelings? In turn, how might understanding ourselves as entities of feeling first and foremost – as the locus of desires, energies, and reactions – free us from traditional categories of identity and being? Starting with the premise that the way bodies get coded parallels the way feelings and desires get coded (‘you’re a man, so you must want or like these things’), this course explores how a sustained and rigorous study of feelings might shake loose the sex/gender system in which we find ourselves and open up the room to exit in more fluid, multiple, and compassionate ways. A brief introduction to “queer theory” and “affect theory” will provide us with some methods and terms to engage with the works of queer writers such as Maggie Nelson, Quentin Crisp, Thom Gunn, Olga Broumas, Christopher Isherwood, Audre Lorde, and Jeanette Winterson, to name a few. Cross-listed with Gender and Sexuality Studies.
200 Level Special Topics (3,000-3,999)
3000. Medieval Star Wars
The Mandalorian. Obi-Wan Kenobi. Jedi: Fallen Order and Jedi: Survivor. As the titles of these STAR WARS television and transmedia series suggest, themes of loss, exile, and sole survival are prevalent in the galaxy far, far away. Yet, in drawing on these themes, STAR WARS joins a storytelling tradition that stretches back more than a thousand years. In this class, we will juxtapose modern uses of these themes with their medieval precursors, studying Old English epic, elegy, and wisdom writings alongside the series above (and a couple of STAR WARS novels too) to question how the medieval informs the modern. Does Din Djarin’s famous “This is the way” collide with medieval monastic codes of conduct? How close are the attitudes of Jedi Knights to those of medieval celibate warrior monks? Are the various guild systems in STAR WARS structured on the medieval system of apprentice-journeyman-master? These are only some of the questions we will ponder, and, along the way, we will also tackle issues of gender, race, equality, environmentalism, and age, studying how these issues contribute to the themes of loss, exile, and sole survival that the STAR WARS universe creates. Weekly writing assignments, presentations, and a final project will comprise the majority of work for this class.
3086. Intro Health Humanities: Narratives of the Body
Through literature and film, we will consider how stories about the body shape the way we see ourselves and others. How do stories influence our image of “normal” bodies? How and why do stories pathologize certain types of bodies, but not others? How can stories be used to expand prevailing methods of diagnosing and treating illness? Our survey of narratives will take us from modernist encounters with the uncanny up to and including the cyborg body enhanced with AI.
300 Level Creative Writing Courses
306. Advanced Screenwriting
An extension and intensification of English 244. Students are expected to work independently on the preparation of two feature-length screenplays. Workshop format emphasizes the revision and editing process. Pre-req: DMF/ENG/PCA-244 or DMF-3099 or DMF-4001 or ENG-241 or ENG-243.
308. Advanced Creative Non-Fiction
CW: Advanced Creative Non-Fiction Writing. Building upon the techniques that we acquired in ENG-243, Techniques of Creative Nonfiction, we will seek to deepen our exploration of writing, reading, and analyzing literary essays by reading a diverse range of authors who challenge basic approaches to writing memoirs and literary essays. We will focus on more nuanced concerns, such as style,voice, narrative stance, and structure, and we may experiment with forms and sub-genres such as the lyric essay, the segmented essay, and other hybrid forms. We will also read theory and criticism on creative nonfiction so as to better understand the possibilities this genre offers writers. In a workshop setting, we will analyze our own work in depth with an eye toward deep, comprehensive revision. Preparing the final portfolio will allow us to learn how to line -edit our prose as well as how to critically situate our own work within the genre. Prerequisite: ENG-243.
310. Advanced Fiction Writing
Building upon the craft techniques acquired in ENG-241, Techniques of Fiction, students encounter authors who challenge basic assumptions about the nature of fiction through writing narratives that experiment with the givens of traditional story forms. Discussion of student-produced manuscripts in a workshop setting is one of a number of pedagogies employed. Emphasis is on writing improvement through increasing awareness of the technical dynamics of the short story genre and through cultivating an understanding of contemporary idioms and the uses of the imagination. Prerequisites: ENG-241.
311. Advanced Poetry Workshop
An extension and intensification of ENG-242. The class combines workshop critique of student poems with discussions of readings in twentieth century and contemporary poetr (including Modernism, Confessionalism, the Beats, the Black Mountain School, the New York School, and Ellipticism). Poetic theory is also discussed. Students are required to submit a formal manuscript of poems, an arts poetica or manifesto, and to read from their work in public. Prerequisite: ENG-242.
300 Level Literature Courses
320. Shakespeare
An intensive study of Shakespeare's plays and their cultural context, including but not limited to the early modern era and successive centuries' reception and interpretation. Instructors will select from the tragedies, histories, comedies,and romances for thematic integrity. Students should expect some performance work. Also offered as PCA 320 and through European Studies. Pre-req: ENG-250 or PCA-250.
363. Harry Potter
This course explores the Harry Potter series, famous for the magic of the Wizarding World as well as the development of it's eponymous hero. Our goal is not so much to master charms such as Lumos! but the light of these novels brings to the ethical, political, and economic challengers we face. How does Rowling's novels in relation to the philosophical works--such as Adam Smith's Theory of the Moral Sentiments--illuminate the ways in which these novels focus on the goal Rowling stresses above all: living " very good lives "? Pre-req: ENG-250.
366. Planetary Modernisms
This course explores Anglophone fiction from late-nineteenth through mid-twentieth century, paying attention to the ways literary culture in modernity has been formed through the double-edged sword of colonialism and capitalist economy. We will consider issues like ecological imperialism and indigeneity, apartheid and immigration policies, transnational and diasporic public sphere, and the hegemony of the English language itself. Primary works may include writings by Chinua Achebe, Ahmed Ali, Muk Raj Anand, J.M. Coetzee, Joseph Conrad, Wilson Harris, Jean Rhys, Tayeb Salih, Njugi wa Thiong'o, and Amos Tutuola. These experimental and visionary writers encourage us to imagine literary geographies free from the terms of globalization and cosmopolitanism, towards perspectives that are sensitive to ecosystems beyond human life. In turn, we will reflect on the relevance of their insight in our era of intensifying political and environmental disaster.
300 Level Projects For Juniors
389, 390. Projects for Juniors
Student-initiated projects involving significant study and writing carried out through frequent conferences with a faculty sponsor. These projects are completed in addition to the five courses required for the advanced level of the major. Prerequisites: junior standing, a 3.4 GPA in English, and approval by the departmental Honors/Independent Projects committee. Proposals must be submitted to the committee by March 1 of the semester preceding the beginning of fall projects, and by November 1 of the semester preceding spring projects.
Senior year experiences
450. James Baldwin and Joan Didion: American Essayists in the American Century
James Baldwin and Joan Didion were arguably two of the most influential chroniclers of the second half of the American Century, engaging subjects still timely well into the this one, including race, religion, class, community, immigration, culture and counter-culture, media and politics. There are obvious points of contrast between the two: Baldwin was a man, she a woman; Baldwin was African-American, Didion white; he was gay and she was straight; he was a New Yorker, raised in poverty in segregated Harlem, she was a Californian raised middle-class in the Sacramento Valley. Yet Tobias Gregory argues the similarities are at least as interesting. Both began as novelists yet had their greatest impact as essayists. Both wrote eloquently about home yet spent many years living far from there. Both, in their essays, bring together the personal and the political. And both are modern masters of the English sentence and the essay form. We will read widely in their essays and, Gregory says, in the process “learn a lot about the possibilities of modern English prose and a lot about America.”
489, 490. SYE: Projects for Seniors
Projects for Seniors. Student-initiated projects involving significant study and writing carried out through frequent conferences with a faculty sponsor. These projects are completed in addition to the five courses required for the advanced level of the major. Prerequisites: senior standing, a 3.4 GPA in English, and approval by the departmental Honors/Independent Projects committee. English majors who complete a senior project will earn the Honors in English designation if, at the conclusion of the semester they complete their project, their English GPA (including the project grade) is at least 3.7. Proposals for fall projects must be submitted to the committee by March 1 of the semester preceding the beginning of fall projects, and by November 1 of the semester preceding the beginning of spring projects.