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Graduate Courses
Click on the course title to view its course description. Please note that all courses are subject to change without notice. For the most up-to-date and current day and time information, please refer to the University Time Schedules. Undergraduate course information is also available on this Web site.
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2003-2004 |
AUTUMN 2003 COURSES
31000/13800 History
and Theory of Drama 1
Bevington, David & Rudall, Nick
TuTh 1:30-2:50 (2 F disc)
A survey of major trends and theatrical accomplishments in Western drama from the ancient Greeks through the Renaissance: Aeschylus, Sophocles, Euripides, Aristophanes, medieval religious drama, Marlowe, Shakespeare, Jonson, along with some consideration of dramatic theory by Aristotle, Horace, Sir Philip Sidney, Dryden. The course features voluntary but highly recommended end-of-week workshops in which individual scenes will be read aloud dramatically and discussed. Assignments at mid-quarter and at the end of the quarter will give the option of two substantial essays, or (in place of either or both) the putting on of a short scene in cooperation with some other members of the class. Acting skill is not required; the point is to discover what is at work in the scene and to write up that process in a somewhat informal report. Crosslisted courses are designed for advanced undergraduates and graduate students.
31400/11400 Writing
Argument
Cochran, Kathryn
TuTh 10:30-11:50
Writing Arguments is a pragmatic course in the rhetoric of arguments.
By "rhetoric," we mean that we won't be asking whether an argument
is internally valid--we'll ask why it is more or less successful in persuading
readers. By "pragmatic," we mean that we'll focus mainly on
your own arguments. We'll use arguments from politics, academics and the
professions to develop an analysis of argument, but the main goal is for
you to use this analysis to enhance your ability to write arguments that
succeed with your readers. We'll spend each Tuesday discussing your writing
and each Thursday expanding, refining and criticizing the analysis. So
you can expect three kinds of work: critiquing arguments, writing new
arguments, and revising. In the final weeks of the course, we will look
at arguments that class members have chosen for discussion, and we'll
look at competing theories. But we're teaching this course for the first
time, so all the above is subject to dramatic change.
31504/11504 Solo
Performance
Staff
Details forthcoming
31505/11505 Dramaturgy
Staff
Details forthcoming
31601/11600 Writing
Arts Reviews
Sartin, Hank
This class was formerly titled Writing Criticism. One good way to understand
how something works is to do it yourself. One good way to understand how
criticism works is to write criticism yourself. This is a pragmatic course
in writing (and understanding) criticism of the arts for the popular press.
We will examine samples of journalistic criticism drawn from a wide range
of publications, both high brow ( e.g. The New Yorker) and more popular
( e.g. Entertainment weekly). Students will criticize the critics, first
by discussing the goals and strategies of the different kinds of criticism
they read and then by writing assignments that imitate, explore, challenge,
and improvise on those strategies. Students will write every week, focusing
on specific aspects of making critical assessments of the arts ( painting,
theater , film, music, performance art, etc.) and writing those assessments
in a style suited to publication in newspapers, magazines, and other popular
venues. Each week, we will use one class session to discuss the students'
own work.
32201/12201 Psychoanalytic
Interpretation
Ruddick, Lisa
MW 1:30-2:50
This course explores fundamental concepts of psychoanalytic theory, as
well as recent developments in psychoanalysis and criticism. At each meeting,
we pair a theoretical or critical text with a poem or short story for
discussion. Psychoanalytic readings emphasize classical theory (including
works by Freud, Abraham, and Chasseguet-Smirgel), object relations theory
(by Winnicott, Chodorow, and Benjamin), postcolonial theory with psychoanalytic
dimensions (by Fanon, Bhabha, and Nandy), and recent work in trauma theory
which, while assuming psychoanalysis as a framework, focuses on traumatic
injury and violence as phenomena that expose the limits of psychoanalytic
understandings of the self (a constellation that includes work by Cathy
Caruth, Shoshana Felman, Dori Laub, and Robert Jay Lifton). Crosslisted courses are designed for advanced undergraduates and graduate students.
32400/12400 Beginning
Fiction Writing
Schaeffer, Susan
TuTh 1:30-2:50
This course will be taught as a workshop. The principal texts to be used
will be those written by the students during the quarter, and class discussion
will center on these works. In addition, several other texts will be examined,
primarily in order to enable students to begin criticizing and editing
their own works. These texts will be short. Those specializing in the
short story will be expected to write at least three to five new stories
during the quarter. If anyone embarks on a novel, a schedule will be worked
out once the quarter begins. It is imperative that all students participate
in discussing the works of everyone else in the class. This is a class
in which everyone is free to experiment. Ideally, students will, by the
end of the semester, have a clearer idea of what they want to be doing,
and how they want to doing it. Each student will submit a portfolio at
the end of the quarter. Grades will be determined both by these portfolios
and by class discussion.
32501/12501 Writing
Fiction
Obejas, Achy
A workshop that will meet once weekly to read, discuss and analyze students' original work. Students will be expected to re-write, revise and re- evaluate from week to week. Lectures will be based on issues that arise from student work. There will be occasional exercises outside the students' own writing.
32905/12905 Beginning
Poetry Workshop: Letters to Young Poets
Reddy, Srikanth
Tu 3:00-5:50
This workshop will introduce you to the writing of lyric poetry alongside
the study of famous letters written by major authors. In the correspondence
of writers such as Dickinson, Rilke, Hopkins, Stevens, and others, we
will encounter "the burden of the mystery" of poetic language
and we will compose our own weekly letters in response to the questions
raised by these writers. During one unit, you may respond to Keats letter
on negative capability; in another, you may write to Marianne Moore with
questions or ideas concerning poetic form. Along with workshopping your
own writing, these weekly "epistolary assignments" will be integrated
with classroom discussions of technique, tradition, and experimental approaches
to the lyric. By the end of the semester, you will have written at least
ten original poems and ten letters on poetry; you will also, hopefully,
be on intimate terms with several major poets from the British, American,
and European traditions.
34303/14303 Advanced
Poetry Workshop: Viewing and Re-viewing Poetry
Reddy, Srikanth
Th 3:00-5:50
In this poetry workshop, we will complement the writing of
our own creative work with the careful study of current trends in contemporary
American lyric writing. By the end of the semester, you will have compiled
a "creative portfolio" of approximately ten original poems and
a "critical portfolio" of at least four publishable reviews
of recent books of poetry. (As in all workshops, however, the primary
reading material will be the participants own work-in-progress). We will
also explore the world of small literary journals and magazines in order
to survey new directions in lyric writing, and we will attend readings
by emerging American poets at various venues in the Chicago area. While
this course is primarily intended to be taught at the graduate level,
qualified undergraduates are welcome to apply.
34400/14400 Advanced
Fiction Writing
Schaeffer, Susan
TuTh 3:00-4:20
This course will be taught as a workshop. Students entering this workshop
will be expected to have some experience in writing fiction. The principal
texts for this course will consist of the students' own writings. Several
short texts will be examined in light of the authors decisions. Those
writing short stories will be expected to write three stories during the
course of the quarter. Anyone writing a longer work will work out a schedule
tailored to the project. It is imperative that all students be willing
to participate in discussing the works of others in the class. Experimentation
is welcome. If, at the end of the quarter, you feel as if you can work
on your own without the help of further workshops or mentors, the course
will have achieved its goal. Each student will submit a portfolio at the
end of the quarter. Grades will be determined both by these portfolios
and by class discussion.
34600/14600 Dialect
Voices in Literature
Mufwene, Sali
9:00-10:20
In this course we will use linguistic techniques to analyze literary texts,
especially to assess how successfully dialect is represented, whether
it matches the characters and cultural contexts in which it is used, and
what effects it produces. About half the quarter will be spent articulating
linguistic features which distinguish English dialects (including standard
English!) from each other and identifying some features that are associated
with specific American dialects, such as African-American English, White
Southern English, and Appalachian English. (We will work on dialects which
interest the class!) During the second half of the quarter we will read
and critique some writers, applying techniques learned during the first
half of the quarter. My primary candidates include Toni Morrison, Zora
Neal Hurston, Mark Twain, William Faulkner, and Richard Wright, but the
list is by no means closed. Students will be encouraged to select their
favorite writers of dialect, especially for their term papers.
34900/14900 Old
English
von Nolcken, Christina
TuTh 9:00-10:20
This course is designed to prepare students for further study in Old English
language and literature. As such, our focus will be the acquisition of
those linguistic skills needed to encounter such Old English poems as
Beowulf, The Battle of Maldon, and The Wanderer in their original language.
In addition to these texts, we may also translate the prose Life of Saint
Edmund, King and Martyr and such shorter poetic texts as the Exeter Book
riddles. We will also survey Anglo-Saxon history and culture, taking into
account the historical record, archeology, manuscript construction and
illumination, and the growth of Anglo-Saxon studies as an academic discipline.
This course serves as a prerequisite both for further Old English study
at the University of Chicago and for participation in the Newberry Librarys
Winter Quarter Anglo-Saxon seminar.
36302/16302 Renaissance
Romance
Murrin, Michael
TuTh 3:00-4:20
Selections from a trio of texts will be studied: Ovid's Metamorphoses
(as the recognized classical model), Boiardo's Orlando innamorato (which
set the norms for Renaissance romance), and Spenser's Faerie Queene. A
paper will be required and perhaps an oral examination.
41400/23400 Virginia
Woolf
Ruddick, Lisa
MW 9:30-10:20 (2 F disc)
Readings will include The Voyage Out, Jacobs Room, Mrs. Dalloway, To the
Lighthouse, The Waves, Between the Acts, and selected essays. Crosslisted courses are designed for advanced undergraduates and graduate students.
42902/12902 Radical
Poetics
Izenberg, Oren
TuTh 9:00-10:20
An intensive study of the texts and contexts of a few 20th-century literary
movements or "scenes" - the Gaelic Revival, The Objectivist
Poets, the San Francisco Renaissance, the New York School, and the "Language"
poets - in which poets have aspired both to be a social group (whether
understood as a local or universal "movement," a publishing
collective, a band of friends or lovers) and to use poetry to reconstruct
social formations in crisis. Crosslisted courses are designed for advanced undergraduates and graduate students.
43600/13600 Playwriting
Allen, Claudia
This course introduces the basic principles and techniques of playwriting
through creative exercises, discussion, and the viewing of contemporary
theater. Structural components of plot, character, and setting are covered
as students develop their dramatic voices through exercises in observation,
memory, emotion, imagination, and improvisation. PQ: Consent of instructor
Contact Heidi Thompson: hnthomps@uchicago.edu
or call 702-3414.
44405/24405 Three
African Women Writers
Driver, Dorothy
MW 1:30-2:50
Although Olive Schreiner, Bessie Head, and Zo Wicomb belong to different
historical periods and write about different geographical spaces, there
are important connections between them, not least the attempt each of
them made to address and redirect gender relations in Africa. Looking
closely at various novels, short stories, and essays, we'll address these
connections as well as the contribution the work of these three writers
has made and is making to feminist postcolonial thought. Crosslisted courses are designed for advanced undergraduates and graduate students.
44800/24800 Gender
and Southern African Writing
Driver, Dorothy
MW 4:30-5:50
Through reading a variety of Southern African material (novels, autobiographies,
short stories, and a few essays), primarily from the 1950s to the present,
this course aims to develop a) a preliminary understanding of Southern
African literature, and b) an awareness of some of the ways in which the
textual representations of gender (masculinities and femininities) interact
with representations of race, ethnicity, community and nation, as well
as with contemporary political ideologies. We'll read from the work of
several of the key Southern African writers. Crosslisted courses are designed for advanced undergraduates and graduate students.
49402/29402 Ernst
Lubitsch and Hollywood
Gregg, Ron
This course examines the Hollywood career of Ernst Lubitsch, one of the
most successful directors and producers in the Hollywood studio system
(1920s-1940s). We will explore what his career reveals about the studio
system and the genre of romantic comedy in which he excelled. We will
also consider the infamous "Lubitsch touch" and its subversion
of the Hays Code, theatrical adaptation, and the representation of national
character, politics, class, gender and sexuality in his films. Screenings
will include Rosita, The Marriage Circle, Trouble in Paradise, Design
for Living, Ninotchka, To Be or Not to Be, Heaven Can Wait, and Cluny
Brown.
33000 Academic
and Professional Writing (Little Red Schoolhouse)
McEnerney, Larry; Cochran, Kathryn & Weiner, Tracy
This course teaches the skills needed to write clear and coherent expository
prose and to edit the writing of others. The course consists of weekly
lectures on Thursdays, immediately followed by tutorials addressing the
issues in the lecture. On Tuesdays, students discuss short weekly papers
in two-hour tutorials consisting of seven students and a tutor. Students
may replace the last three papers with a longer paper and, with the consent
of relevant faculty, write it in conjunction with another class or as
part of the senior project.
38601 The
Eighteenth-Century Public Sphere
Valenza, Robin
TuTh 3:00-4:20
This course examines the idea of the public sphere, an imagined confederation
of writers, readers, printers, booksellers, and the institutions that
connected them. We will read eighteenth-century philosophy, essays, fiction,
and poetry, alongside twentieth-century historical and theoretical writings,
in order to explore several different visions of the enlightenment public
sphere. This class is designed for students interested in social and literary
theory who want to work towards an understanding of how eighteenth-century
conceptions of literature and its institutions inform our current value
systems. Twentieth-century readings will include work by Habermas, Foucault,
Horkheimer and Adorno, Shapin and Schaffer, Hirschman, and Anderson; eighteenth-century
materials will be drawn from the writings of John Locke, Joseph Addison,
Voltaire, Sarah Scott, David Hume, Adam Smith, Immanuel Kant, and others.
39600Glorious Revolution in Comparative Perception
Pincus, Steven
England's Revolution of 1688-89 does not usually merit a place among the pantheon of modern revolutions. In England itself it has lost ground against the events of 1640-1660. This class asks whether the revolution of 1688-89 should be considered a revolution. Readings will include theoretical discussions of revolutions and a range of primary materials including works of political theory, plays, poems, memoirs, and diaries.
Gunning, Tom
This course offers an introduction to ways of reading, writing on, and teaching film. The focus of discussion will range from methods of close analysis and basic concepts of film form, technique, and style; through industrial/critical categories of genre and authorship (studios, stars, directors); through aspects of the cinema as a social institution, psycho-sexual apparatus, and cultural practice; to the relationship between filmic texts and the historical horizon of production and reception. Films discussed will include works by Griffith, Lang, Hitchcock, Deren, and Godard.
50400 Teaching
Undergraduate English (Pedagogy)
Ruddick, Lisa
TuTh 12:00-1:20
This course seeks to provide a setting in which graduate students, prior
to their first formal teaching assignment at this institution, can explore
some of the elements of classroom teaching of English. The course, for
purposes of focus and with the recognition that not all our students will
teach at the graduate level, is intended primarily as an introduction
to teaching undergraduate English. While emphasizing the practical issues
of classroom instruction, the class includes theoretical readings on pedagogy,
which help the students to reflect on and speak to their practice. The
course will provide significant opportunities in conceptualizing, designing,
and running a college-level course in English: e.g., the opportunity to
lead a mock-classroom discussion, to construct a sample syllabus, to grade
a common paper.
51000 PhD
Colloquium
Warren, Kenneth
TuTh 12:00-1:20
Details forthcoming
51500 Perfection
and Utopia in Late Medieval England
Miller, Mark
M 3:00-5:50
A course on the relations among social history, social theory, ethics,
and psychology in fourteenth-century England. Primary readings from Chaucer,
Langland, Gower, Gawain-poet Margery Kempe, penitential texts, saints'
lives, and mystical literature. Substantial secondary readings in the
social history of late medieval England.
55001 Female
Genius
Kristeva, Julia
Readings from Arendt, Klein, and Colette.
55500 Kitsch,
Camp, and the Politics of Culture
Brown, Bill
W 3:00-5:50
This course offers a brief history of bad taste. Beginning with some foundational
arguments about the judgment of taste from the 18th century (by Hume and
Kant, among others), we will then move to some late 19th-century arguments
about art and culture (by Arnold, Wilde, and Veblen, among others) to
establish a frame for exploring a variety of 20th-century case studies
in the practice of producing, destroying, and reclaiming aesthetic value.
These case studies will include arguments structured by the art/kitsch
binary, movements challenging that binary (such as Dada and Pop), and
modes of explicitly transcoding taste into symbolic capital (such as Camp
and Punk). The course will be particularly concerned with understanding
personal taste as an intersubjective phenomenon. Major artists will include
Duchamp, Oldenberg, and Warhol; major critics will include Greenberg,
Benjamin, Brger, and Bourdieu; and major writers will include James, Breton,
Isherwood, Nathaniel West, Genet, and Burroughs.
60301 Space,
Place, and Landscape
Mitchell, W.J.T.
M 3:00-5:50
This seminar will analyze the concepts of space, place, and landscape
across the media (painting, photography, cinema, sculpture, architecture,
and garden design, as well as poetic and literary renderings of setting,
and "virtual" media-scapes). Key theoretical readings from a
variety of disciplines, including geography, art history, literature,
and philosophy will be included: Foucault's "Of Other Spaces,"
Michel de Certeau's concept of heterotopia; Heidegger's "Art and
Space"; Gaston Bachelard's The Poetics of Space; Henri Lefebvre's
Production of Space; David Harvey's Geography of Difference; Raymond Williams's
The Country and the City; Mitchell, Landscape and Power. Topics for discussion
will include the concept of the picturesque and the rise of landscape
painting in Europe; the landscape garden; place, memory, and identity;
sacred sites and holy lands; national landscapes; embodiment and the gendering
of space; the genius of place; literary and textual space. Course requirements:
2 oral presentations: one on a place (or representation of a place); the
other on a critical or theoretical text. Final paper.
64900 Lyric
Forms from Blake to Hardy
Helsinger, Elizabeth
Tu 3:00-5:50
This course will study forms of lyric poetry that are recorded or translated,
revived, imitated, and transformed in the practices of nineteenth-century
British poets. Using selected romantic poems as a point of departure (instances
from Blake's Songs of Innocence and Experience and Wordsworth's and Coleridge's
Lyrical Ballads, together with Keats's adaptations of romance and a few
of Shelley's lyrics), we will follow such forms as the ballad, the song,
the romance, and the sonnet through the rest of the century, looking also
at Victorian additions to these lyric forms, particularly the classical
idyl and various forms of dramatic lyric. Poets from whom examples will
be drawn will include John Clare, Emily Bronte, Tennyson, both Brownings,
Dante Gabriel and Christina Rossetti, Morris, Swinburne, and Hardy. We
will also look at some key defenses of a primarily lyric poetry (Wordsworth,
Shelley, Keats, Arthur Hallam, Browning, The Germ, Swinburne) and some
modern reflections on the nature of lyric - attempting both to come to
a better understanding of the term and to attend to shifts in the understanding
of lyric and changes in the symbolic content and the contours of particular
forms in more local historical contexts.
68600 Classical
Film Theory
Lastra, James
TuTh 10:30-11:50, M 7:00-10:00 & W 3:30-6:30
Details forthcoming
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