the links below will take you to course materials for previous semesters; additional materials are available for all courses on webct vista, on request:

eng61000::research & pedagogy in critical reading (fall 2007)
basic research methods, various critical methods and theories emphasized in this program (textual studies, psychoanalytic studies, cosmopolitan studies), pedagogical practices and instructional design in literature and writing departments, and a variety of professional issues—selected for students considering a career in the humanities.
syllabus, schedule

Literacy, Rhetoric, & Social Practice

eng6/75012::reading & interpreting research on writing (spring 2009)
the disciplinary practices in writing research. in this seminar, we will engage in two large categories of activity: first, we will use rhetorical tools (stasis theory, new rhetoric, and argument structure) to interogate the production of knowledge in the field; second, we will use our knowledge of disciplinary practices and knowledge production to begin our own research production. in more specific terms, we will use our various rhetorical tools to understand how individual scholarly works critique other work in the field, construct new knowledge, and contribute to theory.
syllabus, schedule

eng85025::systems & theories of writing & representation (spring 2008)
the history and use of scripts and other means of representing and constructing shared meanings. Taking an historical perspective, the course explores the implicit "theories" of representation in the development of scripts and other graphic means of representing and constructing meaning, traces those developments through the emergence of reproduction technologies and media, with particular attention to social semiotics of and relations among verbal, graphic, non-verbal, and non-graphic representations and constructions of meaning. The seminar explores such contemporary issues as 1) the nature of text in modern societies, 2) the appropriateness of theories and rhetorics of verbal, printlinguistic texts for understanding the nature of texts that employ multiple symbol systems, 3) what it means to be able to read and write texts that employ multiple symbol systems, and 4) the need to construct a rhetorical theory of multiple representations.
syllabus, schedule

eng6/75053::writing technologies (spring 2007)
while computers may indeed be “indispensable” in our world, we are still debating the effects of this change in writing technology and technology-enhanced pedagogical practice. We will inform ourselves as to the nature of the debate through acquaintance with the philosophy of technology and technological change, through an examination of writing technologies both present and historical, through evaluations of various socio-cultural reactions to changes in writing technologies, and through critique of various contemporary claims about the impact of changing writing technologies in university writing programs as well as “writing in the wild.”
syllabus, schedule

Literature, Cultural Theory, & Social Practice

english6/76101::literature of the united states to 1865 (fall 2006)
American Renaissance Literature in the Context of Slavery: Historical Problems and Contemporary Critique::comprehensive understanding of key writers in the period along side writers more directly involved in the abolitionist movement, and to examine an increasingly important question: why have we (in academe) made these writers important.
syllabus, schedule

eng6/76101::literature of the united states to 1865 (spring 2005)
the last great puritan seminar::the transatlantic phenomenon of Puritan literature, primarily in its colonial manifestation, to determine its vitality as field of study in a period of “New” early American literature
syllabus, schedule

eng6/76706::methods in the study of literature (fall 2005)
designed to prepare doctoral candidates for the prospectus, dissertation, and the profession generally. we will begin by examining the rhetorical practices of literary scholarship over the past 50 years; we will interrogate current practices and “controversies” of what is clearly a field-in-crisis; and we will examine ways by which young scholars locate their work in English Studies. As a sidebar, we will discuss ethics and professional behavior in the classroom, university, and academia generally.
syllabus, schedule