Time Schedule:
Leroy F Searle
C LIT 250
Seattle Campus
Study of literature in its relation to culture. Focuses on literature as a cultural institution, directly related to the construction of individual identity and the dissemination and critique of values.
Class description
This course offers an introduction to the study of literature and its relation to culture. The principal focus is on reading great books, all of historical importance and continuing interest.
The main texts-- Shakespeare's King Lear, Charlotte Bronte's Jane Eyre, Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter, and Leo Tolstoi's Anna Karenina.
These books will be supplemented by shorter texts, including poetry and prose.
The course has no prerequisites, and carries both VLPA distribution credit and "W" course credit. The selected texts will be read in English.
Student learning goals
The most important goal will be learning to read accurately and exactly, and to develop sound and interesting arguments about what you read.
Considerable attention will be devoted to understanding the strategies of the texts assigned, to see exactly why they are constructed as they are, and to follow complicated developmental patterns intelligently.
The historical range of the material, from the Renaissance to the end of the 19th century, will foreground sustained patterns of reflection on fundamental human experiences--and the particular sequence of the texts will trace the development of significant ways of thinking about individual and cultural experience that are still pertinent.
Writing will be important in this course, but the assignments are designed to provide help where students may need it. Writing assignments are sequential, and structured to leave many options for writing. There will be additional help for non-native speakers of English.
General method of instruction
This is a lecture course, with required discussion sections. In the lectures (two days a week, for two hours), questions will be welcome and will be answered, though for each class meeting, there will be an agenda of issues to be covered. Attendance is necessary, but the lectures will be recorded and put on line after class, together with any Powerpoint slides and other documents on the course website.
Recommended preparation
There are no prerequisites for this course. Typical enrollment in the course is very diverse, and we will try to provide pertinent help with reading the assigned texts.
Class assignments and grading
There will be three writing assignments (typically 3-5 pages), each of which can be revised, and an optional final paper (typically 3-7 pages). The course will carry W credit.
Students may opt to take a final examination instead of writing the final paper.
In addition, there will be a short weekly quiz on assigned reading. These are short (taking only about 5 minutes), on details from the reading material for the week.
Required written assignments: 60%; The final paper or final exam: 15%; Participation (incl. attendance): 15% Weekly quizzes: 10%
