Study Tips for English



PoetrySpring 2017Dr. Margaret Smith Elliott(765) 285-7419 msmith4@bsu.eduOffice hours: Monday 3-6 Tuesday 10-1 Wednesday 3-6 Friday 3-4 and by appointmentTexts: Ferguson, et al., The Norton Anthology of Poetry. Shorter 5th ed. Mason and Nims, Western Wind. 5th ed. Handouts (HO) as well as readings posted on Blackboard (Bb).Class aims and policies can be found beginning on p. 4, after the list of readings. Late work policies: page 6Schedule: Below are most of the readings and some of the writing and presentation projects to be assigned in the order we will probably use. Find specific requirements for homework assignments on Blackboard. Assignments may be added, subtracted, or changed for a variety of good reasons.HO= handout. Page number alone: Norton Anthology. WW= Western Wind.1. Poems on poetry, the imagination, the mind. How to read a poem.1/9 Introduction. Strand, Tate, Keats, Hughes, Ammons, Reed, Espada, Ni Dhomhnaill (HO). 1/11 Coleridge, “Kubla Khan” (HO) and 2 prose readings (WW and Bb). HW: written response to prose readings. 1/13 HW: WW Chapter 1 + image exercises. (See Bb.)In class: image exercises and how to read a poem2. Poems on family, childhood, youthSong, “The Youngest Daughter” (HO); Stallworthy, “The Almond Tree” (HO); Sexton, “Pain for a Daughter” (HO); Cofer, “Quinceanera” (HO); Soto, “Not Knowing” 1239; Thomas, “Fern Hill” 989-90; Komunyakaa, “Banking Potatoes,” “Sunday Afternoons” 1209-1211; Jennings, “My Grandmother, (HO); Lorde, “From the House of Yemanja” 1157-8; Plath, “Daddy” 1145-7; Nemerov, “Boy with Book of Knowledge” 1016; Roethke, “My Papa’s Waltz” 955; Walker, “Studying Physics With My Daughter” (WW 532); Tate, “The Lost Pilot” (HO).1/16Martin Luther King Day. No classes.1/18 How to read a poem, continued. Settle on groups and poems for presentations.1/20HW: Group presentation of poems chosen from family/childhood/youth poems.1/23 presentations, continued.1/25 Discuss Essay 1 assignment; avoiding plagiarism; Frost’s “Design.”1/26Here begins the chronological study of English poetry. Bring Norton.In class: history of the English language. Old English. “Caedmon’s Hymn”1/30HW: Compose an original poem in the Old English form (but in our Modern English language!). Find full directions on Bb.In class: Middle English poems2/1Quiz on English language history. Continue with Middle English poems.2/3 HW: short response on a post-medieval religious poem. Find a poem from list # 7, below or from handout. Find directions for short response on pp. 4-5, below.Monday, Feb 13: Essay 1 is due.4. Old English poems: “Caedmon’s Hymn” 1; Riddles 10-11; “Wulf and Eadwacer” (HO)5. Middle English poems: Anonymous lyrics 14-15; 72-76Dates and details for future assignments will be provided and posted on Blackboard.In class: spring and religious poems7. Post-medieval spring poems: Houseman, “Loveliest of Trees” 760; Cummings, “in Just –“ (HO); Larkin, “The Trees” 1031-2. Post-medieval religious poems: Herbert, “Love (III)” 246; Smart, from “Jubilate Agno” 417-9; Arnold, “Dover Beach” 711-12; Hopkins, “God’s Grandeur,” “The Windhover,” “Pied Beauty” 755-6; Larkin, “Church Going” 1027-9; Larkin “Aubade” WW 489; Stevens, “Sunday Morning” 817-9 and WW 444; Jarman, #13 from “Unholy Sonnets” WW 552; Jones, “A Blasphemy” WW 546; Harjo, “Eagle Poem” WW 547’ and handoutsRead WW chapter 6, “Machine for Magic: The Fresh Usual Words” (115-137) Etymology exercise due. (HO)In class: Wyatt. Sonnet introduced. Spenser 141-2; Sidney 157-9.Introduce Shakespeare sonnet presentations.Group presentations on Shakespeare’s sonnets.John Donne 191-2088. Love poems, mostly after Donne: Waller, “Song” 251-2; Behn, “Song” 318; Montagu, “The Lover: A Ballad” 392-3; Sor Juana (HO); Byron, “She Walks in Beauty,” “When We Two Parted,” So We’ll Go No More A-Roving” 510-12; Barrett Browning 594; Tennyson: read either “Mariana” or “The Lady of Shalott” 619-25; Pound, “The River-Merchant’s Wife” 846-7; Eliot, “ . . . Prufrock” 862; Auden, “Lullaby” 936; Roethke, “I Knew a Woman” 956-7; Wright, Woman to Man” 992; Snyder, “Four Poems for Robin” 1130-32; Fenton, “In Paris With You” (HO); Hall, “Mangosteens” 1235-6; Nims, “Love Poem” WW 475; Rich, VI and XVI in WW 507; Soto, “Oranges” WW 556-7; handouts.Research project introduced. Eighteenth-century poetry18th century: Pope’s “Essay on Man” (excerpt) 376-9; Gray’s “Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard” 410-13; Burns, “To a Mouse” 4529. Later poems on death and loss: Whitman, “When Lilacs Last . . .” 696-702; Keats, “When I Have Fears” 568, “Ode to a Nightingale” 582; Dickinson, # 39, 479, 591 (pp. 719-27); Rosetti, “Song,” “Remember” 733; Stevens, “The Emperor of Ice-Cream” 816; Bishop, “One Art” 966; Brooks, “the rites for Cousin Vit” 999Romantic poetry10. The Romantics: (a) Blake 440-50(b) Wordsworth 456-62, 471-2, 476-85(c) Coleridge, “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner” 489-505(d) Shelley, “Ode to the West Wind” 543-5; “To a Skylark” 547-549(e) Keats, “Ode to a Nightingale,” “Ode on Melancholy,” “Ode on a Grecian Urn,” “To Autumn” 582-87.The Victorians: R. Browning, “My Last Duchess” 643-4; Arnold, “Dover Beach” 711-12; Tennyson, 619-641.World War I poets: Sassoon, “They” 853; Rosenberg, “Break of Day in the Trenches” 883-4; Owen, “Dulce Et Decorum Est” 890; “Strange Meeting” 891-2; Reed, “Lessons of the War” 985-6ModernismDuring the final weeks of class, we will intersperse steps toward your research projects with the study of poems from the 20th and 21st centuries. You’ll do a poetry + art project, including a visit to the BSU art museum, and we’ll find a way to celebrate National Poetry Month in April.Research project will be due on Monday, May 1.CLASS GOALS AND POLICIESSupplies: Every day, bring your laptop or some other device for accessing the internet. Bring as well a folder for handouts and returned work for this class only and a notebook and pen or pencil. Keep all work handed in on a storage device separate from your laptop. Keep all your work through the end of the semester!Organization: We will read many short poems written in English and some short prose pieces on poetry. We will spend the first couple of weeks with poems grouped thematically, and most of these will be from the 20th century. We will then turn back to some of the earliest surviving poetry in English, and move forward in two directions at once: chronologically, tasting some of the best known delights in this rich tradition with its roots in the British Isles, and thematically, drawing our themes from the British poetic tradition, discovering how English-speaking poets from various times and places have worked and played with and altered the traditions. Objectives: By the end of the semester, you should know or be able to do the following:1. You should know some poems well. By this I mean that, with the text in hand, you should be able to speak and write knowledgeably and insightfully about most of the poems we have discussed in class. You should also know a few poems very well (those you write essays on or memorize, and perhaps a few others you particularly like), well enough to remember them—their images, language, form, ideas—in some detail without having to reread them.You should know a bit about some major trends in English poetic history.You should be able to make a good analytical approach to a poem. Confronted with an unfamiliar poem, you should have a sense of what kinds of questions to ask, what kinds of things to notice, and how to develop a persuasive reading of the poem.I hope that you will also find great pleasure in reading and hearing poetry, and will respond to its beauty, power, and mystery.Blackboard: I will post assignments on Blackboard. Sometimes I will give them to you on paper, as well. Lose a handout? Find it on Blackboard. I will require that you submit some of your work on Blackboard, as well as handing it in on paper. I may refuse to read an assignment until you have turned it in digitally as well as on paper.Required work:You will have regular reading assignments. Read carefully, and come to class prepared for substantial discussion. Short responses (up to 20 points each) Some weeks you will hand in a one-page response to one of the poems assigned for study that week. You must write about a poem we have not yet discussed in class, and you must choose a poem that you are not presenting in class or discussing in a formal essay. You need not write a formal essay of literary analysis for this exercise. You must give evidence that you have read the poem (so refer to specific things in the poem) and are thinking about it. Beyond that, unless I give you more specific directions, you choose the form of the response. Directions for Short ResponseWrite poem’s full title in quotation marks.Write the full name the author is known by (e.g., T. S. Eliot, Audre Lorde, H.D.).If the poem is from one of our books, identify with N or WW, and give page number.Write a heading that includes the date.Write at least one full page. Choose at least 4 elements from the “Approaching a Poem” sheet to identify in your poem. I recommend that you often choose (1) situation, (3) images, (4) repetitions, (5) contrasts.Identify each element as you discuss it; that is, use the word “images” or “contrast,” etc. (Make it easy for me to see what elements you’re talking about!)Include some of your thoughts on the poem, and, if you wish, your feelings.If you hand in more than one page, fasten and number the pages. Type, double-space, use TNR or Cambria 12-point font and 1 or 1 ?” margins.I’m looking for your own analysis and response to the poem; I’m not expecting you to do any research. If, however, you do include ideas or information that did not come out of your own head, then list your source(s), and make clear what you got from these sources. Failure to identify your sources constitutes plagiarism.Oral presentations in class (14-30 points)1 or 2 essays of literary analysis (about 3-4 pages each) (100 points)Summary of a critical article for citation practice. (50 points)A research project, culminating in a paper, or a portfolio, or an anthology of poems by various poets on a single theme, with your editorial commentary. I will gladly entertain proposals for other projects. I’ll be looking for substantial engagement with the work of one or more poets, poets on whom published critical work is available. (A collection of your own poetry would not satisfy this assignment. More on this later.) (300 points)Recitation of 20 lines of poetry, learned by heart. Choose from any poem in either of our texts or on a class handout, or get my permission for something else. Lines may be taken from more than one poem, or all from one, as you prefer. Make sure the passage you choose forms a coherent whole; don’t break off in mid-thought. Learn more than 20 if you need to in order to find a good stopping place. To earn an A, recite your lines on the assigned day without errors, sound as though you know what you’re saying, and begin by correctly identifying the author and title of the poem(s). (30 points)Other exercises, some creative (usually 20 points)Quizzes (20 points) or an exam may materialize. Late work: Late formal essays and research projectTurned in late on assigned day: minus 2 pointsTurned in after the assigned day: minus 5 points per school day Late exercises (including short responses)Have an excused absence on the due date? Turn in the exercise by your second day back and I will accept it. (Example: it was due on Wednesday and you’re back on Friday, so you may turn it in Friday or Monday.) Think you have a good reason for an extension? Discuss it with me.Don’t have an excused absence on the due date? Accept a zero for that exercise. You are allowed one missed 20-point exercise without penalty. Late oral presentation: Due the next class day and marked down 5 points.Turning in work to my Elliott mailbox: Always ask an Academy staff member (teacher, SLC, secretary, staff member, administrator) to sign the paper and write the date and time on it.Printer problem? Email the work to me as a Word attachment by the beginning of class on the due date, and turn in the paper copy by the day of our next class. Work turned in on paper after that may lose 1 point per school day. msmith4@bsu.edu.Absences and Tardies: Come to class, arrive on time, and have your book and note-taking materials ready when class begins. Absences and tardiness will be reported to the Office of Academic Affairs. You may also be reported absent or tardy for any of the following reasons: you sleep during class; you violate dress code and are sent back to Wagoner to change; I find you using your laptop during class for purposes I consider unrelated to our work.Finding out about missed work: When you have been absent from the room for some or all of any class, it is your responsibility to find out about any work, assignments, announcements, syllabus changes, etc., that you miss. Get information and class notes from a reliable classmate, check Blackboard, and, if you’d like further information, contact me. Your absence on the day an assignment is given is not a legitimate excuse for a late or missing assignment. If your absence or tardy is not excused you will usually not be allowed to make up work missed for credit. You must, however, find out what you missed and keep up.Planned absence: If you know that you will be absent on a day when an assignment is due, see me to arrange an alternative due date. Assume that the work will be due before your absence.Laptop use: Every day, bring your laptop some other device that will provide internet access. Occasionally you will be instructed or allowed to use your laptop/tablet/phone in class. Do not use it otherwise. Exception: if something comes up that you want to look up on the spot for our edification, you may do that.Academic Honesty: It is extremely important that you hand in our own work and give credit for any borrowed ideas, words, or information. Use MLA rules for documenting published sources, and I will show you how to acknowledge unpublished sources (e.g., your roommate). I take plagiarism seriously and will follow Academy policies, which are laid out in the Handbook, for all cases of academic dishonesty.Grading: Your work will be graded using a point system. I will tell you the point value for each assignment. Typically, exercises can earn up to 20 points and formal essays 200 points. The research project will be worth 300 points.As I grade your formal work, I judge its quality using the following scale: A+ = 97-100% (You knocked my socks off!); A= 95 (exceptional); A-=92; A--=90; B+=88; B=85 (good); B-=82; B--=80; C+=78; C=75 (passing); C-=72; C--=70; D*= not passing. The points I assign represent the percentage you earned of the total possible points.When I grade exercises (such as short responses), I don’t always evaluate the quality as rigorously as when I grade formal essays and big projects. I do look, though, to make sure you followed the directions. PowerGrade will translate the points into percentages and grades, using the following scale:PowerGrade scale: 93-100=A 90-92= A- 87-89= B+ 83-86= B 80-82=B- 77-79=C+ 73-76=C 70-72= C- 69 and below= D*Help: If you ever have any questions about anything to do with this class, please get in touch with me. I would be very happy to talk with you. Come by or call during my office hours, or catch me after class to make an appointment, or email me. I’m here to help.Note: Important literature is often about the deepest and most difficult struggles of humans to live authentically in a complex world. Through the thoughts and experiences of literary characters, we readers can examine and evaluate our personal responses to life’s mysteries, complexities, disappointments, and joys. In addition, we begin to understand how a writer, in his or her own struggle to express experience creatively, has responded to the social, political, and artistic environment of his/her times. The English Department at the Academy selects reading material that reflects these human struggles, has endured the test of time, and has earned a respected place in the universe of letters. In addition, the instructors include recently published poems, stories, and articles that reflect the diversity of contemporary cultures and experiences. If, because of the powerful nature of the reading experience, you are unable to read and study a specific text with reasonable analytic objectivity, please confer with your instructor. Alternative texts are availableKeeping students safe: Please know that if you write or say anything that suggests that you may be in danger, I will report that to another Academy adult, probably our counselor. ................
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