SUNY Fredonia
Division of Arts and Humanities
ENGL 331: American Literary Roots
Literatures of Early America
Fall 2002
Section 1: Fenton 180, MW 3-4:20
Office: Fenton 240; MTWF 1-3, and by appointment; 673-3859
E-mail: simon@fredonia.edu
Web Page: www.fredonia.edu/department/english/simon/
About the Course Web Site
This web site is designed to help you get as much out of this course as possible--you can use it to find out how you will be graded, what reading and writing assignments are due and when, how to join and use the course listserv, what books are on reserve for your use in Reed Library, and how to use the world-wide web for research. Please take the time over the weekend after the first week of classes to read this page carefully and to familiarize yourself with the other pages for this course. Please get in the habit of checking back to this web site to keep track of changes to the tentative schedule listed in your syllabus and to find advice on papers, as well as to surf the ever-expanding list of links to interesting web pages related to the course. And please contact me anytime (see above for my coordinates) if you have ideas about how to improve these pages or the course as a whole. I hope you enjoy taking this course as much as I enjoy teaching it!
I. Course Description
Study of American literary and cultural roots in the 17th and 18th centuries; special attention to the emergence of myths and realities concerning the American hero and the American dream, including specific issues such as the rise of slavery, the roles of women, the treatment of Indians, the power of the Puritans, and the rhetoric of the Revolution. This section is ENGL 331 is designed to introduce students to the analysis of influential authors, works, genres, movements, ideologies, and cultural narratives in the period known as early American literature. We will read, contextualize, and compare a wide range of writings from colonial America, focusing on such genres as exploration narratives, captivity narratives, promotional literature, travel narratives, poetry, histories, oratory, autobiographies, and political writings.
ENGL 331 is a period course for students in the English and Secondary English Education majors and an elective in American Studies; for non-majors who entered Fredonia before Fall 2001, it satisfies Part IIIA of the General College Program (GCP), and, for all students who entered Fredonia in Fall 2001 or after, it satisfies Part VIIIB in the College Core Curriculum (CCC).
II. Rationale
In ENGL 331, as in most courses offered by the English Department, students from a range of majors, minors, and concentrations interact, and the goals of the professional programs are integrated with specific course and CCC goals. Achieving these goals (described in Section IV below) will require us to foster academic skills and intellectual habits of reading closely and carefully, thinking critically and creatively, listening actively and attentively, speaking thoughtfully and concisely, and writing clearly and analytically--skills and habits useful to everyone, but of particular importance to future teachers.
III. Textbooks. The textbooks adopted for this course are:
IV. Course Objectives and Outcomes
Courses in Part IIIA of the GCP and Part VIIIB of the CCC are designed to focus on American history and culture, promote interdisciplinary approaches, and to foster critical thinking and critical literacy. Hence, students in ENGL 331 will read, analyze, and compare a wide range of writings from and about colonial America, consider relations between literary, cultural, political, and historical events, topics, and issues in the period, and make connections between this period and later periods of American literature and history. To achieve these goals, students will
V. Instructional Methods and Activities
The methods used in the classroom will include lecture, in-class writing, guided discovery, open discussion, cooperative group work, and other discussion-oriented activities.
VI. Evaluation and Grade Assignment
A. Methods
Attendance/Preparation/Participation (10%). Regular attendance and thoughtful participation are crucial to your enjoyment of and success in this course. If there is absolutely no way for you to avoid missing a class, please contact me ahead of time or soon after your absence, preferably by email. More important than showing up on time, of course, is coming to class prepared and focused. I expect you to read what has been assigned for a given date at least once (and preferably more than that!) by the time we begin to discuss it in class. This is a discussion rather than a lecture course, after all; although I will provide some context for and interpretations of our reading, the bulk of class time will be spent in small or large group discussions. Since it's difficult to make good contributions to discussions about a literary work if you haven't read it carefully or thought about it extensively, how well you budget your time outside of class will to a large degree determine how well you do in this class in general and how well you do on this portion of your course grade in particular.
Your grade for this segment of the course will be based on a combination of your attendance and your preparation/participation in class and on the class listserv (described below). As there are no exams in this course, think of my evaluation of your preparation/participation as a different but equally important method of assessing your performance in the course. Due to the importance of attendance and participation, more than one unexcused absence will hurt your preparation/participation grade and each non-emergency absence after the third will lower your final course grade by one grade (e.g., with four absences a B+ will become a C+; with five, it will become a D+).
Reading Responses (15%). Detailed instructions for subscribing to and using the course listserv (engl33101@listserv.fredonia.edu) are given below (see Section VIII) and will be discussed in class; they are reproduced on the course web site, along with a troubleshooting guide, at http://www.fredonia.edu/department/english/simon/engl331f02/listserv.htm. This listserv will be your space; I will keep my own input to a bare minimum. Although you may use the listserv in any number of ways, you must use it in the following way: you must come to each class having read and thought about your peers' responses, and, over the course of the semester, post a certain number of your own reading responses to the course listserv (no more than one response per week). Hence, no later than 9 pm Sunday or Tuesday of weeks you choose to write a reading response, you must post to the course listserv a response to one or more assigned readings (including both observations and questions) that you believe would spark discussion for the coming Monday's or Wednesday's class meeting. Advice on generating reading responses can be found elsewhere on the course web site at http://www.fredonia.edu/department/english/simon/engl331f02/rr.htm.
Your grade for this segment of the course will be determined by the number of on-time, passing reading responses you post to the course listserv. Since there are thirteen weeks when reading responses are due in the semester, and since you are allowed five missed weeks without penalty, 8 or more reading responses=A; 7=B+; 6=B; 5=C+; 4=C, 3=D; 2 or less=E. The quality of your reading responses will be factored into your preparation/participation grade (see above).
Critical Essay (20%). I provide detailed information on the 5-to-7-page critical essay, which must be a thesis-driven analytical or persuasive essay, elsewhere on the course web site at http://www.fredonia.edu/department/english/simon/engl331f02/ce.htm.
In-Class Group Presentation (25%). The group presentation involves leading class for roughly 45 minutes during one of our final six meetings of the semester. Possibilities for your group to focus on include putting a work or genre in historical/social context; analyzing the ways in which critics have positioned a given work or genre as central to the American literary canon; analyzing how interpretations of a work or genre have changed over time; introducing major themes, image patterns, or issues in a given work or genre; or a focus of your own invention. We will arrange for a mandatory conference on group's presentation emphasis after October break. Further information and advice on the group presentation can be found elsewhere on the course web site at http://www.fredonia.edu/department/english/simon/engl331f02/gp.htm
Final Project (30%). I will provide detailed information on the 8-to-10-page final paper or the 20-to-30-minute final presentation later in the semester on the course web pages. Possibilities include analyzing a literary work from a later period of American literature in relation to one of the works we read in the course; giving a presentation on how you'd organize a high school class period devoted to one of the works we read in the course and the reasons for teaching it that way; comparing and contrasting the Jehlen/Warner anthology with the Norton anthology; or a topic of your own invention. We will arrange for a mandatory individual conference on your final paper/project topic after Thanksgiving break.
B. Grading. All work during the semester will be graded on a letter basis (A=outstanding, B=good, C=average, D=bad, E=awful) and converted into a number for purposes of calculating final grades. I use the following conversion system (the number in parentheses is the "typical" or "normal" conversion, but any number in the range may be assigned to a given letter grade):
A+=97-100 (98); A=93-96.99 (95); A-=90-92.99 (91); B+=87-89.99 (88); B=83-86.99 (85); B-=80-82.99 (81); C+=77-79.99 (78); C=73-76.99 (75); C-=70-72.99 (71); D+=67-69.99 (68); D=63-66.99 (65); D-=60-62.99 (61); E=0-59.99 (55)
Your final grade is determined by converting the weighted numerical average of the above assignments into a letter grade, according to the above scale.
C. Portfolio. English and Secondary English Education majors should be aware of the English department's guidelines for ongoing portfolio submissions.
VII. Bibliography. Some of the following works may be found on reserve at the circulation desk in Reed Library (click here for the reserves list):
A. Contemporary References
B. Classic References
C. Key Journals
VIII. Course Schedule and Policies
A. Tentative Course Schedule. The following course schedule is subject to revision--please refer here regularly for updates to this schedule, notes on the texts, and suggestions for further reading. Please recall that you need to submit 8 reading responses to earn an A for that segment of your final grade (see Section VI). (Key: ELA=The English Literatures of America, 1500-1800; NAAL=The Norton Anthology of American Literature, Vol. A [6th ed.].)
W 8/28 Introductions; Jehlen and Warner, "General Introduction" (ELA xvii-xxiii); Franklin, "Literature to 1700" (NAAL 3-18); 1785: Philip Freneau, "On Emigration to America..." (NAAL 799-800); 1787: Joel Barlow, from The Vision of Columbus (ELA 1094-1098); 1791: Noah Webster, "The Story of Columbus" (ELA 798-799)
M 9/2 Labor Day: No Class
W 9/4 Tales of Exploration and Encounter. Jehlen and Warner, "The Expansion of Europe" (ELA 3-6); 1493: Christopher Columbus, letter to the King and Queen of Castile (ELA 11-17) and letter to Luis de Santangel (NAAL 34-36); 1503: Christopher Columbus, letter to Ferdinand and Isabella (NAAL 36-37); 1504: Amerigo Vespucci, letter to Pier Soderini (ELA 17-28); 1596: Sir Walter Ralegh, from The Discovery of the Large, Rich and Bewtiful Empire of Guiana (ELA 91-94); 1613: Samuel de Champlain, from The Voyages of Sieur de Champlain (NAAL 86-97); 1616: John Smith, from A Description of New England (ELA 116-122); 1619: Samuel de Champlain, from The Voyages and Discoveries (NAAL 97-103)
M 9/9 Narratives of Conquest and Captivity. 1528-: Nahuatl accounts of the Spanish conquest of Mexico (ELA 30-35); 1542-1546: Bartolomé de las Casas, from The Very Brief Relation of the Devastation of the Indies (NAAL 38-42); 1568?: Bernal Díaz del Castillo, from The True History of the Conquest of New Spain (NAAL 42-58)
W 9/11 1536-40: Álvar Núñez Cabeza de Vaca, from The Relation (NAAL 58-70); 1605: Garcilaso de la Vega, from The Florida of the Inca (NAAL 70-79); 1665: Pierre-Esprit Radisson, The Relation of My Voyage (ELA 325-348) (1-48)
M 9/16 Yom Kippur: No Class
W 9/18 1682: Mary Rowlandson, The Soveraignty and Goodness of God (ELA 349-382) [roughly the same text in NAAL 308-340, but stick with ELA version for ease of reference]
M 9/23 Literature Promotional and Polemical. Jehlen and Warner, "Learning to Say 'America' in English" (ELA 39-41); 1555: Richard Eden, from translation of Peter Martyr (ELA 49-51); 1578-1583: four views on plantation (ELA 58-63); 1580: Michel de Montaigne, from "Of Coaches" (ELA 96); 1586: Lopez Vaz, the English in New Spain (ELA 52-54); 1587: William Lightfoot, from The Complaint of England (ELA 63-64); 1588: Thomas Harriot, A Briefe and True Report of the New Found Land of Virginia (ELA 64-89); 1610: William Strachey, from A True Repertory of the Wrack and Redemption (ELA 104-107)
W 9/25 1634: William Wood, from New England's Prospect (ELA 164-167); 1638: Anon., "A Friendly Invitation to a New Plantation" (ELA 536-537); 1642: Anon., "New England's Annoyances" (ELA 538-540); 1655: Adriaen Van der Donck, from A Description of New Netherland (NAAL 285-292); 1661-1662: Jacob Steendam, "The Praise of New Netherland" and "Spurring Verses" (NAAL 275-285); 1684: Francis Daniel Pastorius, from Positive Information from America (NAAL 366-371); 1698-1699: Ned Ward, from A Trip to Jamaica and A Trip to New England (ELA 299-303, 400-404)
M 9/30 Stories of Settlement and Secession. Jehlen and Warner, "The English Diaspora" and "Seventeenth-Century Anglo-America: Virginia and the Indies" (ELA 101-103, 195-197); 1612: John Smith, from A Map of Virginia (ELA 108-115); 1619-1631: five letters from America (ELA 122-129); 1622: Edward Waterhouse, A Declaration of the State of the Colony in Virginia (ELA 129-146); 1624: John Smith, from General History of Virginia (NAAL 103-114); 1624: The Tragicall Relation of the Virginia Assembly (ELA 149); CRITICAL ESSAY due in class
W 10/2 1676: two accounts of Bacon's Rebellion (ELA 224-232); 1676: Aphra Behn, The Widow Ranter; or the History of Bacon in Virginia (ELA 233-291)
M 10/7 1676: Aphra Behn, The Widow Ranter; or the History of Bacon in Virginia (ELA 233-291)
W 10/9 Jehlen and Warner, "Seventeenth-Century Anglo-America: New England and Canada" (ELA 305-307); 1630-1650: William Bradford, from Of Plymouth Plantation (ELA 176-186, NAAL 169-196); 1630-1649: John Winthrop, from The Journal (NAAL 217-226, ELA 308-315); 1702: Cotton Mather, from Magnalia Christi Americana (NAAL 397-417)
M 10/14 Jehlen and Warner, "Seventeenth-Century Anglo-America: The Trials of Puritanism" (ELA 429-433); 1635: Thomas Morton, from New English Canaan (NAAL 197-198, ELA 168-171, NAAL 198-205); 1637: Ann Hutchinson, from The Examination (ELA 434-441); 1644: John Winthrop, from A Short Story (ELA 441-442)
W 10/16 1640: William Hooke, from New-Englands Tears for Old-Englands Fears (ELA 447-449); 1643/1655: Roger Williams, from The Bloody Tenet of Persecution and "A Letter to the Town of Providence" (NAAL 235-237); 1647: Nathaniel Ward, from The Simple Cobler of Aggawam in America (ELA 451-456); 1652: Richard Saltonstall, letter to the Boston church and John Cotton, reply (ELA 457-460)
M 10/21 1692: Cotton Mather, from The Wonders of the Invisible World (NAAL 392-397); 1692: Deodat Lawson, A Brief and True Narrative (ELA 475-481); 1692-1720: Samuel Sewall, from the diary (ELA 382-388); 1700: Robert Calef, from More Wonders of the Invisible World (ELA 482-487)
W 10/23 Theology and Everyday Life. 1630: John Winthrop, from "A Modell of Christian Charity" (ELA 151-159); 1630: John Cotton, from Gods Promise to His Plantations (ELA 160-161); 1662: Michael Wigglesworth, "God's Controversy with New-England" (ELA 563-575); 1671: Samuel Danforth, A Brief Recognition of New-Englands Errand into the Wilderness (ELA 461-474)
M 10/28 Jehlen and Warner, "Poetry: The Seventeenth-Century" (ELA 527-530); 1640: Psalm 137, from the Bay Psalm Book (ELA 542); 1650: Anne Bradstreet (ELA 548-563, NAAL 238-271); ca. 1680s: Edward Taylor (ELA 581-591, NAAL 341-362); 1725-1800, three versions of Psalm 137 (ELA 1040-1043)
W 10/30 The Iroquois Creation Story, Pima Stories of the Beginning of the World (NAAL 19-33); Native American Trickster Tales (NAAL 120-156); 1646: Thomas Shepard, a visit to John Eliot's Indian mission (ELA 316-317); 1652: John Eliot, "Indians and Imps" (ELA 318); 1745: David Brainerd, from the journal (ELA 639-643); 1772: Samson Occom, A Sermon Preached by Samson Occom (ELA 643-659)
M 11/4 Commerce, Independence, and Slavery. Gura, "American Literature: 1700-1820" (NAAL 425-435); 1708: Ebenezer Cooke, "The Sot-Weed Factor" (ELA 1014-1031); 1757: John Dyer, "The Fleece" (ELA 1061-1064); 1764: James Grainger, from The Sugar-Cane (NAAL 628-645)
W 11/6 Jehlen and Warner, "The Literature of Politics" (ELA 813-816); 1700: Samuel Sewall, The Selling of Joseph (ELA 817-820); 1701: John Saffin, A Brief and Candid Answer (ELA 821-825); 1735: Moses Bon Sàam, "The Speech of Moses Bon Sàam" (NAAL 652-656); 1746: John Woolman, from Some Considerations on the Keeping of Negroes (NAAL 618-626); 1774: Phillis Wheatley, letter to Samson Occom (NAAL 823-824); 1782: J. Hector St. John de Crèvecoeur, from Letters from an American Farmer (NAAL 671-675); 1784: Phillip Freneau, "To Sir Toby" (NAAL 802-804); 1787: Ottobah Cuguano, from Thoughts and Sentiments on the Evil and Wicked Traffic (ELA 880-883); 1788: George Mason and James Madison, from the Virginia ratification debate (ELA 883-885); 1790: Benjamin Franklin, "Sidi Mehemet Ibrahim on the Slave Trade" (ELA 891-893)
M 11/11 Jehlen and Warner, "Histories" (ELA 683-685); 1722: John Trenchard and Thomas Gordon, Cato's Letters, no. 106, "Of plantations and colonies" (ELA 825-830); 1758: Nathaniel Ames II, "A Thought Upon the Past, Present, and Future of British America" (ELA 716-718); 1764: Thomas Pownall, from The Administration of the Colonies of America (ELA 836-841); 1776: Adam Smith, from The Wealth of Nations (ELA 854-857); 1777: William Robertson, from The History of America (ELA 779-781)
W 11/13 1773-1776: Phillis Wheatley, "To the Right Honorable William, Earl of Dartmouth" and "To His Excellency General Washington" (NAAL 812-813, 819-820); 1774-1776: letters of John and Abigail Adams (NAAL 682-698); 1775: Samuel Johnson, from Taxation No Tyranny and Edmund Burke, from Speech...On Moving His Resolutions for Conciliation with the Colonies (ELA 849-852); 1776: Thomas Paine, The American Crisis, #1 (ELA 868-873), Peter Oliver, from Origin and Progress of the American Revolution (ELA 771-778), Thomas Jefferson, A Declaration by the Representatives of the United States of America (ELA 858-862); 1782: J. Hector St. John de Crèvecoeur, from Letters from an American Farmer (NAAL 657-667)
M 11/18 The Development of Autobiography. 1660s: Anne Bradstreet, "To My Dear Children" (ELA 322-325); 1701: The Declaration and Confession of Esther Rodgers (ELA 404-407); 1741: Jonathan Edwards, "Personal Narrative" (ELA 605-615); 1768: Samson Occom, "A Short Narrative of My Life" (NAAL 647-652); 1774: Elizabeth Ashbridge, from Some Account of the Fore-Part of the Life of Elizabeth Ashbridge (ELA 659-667); 1774: John Woolman, Journal (NAAL 610-618); GROUP 1 LEADS CLASS (Katharine Felt, Kim Klein, Kristen Lubkowski, Bridget Quinlan)
W 11/20 1704-1705: Sarah Knight, journal (ELA 415-427); 1709-1712/1728: William Byrd, from The Secret Diary and History of the Dividing Line (NAAL 447-464, ELA 699-707); 1782: J. Hector St. John de Crèvecoeur, from Letters from an American Farmer (ELA 973-981); 1798: Memoirs of the Notorious Stephen Burroughs (ELA 801-812); GROUP 2 LEADS CLASS (June Crawford, Brian Hamilton, Jessica Mancuso, Liz Philipps, Matt Robinson)
M 11/25 - F 11/29 Thanksgiving Break: No Classes.
M 12/2 1771-1790: Benjamin Franklin, The Autobiography (NAAL 538-610); GROUP 3 LEADS CLASS (Emily Burbank, Brad Kaye, Kristen Kszos, Nick Weiser)
W 12/4 1760: Briton Hammon, from Narrative of the Uncommon Sufferings and Surprizing Deliverance (NAAL 874-879); 1770: Ukawsaw Gronniosaw, from A Narrative of the Most Remarkable Particulars (ELA 719-725); 1789: Olaudah Equiano, from The Interesting Narrative of the Life (ELA 792-798); GROUP 4 LEADS CLASS (Nate Bowser, Matt Dumuhosky, Andrea Georgakis, Kristie Howell)
M 12/9 Maryse Condé, I, Tituba, Black Witch of Salem, Author's Note-Ch. 7 (iii-122); GROUP 5 LEADS CLASS (Julia Anderson, Vanessia Hosein, Bill Hughey, Carrie McCausland)
W 12/11 Maryse Condé, I, Tituba, Black Witch of Salem, Ch. 8-Afterword (123-225); GROUP 6 LEADS CLASS (Ryan Geise, Sam Hess, Aaron Jessey, Patrick Lovaglio)
M 12/16 DRAFT of final project due at noon in regular classroom; course evaluations, wrapping up
F 12/20 FINAL PROJECT due by 5 pm outside my office door (Fenton 240) or my mailbox in Fenton 277
B. Class Policies
1. Attendance. As stated in Section VI above, barring emergencies each absence after the third will lower your final course grade by one grade (e.g., with four absences a B+ will become a C+; with five, it will become a D+). Be aware that absences due to emergencies are the only absences that will not be counted toward your total for the semester. Emergencies include but are not limited to death in the family, hospitalization or major illness, and natural disasters; scheduled and unavoidable school-sponsored events (games, meets, performances, etc.) are also counted as emergencies for the purpose of this attendance policy.
2. Course Listserv. You are required to subscribe to your section's listserv and to read and think about your peers' observations and discussion questions before each class meeting. To subscribe to your section's listserv, compose an email message to listserv@listserv.fredonia.edu, leave the subject line blank, and write this exact command in the body of message: subscribe engl33101 [your name]. Please be sure to delete any signature or other text that may appear in the body of your message, as it will only confuse the very literal-minded machine that handles subscriptions. Very soon after sending this message, you should receive an email from the machine that handles listserv subscriptions asking you to confirm your subscription; please follow the instructions in this email carefully, as you are not subscribed to the listserv until you have done so. Soon after doing this, you should receive another email message from the machine that handles subscriptions informing you that you are indeed subscribed to your section's listserv and laying out basic information about the listserv. Save this message--it's very useful. Once you get this message, you will begin receiving messages from others who are subscribed to the listserv; you also will be authorized to send messages to them by composing a message to the machine that distributes messages to those who are subscribed to the listserv. To do so, simply send an email message to engl33101@listserv.fredonia.edu. It is highly recommended that you either save a copy of every message you send to the course listserv (many email programs automatically save all messages sent in a "sent mail" folder) or "cc:" yourself whenever you send a message to the listserv, as your listserv participation will be graded both quantitatively and qualitatively (see Section IV, above) and it is possible that technical or human error could result in your messages being lost in transit, accidentally deleted, misfiled, or miscounted. Please familiarize yourself with the college's "Computer and Network Usage Policy" (College Catalog 2001-2003, pp. 227-229), and remember this simple rule of thumb: check with me first before posting something to your section's listserv that is not directly rELAted to the course.
3. Late Assignments. Late reading responses and final projects will not be accepted or graded. Other assignments will be accepted and graded but will lose one-third of a grade per day late (e.g., a paper turned in two days past the due date that would have otherwise received an A- would be penalized two-thirds of a grade and thus receive a B). Only students who ask for an extension at least two days before the due date will be granted one; asking for an extension on the final project means that your final grade for the semester will be an incomplete (I), and that you must turn in your final project before the end of the following semester so that the I becomes a grade other than an E.
4. Plagiarism and Academic Honesty. To plagiarize is "to steal and pass off as one's own the ideas or words of another" (Webster's Seventh New Collegiate Dictionary). SUNY Fredonia strongly condemns plagiarism and takes severe action against those who plagiarize. Disciplinary action may extend to suspension from privileges or expulsion from college. See pages 216 and 226 of the College Catalog 2001-2003 for further information.
ENGL 331: American Literary Roots, Fall 2002
Created: 9/3/02 3:50 pm
Last modified: 12/6/02 2:38 pm