So far, I've suggested strategies for close reading--what some have called a "formalist" approach because of its emphasis on the "form" of the text, its concern with how a text means or how a writer structures an argument--and for using close reading to generate comparisons between texts. As you can see, it's closely related to a similar reading strategy I encourage you to explore, which has been called "intertextual" because of its emphasis on the relations between literary texts (or between literary texts and other kinds of texts). Any time you compare or contrast two texts, you're engaging in an intertextual approach to literature and culture.

The traditional version of intertextual criticism focuses more on generic conventions and evolutions, the way literary traditions emerge and change. It focuses on the relations between two texts primarily to discern significance changes in a genre, or ways in which writers relate themselves to literary traditions. It asks, what can we figure out about science fiction about war in general from comparing and contrasting two particular science fiction novels that deal with war? But there are other ways of doing intertextual criticism relate to other approaches. Consider the following kinds of questions:

• Do you see similar themes, issues, situations, characters, symbols, or any other literary techniques or narrative strategies in the texts you're examining? (Many times these techniques and strategies can also be found in non-literary texts, as well.) Is this shared element being used in similar ways or to similar ends in the two texts? If you do see differences in the uses or functions of an element that two texts both seem to emphasize, can you account for these differences? Can you figure out what each writer may be trying to do by using the element the way each does? (This is the form-centered version of intertextual criticism.)
• Which text was published first? Can one be said to influence another? In what ways does the later text respond to the earlier one? How would you characterize the attitude of the later writer to the earlier writer's text? What techniques or strategies does the later writer seem to have learned from the earlier writer? What do you imagine the later writer would say about the earlier text? What do you imagine the earlier writer would say about the later text? What do you think the changes reveal about the time periods that the authors were writing during ? (These questions are historicist--author- and period-centered--variations on intertextual criticism.)
• Can you imagine the audience or audiences to which the different writers are most directly addressing their texts? How do considerations of audience influence different writers and the shape of their texts? (These questions are reader-centered variations on traditional intertextual criticism.)

As you can see, some versions of intertextual criticism are not that different than what has been called a "contextual" approach to literature because of its attempt to read a text in historical "context," its concern with how political or social issues of a specific time or place are represented, registered, or responded to in literature and culture. This approach can be difficult to do well if one's knowledge of context is limited, but we can certainly try to make inferences about the relation between text and context based on what we have read. This is a valid and potentially fruitful way to generate observations about a given text, comparisons between different texts, and reflections on the meaning and significance on those observations and comparisons, so I encourage you to experiment with it in your reading responses. Both literary and historical critics in the group research project can use this kind of contextual approach, although in its purest form it does involves doing outside research.

• One way to do this is to speculate about the author's intentions: what do you think the author was trying to achieve by telling this story or making that argument? what were his or her goals? what aspects of his or her society and culture does the author seem to be commenting on or responding to through his or her narrative or essay?
• Another way to do this is to consider what aspects of the story or essay seem particularly specific to the author's place and time. This can be examined in terms of plot, characters, and dialogue, but it can also manifest itself in assumptions, values, belief systems, and narrative strategies of characters, narrators, and authors.
• One cautionary note: it's all too easy when writing about "other" cultures and time periods to rely on broad generalizations or reductive simplifications, to overemphasize or underplay either differences or similarities (to see "them" as either "really just like us" or "completely different from us"), and to assume that literature and culture unproblematically reflect or emanate from its society or magically give "us" insight into "them" (whether or not the "them" in the stories were invented by an individual author with his or her own agendas and insights, or that hundreds of years separate the "then" of the stories from "now"). Not only do we do this all the time about "our own" cultures and time period when we're being careless (think how easy it is do when we're reacting to something that's unfamiliar to us), but the influence of a centuries-long tradition in the West of having difficulties with difference is at play here, as well. Western strategies for dealing with difference have ranged from exoticization to domestication, from false universalisms to dangerous relativisms, from rejection to appropriation, from positive to negative (but always one-dimensional) stereotypes, but one constant is an unwillingness or inability to grant "others" the same right to complexity, contradiction, conflict, ambivalence, multiplicity, and mystery that we assume for ourselves. I can't offer more than awareness of possible pitfalls here, but this will be a recurring theme of discussion in the course and you will have an opportunity to address this problem in writing, as well.

Now obviously it's going to be difficult to give this quality and amount of attention to every reading we do in a particular week. That's perhaps a goal to strive for, but one that's going to take a semester at least to be able to reach. So for the beginning of the semester in particular, I advise you to give only one reading per day this kind of close and undivided attention, and to use it to identify key concepts, terms, and issues that you'll then be looking for as you read the other reading assignments for a given day. By emphasizing the relations between the readings, the similarities and differences between them, the points of intersection and tension, where they converge and where they diverge, you'll not only be better prepared for class discussion, you'll also be well on your way to preparing yourself for doing similar comparative, analytical, and synthetic thinking from day to day and from days to week. By making these kinds of reading strategies part of your everyday approach to the course, you'll be in a position to write excellent reflective essays.

If you've asked yourself some of these questions and considered some of these issues while reading or rereading the assigned texts, and if you've paid attention during class and thought about the relation between what we read and what we did that week, then you're ready to begin composing a reflective essay. Your task is to cull or distill from all the possible observations you've made on your own while reading and thinking about the text and all the possible discussion questions from the listserv and the classroom the one or two that will best help you get a handle on the week as a whole--to both focus in on the issues and problems that interested you the most and to gain a holistic understanding of patterns and relations across the week.

Remember that informal as reflective essays are, you're still writing to a "public"--to your classmates, in this case. Take pride in what you do, and be aware of your audience as you write. Try to interest them in your point of view, make them see the issues you've focused on from your perspective. Try to convey why you find the reflections you're posting important or interesting. And try to treat each reflective essay as part of a continuing dialogue that goes on out of class; feel free to respond to other people's questions and reflections, to note patterns in what people have been talking about in class or writing on the listserv, or otherwise show that you're thinking about the issues other people have been raising during that week.

"Do"s:

• Compose your reflective essays in a word processing program first and save it as a word processing document; only after you have done this should you cut and paste it into an email to the listserv. This will also make it easier to revise your essay for clarity and conciseness.
• Try to make your reflection something interesting, something individual, something that gives us insight into texts and issues in a given week from your own perspective. Try to convince us to see them the way you see them, or at least understand why you see them that way.
• Try to make it fun or interesting to read. Think of your classmates as your audience (they are), and write with an awareness of your audience.
• Consider relating your experience of reading a text or texts and what specific features made it or them interesting, challenging, frustrating, or whatever to your reactions to specific discussion questions or moments in class discussion and reflect on how your understanding of the text and the issues it was addressing changed over time.
• Consider focusing your reflection on a single passage (paragraph, sentence, phrase) and doing a "close reading" of it that shows how it raises an issue fundamental to the entire week's readings and discussions.
• Consider identifying a significant pattern in the readings for that week and reflecting on its significance.
• Consider identifying a particular issue that a set of texts seems designed to raise or explore or a debate they seem designed to participate in and then analyzing or reflecting upon that issue or debate.
• Consider responding to a particularly interesting question from one of your classmates, one that requires interpretation or introspection or reflection to answer.
• Consider varying the kind of reflections you make (see above for some different kinds) and trying out new ways of reading, interpreting, analyzing, comparing, and reflecting on texts and arguments.

"Don't"s:

• Don't send your reflective essay as an attachment; it wastes bandwidth, is often hard to download, and sometimes transmits computer viruses.
• Don't be so general or vague or tangential that your reflection could be construed as evidence that you haven't done the reading, or done it carefully, or thought about it much.
• Don't resort to summary or paraphrase just to show you've done the reading. If you have to summarize, make it the set-up for an original commentary or question, rather than the substance of your reflection.
• Don't put someone else's reflections in your own words, or worse, simply echo another response exactly. This is known as plagiarism, a serious academic offense that can get you kicked out of school (look it up in the course catalog, pp. 225, 237-239). If you find someone else's ideas compelling, say so, discuss what makes it compelling, and otherwise follow up on it and develop it further. Acknowledging how someone else's ideas have influenced your own is enough to avoid suspicions of plagiarism.