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Home Course Syllabi and Announcements Notebook for Topics in Literature: Imaginary Worlds (Spring 2008) Notebook for Topics in Literature: Rites of Passage (Spring 2006) Notebook for Effective Writing I (Spring 2006) Go Exploring Notebook for Topics in Literature: Imaginary Worlds (Fall 2005) Notebook for Effective Writing I (Fall 2005) Go Exploring
LIT 165 Syllabus
LIT 165 Announcements and Assignments
WRT 120 Syllabus
WRT 120 Announcements and Assignments
A Reading of THE TEMPEST
Goals of the Course
Fundamental Questions about Literature
Valuing Literature
Critical Thinking and Reading Literature
Critical Approaches to Literature
Literature as ART
Ambiguity
Approaching the Art of Fiction
Defining the Short Story
Evaluating Short Fiction
Craft of Fiction: PLOT
Craft of Fiction: CHARACTER
Small Group Exercise
ARABY by James Joyce
WHERE ARE YOU GOING, WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN? by Joyce Carol Oates
Our RITES OF PASSAGE Theme
A note about GIRL
POE and the art of STORY OF A HOUR
THE YELLOW WALLPAPER
YOUNG MAN ON SIXTH AVENUE
Notes on Innovative Fiction
Assignment Sheet for Paper #1
Fiction and Ambiguity - Your Questions
Writing Workshop - Short Fiction
Poetry Journal Project Assignment Sheet
LITERARY SYNTHESIS PROJECT
Defining Poetry
Reading Poetry
The Craft of Poetry
Drama and Tragedy
Study Questions: DEATH OF A SALESMAN
Paper #4 Assignment Sheet
Critical Thinking and Commentary
Casebook: Evaluating Sources Worksheet
Selecting Information
Evaluating Arguments
CASEBOOK PROJECT Assignment Sheet
Approaching Persuasive Writing
Topic Development - Profile Essay
Generating Ideas for the Profile Essay
Paper #2 Assignment Sheet
Profile Exercise
Analyzing THE FIVE BEDROOM, SIX FIGURE ROOTLESS LIFE
Objective Writing: Selected Readings
Writing Workshop: Paper #1
Expressive Writing in the NYTimes
Writing Effective Introductions and Conclusions
Paper #1: IDENTITY
Expressive Writing
Open Letter Exercise and Examples
EMERSON on Individuality vs. Conformity
Literature related to IDENTITY
Understanding the 'Rhetorical Situation'
Weblog for WRT 120
Writing Assistance on the Web
Blackboard at WCU
WCU Homepage
WCU's Francis Harvey Green Library
One Last Look at Imaginary Worlds
Franz Kafka's BEFORE THE LAW
Analyzing WAITING FOR GODOT
Approaching WAITING FOR GODOT
Paper #3: Assignment Sheet
Paper #4: Independent Project
The Problem of Stability in BRAVE NEW WORLD
UTOPIA/DYSTOPIA Links
Analyzing Huxley's BRAVE NEW WORLD
Defining Utopia
Embarking on Huxley's BRAVE NEW WORLD
A Reading of Shakespeare's THE TEMPEST
From today's news (11/3/05)
Assignment Sheet for Paper #2
Goodbye to Dante's Imaginary World
Stepping Through Dante's Inferno: Cantos 10-34
Stepping Through Dante's Inferno: Cantos 1-10
INFERNO: Questions/Analysis: Cantos 32-34
INFERNO: Questions/Analysis: Cantos 18-31
INFERNO: Questions for Analysis: Cantos 12-17
INFERNO: Structure
INFERNO: Questions for Analysis: Cantos 1-5
INFERNO: Analyzing Canto 1
Relating to Dante's Inferno
Approaching Dante's DIVINE COMEDY
A Little Help with Dante's INFERNO
Assignment Sheet for Paper #1
Notes on LEAF BY NIGGLE
Responses to LEAF BY NIGGLE
ON FAIRY STORIES: An Essay by Tolkien
Notes on Axolotl
Reading Ovid's Tales
From Myth to Literature: Approaching Ovid's Tales
Notes on THE EYE OF THE GIANT
Functions of the Genesis Tales
Analyzing Mythic Tales
Defining Mythology
Filtering the Introduction to FANTASTIC WORLDS
Commentary on LA BELLE DAME SANS MERCI by Keats
Commentary on DARKNESS by Byron
Handout: Imagination Poems Set
What is Imagination?
Our Course Theme: Imaginary Worlds
LIT 165 Assignments: Fall 2005
LIT 165 Announcements: Fall 2005
Imaginary Worlds: Course Syllabus
Paper #4: Independent Thinking/Reading/Writing
Casebook Preparation Checklist
Casebook Assignment Schedule
Evaluating Sources for the Casebook
Casebook Project Assignment Sheet
Notes on Rational Argument
Argument
Assignment Sheet: Objective Writing
Reviewing Elements of the Profile Essay
Writing the Profile Essay
Readings: Objective Writing
Assignment Sheet: Expressive Writing
Rubric for Evaluation of Writing
About SKIN DEEP
Emerson on Individuality vs. Conformity
Mind-map: Identity
Understanding the 'Rhetorical Situation'
Assignments Page
Announcements Page
WRT 120 Course Syllabus for Fall 2005
Weblog for WRT 120
Writing Assistance on the Web
Blackboard at WCU
WCU Homepage
WCU's Francis Harvey Green Library
PRINTER FRIENDLY
The stories we’ve read so far all relate to our “rites of passage” theme in that they all present characters who are involved in moving, or trying to move, from one significant stage of life to the next—they are making a passage—in most cases from childhood, or adolescence, to maturity. All of these stories explore what it means to make that move, and they show us a few characters who seem to make it successfully and some characters who don’t.
A “rite of passage” has deep roots in religious ritual and ceremony. The “rite” is something performed, usually in front of a social gathering. The ceremony ideally helps participants feel like they’re successfully making the passage from one phase of life to another. Rites of passage are culturally defined and circumscribed, but when traditional rituals begin to lose their power, new ones emerge to take their place. Some of the traditional rites of passage in our culture probably occur to you right away—graduation or marriage, for example.
But how successful are these rituals at transforming us? Are we really that different once we’ve taken that diploma in hand, slipped that ring on our fingers? When traditional rites of passage lose their transformative power, other rites emerge. It’s possible that your first love or your first sexual encounter, your first drink, your first car, or your first step out from under the protection of your parents’ rules or approval may be more transformative than any of these rituals.
The stories we’ve read so far all are thematically related to one another because they are all, so far, about making the passage from childhood or adolescence to adulthood. The stories aren’t about ceremonies or rituals, but instead about experiences that are so powerfully transformative that they move us from one stage of life to another. Faced with certain kinds of experiences we may grow in subtle or obvious ways, or we may shatter—and sometimes we become mired in a mental, spiritual, emotional, or intellectual paralysis. This particular set of short stories all show us characters experiencing some type of transformative experience, and in many cases they are experiences we readers have shared. They feel like common, universal experiences. Sometimes, however, we’re witnessing a type initiation we’ll never undergo. The characters we’re reading about are experiencing something entirely unique to them. How would you classify the characters we’ve seen in the stories we’ve read so far, given these terms?
Some provocative questions to ask of these stories and these characters we seen so far:
- Which of these characters makes it to the next stage and which don’t? Who is moving forward and who is standing still? Who is shattering? Do you have any notions about why these character react the way they do?
- What do these characters leave behind as they leave their childhoods? What do they lose and what do they gain? Internally, what dies and what is born?
- Two “outlaws”: Outlaw Jake vs. Outlaw Arnold Friend
- The mother/daughter relationship in “Girl” vs. “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?”
- The causes of “paralysis” in “The Sorrowful Woman” vs. “Eveline”
- The levels of maturity in Sammy vs. Eveline
- The sexual awakenings in “Lust” vs. “Where Are You Going Where Have you Been?” vs. “Araby” (also “Summer” by David Updike (p. 292), which wasn’t assigned but is right on theme)
- The experience of “first love” in “Araby” vs. “Summer”
- Promiscuity in “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?” vs. “Girl” vs. “Lust”
- Sense of liberation in “the Story of a Hour” vs. “Love in L.A.”
- Illusion vs. disillusion in “Araby” vs. “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?”
- Innocence vs. Experience in “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?” vs. “Lust”
- Awareness of evil in “The Flowers” vs. “How to Tell a True War Story”