The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism



Dr. Roberta Seelinger Trites 438-3651

Office: STV 409B; Office hours MW 3-4 seeling@ilstu.edu

ENG 471: Critical Theories in Children’s Literature

Required texts:

The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism

Coats, Looking Glasses and Neverlands

Hunt, Understanding Children’s Literature

Nodelman, Words About Pictures

e-readings from Milner Reserves and English Department e-folder

Course objectives: This course is an introduction to critical theory in children’s and adolescent literature. We will cover theoretical issues that have influenced the study of children’s/adolescent literature and theoretical scholarship published in the field of children’s/adolescent literature, including but not limited to the following: structuralism, semiotics, deconstruction, race and ethnic studies, Marxism, feminism, colonialism/post-colonialism, narrative theory, psychoanalysis, and historicism.

This course will be taught in conversation with ENG 495, The Pedagogy of Children’s Literature, by Professor Karen Coats. Students enrolled in both courses are expected to have read the following novels prior to the start of the semester: The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, Alice in Wonderland, Anne of Green Gables, Charlotte’s Web, The Magical Adventures of Pretty Pearl, Peter Pan, and The Watsons Go to Birmingham. These two courses will coordinate readings schedules so that students will be exposed to pedagogical and theoretical issues simultaneously.

Course requirements:

Class participation: 15%

Response essays: 20%

Annotated bibliography: 15%

Seminar paper (in stages): 50%

Class participation: Students are expected to attend every seminar for the full three hours, plus attend the Lois Lenski Lecture, given by ISU alumnus Mike Cadden, on March 26. Students are expected to have read the material scheduled for each class prior to each class meeting and to then engage actively in the class discussion.

Response essays: Before noon each Thursday, students will post to me and to each other a response essay that analyzes how the major theoretical issues the readings for the week interact with each other. What is each theorist arguing? How do the theorists engage with each other’s ideas? How do they agree and disagree? Can the theory be applied with ease to one of the seven preliminary novels we’ve read? If so, how? Please post your response to every student in the class, and please limit your response to 100-500 words.

Annotated bibliography: On April 5, each student will submit an annotated bibliography in preparation for the seminar paper. (This is stage three of your paper; see below for more directions.)

Seminar paper: Each student is to perform a theoretically engaged reading of one or more children’s text(s). I encourage you to experiment with a theoretical form that is not already familiar and comfortable to you. The final paper is to be 15-20 pages long. Students must consult with me about their paper topics; I will not accept papers on topics that I have not approved. It is assumed that students will not switch topics after the April 5 annotated bibliography is completed; students who do switch topics will be expected to resubmit each stage.

Stage One: (10%, due March 1) Each student will write approximately five pages of an original argument on the topic of your choice. While that will require some preliminary research on this topic to ensure A) what your topic is; B) that it is “do-able”; and C) that it has not already been “done,” this five-page paper should contain NO reference to any scholarly sources. Such a paper is generally referred to as a “statement of the problem”—meaning, you are stating the problem you are analyzing and identifying the steps you will undertake to solve that problem. The goal of this assignment is to help you learn to articulate your own argument, independent of sources.

Stage Two: (10%, due March 22) Locate at least five journals that would be interested in your topic. At least two should be journals other than the mainstream children’s literature journals (Children’s Literature, Children’s Literature Association Quarterly, The Lion and the Unicorn, Children’s Literature in Education). For each of these five journals, A) list related articles the journal has published on your topic; B) after having reviewed the journal’s submissions standards, various editors’ introductions, and performed an informal rhetorical analysis of the journal, rewrite your thesis statement (or thesis paragraph) to accommodate the journal’s audience; C) write a submission letter (complete with accurate address) to the three that you think would be most interested in your work, explaining in that letter why you think your essay would be a “good fit” for them. (At least one of these letters must be to a non-mainstream ch lit journal.

Stage Three: (15%, due April 5) Submit an annotated bibliography in which you write a 2-3 sentence description of the argument for each scholarly work. Follow MLA bibliography style SCRUPULOUSLY.

Stage Four: (30%, due May 3) Submit your final paper, having synthesized the background theoretical and scholarly work from the annotated bibliography with your own argument. The paper must be submitted in a manila envelope, with a cover letter, addressed to the journal you think would be most likely to accept your essay. Following the style guidelines of the journal you have chosen.

Policies:

• Students are expected to attend class. It is impossible to imagine how students who have missed more than three classes will be able to complete all of the expectations for the course.

• Any assignment that is late will be penalized one letter grade per day that it is late.

• I expect you to have read the assignments listed on the syllabus before you come to class. Yes, I know it’s a lot of reading. Each class is meant to be the equivalent of reading one book. Please recognize that there is a direct correlation between your self-presentation and how other people perceive you. (In other words, when you are unprepared and or complain, you affect how other people perceive you professionally.)

• Proofread everything you turn in, because grammar, organization, MLA style, and mechanics are a substantial part of every grade you receive.

• I will not discuss any evaluation I have given your work until at least twenty-four hours after you have received the evaluation.

• You earn your grade by performance, not by negotiation. Unless I have made an error of computation, please do not ask me to raise your grade.

• Any student needing to arrange a reasonable accommodation for a documented disability should contact Disability Concerns at 350 Fell Hall, 438-5853 (voice), 438-8620 (TTY).

Communication:

I consider communication between the student and the instructor a key factor in maximizing students’ learning. Please feel free to email me at the address above; I find email exchanges with students very fruitful.

I also encourage you to drop by my office during office hours or to contact me to set up an appointment. Students are my top priority; don’t be afraid to contact me!

I expect students to treat each other respectfully at all times both in class and outside of class. Sometimes, discussions will touch on controversial topics. When we treat each other with as much civility and professionalism as possible, our discussions will generate the best possible learning environment for all students.

Webpage:

ENG 471: Critical Theories in Children’s Literature

Reading schedule

January 18: Introduction

Defining theory; defining children’s literature

January 25: Structuralism

(anticipating Myth, Folk Tales, and Fairy-Tales in 495)

Lukács, “Realism in the Balance,” Norton 1033

Bakhtin, Discourse in the Novel, Norton 1190

Jakobson, “The Metaphoric and Metonymic Poles,” Norton 1265

Todorov, “Structural Analysis of Narrative,” Norton 2099

Griswold, “Introduction: Fundamental Similarities Among Twelve American Children’s Books,” from Audacious Kids, Milner e-Reserve

Nikolajeva, “A Time to be Born, A Time to Die,” from From Mythic to Linear, Milner e-Reserve

Nikolajeva, “Character and Plot,” from A Rhetoric of Character in Children’s Literature, Milner e-Reserve

Trites, “When I Can Control the Focus,” from Disturbing the Universe, Milner e-Reserve

Chaston, “The Ozification of American Children’s Fantasy Films,” Milner e-Reserve

February 1: Historicism

(anticipating Histories of Childhood in 495)

Howe, “History and the Novel,” Norton 1535

White, “The Historical Text as Literary Artifact,” Norton 1712

Greenblatt, “Introduction to The Power of Forms in the English Renaissance,” Norton 2251

Clark, Kiddie Lit, “Kiddie Lit in the Academy,” Milner e-Reserve

Mintz, “Save the Child” and “Children Under the Magnifying Glass,” both from Huck’s Raft, Milner e-Reserve

Smith, “The Emblematic Black Child,” from Children’s Literature of the Harlem Renaissance, available @ english.ilstu.edu/reserve/index.html, reserve folder for “Trites”

Kidd, “Boyology in the Twentieth Century,” Milner e-Reserve

Watkins, “The Setting of Children’s Literature,” Understanding Children’s Literature 30-38 (1999 edition) OR “Space, History and Culture: the Setting of Children’s Literature, 50-72 (2006 edition)

February 8: Narrative Theory

Genette, “Voice,” from Narrative Discourse, Milner e-Reserve

Trites, “I double never ever lie to my chil’ren,” Milner e-Reserve

Nikolajeva, “Beyond the Grammar of the Story,” Milner e-Reserve

Cadden, “The Irony of Narration in the Young Adult Novel,” Milner e-Reserve

McCallum, “Very Advanced Texts,” Understanding Children’s Literature 138-50 (1999 edition)

February 15: Race and Ethnicity Studies

Anzaldúa, “Borderlands/La Frontera,” Norton 2211

Baker, “Blues, Ideology, and Afro-American Literature,” Norton 2227

Christian, “The Race for Theory” Norton 2257

Gates, “Talking Black,” Norton 2424

hooks, “Postmodern Blackness,” Norton 2478

Tolson, “‘Brutal Honesty and Metaphorical Grace’: The Blues Aesthetic in Black Children’s Literature,” Milner e-Reserve

Bader, Barbara, “How the Little House Gave Ground,” and “Multiculturalism in the Mainstream” and “Multiculturalism Takes Roots,” Milner e-Reserve

Fernandez, “Negotiating Identity,” Milner e-Reserve

February 22: Feminism

Cixous, “The Laugh of the Medusa,” Norton 2039

Bordo, “The Body and the Reproduction of Femininity,” Norton 2362

Smith, “Toward a Black Feminist Criticism,” Norton 2302

Paul, “Enigma Variations,” Milner e-Reserve

Paul, “From Sex-Role Stereotyping to Subjectivity,” Understanding Children’s Literature 112-123 (1999 edition) OR “Feminism Revisited,” 114-27 (2006 edition)

Trites, “Defining the Feminist Novel,” Milner e-Reserve

Vallone, “The Daughters of the New Republic,” from Disciplines of Virtue, Milner e-Reserve

March 1: Deconstruction

De Man, “Semiology and Rhetoric,” Norton 1514

Lyotard, “Defining the Postmodern,” Norton 612

Estes and Lant, “Dismembering the Text,” Milner e-Reserve

Kertzer, “Reading Anne Frank Today,” from My Mother’s Voice: Children, Literature, and the Holocaust, Milner e-Reserve

op de Beeck, “Speaking for the Trees,” Milner e-Reserve

Stage 1 of Seminar Paper (5-page statement of problem) due

March 8: Reader Response

Iser, “Interaction between Text and Reader,” Norton 1673

Barthes, “The Death of the Author,” Norton 1466

Foucault, “What is an Author,” Norton 1622

Chambers, “The Reader in the Book,” Milner e-Reserve

Hunt, “The Text and the Reader” and “Criticism and Children’s Literature,” from Criticism, Theory, and Children’s Literature, available @ english.ilstu.edu/reserve/index.html, reserve folder for “Trites”

Rose, “Introduction,” from The Case of Peter Pan, Milner e-Reserve

Benton, “Readers, Texts, Contexts,” Understanding Children’s Literature 81-99 (1999 edition) OR 86-102 (2006 edition)

Wilkie, “Relating Texts,” Understanding Children’s Literature 130-37 (1999 edition) OR “Intertextuality and the Child Reader” 168-79 (2006 edition)

March 22: Semiotics

(anticipating Picture Books in 495)

Saussure, Course in General Linguistics, Norton 963-74

Nodelman, Words About Pictures, chapters 7-10

Martin, “The Influence of the Black Arts Movement on African-American Picture Books,” from Brown Gold, Milner e-Reserve

Stage 2 of Seminar Paper (Journal Analysis) due

March 29: Marxism

Benjamin, “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction,” Norton 1166

Horkheimer and Adorno, The Culture Industry, Norton 1223

Althusser, “Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuses,” Norton 1483

Williams, Marxism and Literature, Norton 1567

Habermas, ‘Modernity—An Incomplete Project,” Norton 1748

Jameson, “Postmodernism and Consumer Society,” Norton 1960

Eagleton, “The Rise of English,” Norton 2243

Stephens, “Ideology, Discourse, and Narrative Fiction,” from Language and Ideology in Children’s Fiction, Milner e-Reserve

Hollindale, “Ideology and Children’s Books,” Milner e-Reserve

Sarland, “The Impossibility of Innocence,” Understanding Children’s Literature 39-55 (1999 edition) OR “Critical Tradition and Ideological Positioning” 30-49 (2006 edition)

April 5: Post-Colonialism

Achebe, “An Image of Africa,” Norton 1783

Said, Orientalism, Norton 1991

Spivak, “Can the Subaltern Speak?”, Norton 2197

Bhabha, “The Commitment to Theory,” Norton 2379

Phillips, “The Mem Sahib,” Milner e-Reserve

Maruis, “Romancing the Home,” from Girls, Boys, Books, Toys, Milner e-Reserve

MacCann, “The Sturdy Fabric of Cultural Imperialism,” Milner e-Reserve

Hines, “He Made Us Very Much Like the Flowers,” available at english.ilstu.edu/reserve/index.html, reserve folder for “Trites”

Stage 3 of Seminar Paper (annotated bibliography) due

April 12: Psychoanalysis

Freud, “The Uncanny,” Norton 929

Heidegger, “Language,” Norton 1118

Lacan, “The Mirror Stage,” Norton 1285

Lacan, “The Signification of the Phallus,” Norton 1302

Coats, Looking Glasses and Neverlands, Chapter 1

April 19: Psychoanalysis

Coats, Looking Glasses and Neverlands, Chapters 2-6

April 26: Gender, Sexuality and Film

Foucault, The History of Sexuality Norton 1648

Butler, Gender Trouble, Norton 2485

Sedgwick, “Between Men,” Norton 2434

Mulvey, “Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema,” Norton 2181

Stephens, Ways of Being Male, TBA

Film: TBA

May 3: Review and stage 4 of paper (FINAL SEMINAR PAPER) due

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