Schedule | Fall 2015

September: 1, 8, 15, 22, 29, October 6, 13, 20, 27 November 3, 10, 17, 24, December 1, 8, Finals

Today

     
R 12/10
LAST CLASS

Homework

Exam Preparation: Two Copies of Cluster

1. Do a cluster of at least ten items from our semester's readings and discussions. (Follow the link for directions on clustering.)

This cluster should have as its central starting point one "stimulus word or phrase": a particular object, example, symbol, person, etc. from a single text from our class.

In that cluster, then try to associatively conntect to that central starting point as many items as you can from the entire semester as you can. These conntected items can be titles, examples, abstract ideas, characters, scenes, phrases, distinctions, passages, key terms, etc.

Examples of the cluster's central object, example, etc. could be

  • the memory hole in Winston's office from 1984,
  • the 38-year-old wheat farmer from Walter Ong's Orality and Literacy,
  • the 10-minute scene of Norman's cleaning up from Psycho.
  • Mina's typerwriter from Dracula
  • Cobley's reading of Heart of Darkness in the Modernism chapter of Narrative.

All items should include have page numbers.

2. Make a second copy of your completed cluster and bring both to class.

Another Moodle Post to "Psycho 1"

Having finished the film, read over the postings in the Moodle forum "Psycho 1." Choose one to reply to.

In this reply, extend the conversation started in the previous posting(s) with additional details from the last part of the film.

In your post, try to speak to what Hitchcock is doing in both the

  • story/plot, as well as the
  • narrative.

That is, try to write not only about

  • what happens and what it means (in relation to the Spoto themes and ideas), but also about
  • the ways that Hitchcock renders the shots and scenes using the narrative parameters of film.

 

Day 27. Exam Preparation

 

Resources

List of Texts from Fall 2015

 


Next Meeting

WEEK 16
FINALS WEEK:
T 12/15
 

Online FINAL EXAM via Moodle
(open book, open note, 2-hour time limit)

moodle Complete the two-hour final exam via Moodle sometime between 8 a.m. and 4 p.m. today.

Remember to answer only two of the four questions.

If you have technical issues during office hours, call the ITSS Help Desk at 726-8847.

As a precaution, be sure to write each answer in text-editing software and save it in a file on your computer.

After you have completed each answer, copy the text into that question's text box in Moodle.

If you have technical problems with Moodle during the exam time, please copy the text of your answers into an email and send the email to me no more than two hours after the time you started the exam.

If you are using Firefox and have trouble typing into a text box, use the handle grip in the lower right of the text box to enlarge it slightly.

 

Semester Calendar:

September

     

WEEK 1
T 9/1

 

 

Homework

Obtain the Books

See the syllabus

Day 1. Introduction to Literacy, Technology, and Society

Syllabus and Course

prehistoric tribe around fire

Literacy, Technology, Society

Timeline and Phases of Society/Identity

Terms to Remember

  • "society" as the entire complex of conditions, practices, and structures that makes up the norms of given way of life: economic, legal, technological, bureaucratic, cultural, geographical, etc. (in contrast to the term culture): the example of the car with a cluster of structures and conditions around it.
  • literacy
  • technology
  • historical timeline of the class: 1500 BC through 2015 AD.

Resources

 

R 9/3

 

Homework

Read and Be Prepared to Answer

Read Walter Ong, Chapters 1 and 2 using the principles of Active Reading, and come in prepared to answer the Reading Questions.

Don't answer the questions on the handout in sentences and paragraphs, however. Instead, answer them in the margins of the book with word tags, arrows, stars--whatever symbols seems useful.  

Photocopy and Bring in

After you've read and marked your text, choose a two-page spread from the book that best shows your active reading and engagement with Ong and one of more of the questions above.  

Photocopy (a.k.a., scan and print) that two-page spread, write your name in the upper right on the paper, and bring it to class next time to turn in.  

Re-read, Re-mark and Bring Back

The Handout from Class "Jay David Bolter: The Cathedral and the Book"

 

 

Day 2. Literacy and Orality

bards
Turkish bards perform in the video Homer: Singer of Tales

Review from Last Time

  1. Literacy, Technology, and Society: the interrelationship of these terms, and how it rolls through history producing changes. 
  2. This course tells an historical story of these interrelationships, and this story is a history of the present moment: a moment when technology is changing who we are and how we live. 
  3. Active Reading: you are not just absorbing what the book has to say.  You’re using a pencil to have a conversation with the text in the margins.  You’re a partner in making the book mean something.  Your part of the conversation doesn’t have to be in words: lines, arrows, symbols, circles, pictures, diagrams. Idiosyncratic. 
  4. Read on paper, class is a device-free zone
  5. “Society" contrasted to “culture"


    "Society" (example: 15th Century Europe - time of Gutenberg)

    1. "body of institutions and relationships2. "common life" as in "life we share in common" 3. companionship or fellowship

    "Culture"

    Shared ways of thinking, feeling, and acting

Goals Today

  1. Explain what the "orality of language” is, and why it is interesting and relevant to writers, and to those of us who live in a literate culture
  2. See Plato and Homer as chapters in this big story, locations on this journey: The Homeric question and Plato's Self Contradiction
  3. Appreciate and understand the differences between oral and written cultures 
  4. Understand how “culture” is different from “society" (car example)

Terms to Remember

  • the orality of language
  • oral culture
  • the Homeric Question
  • soceity vs. culture

Resources

 

WEEK 2
T 9/8

Homework

Read and Mark

Read Ong's Chapter 3, "Psychodynamics of Orality" and come in prepared to answer the Reading Questions for Chapter 3

Answer The Reading Questions on Paper

Answer each of these questions in writing: a paragraph, a list, a chart, or map, etc. Make your answer "thing-like" (Ong 11), and be sure the "thing" specifically refers to particular pages and passages in Ong's Chapter 3.

Day 3. The Oral Mind

Goals for Today

  1. Understand the Kinds of Things to Know How to Do for the Exams
  2. Memorize and understand the 9 Psychodynamics of Orality
  3. Explain the significance of Ong's distinction between sight and sound (sight isolates, sound incorporates, interiority)

Kinds of Things to Know How to Do for the Exams

  1. Identify who said/thought/represents what
  2. Be able to explain transformative terms and statements
  3. Remember components of important ideas and how they relate ("W" is made up of "X," "Y," and "Z")
  4. Distinguish key distinctions ("this vs. that")
  5. Make connections and elaborate narratives ("this goes with that," or "this leads to that" or "this is like that")

Psychodynamics of Orality

A
A
R
C
L
A
E
H
S

38-Year-Old Wheat Farmer

wheat farmer

Terms to Remember

  • the nine psychodynamics of orality
  • "sight isolates, sound incorporates"
  • agonistic (6th of 9 psychodynamics of orality)
  • 38-Year-Old Wheat Farmer as example of oral consciousness)
  • 7 brothers becoming 5 brothers as example of oral history (
  • bards (oral tradition of poetry)

Resources

 

R 9/10

Homework

Read and Mark

Read "Ong Chapter 4 "Writing Restuctures Consciousness." Mark and, using the techniques of Active Reading, make marginal notes, especially with the question below in mind.

Write, Print, and Bring

Write a 500-word "Preparation Sheet" titled "Ong Chapter 4" which answers the following question:

"According to Ong, how does the technology of writing "restructure consciousness" and how does this restructuring affect human society, individual identity, or the sense of history?"

This preparation sheet should

Bring

Bring your Ong book and be sure you have the handouts "The Cathedral and the Book" and "from Plato's Phaedrus"

Day 4. Writing Restructures Consciousness

Review from Last Time

  • nonsense sentences for "AARCLAEHS"

Look at Homework for Next Time

spectator
Concert spectator from the video "Dream Baby Dream" (Bruce Springsteen, The Wrecking Ball tour)

Discussion of Chapter 4

Extreme change of gears:
Reading from your responses and commentaries...

"The Sense of True Writing"

  • page 83

Plato

Terms to Remember

  • Oral culture as "conservative" (4th of 9 psychodynamics)
  • "true writing" (a "script") as the "representation of an utterance,"" rather than of "things" (Ong).
  • "writing restructures consciousness"
  • Plato's criticism of writing

 

WEEK 3
T 9/15

Homework

Post to Moodle Site

In the Moodle forum, "Writing Restructures Consciousness," create an "intellectual postcard" about a key idea from the first four chapters of Ong's Orality and Literacy.

Use a quote from Ong somewhere in your writing. Feel free to repurpose some analysis from your Preparation Sheet on Chapter 4.

You should try to insert a visible image into your posting, rather than just inserting a link. To insert an image in Moodle,

  1. Find an image online.
  2. Right-click (control+click on Mac) and select "View Image"
  3. In the new browser window, copy the URL from the location bar at the top
  4. In the Moodle forum, choose to post a reply
  5. Click in the New Message Window
  6. At the top of the message window, click the "Insert Image" icon (looks like a tree)
  7. In the Insert/Edit Image Window, find the "Image URL" box and paste in the URL.
  8. Click the "Insert" button
  9. In the message window, you can type or copy text to include with the image.
  10. If you are unable to make this work, simply include a text link to the image in your message.)

If you insert the URL of a video (YouTube, for example), Moodle will usually embed the video in a player, which will allow us to watch it without having to leave the Moodle page.

Bring Your Ong Book

 

Day 5. The Machine that Made Us

machine that made us: paper

Viewing Guide

Handout: Viewing Guide for the film

Return of Preparation Sheets

Terms of Remember

  • modernity
  • secondary orality (Ong)
R 9/17

Homework

Read

Paul Cobley, Narrative, Chapter 1 "In the Beginning, The End"

Reading Question:

Cobley argues that the power of narratives comes not simply from their content, but from the form of narrative.

This power, Cobley says, is fundamental to the human experience, which makes "narrative" much more than just another way of organizing a piece of writing.

Choose three specific, key quotations from Cobley's chapter which suggest the source, nature, and/OR consequence of this primal, narrative power.

Come to class prepared to read and explain your choices.

Day 6. Why Narrative?

The Machine That Made Us

machine that made us: paper

machine that made us: boat

machine that made us: press

How the Cobley Book is Different From Ong's Book

 

Terms to Remember from Cobley C1

  • story, plot, narrative 5
  • emplotment 17;
  • history 18
  • identity 21 
  • representation 8, 14
  • phylogeny, ontogeny 19, 27

 

 

WEEK 4
T 9/22

Homework

Read Cobley Chapter 3

Read Cobley, Chapter 3 "The Rise and Rise of the Novel."

Reading Question:

Cobley argues that how you choose to tell a story creates a "problem of representation" and a potential crisis of social authority. Identify three passages (with page numbers) from the chapter that suggest why the telling of a story has such an effect on the story's meaning and consequence.

Post In Moodle

Choose one of those passages and, in a reply to the Moodle forum, "Cobley C3,"

  1. Type in the quotation from Cobley
  2. Include a page-number citation at the end of the quotation
  3. Write a paragraph analyzing your quotation and explaining how Cobley sees narrative as playing a role in consciousness, society, identity formation, etc. and why that role is controversial or problematic.

Read Cobley Chapter 4

Read Cobley, Chapter 4, "Realism"

Reading Questions

1. According to Cobley, what are some characteristics of "realist" representation? What ideas, attitudes, philosophies, or goals do works of realism share?

Make a list of at least four characteristics with page numbers.

2. Conventionally, "realistic" representation is assumed to be objective, scientific, and apolitical. Throughout this chapter, however, Cobley argues otherwise.

Identify at least three of Cobley's reasons, ideas, examples, or arguments (with page numbers) that show how realist narrative is not pure or uncontroversial in its representation of truth.

Post In Moodle

Choose one of those passages and, in a reply to the Moodle forum, "Cobley C4,"

  1. Type in the quotation from Cobley
  2. Include a page-number citation at the end of the quotation
  3. write a paragraph explaining how the quotation from Cobley argues that realism is not ultimately a way around the problems and controversies of representation.

 

Day 7. Cobley C3: The Problem of Representation;

Cobley C4: RealismRomper Stomper

Representation

Imitation and Elaboration

showing and telling, scene and summary, imitative mimesis and the poet's voice

List

Ideas, Attitudes, Philosophies, Goals Shared by Works of Realism

Terms to Remember

  • mimesis vs. diegesis (showing vs. telling)
  • the problem of representatkon
  • realism (5 characteristics)
  • broad canvas
  • knowable community

Resources:

 

 

R 9/24

Homework

Read

Read Cobley Chapter 5, "Beyond Realism"

Reading Question:

In Chapter 4, Cobley argued the 19th and 20th centuries saw a transformation in the scale of economic life (i.e., "capitalism") through three phases (88). These phases had profound effects on both the form and focus of narratives, and on contemporary models of individualism or identity.

In Chapter 5, Cobley is describing the last phase of economic development: the global or "imperialist" stage.

Identity at least three passages or examples from Chapter 5 that demonstrate the characteristics of this third phase, and how those characteristics resulted in "modernist" narrative style and a "modernist" identity.

In a reply to the Moodle forum "Cobley C5" (by 7 a.m.), give the page number, a brief quotation, and two or three sentences of explanation for each of your choices.

 

Day 8. Modernism (Cobley C5: Beyond Realism)

Reveiw from Last Time:

  • The problems of representation are what makes studying representations interesting (example, Romper Stomper): "Who is in control of these signs?" "Who is the authority here?" (Cobley 79)
  • narrative (a form of representation) = showing + telling (that is "mimesis" + "diegnsis")
  • omniscient narrator is typical of realism (narrative point of view)
  • realism is an -ism (a system of belief and practice)

Comment

Narrative Levels

Resources

 

WEEK 5
T 9/29

Homework

1. Read

Read all of The Picture of Dorian Gray, including the "Preface"

2. Answer a Reading Question in Moodle

The Picture of Dorian Gray is a book about the relationship of art and life--or, more generally, of representation and life.  

(Remember, "representation" includes writing, visual art, music, performance, or any other way of "externalizing" and preserving experience.)

Wilde's particular position about that relationship can be termed "aestheticism," which is partly a reaction against realism and the conventionalized "common sense" that accepted forms of realism expressed.  

moodle In a message to the Moodle forum "Wilde Dualisms," identify 2 quotations with page numbers which demonstrate the novel's ongoing preoccupation the relationship of art and life and its opposition to common-sense realism, which appears in dualisms like the following:

  • morality vs. sensuality
  • philosophy vs. art
  • beauty vs. genius
  • emotion vs. intellect
  • pretend vs. real
  • the senses vs. the soul
  • etc.

Write a paragraph under these quotations explaining how the two quotations, together, might suggest a philosophy or position concerning the relationship of representation and life.  In what ways might representation be the foundation of a life founded on "aestheticism"?  

3. Be Ready to Discuss the "Problems of Representation" Posed By This Novel

Contemporary criticisms of Picture of Dorian Gray charged:

  • that the book was immoral
  • that the characters are callow "puppies," not worthy of our attention
  • that the book is little more than a "self-advertisement" for Wilde's self-created cult of personality

Wilde responded to these criticisms in his "Preface" to The Picture of Dorian Gray.  

Is the book immoral?  Are the characters shallow? Is Wilde using the book only as a vehicle for his wit and personal style?  

How does Wilde answer these accusations in specific lines of his rather cryptic Preface?  

4. Read to Understand "Aestheticism" Better

Read the brief excerpts from Walter Pater's The Renaissance. These are two classic statements of aestheticism (in short, the assertion of art and literature's independence from the need to teach, inspire, or otherwise be socially useful).

5. Complete the Handout

In the right-hand column of the handout Realism vs. Aestheticism, try entering in phrases and page numbers from either Wilde or Pater which characterize aestheticism, in contrast to the characteristics of realism listed on the left side.

Please bring this handout in paper form so you can turn it in for credit.

Day 9. Picture of Dorian Gray

wilde

Modernism Handout

I will give you a copy of the revised "Modernism" handout. On it, I have copied some of the quotations from Cobley which you posted to the "Cobley C5" Moodle forum about modernism.

I will ask you to keep this handout for a later meeting, when I will ask you to combine and distill the quotations into 5 characteristics of modernist narrative.

Read over this handout and make some preliminary notes in the margins about how we will describe these characteristics.

Historical Relationship of Realism, Modernism, and Aestheticism

Base and Superstructure: Historical Materialism ;Eagleton on Imperialism (Cobley 88)

art and literature (narrative forms)
religion and culture
politics
social relations
economic relations
economics and technology
material facts of the here and now

Aesthetic-

"of or relating to the nature of art, beauty, and taste, and to the creation and appreciation of beauty."

-ism

"a distinctive practice, system, or philosophy, typically a political ideology or an artistic movement."

Characters, Plot, Ideas

Aesthetic Ideas (Dualisms) in Contrast to Realist Ideas

We'll consider how these two sets of ideas relate using the handout "Realism and Aestheticism," which you completed for homework.

Criticisms of the Novel

  • the ending of Dorian Gray
  • the Preface as a response to the criticisms of the books as immortal and a self-advertisement.

Note: Why We're Reading Dorian Gray Before Dracula

In this class, we're reading The Picture of Dorian Gray (1891) right before Dracula (1899) because we want to understand why the 1890s were such an "anxious" period, especially concerning issues of gender and sexuality. Dracula is drenched in such social anxiety.

The ends of centuries tend to produce cultural anxieties about the future. The French even have a word for such periods of apprehension: the fin de siècle (pronounced "fan de see-ECK-le, translated, the "end of the century").

Why might The Picture of Dorian Gray have produced anxieities about gender and sexuality in the 1890s--or how might it produce such anxieties for readers today?

How did (or does) aestheticism support or heighten this sexual anxiety in The Picture of Dorian Gray?

 

October

  Homework to Complete Topics in Class

R 10/1

 

Homework

Read

Read Dracula, pages 26-153

Find Quotations, Page Numbers, and Be Prepared to Discuss:


1.
East and West

During Jonathan Harker's journey to, and stay with, Dracula at his castle, Stoker suggests contrasts of East and West (Transylvania and Britain). Write down the page numbers of two specific phrases, passages, or descriptions where Stoker characterizes (or even just implies a characterization of) differences between East and West. ...What role do literacy and technology play in shaping those respective societies?

...In what ways do Dracula and Jonathan exemplify their respective societies?

2. Past and Present

Note down the location of three passages (with page numbers) that contrast past and present in the novel Dracula. What ideas does Stoker associate with the past or the present, and with their differences.

Day 10. Dracula I

Review: Base and Superstructure

I will give you a paper copy of the online handout, Base and Superstucture (Historical Materialism of Marx).

art and literature (narrative forms)
religion and culture
politics
education and science
social relations
economic relations
economics and technology
material facts of the here and now

Discussion

  • The East/West in Dracula
  • Past/Present in Dracula

Wilde and Stoker

Handout

"Notes on the Gothic Genre"

 

 

WEEK 6
R 10/6

Homework

Read and Be Prepared

Read Dracula, page 154 to the end of the novel.

Be prepared for some plot-oriented questions that might take the form of a pop-quiz.

Compare Dracula and Dorian Gray

Our handout, "Notes on the Gothic Genre," describes six characteristics of Gothic Narraive.

On the version of the handout with tables under each characteristic, write page numbers and brief notes under each to compare Dracula to The Picture of Dorian Gray as examples of this Gothic genre.

Under characteristic #6, some aspects of modern culture that might be the subject of either radical critique or conservative defense include

  • gender/sexuality
  • race
  • nationality
  • what is "natural" or unnatural
  • power
  • religion
  • family (blood)
  • rationalism
  • capitalism
  • communication technologies
  • social class
  • there are others -- choose your own

 

Day 11. Dracula II


Shot from Tim Burton's Edward Scissorhands (1990)

Midterm Moved to Tuesday, October 20

This will allow us to spend one more day with Dracula.

Return of Realism/Aestheticism Handouts

What I Was Hoping We Would Get Out of Reading Dracula in this Class

  • how Dracula continues to tell the story told by Ong, Fry, Cobley--the relations of literacy, technology, and society 
  • what's happening in that story in 1897 -- at the turn of the 20th century -- at least from the point of view of Bram Stoker.

Dracula, Dorian Gray, and Gothic Narrative

Resources

 

R 10/8

Homework

Literacy, Technology, or Society in Dracula (Response in Moodle)

Post the following to the Moodle Forum, "Literacy, Technology, or Society," by 8 a.m. today.

Choose a passage from Dracula and use it to analyze how Stoker's presents literacy, technology, or society as a theme in Dracula.

1. Start by choosing a character or plot event in the novel, which seems to feature literacy, technology, or society as a theme.

2. Look closely at Stoker's language in some passages from the novel which represent what happens to that character, what the character does, or how the plot event unfolds.

3. In a rite a substantial paragraph in which you quote from Dracula to describe what you see Stoker saying about the

  • promise or dangers of technology
  • the power or limitations of literacy
  • the strengths or limitations of modernity as embodied in the structures and norms of modern "society."

Be sure to quote from the novel at least twice in your paragraph, and to do a "close reading" of the language of those quotations in your own analysis.

A Note on "Society" (Remember the Car Example from the First Day)

By the word society, we mean not just the people of a nation or group, but the entire complex of conditions, practices, and structures that makes up the norms of given way of life: economic, legal, technological, bureaucratic, cultural, geographical, etc.

Remember the first day of class when we drew on the board a cluster around the picture of the car. With this cluster, we attempted to identify all the "conditions, practices, and structures" necessary to make having a car possible and useful. That cluster was one way of describing a modern society, of which the car is emblematic.

In the Moodle paragraph assigned above, I'm asking you to choose some element of Dracula to put at the center, and then describe how Stoker represents the society (or the literacies, or the technologies) that fan out from the example you pu at the center.

Day 12. Dracula III

Review

  • The Cycle of Literacy, Technology, and Society
  • Identity, History, Consciousness

For Next Time: Set Up Historiography,
Hayden White, and Karl Marx

These are our readings for next time.

 

 

 

WEEK 7
T 10/13

Homework

Download, Print, Read, Mark, and Bring

1. From Moodle, download, print, read, mark and bring to class

  • the first page of Hayden White's Introduction to The Tropics of Discourse
  • the first four pages of Hayden White's chapter "Fictions of Factual Representation" (pages 121-125) from his book Tropics of Discourse
  • the first two pages of Hayden White's chapter "Interpretation in History" (pages 51 and 52)

See the Moodle site for links to these PDFs.

2. Download, print, read, mark and bring to class Karl Marx's "Preface" to A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy (starting with the fifth paragraph, which begins "The first work which....")

Read this as both an example of what White calls "metahistory," and also an interpretation of the historical processes we've been discussing in class (think of Ong, the big timeline on the board, the succession of eras in Cobley, etc.).

Day 13. Historiography: Hayden White, Karl Marx

 

Exam Format

I will give you a copy of the exam format for the Midterm

Kinds of Things to Know How to Do for the Midterm Exam

  1. Identify who said/thought/represents what
  2. Be able to explain transformative terms and statements
  3. Remember components of important ideas and how they relate ("W" is made up of "X," "Y," and "Z")
  4. Distinguish key distinctions ("this vs. that")
  5. Make connections and elaborate narratives ("this goes with that," or "this leads to that" or "this is like that")

Question about White's Tropics of Discourse

— Why does what White's analysis of "data," "discourse" and "meaning" call into question the very possibility of history being scientific and objective?  

discourse

Terms to Remember

  • Plato's idealism vs. historical materialism
  • data
  • discourse
  • verbal image of meaning
  • metahistorian vs. "proper" historian
  • Ong: "you know what you can recall" (33)
  • Ong: seven sons/five sons (48)
  • historiography
  • narrative/aesthetic interpretation vs. scientific explanation
  • base and superstructure
  • ideology

Resources:

 

R 10/15

Homework

Bring to Class

Bring to class all books, handouts, and notes from the first half of the class.

Make a Short List on Paper

List the five or six most significant or memorable ideas or examples (to you) from the first half of the semester?

These items may or may not appear on the "Terms to Remember" sections of each day's caldenar. 

Include the names of sources and page numbers for each item. 

Write and Printout

Download and open this online verison of the Aestheticism/Realism handout that I gave you previously.

On this handout, I have included quotations that you selected from Oscar Wilde and Walter Pater to represent the aesthetic side of this conversation. Each row is a different issue or topic with the realism viewpoint described on the left and the aesthetic viewpoint suggested with quotations on the right.

Using Word or another word processing program, try adding your own language above the quotaions on the aesthetic side. Try to make your language parallel the descriptions on the realism side so it speaks directly to them and thus replies to what the realist viewpoint argues.

Print out the revised handout with your additions and bring it to class.

Day 14. FIRST-HALF WRAP UP
Review for Midterm Exam

Questions?

Review/Catch Up: Materialism and Idealism (Marx and Plato)

Discuss Homework/Online Study Session

Five or Six Significant or Memorable Ideas/Examples

Kinds of Things to Know How to Do for the Exams

  1. Identify who said/thought/represents what
  2. Be able to explain transformative terms and statements
  3. Remember components of important ideas and how they relate ("W" is made up of "X," "Y," and "Z")
  4. Distinguish key distinctions ("this vs. that")
  5. Make connections and elaborate narratives ("this goes with that," or "this leads to that" or "this is like that")

 

 

 

WEEK 8
T 10/20

Homework

Post Three Sample Questions to the Moodle Wikis by Monday at Noon

By Monday at noon, post a question to each of the three Wiki's in our Moodle site's "Midterm Exam" section.

The questions should follow the format of questions in the three parts of the Midterm's exam format handout I gave you previously.

In the "Terms" and "Short Answer" Wiki, do not post or indicate the answers.

In the "Matching" Wiki, be sure to list your "Item" out of order (that is, if your "Match" is third in the list, do not put your "Item" third in its list).

See the directions in the headnote of each Wiki. I have posted an example of a sample question to get you started.

In each Wiki, you will need to

  • click the "Edit" tab to write your question
  • click the "Save" button at the bottom to save your work.

Bring 2 Pens to Class

 

 

 

Day 15. Midterm Exam

Time Management in the Exam

You will have the entire 75 minute class period to take the exam.

Though the exam is in three parts--Matching, Fill in the Blanks, and Short Answer--you should devote more time to the Short Answer part than the others.

Since the Matching and Fill-in-the-Blanks parts take the least amount of writing, therefore, plan on spending no more than one-third of the period on both of these.

If you finish both the Matching and Fill in the Blanks parts by 9:55, you would then have at least 25 minutes each on the two short answer quesitons.

This would mean you could start your second short-answer question no later than 10:20 and complete it by 10:45.

If you finish before 10:45, you can turn in all your materials and leave quietly.

Directions for the Exam

  1. Clear your desk of any books and notes

  2. Write your name at the upper right of (1) the question sheet, (2) the answer sheet, and (3) each sheet of lined paper on which you write your Short Answer responses.

  3. Write all your answers on the answer sheet or lined paper provided. 

  4. Feel free to make notes and marks on the question sheet. 

  5. Be sure to read all directions for each section carefully. 

  6. Please write clearly and legibly in blue or black ink.

  7. When you're done, turn in everything: the question sheet, the printed answer sheet, and the lined paper you wrote on.

  8. If you finish before the end of the period, you can turn in all your materials and leave quietly.

 

 

 

R 10/22

Homework

Read

Read Cobley C6: Modernism and Cinema

Copy, Paste, Write, Print, Bring

Copy the following questions into a Word file and, for each, record page numbers and brief verbal tags that point to two quotations from Cobley that help answer it. Print out the document and bring it to class. (Note that your answers may be handwritten or typed on the printout.)

1. According to Cobley, what are the features of modernist narrative (for instance, how does it differ from realist or traditional narrative)?

2. What are the features of a modernist self or identity?

3. In what ways does cinematic narrative differ from print narrative according to Cobley? What are some of cinematic narrative's features and techniques?

4. According to Cobley, what are some ways that cinema naturally expresses modernist ideas and attitudes? What are some examples Cobley uses, or that Cobley makes you think about?

 

Day 16. Modernism and Cinema (Cobley C6)

Resources

 

 

 

WEEK 9
T 10/27

Homework

Read

George Orwell's 1984, pgs. 1- 104.

Write a Paragraph Using 3 Quotations

What are some ways that the government controls society in 1984?

Identify three quotations that help describe these methods and their effects.

Write a long paragraph that uses the three quotations to answer the question.

Print the paragraph and bring it to class.

 

Day 17. 1984 I

ministry of truth

Writing Constitutes Thought

"How do I know what I think till I see what I say?" - E.M. Forester

Modernism (SPAS)

"Smirking Picasso Awfully Skewed."

Topics

Resources

Return of Midterms at the End of Class

 

R 10/29
 

Fall Break: No Class Meeting


November

Homework Topics
T 11/3

Homework

Read

1984 Book Two: pgs. 105- 298

Four Quotations and a Paragraph

Come in with four quotations from 1984 and a paragraph (on paper):

1. Look at the four characteristics of modernism from out Modernism handout.

2. Consider these two questions:

  • How does the novel 1984 represent a modermist kind of world?

  • How does the novel express modernist ideas and assumptions in its representation of that world?

 

3. For each of the four characteristics, write down a quotation (with page number) from the novel that demonstrates/illustrates that kind of world or representation. (Be sure that at least two of the four quotations come from today's reading assignment)

4. Beneath those four quotations, write a substantive paragraph that sums up how those four quotations work together:

  • to describe modernist "society" (institutions, relationships, practices) and

  • to express modernist "culture" (shared ways of thinking, feeling, and acting).

 

Day 18. 1984 2

1984 worst cover art

Julia as a Rebel

Proles

Resources

 

R 11/5

Homework

Read

Cobley, Chapter 7 "Postmodernism"

Copy, Write, Print, Bring in

Answer each of the following questions in a paragraph. Quote from the Cobley book at least once in each.

1. In what ways does the postmodern condition result from the saturation of everyday life by media (the "mediation" of life)?

2. In what ways does the postmodern condition result from changes in the material or economic nature of this era's society (a.k.a., Marx's "base")?

3. How do postmodernist attitudes and ideas about the past (or history) differ from either the modernist rejection of the past, or the older veneration of tradition? What are these attitudes and ideas?

4. How do the "grand narratives" or "metanarratives" that Cobley (via Lyotard) talks about differ from ordinary stories or narratives? In other words, what makes them "grand" or "meta"?

 

DAY 19. Postmodernism

Postmodernism

"Real Dogs Have Fun, Mostly Inside"

dog inside

Resources

 

wheat farmer
38-year-old wheat farmer (from Ong)

WEEK 11
T 11/10

Homework

Read

Bridget Jones' Diary through page 177, but finish it if you have time.

Note Page Numbers

Come to class with two passages (with page numbers) chosen to help answer each of the following questions.

1. If you found this book funny at all, let's think about its comic or satirical aspects. In general, what are we laughing at? Are there repeated objects of humor? What might Fielding be satirizing (criticizing) in this book?

2. What are some postmodern aspects or moments in this book? (See details from our handout and Cobley's chapter).

3. Bridget and her friends like to go out and indulge in what Bridget calls "drunken feminist ranting" (107). Is Bridget Jones' Diary feminist? anti-feminist? post-feminist? We've talked about how female gender identities in Dracula signal anxieties about the coming modernist age. What implications does postmodernism have for gender identities in (more or less) our own time?

Day 20. Bridget Jones' Diary 1

Resources

Ong's 38-Year-Old Wheat Farmer
and Bridget Jones

wheat farmer

Postmodernism: (R.D.H.F.M.I.)

Rupture. Depthlessness. Hiearchies (collapsed), Fragmented (forms), Metanarratives (weakened), Irony
dog inside

 

R 11/12

Homework

Write and Print Out

1. Choose one passage (a paragraph to a page) from Bridget Jones' Diary which illustrates or suggests how the book might be "postmodern" in its style, subject matter, or meaning.

Consult the the Posmodernism handout defining the 6 characteristics of postmodernism. From class activities, you should have notes written on the handout, keying certain quotations from Cobley's book to the handout's six items.

2. From the passage in the novel, identify several key words or phrases that exemplify its meaning as an example of postmodernism.

3. Write a preparation sheet of 250 words (1 page, double-spaced) which performs a close reading of these words or phrases and their role in the passage. What are the implications of Fielding's word choice or word order for postmodern issues?

In the paragraph, be sure to quote Bridget Jones' Diary at least twice, and the Postmodernism handout (or Cobley's postmodernism chapter) at least twice.

 

Day 21. Bridget Jones' Diary 2

Bridget Jones and 1984

See 10 Books That Defined the Twenieth Century (Guardian newspaper)

Walter Ong on Diaries

See page 101 in Orality and Literacy

Postmodernity on the Street

We'll watch a short video of walking through Times Square (contrast to walking through Medieval cathedral)

Postmodernity: (R.D.H.F.M.I.)

dog inside

Discussion of Postmodernity in Bridget Jones' Diary

How does

  • the world of Bridget Jones,
  • the mind/self of Bridget Jones, and 
  • Helen Fielding’s way of writing Bridget Jones' Diary

register some of the social and psychological consequences of life in postmodern conditions? 

Feel free to make changes and annotations to your printout of your homework.

Postmodern Intertextuality

See Mark Darcy and Mr. Darcy

Resources

  • Depthless Surfaces: "Commentators such as Jean Baudrillard see the same period as dominated by the constant action of signs referring to themselves in an all-encompassing realm of 'simulation,' where signs take on value not because they refer to things in the world but because they refer only to each other" (Cobley 171)
  • Intertextuality: "Producers of narratives [are] 'oppressed by the [postmodern] fear that whatever they might have to say has been said before, and condemned to self-consciousness by the climate of modern culture" (Lodge qtd. in Cobley 180)
  • Pride and Prejudice: Mr Darcy's First Appearance
  • Bridget Jones' Diary: Intro
  • Postmodern Fight Scene (Mark and Daniel's fight from the film Bridget Jones' Diary)
  • Bridget Jones and 1984 (Guardian newspaper)

 

WEEK 12
T 11/17

Homework

Print, Read, and Make Notes On

Print, read, and annotate Chapters 2 and 6 of Scott McCloud's Understanding Comics" available from the Moodle site.

Reading Questions:

1. What points does McCloud make in Chapter 2 about the nature of "visual literacy" (in comics and graphic fiction).

2. In Chapter 6, how does McCloud characterize the hybrid literacy that results when visual and verbal languages are mingled together?

For each question, come in with 3-5 specific panels to point to that illustrate/make such points.

Designate panels by page number, row, and column (example: 41.1.2, meaning page 41, row 1, 2nd panel from the left)

Be ready to discuss the key ideas about visual or hybrid literacy, to point to where and how McCloud "explains" those ideas (what's the right word?), and ways that McCloud's style of presentation reflects the principles that he's conveying.

Post to Moodle by Monday Night

In the Moodle forum “Visual Styles,” post an image (as a visible image) and use McCloud’s critical vocabulary to analyze its visual style in a paragraph.

Start with McCloud's index of visual styles on pages 52-53.

How does the visual style affect the images meaning and effect? Be sure to cite the page, row, and column of the panel where McCloud discusses any critical terms you use. 

Resources That Might Be Useful

 

Day 22. Scott McCloud's Understanding Comics: Visual and Hybrid Literacies

Resources

R 11/19

Homework

Read

Read Persepolis: all including introduction

Post to 2 Moodle Forums

moodle By 8:30 today: In the two Moodle forums for Persepolis and McCloud, I will ask you to compare an individual panel or sequence of panels from Persepolis (cite page number and row number) to an idea/technique/effect from McCloud (represented by a particular panel or set of panels identified by page/row number).

Write about two such comparisons:

  1. in the "Perspolis and McCloud's C2" forum, compare panels from Satrapi and McCloud's Chapter 2 to analyze a technique of Visual Style in Persepolis

  2. in the "Perspolis and McCloud's C6" forum, compare panels from Satrapi and McCloud's Chapter 6 to analyze a technique of using Word/Image Combinations in Persepolis

In each case, try to explain how the McCloudesque technique affects the meaning and feeling Satrapi achieves in the story at that moment. In other words, we want to see how McCloud's various techniques actually matter when it comes to a real narrative.

Day 23. Persepolis

Resources

 

 

WEEK 13
R 11/24
 

No Class Meeting: Optional Conferences

If you could like to schedule an optional conference during our classtime, please email me at <cstroupe@d.umn.edu>.

I will list the times of already scheduled conferences below:

 

R 11/26  

Thanksgiving


December

Homework Topics
WEEK 14
T 12/1

Homework

Bring

Bring to class your McCloud printouts, Persepolis, and 1984.

Print Out and Read

Print, read, and write comments on the pages of McCloud’s Chapter 3 (available from the Moodle site). You can print multiple pages per sheet if you want to save money and paper.

Print and Annotate

Then Xerox/scan/print a single page from Persepolis and write annotations on the copy/printout that perform a "close reading" of the ways that Satrapi uses techniques of "closure" between or among panels to create meaning or effects in the reader's mind.

Draw lines between details in the panels (or the spaces between) and your comments (which you can write on post-its or small pieces of paper taped to parts of the page which are not part of your analysis.  

Each of your comments should cite a page/row/column in McCloud (mostly from Chapter 3, but other chapters too as useful).

Bring this printout to use in class and turn in.  

Day 24. McCloud C3 and Persepolis; Film Literacy: Psycho

McCloud's "Blood in the Gutter" (C3)

Four Parameters of Film

  • Cinematography
  • Editing
  • Mise-en-Scene
  • Sound

Resources

Handout

The Tragic Wit of Psycho (Donald Spoto)

 

R 12/3

Homework

Film Literacy Exercise

  1. Turn a piece of paper so it is oriented landscape
  2. Divide the page into four columns
  3. Label each column with the four formal parameters of film from today's lecture.
    Cinematography
    Editing
    Mise-en-Scene
    Sound

  4. Watch a scene from a film or television show (ideally one you can pause)
  5. Try writing down what is happening simultaneously or sequentially in each column.  
    In other words, imagine that there are time markers running down the left edge of the page, and try to keep your notes in that time structure, top to bottom.  

  6. Try to make notes to yourself on ways that the parameters work together to suggest meaning, prompt audience reponses, or create a sense of identification.

  7. You may need to replay the scene again.
     

Bring your page with you to class.

Read "Tragic Wit...," Choose Topic, and Bring Note Sheets

Read the handout The Tragic Wit of Psycho (Donald Spoto)

Choose a particular theme or effect described by Spoto to look for as you watch the film

Come in with several sheets of paper divided into four columns for taking notes on the four parameters of film: Cinematography, Editing, Mise en Scene, Sound.

Be prepared especially to take notes on the narrative of the film (as opposed to the story or plot), paying particular attention to how the film's technique serves a meaning and effect that Spoto talks about (and the meaning and effect of the film generally).

Essentially, we want to pay attention to how technique (narrative) is deployed not for its own sake, but for larger social, cultural, political, aesthetic purposes.

Day 25. Psycho

Taking Notes on Film

Today in class, I will ask you to take notes on the film using the four-column-entry format I explained as part of your homework for today:

  1. Turn a piece of paper so it is oriented landscape
  2. Divide the page into four columns
  3. At the top, label each column 
    Cinematography
    Editing
    Mise-en-Scene
    Sound

 

 

 

 

WEEK 15
T 12/8

Homework

Post to Moodle in "Psycho 1"

moodle In a reply to the forum "Psycho 1," write a long paragraph that does the following:

1. Begin by quoting Spoto about one theme or idea that he observes in Psycho from the handout "The Tragic Wit of Psycho."

Some of the themes or ideas Spoto mentions incude

  • Gothicism,
  • the American Dream,
  • "horror and tyranny" of "impulses"
  • decay, death
  • sex,
  • wit, humor, fun
  • sadness,
  • madness,
  • mothers, sons
  • wasted lives
  • spiritual, moral disarray
  • bathrooms,
  • audience manipulation,
  • tragedy,
  • economy of style
  • (Even this is not a complete list)

2. Then do the following in your paragraph:

A. describe a scene, shot, or sequence in the film that illustrates Hitchcock's handling of that theme or idea,

B. analyze how Hitchcock employs one of more of the narrative "parameters of film" to develop this theme or idea in your chosen scene or shot (cinematography, editing, mise-en-scene, sound),

B. Then, explain how that same scene or shot suggests a relationship or association between your chosen theme or idea and another one that Spoto mentions, or perhaps one that you've observed. (For example, how a particular scene relates

  • "bathrooms" and "wasted lives," or
  • "Gothicism" and "mothers/sons," or
  • "American Dream" and "birds").


If you are able to find a screen shot online from that scene to illustrate your paragraph, feel free to insert it into your post. (For help, see these instructions for inserting images into Moodle.)

Reply to Someone Else's Post to "Psycho 1"

Finally, respond to someone else's Moodle posting, explaining to some connection or parallel between that posting and your own.

In essence, we're using one scene or shot from Psycho to enable us to see how two of the many ideas Spoto talks about work together in the film.

Day 26. Psycho

Taking Notes on Film

Today in class, I will ask you to take notes on the film using the four-column-entry format I explained as part of your homework for today:

  1. Turn a piece of paper so it is oriented landscape
  2. Divide the page into four columns
  3. At the top, label each column 
    Cinematography
    Editing
    Mise-en-Scene
    Sound

 

R 12/10
LAST CLASS

Homework

Exam Preparation: Two Copies of Cluster

1. Do a cluster of at least ten items from our semester's readings and discussions. (Follow the link for directions on clustering.)

This cluster should have as its central starting point one "stimulus word or phrase": a particular object, example, symbol, person, etc. from a single text from our class.

In that cluster, then try to associatively conntect to that central starting point as many items as you can from the entire semester as you can. These conntected items can be titles, examples, abstract ideas, characters, scenes, phrases, distinctions, passages, key terms, etc.

Examples of the cluster's central object, example, etc. could be

  • the memory hole in Winston's office from 1984,
  • the 38-year-old wheat farmer from Walter Ong's Orality and Literacy,
  • the 10-minute scene of Norman's cleaning up from Psycho.
  • Mina's typerwriter from Dracula
  • Cobley's reading of Heart of Darkness in the Modernism chapter of Narrative.

All items should include have page numbers.

2. Make a second copy of your completed cluster and bring both to class.

Another Moodle Post to "Psycho 1"

Having finished the film, read over the postings in the Moodle forum "Psycho 1." Choose one to reply to.

In this reply, extend the conversation started in the previous posting(s) with additional details from the last part of the film.

In your post, try to speak to what Hitchcock is doing in both the

  • story/plot, as well as the
  • narrative.

That is, try to write not only about

  • what happens and what it means (in relation to the Spoto themes and ideas), but also about
  • the ways that Hitchcock renders the shots and scenes using the narrative parameters of film.

 

Day 27. Exam Preparation

 

Resources

List of Texts from Fall 2015

 

WEEK 16
FINALS WEEK:
T 12/15
 

Online FINAL EXAM via Moodle
(open book, open note, 2-hour time limit)

moodle Complete the two-hour final exam via Moodle sometime between 8 a.m. and 4 p.m. today.

Remember to answer only three of the five questions.

If you have technical issues during office hours, call the ITSS Help Desk at 726-8847.

As a precaution, be sure to write each answer in text-editing software and save it in a file on your computer.

After you have completed each answer, copy the text into that question's text box in Moodle.

If you have technical problems with Moodle during the exam time, please copy the text of your answers into an email and send the email to me no more than two hours after the time you started the exam.

If you are using Firefox and have trouble typing into a text box, use the handle grip in the lower right of the text box to enlarge it slightly.