E506B: Survey of 20 th Century American Literature Fall 2011 M, W, F 11:00-11:50 Office: Eddy 347 Leif Sorensen Office Hours: M 2-3; W 3-4 Education 1 Leif.Sorensen@colostate.edu Course Description This course offers an overview of 20 th Century American literature with selections from major poets, fiction writers and dramatists. We will pay specific attention to international and transnational elements of literature written in the U.S. As we read primary texts we will also be addressing recent developments in the study of American Literature that have been grouped together as the transnational turn in American Studies. These critical materials will help us address the question of what it means to an American writer in a century characterized by large-scale immigration, globalization, and neoimperialism. As writers and texts circulate more and more rapidly around the globe, does it even make sense to speak in terms of national literatures? Over the course of the semester we will track the changing demographics of the U.S. and the changing face of American literature. In the process we will discuss major aesthetic movements in the century including modernism, multiculturalism, and postmodernism. Works considered will include plays by David Henry Hwang and Tennessee Williams; fiction by Nella Larsen, Leslie Marmon Silko, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Gertrude Stein, Theresa Hak Kyung Cha, and Salman Rushdie and poetry by Langston Hughes, Claude McKay, and T.S. Eliot. Assignments: Facilitation: 15% Position Paper: 15% Abstract: 5% Revised Abstract and Annotated Bibliography: 10% Participation: 15% Final Project: 40% Required Texts: F. Scott Fitzgerald, Tender is the Night Tennessee Williams, Streetcar Named Desire T. S. Eliot, The Waste Land and Other Writings Nella Larsen, Quicksand Theresa Hak Jyung Cha, Dictee David Henry Hwang, M. Butterfly Leslie Marmon Silko, Garden in the Dunes Salman Rushdie, Fury Additional readings available on RamCT Schedule of Readings Unit I: The Transnational Turn 8/22 Introduction The Transnational Turn in American Studies Part 1: Foundations Jane C. Desmond and Virginia R. Domínguez, Resituating American Studies in a Critical Internationalism, American Quarterly 48.3 (September 1996): 475-490
Priscilla Wald, Minefields and Meeting Grounds: Transnational Analyses and American Studies, American Literary History 10.1 (Spring 1998): 199-218 8/24 The Transnational Turn in American Studies Part 2: Current Headings Djelal Kadir, Defending America Against its Devotees, Comparative American Studies 2.2 (2004): 135-52 Amy Kaplan, The Tenacious Grasp of American Exceptionalism: A Response to Djelal Kadir, Defending America Against its Devotees, Comparative American Studies 2.2 (2004): 153-9 Donald Pease, American Studies after American Exceptionalism: Toward a Comparative Analysis of Imperial State Exceptionalisms, Globalizing American Studies, eds. Brian T. Edwards and Dilip Parameshwar Gaonkar (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2010), 47-83 8/26 The Transnational Turn in American Studies Part 3: 8/29 F. Scott Fitzgerald, Lonely is the Night 8/31 Continue Lonely is the Night 9/2 Conclude Lonely is the Night 9/5 Labor Day 9/7 Tennessee Williams, A Streetcar Named Desire 9/9 Continue A Streetcar Named Desire 9/12 Conclude A Streetcar Named Desire Unit II: Transnational Poetics 9/14 Critical Reading: Jahan Ramazani, A Transnational Poetics, American Literary History 18.2 (Summer 2006): 332-359 Begin T. S. Eliot The Waste Land Position Paper Due 9/16 Continue T. S. Eliot The Waste Land 9/19 Conclude The Waste Land 9/21 Claude McKay Harlem Shadows (on RamCT) 9/23 Conclude Harlem Shadows Unit III: Diaspora
9/26 James Clifford, Diasporas, Cultural Anthropology 9.3 (August 1994): 302-338 Brent Hayes Edwards, The Uses of Diaspora Social Text 19.1 (Spring 2001): 45-73 9/28 Langston Hughes, The Weary Blues (on RamCT) 9/30 Langston Hughes, The Weary Blues 10/3 The Weary Blues 10/5 Nella Larsen, Quicksand 10/7 English Department Reading Days No Class 10/10 Nella Larsen, Quicksand 10/12 Conclude Quicksand Abstract Due Unit IV: The Planetary Turn 10/14 Wai Chee Dimock, Deep Time: American Literature and World History, American Literary History 13.4 (Winter 2001): 755-75 Paul Giles, The Deterritorialization of American Literature, Shades of the Planet: American Literature as World Literature, eds. Wai Chee Dimock and Lawrence Buell (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2007) 39-61 10/17 Gertrude Stein, from The Making of Americans (on RamCT) 10/19 Gertrude Stein, from The Making of Americans (on RamCT) 10/21 No Class 10/24 Conclude The Making of Americans 10/26 David Henry Hwang, M. Butterfly 10/28 Conclude M. Butterfly 10/31 Leslie Marmon Silko, The Garden in the Dunes 11/2 Leslie Marmon Silko, The Garden in the Dunes 11/4 Leslie Marmon Silko, The Garden in the Dunes Revised Abstract and Annotated Bibliography Due 11/7 Conclude The Garden in the Dunes
Unit V: Traveling Literature 11/9 Rebecca L. Walkowitz, Comparison Literature New Literary History 40.3 (Summer 2009): 567-582 and The Location of Literature: The Transnational Book and the Migrant Writer Contemporary Literature 47.4 (2006): 527-45 11/11 Theresa Hak Kyung Cha, Dictee 11/14 Theresa Hak Kyung Cha, Dictee 11/16 Conclude Dictee 11/18 Salman Rushdie, Fury Fall Break 11/21-25 11/28 Salman Rushdie, Fury 11/30 Conclude Fury 12/2 Presentations of Final Projects 12/5 Presentations of Final Projects 12/7 Presentations of Final Projects 12/9 Presentations of Final Projects Final Projects Due
Academic Policies Course Structure: This course will be a modified seminar and each of our meetings will revolve around group discussion. We will discuss the optimal course structure on the first day of class. Participation: Since we will be relying heavily on discussion your participation is a crucial component of the course. Assignments Facilitation: Each student will sign up to facilitate discussion. facilitators are required to post discussion questions to RamCT by 5:00 PM on the day of the class meeting before they are to facilitate discussion (if you are facilitating discussion on a Friday then your questions must be posted by 5:00 on that Wednesday). Facilitators are required to meet with me. Successful questions will: (1) situate the text under discussion in the larger context of the class, making references to relevant critical and literary works we have already covered, (2) identify key passages for us to work with and (3) provide some background from you own research on the text or author. Position Paper: A position paper of no more than 1500 words is due on 9/14. This paper will draw from the theoretical readings with which the class began to present an argument for reading either A Streetcar Named Desire or Tender Is the Night as a transnational text. One of the goals of this exercise is for you to begin to see what you think the value of a transnational approach might be. While you will not have the space for an extensive reading of either text you should point to specific examples that support your claims. Abstract: You are required to write an abstract for a critical presentation on the materials for this course. This abstract may become the topic of your final project. Revised Abstract and Annotated Bibliography: About a month before the final project is due you will turn in a revised abstract and an annotated bibliography of primary and secondary sources that you have consulted in preparing to write your project. These may include additional theoretical readings, relevant literary texts, or criticism. The annotations should be brief statements that both identify key claims or points of interest and that can serve as reminders of how you might use these sources. Final Project: The final project for this course will be a 15-20 page analytical essay on a topic of your choosing.