Classes You Won’t See Every Semester
ENGL 419.001 TOPICS: Legends of King Arthur TTH 10:05AM-11:20AM Gwara
An examination of the evolution and cross-transmission of French and English Arthurian Literature, focusing on analyses of key works, including Geoffrey of Monmouth’s History of the Kings of Britain, Malory’s Morte darthur and romances by Chrétien de Troyes. Readings late in the semester will focus on modern novels, including Robertson Davies’ Lyre of Orpheus and The Winter King by Bernard Cornwell.
ENGL 430 TOPICS: Introduction to Afro-Latinx Literature of the 20th and 21st Century TTH 2:50PM-4:05PM Jimenez
(Crosslisted with AFAM398)
In this course, we will explore the literature of 20th century and contemporary Afro-Latinx writers in the United States, including Arturo Schomburg, Jesus Colón, Julia de Burgos, Nicolas Guillen, as well as more recent writers such as Jasminne Méndez, Elisabeth Acevedo, Raina León, Mayra Santos-Febres, and Malcolm Friend. We will examine how these writers represent, subvert and/or challenge the histories and ideas of race, Latinidad, Blackness and diaspora in their work. In addition to close reading and critical analysis, students will also have the opportunity to craft their own creative stories and poems.
ENGL 430 TOPICS: Toni Morrison Research Seminar MWF 10:50AM-11:40AM Whitted
(Crosslisted with AFAM498)
This is a multi-disciplinary research course that explores American history and culture through the work of Nobel Prize-winning novelist, Toni Morrison. We will use Morrison’s fiction as a window for exploring issues of race and nation, history and memory, folk culture and belief, and theories of language and narrative. While the course will include a set of common readings about Morrison’s life, work, and critical reception, students will have the chance to work independently on three small research projects on topics of their choice. This is an opportunity to consider the interdisciplinary and intertextual connections between Morrison and other disciplinary frameworks, including history, politics, sociology, anthropology, art, and media.
ENGL 439.001 TOPICS: The Birth & Death of the Book, from Gutenberg to Google TTH 2:50PM-4:05PM Jackson
With the all-pervasiveness of the Internet calling into question the very future of the book as a viable technology, it seems like an especially good time to explore the book’s past. Where do books come from? How are they printed, published, and promoted? How are they shipped, stored, sold, and read? How long have they been around, and how much longer are they likely to be so? 'The Birth and Death of the Book' invites you to explore the history of the book as a technology, as a means of information storage and retrieval, as a commodity, an art form, and as a way of understanding the world. It will introduce you to the history of the book from the beginning of the first millennium to the beginning of the second, ranging across continents, cultures, and centuries. You'll also get to explore the ways in which the book has been threatened with extinction or irrelevance by other forms of communication including telephones, televisions, and especially computers. Does book have a possible future? Our class begins with a unit on the mechanics and psychodynamics of communication, ranging from the invention of writing in Sumeria, three and a half thousand years before the birth of Christ, to the invention of printing in the middle of the fifteenth-century. Our concerns here will be with the ways in which the spoken word, the written word, and the printed word create particular ways of looking at the world. We’ll also consider magic, bookcases, memory, concrete poetry, and why the physiology of the cow may have influenced the shape of books. Our second unit will introduce you to the world of print in eighteenth and nineteenth century America, when reading, printing, and publishing enjoyed unprecedented influence and technological refinement. We’ll consider the printing, publishing, shipping, and reading of texts and also the fetish for fancy bindings. Our final unit will consider the book in the twenty-first century, investigating the crisis in reading habits and literacy and by exploring the influence of TV, computers, corporate media mergers, and hypertextuality on the book today and tomorrow. Remember: In this class, you are not only a student, but also an expert. I look forward to learning from you!
ENGL 439.002 TOPICS: Teaching English Abroad TTH 10:05AM-11:20AM Liu
(Crosslisted with LING395)
An intensive, hands-on introduction to principles and techniques of teaching English language learners, exposing students to norms of the field of Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL), working with non-native English speakers, and discovering TESOL opportunities worldwide.
ENGL 439.004 TOPICS: Alfred Hitchcock: Gender, Sexuality, and Representation MW 2:20PM-3:35PM Greven
(crosslisted with FAMS310)
This course examines several key works of Alfred Hitchcock, one of the most important directors in film history, paying close attention to the recurring motifs and concerns in his body of work. Hitchcock’s career began in England, where he made the first English sound film (Blackmail) and several of the most important works of the 1930s. Lured to America by David O. Selznick, Hitchcock went on to make an astonishing number of films still pored over and debated by scholars. This course examines Hitchcock’s cinematic art, focusing on the intersection between his complex aesthetics and his controversial representation of gender roles and sexuality. Of particular interest will be Hitchcock’s development of suspense techniques from the equally influential sources of Soviet montage and German Expressionism; his recurring interest in the figure of the embattled woman; his representation of queer sexuality; his use of the film star (Cary Grant, James Stewart, Ingrid Bergman, and Grace Kelly especially); and the development of Hitchcock’s reputation as his critical reception, shaped by the intervention of the auteur critics in France and the United States, transformed the view of Hitchcock as primarily an entertainer to that of a serious artist.
ENGL 445.001 LGTBQ+ Literature TTh 10:05AM-11:20AM Madden
(crosslisted with WGST445)
This course will examine LGBTQ+ (lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans, queer, and other nonnormative sexual identities) literatures and cultures.
ENGL 566.001 TOPICS: Superheroes Across Media TTh 2:50PM-4:05PM Minett
(crosslisted with FAMS325)
Given the box office success of Marvel’s Cinematic Universe and the recent flourishing of superheroes in filmed and animated television, the superhero and the superhero genre has arguably never had a higher cultural or industrial profile. This class will examine the superhero genre’s movement across art forms, industries, and eras. In doing so we will engage with and refine notions of genre, adaptation, storytelling strategies, industry, and reception. Primary focus will be placed on examining the iterations of iconic DC and Marvel comic book superheroes such as Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Spider-Man, the X-Men, and the Avengers. The historical perspective we will take here seeks to cut against both the “mythic” approach and the naturalizing and essentializing notions of the superhero that you may be more familiar with. That is, rather than thinking about a superhero or the superhero genre in terms of broad cultural “significance,” pondering a given superhero’s psychology or philosophy as if they were a real person, or worrying about whether a given adaptation lacks fidelity we will instead focus on understanding the large-scale design and concrete details of given iterations within specific industrial and cultural contexts. The class will serve as both a historical poetics of superhero storytelling across media and as a multi-industrial history.
Courses That Satisfy Core AIU & VSR
ENGL 200.002 Creative Writing & Community TTH 10:05AM-11:20AM Mueller
(AIU & VSR)
Workshop course on creative writing with a focus on values, ethics, and social responsibility.
ENGL 200.003 Creative Writing & Community MWF 9:40AM-10:30AM TBA
(AIU & VSR)
Workshop course on creative writing with a focus on values, ethics, and social responsibility.
ENGL 200.004 Creative Writing & Community TTH 1:15PM-2:30PM Mueller
(AIU & VSR)
Workshop course on creative writing with a focus on values, ethics, and social responsibility.
ENGL 200.005 Creative Writing & Community MW 3:55PM-5:10PM TBA
(AIU & VSR)
Workshop course on creative writing with a focus on values, ethics, and social responsibility.
ENGL 200.006 Creative Writing & Community TTH 4:25PM-5:40PM Wishon
(AIU & VSR)
Workshop course on creative writing with a focus on values, ethics, and social responsibility.
ENGL 280.001 Literature & Society TTh 11:40AM-12:55PM Gavin
(AIU & VSR)
Literature & AI
This course introduces students to literature and artificial intelligence (AI). Recent technological breakthroughs in AI raise fundamental questions that have long been topics of science fiction: What does it mean to be a person? What feelings and values are characteristically human? What social responsibilities do scientists, corporations, and governments have to innovate ethically? What do we owe each other, and what futures do we hope to build? Students will explore these issues by critiquing the representation of AI in literature and film, analyzing current issues involving the ethics and politics of AI, and creating literature and essays using the latest technology to better understand its current limitations and future possibilities. Requirements include two analytical papers and two creative works (poems, short stories, or screenplays). Students will be encouraged to compose some of these out-of-class writing assignments using AI-assisted software. In-class activities include daily reading quizzes, small-group discussions, and written reflections on issues raised in the course. Readings may include novels by Philip K. Dick, Kazuo Ishiguro, and Nnedi Okorafor, among other short literary pieces and relevant news stories. Films may include Blade Runner, Terminator 2: Judgment Day, and M3GAN. This course satisfies Carolina Core requirements for both Aesthetic and Interpretive Understanding (AIU) and Values, Ethics, and Social Responsibility (VSR).
ENGL 283.004 TOPICS: The Tolkien Legendarium TTh 1:15PM-2:30PM Gwara
(AIU)
Thematic, conceptual and lexical study of J. R. R. Tolkien’s major works, The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings. Evolution of his thinking on power, war, technology, race and environmentalism and sin. Particular focus on heroic identity, individualism, Christianity, and fatalism.
Major Prerequisites
ENGL 287.001 American Literature MWF 1:10PM-2:00PM TBA
(Designed for English Majors)
An introduction to American literary history, emphasizing the analysis of literary texts, the development of literary traditions over time, the emergence of new genres and forms, and the writing of successful essays about literature.
ENGL 287.002 American Literature MW 2:20PM-3:35PM TBA
(Designed for English Majors)
An introduction to American literary history, emphasizing the analysis of literary texts, the development of literary traditions over time, the emergence of new genres and forms, and the writing of successful essays about literature.
ENGL 287.003 American Literature TTH 11:40AM-12:55PM Forter
(Designed for English Majors)
This course traces the history of literature in the U.S., focusing especially on the period from 1850 to around 2020. We will explore major literary movements and their characteristic forms (narrative techniques, styles) by placing them in relation to the historical conditions from which they emerged. This means attending to the different ways in which authors have grappled with the central issues of their day. At the same time, the course will emphasize the continuity of certain themes across the movements and periods that we study: the problem of “freedom” and its relationship to the idea of America; the legacy of chattel slavery and place of race in the imagination of Black and white authors; the persistent attempts by women writers to develop literary forms adequate to their experience; and the alienating effects of capitalism on writers from all backgrounds. We’ll read almost exclusively short works by: T. Jefferson, W. Whitman, N. Hawthorne, E. Dickinson, F. Douglass, W. D. Howells, M. Twain, H. James, K. Chopin, N. Larsen, T. S. Eliot, E. Hemingway, J. Dos Passos, L. Hughes, R. Wright, J. Baldwin, and E. Lim.
ENGL 287.006 American Literature MW 3:55PM-5:10PM Trafton
(Designed for English Majors)
An introduction to American literary history, emphasizing the analysis of literary texts, the development of literary traditions over time, the emergence of new genres and forms, and the writing of successful essays about literature.
ENGL 288.001 English Literature TTh 10:05AM-11:20AM Crocker
(Designed for English Majors)
An introduction to English literary history, emphasizing the analysis of literary texts, the development of literary traditions over time, the emergence of new genres and forms, and the writing of successful essays about literature.
ENGL 288.002 English Literature TTH 2:50PM-4:05PM Stern
(Designed for English Majors)
A survey of British literature from the Romantic through the Modern periods.
ENGL 288.004 English Literature MW 2:20PM-3:35PM TBA
(Designed for English Majors)
An introduction to English literary history, emphasizing the analysis of literary texts, the development of literary traditions over time, the emergence of new genres and forms, and the writing of successful essays about literature.
Pre-1800 Literature
ENGL 381.001 The Renaissance TTH 1:15PM-2:30PM Shifflett
(Crosslisted with CPLT 381)
Study of major authors of the European Renaissance including Castiglione, Marguerite de Navarre, Cervantes, and Shakespeare among others. Requirements are likely to include weekly quizzes, a midterm exam, and a final exam.
ENGL 382.001 The Enlightenment MW 2:20PM-3:35PM Jarrells
This course provides an introduction to some of the key texts and arguments of the Enlightenment, especially those centered on the question of whether human beings are naturally social (and – if they are – of what constitutes a good society) and on the theory of how and why societies progress over time. Readings will include eighteenth-century philosophy and political economy (David Hume, Adam Smith, Mary Wollstonecraft), historical novels, ballads, and national tales (Maria Edgeworth, Walter Scott, James Macpherson, William Wordsworth), and a variety of critical accounts that will help us contextualize these primary readings. Throughout the course we will pause, as well, to reflect on what counts as Enlightenment today and on where society’s present discontent with the legacies of Enlightenment might be leading us.
ENGL 406.001 Shakespeare’s Comedies & Histories TTH 10:05AM-11:20AM Shifflett
Study of some of Shakespeare's best comedies and romances, with the goals of figuring out how they delight us, what they are teaching us, and why they sometimes disappoint us. Requirements are likely to include weekly quizzes, a midterm exam, and a final exam.
ENGL 419.001 TOPICS: Legends of King Arthur TTH 10:05AM-11:20AM Gwara
An examination of the evolution and cross-transmission of French and English Arthurian Literature, focusing on analyses of key works, including Geoffrey of Monmouth’s History of the Kings of Britain, Malory’s Morte darthur and romances by Chrétien de Troyes. Readings late in the semester will focus on modern novels, including Robertson Davies’ Lyre of Orpheus and The Winter King by Bernard Cornwell.
Post-1800 Literature
ENGL 391.001 Great Books of the Western World II TTH 11:40AM-12:55PM Jelly-Schapiro
(Crosslisted with CPLT 302)
This course will consider important works of Anglophone literature published over the past several decades. Though contemporary, the texts we will read and discuss share an interest in history and historical representation. More particularly, the novels we will examine bring the conjoined questions of history and memory to bear on the latter half of the twentieth century—from the event of the Second World War and its planetary reverberations, to processes of decolonization in Africa and South Asia, to September 11, 2001 and the wars of its aftermath. These are but some of the historical markers that animate the texts we will read and that will guide our discussion. Throughout, we will remain attentive to how particular texts might help us think about two possible meanings of the term “history”: history as what happened, and history as narrative—the story we tell ourselves about what happened. Abiding the course title, our inquiry will privilege works from the so-called Western World. But acknowledging the global impact of the West, we will also read several novels emanating from societies that were formerly colonized by European powers.
ENGL 412.001 Victorian Literature TTH 11:40AM-12:55PM Stern
Forget the stereotypes about corsets and tea and sober black suits. This class will be an immersion in the luscious, long novels and twisted, kinky poetry of Victorian Britain. We’ll read marriage plots and murder plots; sensation fiction and melodrama; detective fiction and dramatic monologues. We’ll cover a range of forms and genres to give you a long view of key issues during Victoria’s reign (1837-1901): marriage and divorce; wealth and poverty; imperialism and civil rights; railway travel and armchair tourism. We’ll read among works from Charles Dickens, George Eliot, Tennyson, Charlotte Brontë, both Brownings, Tennyson and more. Be prepared to read a lot, to write frequently, to talk avidly, to ask questions, to learn about archival research, to be surprised, and to have a lot of fun. Likely assignments: weekly reading responses, two short research assignments, and one substantive final paper.
ENGL 428B.001 African American Lit II: 1903-Present MW 2:20PM-3:35PM Whitted
(Crosslisted with AFAM 428B)
Representative works of African-American writers from 1903 to the present.
ENGL 430 TOPICS: Introduction to Afro-Latinx Literature of the 20th and 21st Century TTH 2:50PM-4:05PM Jimenez
(Crosslisted with AFAM398)
In this course, we will explore the literature of 20th century and contemporary Afro-Latinx writers in the United States, including Arturo Schomburg, Jesus Colón, Julia de Burgos, Nicolas Guillen, as well as more recent writers such as Jasminne Méndez, Elisabeth Acevedo, Raina León, Mayra Santos-Febres, and Malcolm Friend. We will examine how these writers represent, subvert and/or challenge the histories and ideas of race, Latinidad, Blackness and diaspora in their work. In addition to close reading and critical analysis, students will also have the opportunity to craft their own creative stories and poems.
ENGL 430 TOPICS: Toni Morrison Research Seminar MWF 10:50AM-11:40AM Whitted
(Crosslisted with AFAM498)
This is a multi-disciplinary research course that explores American history and culture through the work of Nobel Prize-winning novelist, Toni Morrison. We will use Morrison’s fiction as a window for exploring issues of race and nation, history and memory, folk culture and belief, and theories of language and narrative. While the course will include a set of common readings about Morrison’s life, work, and critical reception, students will have the chance to work independently on three small research projects on topics of their choice. This is an opportunity to consider the interdisciplinary and intertextual connections between Morrison and other disciplinary frameworks, including history, politics, sociology, anthropology, art, and media.
ENGL 432.001 Young Adult Literature TTH 1:15PM-2:30PM Viswanath
This is a survey course in which we will read contemporary literature for young adults that will help us challenge and reimagine the literary canon. We will explore a variety of genres including fiction, poetry, television, and graphic novels. Most important, we will work together to better understand the concept of adolescence, discuss the characteristics of young adult texts and literary criticism, and use that criticism to analyze the texts we read.
ENGL 437.001 Women Writers TTH 10:05AM-11:20AM Powell
(Crosslisted with WGST 437)
This section of English 437 will consider how selected U.S. southern women writers have explored their experience of education in imaginative writing since the mid-twentieth century. Some of the questions we will consider are what a cross-section of southern women writers have suggested that it may mean to learn or teach, what it may mean to learn or teach in the U. S. South in particular, and what it may mean for a woman to learn or teach. Some of the course texts under consideration include but are not limited to poems, nonfiction, and fiction by authors such as Dorothy Allison, Doris Betts, Tracy Deonn, Claudia Emerson, Gail Godwin, Allison Adelle Hedge Coke, Flannery O’Connor, Mab Segrest, Lillian Smith, Monique Truong, Alice Walker, and Jesmyn Ward. In addition to completing course readings in poetry and prose, and attending and participating in class activities, participants will complete 3-4 written assignments and demonstrate mastery of course materials on quizzes and a cumulative final exam.
ENGL 439.001 TOPICS: The Birth & Death of the Book, from Gutenberg to Google TTH 2:50PM-4:05PM Jackson
With the all-pervasiveness of the Internet calling into question the very future of the book as a viable technology, it seems like an especially good time to explore the book’s past. Where do books come from? How are they printed, published, and promoted? How are they shipped, stored, sold, and read? How long have they been around, and how much longer are they likely to be so? 'The Birth and Death of the Book' invites you to explore the history of the book as a technology, as a means of information storage and retrieval, as a commodity, an art form, and as a way of understanding the world. It will introduce you to the history of the book from the beginning of the first millennium to the beginning of the second, ranging across continents, cultures, and centuries. You'll also get to explore the ways in which the book has been threatened with extinction or irrelevance by other forms of communication including telephones, televisions, and especially computers. Does book have a possible future? Our class begins with a unit on the mechanics and psychodynamics of communication, ranging from the invention of writing in Sumeria, three and a half thousand years before the birth of Christ, to the invention of printing in the middle of the fifteenth-century. Our concerns here will be with the ways in which the spoken word, the written word, and the printed word create particular ways of looking at the world. We’ll also consider magic, bookcases, memory, concrete poetry, and why the physiology of the cow may have influenced the shape of books. Our second unit will introduce you to the world of print in eighteenth and nineteenth century America, when reading, printing, and publishing enjoyed unprecedented influence and technological refinement. We’ll consider the printing, publishing, shipping, and reading of texts and also the fetish for fancy bindings. Our final unit will consider the book in the twenty-first century, investigating the crisis in reading habits and literacy and by exploring the influence of TV, computers, corporate media mergers, and hypertextuality on the book today and tomorrow. Remember: In this class, you are not only a student, but also an expert. I look forward to learning from you!
ENGL 439.004 TOPICS: Alfred Hitchcock: Gender, Sexuality, and Representation MW 2:20PM-3:35PM Greven
(crosslisted with FAMS310)
This course examines several key works of Alfred Hitchcock, one of the most important directors in film history, paying close attention to the recurring motifs and concerns in his body of work. Hitchcock’s career began in England, where he made the first English sound film (Blackmail) and several of the most important works of the 1930s. Lured to America by David O. Selznick, Hitchcock went on to make an astonishing number of films still pored over and debated by scholars. This course examines Hitchcock’s cinematic art, focusing on the intersection between his complex aesthetics and his controversial representation of gender roles and sexuality. Of particular interest will be Hitchcock’s development of suspense techniques from the equally influential sources of Soviet montage and German Expressionism; his recurring interest in the figure of the embattled woman; his representation of queer sexuality; his use of the film star (Cary Grant, James Stewart, Ingrid Bergman, and Grace Kelly especially); and the development of Hitchcock’s reputation as his critical reception, shaped by the intervention of the auteur critics in France and the United States, transformed the view of Hitchcock as primarily an entertainer to that of a serious artist.
ENGL 445.001 LGTBQ+ Literature TTh 10:05AM-11:20AM Madden
(crosslisted with WGST445)
This course will examine LGBTQ+ (lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans, queer, and other nonnormative sexual identities) literatures and cultures.
ENGL 566.001 TOPICS: Superheroes Across Media TTh 2:50PM-4:05PM Minett
(crosslisted with FAMS325)
Given the box office success of Marvel’s Cinematic Universe and the recent flourishing of superheroes in filmed and animated television, the superhero and the superhero genre has arguably never had a higher cultural or industrial profile. This class will examine the superhero genre’s movement across art forms, industries, and eras. In doing so we will engage with and refine notions of genre, adaptation, storytelling strategies, industry, and reception. Primary focus will be placed on examining the iterations of iconic DC and Marvel comic book superheroes such as Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Spider-Man, the X-Men, and the Avengers. The historical perspective we will take here seeks to cut against both the “mythic” approach and the naturalizing and essentializing notions of the superhero that you may be more familiar with. That is, rather than thinking about a superhero or the superhero genre in terms of broad cultural “significance,” pondering a given superhero’s psychology or philosophy as if they were a real person, or worrying about whether a given adaptation lacks fidelity we will instead focus on understanding the large-scale design and concrete details of given iterations within specific industrial and cultural contexts. The class will serve as both a historical poetics of superhero storytelling across media and as a multi-industrial history.
Creative Writing
ENGL 360.001 Creative Writing TTH 10:05AM-11:20AM Dings
This is an introductory course in creative writing that will focus on short fiction and poetry. We will read and discuss professional stories and poems that will serve as models of technique. Students then will write their own stories and poems which will be discussed in class using the workshop method. Revision is expected. Grading will be done by portfolio.
ENGL 360.002 Creative Writing TTH 11:40AM-12:55PM Dings
This is an introductory course in creative writing that will focus on short fiction and poetry. We will read and discuss professional stories and poems that will serve as models of technique. Students then will write their own stories and poems which will be discussed in class using the workshop method. Revision is expected. Grading will be done by portfolio.
ENGL 360.003 Creative Writing TTH 1:15PM-2:30PM Countryman
This course is an introduction to the practice and methods of poetry and fiction writing. In this class, students will work toward the completion of a final portfolio, due at the end of the semester. As a class, we’ll respond to student work as it is created and develop a vocabulary for describing what we see happening in one another’s stories and poems. We’ll think of writing as an ongoing process and a mode of “serious play.” The class will also read works by a spectrum of outside writers, which we’ll examine alongside and in conversation with students’ work.
ENGL 360.004 Creative Writing MW 3:55PM-5:10PM Sundermeyer
Workshop course on writing original fiction, poetry, drama, and creative nonfiction.
ENGL 465.001 Fiction Workshop TTH 2:50PM-4:05PM Bajo
This will be a course in the writing of the contemporary literary short story (novel chapters possible). We will begin by studying stories and essential elements of fiction writing in order to explore the aim and possibilities of contemporary literature. However, the course will primarily be a workshop for students’ own stories.
Basically, the course will have a three-part structure comprised of writing fiction, workshop discussion, and fiction writing assignments. The assignments are designed to add dimension to the stories students will be composing, to make their work richer and more attuned to contemporary literature.
ENGL 465.002 Fiction Workshop TTh 4:25PM-5:40PM Blackwell
What makes a good story? How do you create believable characters? Can you move a reader’s emotions without resorting to sentimentality? This course is for students who have completed ENGL 360 or have dabbled in writing fiction and want to roll up their sleeves a get a little more serious. We’ll read some published stories to consider how contemporary writers ply the craft of fiction, but most class time will be given to the friendly yet constructive group critique of each other’s writing.
ENGL 491.001 Advanced Poetry Workshop MW 2:20PM-3:35PM Amadon
The focus of this course will be writing and revising new poems. Students will develop and refine their ability to articulate their own poetic aims and style, while also expanding their view of what a poem can be and do through readings of contemporary poetry and assignments tied to those readings. The final goal of this course is a portfolio of original creative work, but peer response is a fundamental part and both will factor heavily in the final grade. Students should have taken ENGL 360 previously, but those with experience writing poetry or taking creative writing workshops are welcome.
Rhetoric, Theory, and Writing
ENGL 387.001 Introduction to Rhetoric TTh 11:40AM-12:55PM Edwards
(Crosslisted with SPCH 387)
This course offers an introduction to the theory and practice of rhetoric. What is rhetoric? In politics, people often use the term “rhetoric” to refer to empty speech or talk that is opposed to action. Some people argue that rhetoric is a means to conceal the truth and deceive audiences about actual conditions or issues. Others describe rhetoric as an essential feature of open and democratic societies. Today we find rhetoric in speeches and movies, social media posts and memes, novels and clothing and protests. We find rhetoric everywhere that people use words, music, images, or even their own bodies to produce, sustain, or challenge truth, knowledge, and authority in the world. We find rhetoric everywhere that people struggle to hold on to power or advocate for change.
During this semester, you will have the opportunity to study ancient and contemporary perspectives on rhetoric and develop a working understanding of rhetorical theory, criticism, and practice. Through the course readings and your own rhetorical scholarship, we will work to differentiate between communication that sponsors violence or closes down dissent and communication that opens opportunities for understanding, productive disagreement, and collective action.
ENGL 388.001 History of Literary Criticism & Theory TTh 4:25PM-5:40PM Muckelbauer
Representative theories of literature from Plato through the 20th century.
ENGL 460.001 Advanced Writing MW 3:55PM-5:10PM Hawk
Extensive practice in different types of nonfiction writing.
ENGL 462.001 Technical Writing TTH 11:40AM-12:55PM Bland
Preparation for and practice in types of writing important to scientists, engineers, and computer scientists, from brief technical letters to formal articles and reports.
ENGL 463 Business Writing 6 available sections on various days and times
Please see Self-Service Carolina for more details
Extensive practice in different types of business writing, from brief letters to formal articles and reports
Language and Linguistics (all fulfill the Linguistics overlay requirement)
ENGL 389.001 The English Language MW 2:20PM-3:35PM Wilson
(Crosslisted with LING 301)
Introduction to the field of linguistics with an emphasis on English. Covers the English sound system, word structure, and grammar. Explores history of English, American dialects, social registers, and style.
ENGL 389.002 The English Language MW 3:55PM-5:10PM Wilson
(Crosslisted with LING 301)
Introduction to the field of linguistics with an emphasis on English. Covers the English sound system, word structure, and grammar. Explores history of English, American dialects, social registers, and style.
ENGL 439.002 TOPICS: Teaching English Abroad TTh 10:05AM-11:20AM Liu
(crosslisted with LING395)
An intensive, hands-on introduction to principles and techniques of teaching English language learners, exposing students to norms of the field of Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL), working with non-native English speakers, and discovering TESOL opportunities worldwide.
ENGL 450.001 English Grammar TTH 1:15PM-2:30PM Liu
(Crosslisted with LING 421)
This course helps students build a solid foundation for grammatical analysis of sentences. It covers the core areas of morphology, word classes, phrases, and sentence structures. Students will gain hands-on experiences through tree diagraming and analyzing the lexical and grammatical features in sample texts. The knowledge and skills gained in the course will benefit students’ writing and editing practices and conducting linguistic, stylistic, and other types of discourse analysis.
ENGL 453.001 Development of the English Language MW 3:55PM-5:10PM Lassahn-Worrell
(Crosslisted with LING 431)
History of English from the earliest Old English texts through Middle English to Contemporary English. No previous knowledge of Old or Middle English is required.
ENGL 455.001 Language in Society TTh 11:40AM-12:55PM Chun
(Crosslisted with LING 440)
This course examines language in social life and the social basis of linguistic patterns. We will investigate language use within and across social groups and contexts, focusing on how language reflects and creates speakers’ group memberships, interpersonal relationships, and social identities. Some of the issues we will address include whether members of different gender groups may speak differently, how using a ‘Southern accent’ can help or hurt, and what happens when languages come in contact. Students will learn to think critically about their everyday sociolinguistic experiences using concepts and methods from the course. Special attention will be given to languages, dialects, and styles in U.S. settings.
HONORS COLLEGE COURSES (restricted to SC Honors College Students)
ENGL 200.H01 HNRS Creative Writing & Community TTh 1:15PM-2:30PM Jimenez
(AIU & VSR)
Workshop course on creative writing with a focus on values, ethics, and social responsibility.
ENGL 280.H01 HNRS Literature & Society TTH 2:50PM-4:05PM Gavin
(AIU & VSR)
Literature & AI
This course introduces students to literature and artificial intelligence (AI). Recent technological breakthroughs in AI raise fundamental questions that have long been topics of science fiction: What does it mean to be a person? What feelings and values are characteristically human? What social responsibilities do scientists, corporations, and governments have to innovate ethically? What do we owe each other, and what futures do we hope to build? Students will explore these issues by critiquing the representation of AI in literature and film, analyzing current issues involving the ethics and politics of AI, and creating literature and essays using the latest technology to better understand its current limitations and future possibilities. Requirements include two analytical papers and two creative works (poems, short stories, or screenplays). Students will be encouraged to compose some of these out-of-class writing assignments using AI-assisted software. In-class activities include daily reading quizzes, small-group discussions, and written reflections on issues raised in the course. Readings may include novels by Philip K. Dick, Kazuo Ishiguro, and Nnedi Okorafor, among other short literary pieces and relevant news stories. Films may include Blade Runner, Terminator 2: Judgment Day, and M3GAN. This course satisfies Carolina Core requirements for both Aesthetic and Interpretive Understanding (AIU) and Values, Ethics, and Social Responsibility (VSR).
ENGL 282.H01 HNRS TOPICS: Fiction and Mental Health TTh 11:40AM-12:55PM Jackson
(AIU)
Attending school can be stressful for all of us, but according to a 2019 article in the Chronicle of Higher Education, America's colleges are currently witnessing a "student mental health-crisis." In the last decade, the number of students visiting campus counseling services for depression and anxiety has grown by forty percent. Our lives have only become more stressful with the advent of Covid. What can fiction possibly teach us about mental health, and how might fiction, and stories more generally, help us achieve and maintain it? In this course, we'll find out. We'll read a variety of contemporary novels and short stories, and a few historical ones, about anxiety, depression, dissociation, and isolation but also consider fictions about healing, happiness, and wellness. We'll probe the boundaries of what counts as fiction by reading clinical case histories and memoirs, and we'll investigate how fiction has operated in therapeutic practices such as Bibliotherapy, Existential, Narrative, and Cognitive Behavioral Therapies. We'll also investigate the value of traditional wellness practices including mindfulness and yoga. We'll cover a wide range of approaches to interpreting and analyzing fiction and along the way learn about some basic concepts in mental health and wellness. Assessment will be by a variety of take home assignments. This class is not a substitute for attending counseling, but our emphasis will be on reading fiction in ways that are not only perceptive but also helpful and hopeful.
ENGL 282.H02 HNRS TOPICS: American Childhood(s) in Fiction for Young Readers TTh 10:05AM-11:20AM Johnson-Feelings
(AIU)
The broad topic of this course is American Fiction. This section is centered around the idea of childhood and young adult experience as depicted in children’s, middle grade. and young adult literature. The readings will include texts written by authors whose works represent a wide range of American backgrounds and identities, in terms of ethnicity, religion, region, gender, and more. Seminar members will give particular attention to the ways in which literature for young readers addresses the idea of social justice. Students will design major projects/papers in consultation with the professor. (There will be opportunities for those who are creative writers to submit their own writing to fulfill the major course requirement.)
ENGL 286.H01 HNRS Poetry TTh 2:50PM-4:05PM Vanderborg
Take a trip through English poetry’s earliest influences and roots to its newest digital media forms! Watch the god Apollo draft the world’s first love poem in Ovid’s Metamorphoses. Learn how to close read sensational ballads and artful sonnets, both past and present, and investigate a modern collage poem response to Chaucer’s Canterbury Prologue. Have fun writing your own Old English-style riddle poem, blues stanzas, and an erasure poem. Explore rhyming children’s books, Blake’s illustrated poem printings, comics poetry, poetry apps, poems that are games, poems that talk back to you, sculpture and photography poems, a concrete poem film, an interactive documentary poem about the transcontinental railroad, DNA poems implanted in living cells, and digital poem-stories spread out in constellations against a night sky.
The class has three exams as well as creative take-home quizzes and class preparation assignments. We’ll explore a rich range of English forms and dialects and many different experiments in lyric and narrative poetry. Come prepared to expand your ideas of what poetry looks like and can do!
ENGL 287.H01 HNRS American Literature TTH 11:40AM-12:55PM Shields
(Designed for English Majors)
An introduction to American literary history, emphasizing the analysis of literary texts, the development of literary traditions over time, the emergence of new genres and forms, and the writing of successful essays about literature.
ENGL 360.H01 HNRS Creative Writing TTH 10:05AM-11:20AM Countryman
This course is an introduction to the practice and methods of poetry and fiction writing. In this class, students will work toward the completion of a final portfolio, due at the end of the semester. As a class, we’ll respond to student work as it is created and develop a vocabulary for describing what we see happening in one another’s stories and poems. We’ll think of writing as an ongoing process and a mode of “serious play.” The class will also read works by a spectrum of outside writers, which we’ll examine alongside and in conversation with students’ work.
ENGL 463.H01 HNRS Business Writing TTH 2:50PM-4:05PM Rees-White
Extensive practice in different types of business writing, from brief letters to formal articles and reports.
SCHC 350.H02 HNRS Nature Writing & The 21st Century Southern Sublime TTH 1:15PM-2:30PM Powell
“Sublime in the southern wilderness is always closed in, cramped by trees, cliffs, hills. Everything closes in on you down here, everything close enough to touch, both the beautiful and the ugly. If you can’t see beauty in closeness, you’ll never really see it in the South.” -- John Lane, Chattooga: Descending into the Myth of Deliverance River (2004)
Writers inspired by the green spaces of the U.S. South have long made the representation of those landscapes a distinctive feature of the region’s literature. This section of SCHC 350 considers how a cross-section of U.S. southern writers explore the possibilities of imaginative environmental writing to envision a southern landscape for our own time and beyond. Whether seeded with nostalgia or ravaged by apocalypse or both at the same time, the fields and streams of southern spaces continue to be fertile material. As we read, we will use these selections to develop a critical framework for understanding contemporary scholarship on southern literature about the environment, including ideas about the pastoral tradition, ecocriticism, wilderness theory, geopoetics, the new southern studies, and the southern sublime. Some course texts under consideration include but are not limited to poems, nonfiction, and fiction by Wendell Berry, Allison Adelle Hedge Coke, Kwame Dawes, James Dickey, Nikky Finney, Ashley M. Jones, John Lane, J. Drew Lanham, Gabriel Ojeda-Sagué, Ron Rash, Janisse Ray, Atsuro Riley, Karen Russell, Natasha Trethewey, and Jesmyn Ward. In addition to completing course readings and attending and participating in class activities, participants will complete 3-4 written assignments and demonstrate mastery of course materials on quizzes and a cumulative final exam.
SCHC 396.001 Creative Writing and Community Engagement TTh 1:15PM-2:30PM Madden
This course will explore creative writing and/as community engagement. The course will explore tactical urbanism and its focus on human-centered design; public arts projects that disrupt routine, invite reflection, or facilitate human connection; and creative writing as social engagement and social activism. We will also read selected literary works that engage with ideas of identity, belonging, community, and writing as action. We will also meet with writers and artists who are engaged in community projects or community service.
Among the texts we will discuss will be Matias Viegener’s 2500 Random Things About Me Too, a memoir in social media posts; Carl Wilson’s Let’s Talk About Love: A Journey to the End of Taste, a book exploring the sociology of taste (and Celine Dion); and Ross Gay’s book of essays, The Book of Delights.
As a writing course, the class will include a number of creative writing assignments
and short reading responses to creative works. Also a service learning course, student
in the class will be asked to design and implement community arts projects. In addition,
we hope to take a class fieldtrip to Miami for the O Miami poetry festival in April,
during which we will observe—and I hope participate—in some of the many creative projects
that are part of the annual festival.
SCHC 398.H01 Visual Narratives in Children’s and Young Adult Literature TTH 10:05AM-11:20AM Viswanath
Images often evoke thoughts and feelings, and provide aesthetic experiences to readers and viewers of all ages. The focus of this course, therefore, is to explore a wide range of visual texts meant for young readers and audiences to better understand how such visual narratives contribute to young learners’ literacy and meaning making. Together, we will explore a variety of genres including picture books, graphic novels, television, and film.
SCHC 450.H02 Melville and Shakespeare MW 3:55PM-5:10PM Greven
Melville's discovery of Shakespeare ignited the writing of Moby-Dick, widely considered the greatest American novel. This course reads key Melville and Shakespeare works alongside one another. Topics include themes of gender, sexuality, race, class, and theories of literary influence.