Connections A Hypertext Resource for Literature

Spring 2024 (two sections)

Monday, January 22

First day: introductions and course overview

First (brief) assignments, due by tonight at 9:00 p.m. Iowa time

First, go to the Self-introductions document in our class OneDrive folder and introduce yourself.

Then, put the following in your Commonplace Document:

  • A statement of interest: based on the readings for this class so far and your previous academic work, write down a topic that you'd like to follow through the term as a way to guide your reading. Examples of possible topics include literary experimentation, sexualities, religion, animal imagery, literary form, narrative technique, race and ethnicity, money and work, and so on. You are welcome to choose any of these or create your own. Just be sure that you select something you will be excited to look for throughout the term.

Wednesday, January 24

An introductory video and three poems on the United States:

Assignment, from the reading routine, due by 10:00 the night before class in your Commonplace Document:

  • Group 1: prepare discussion prompts
  • Everyone else: enter commonplace notes

Friday, January 26

  • Natalie Diaz on using poetic form to find freedom (short video)

  • Professor Simpson's introductory video on Shakespeare's sonnets (use the Pweb link to the class YouTube channel)

  • Connections on the sonnet (either through the website or, probably better, in this PDF)

  • Close Reading (PDF)

  • William Shakespeare, Sonnet 29 (PWeb Documents section)

Assignment, from the reading routine, due by 10:00 the night before class in your Commonplace Document:

  • Group 2: prepare discussion prompts
  • Everyone else: enter commonplace notes

Monday, January 29

Note: here and throughout this syllabus, the first (less indented) reading or link is required, while the second (more indented) reading or link is supplemental and optional. Here, for example, the first four readings are required, whereas exploring "for better or verse" is optional.

Assignment, from the reading routine, due by 10:00 the night before class in your Commonplace Document:

  • Group 3: prepare discussion prompts
  • Everyone else: enter commonplace notes

Wednesday, January 31

Assignment, from the reading routine, due by 10:00 the night before class in your Commonplace Document:

  • Group 4: prepare discussion prompts
  • Everyone else: enter commonplace notes

Friday, February 2

Friday writing: Submit the close reading exercise to your commonplace document by 9:00 p.m.

Monday, February 5

  • Robert Dale Parker, "Feminism," from How to Interpret Literature (Pweb Documents)

  • Connections on couplets (either through the website or, probably better, in this PDF)

  • Robert Browning, "My Last Duchess" (1842; read the text and listen to the recording by hitting the play button next to the title)

  • Erik Simpson, Five Ways of Looking at a Thesis

Assignment, from the reading routine, due by 10:00 the night before class in your Commonplace Document:

  • Group 1: prepare discussion prompts
  • Everyone else: enter commonplace notes

Wednesday, February 7

  • Parker, "Queer Studies" (Pweb Documents)

  • Connections on blank verse (either through the website or, probably better, in this PDF)

  • Robert Frost, "Mending Wall" (1914; at least read the poem, then continue to these critical excerpts if you wish to)

Assignment, from the reading routine, due by 10:00 the night before class in your Commonplace Document:

  • Group 2: prepare discussion prompts
  • Everyone else: enter commonplace notes

Friday, February 9

Read the thesis handout carefully so that you are prepared for an in-class writing exercise about thesis construction.

Monday, February 12

Assignment, from the reading routine, due by 10:00 the night before class in your Commonplace Document:

  • Group 3: prepare discussion prompts
  • Everyone else: enter commonplace notes

Wednesday, February 14

Poetry embodied in performance:

  • Tracie Morris, "Africa(n)" (2008, video #3 on the page)

  • Danez Smith, "Dinosaurs in the Hood" (2014): text and video

  • Ocean Vuong, two pieces from this video:

    • Introductory analogy between poetry and fashion (5:00)

    • "Threshold" (6:45, immediately following the introductory analogy)

Assignment, from the reading routine, due by 10:00 the night before class in your Commonplace Document:

  • Group 4: prepare discussion prompts
  • Everyone else: enter commonplace notes

Friday, February 16

By 10:00 the night before class, enter your poetry close reading prototypes into your Commonplace Document. We will workshop your prototypes in class.

Monday, February 19

  • Timothy Corrigan, A Short Guide to Writing about Film, from chapters 2 and 3 (PWeb Documents)

  • CineFix's Best Shots of All Time, Part 1 (and if you like that, feel free to keep exploring similar videos on the CineFix channel!)

By 10:00 the night before class, make a brief note in your Commonplace Document about one thing that Corrigan's book has helped you understand in a new way.

Wednesday, February 21

Assignment, from the reading routine, due by 10:00 the night before class in your Commonplace Document:

  • Group 1: prepare discussion prompts
  • Everyone else: enter commonplace notes

Friday, February 23

Friday writing: PAPER DUE BY EMAIL ATTACHMENT at 9:00 p.m.

Monday, February 26

Assignment, from the reading routine, due by 10:00 the night before class in your Commonplace Document:

  • Group 2: prepare discussion prompts
  • Everyone else: enter commonplace notes

Wednesday, February 28

By 10:00 the night before class, type into your commonplace document the one sentence (with a page citation) that you most think of as the thesis of Ecks's article. (There is not a single right answer.)

Friday, March 1

Friday writing: Submit the source analysis to your Commonplace Document by 9:00 p.m.

Monday, March 4

Assignment, from the reading routine, due by 10:00 the night before class in your Commonplace Document:

  • Group 3: prepare discussion prompts
  • Everyone else: enter commonplace notes

Wednesday, March 6

  • Paul Schrader, "Notes on Film Noir" (PWeb Documents)

  • Carl Franklin, Devil in a Blue Dress (1995)

    • Assignment, from the reading routine, due by 10:00 the night before class in your Commonplace Document:

    • Group 4: prepare discussion prompts
    • Everyone else: enter commonplace notes

    Friday, March 8

    By 10:00 the night before class, enter your scene analysis prototypes into your Commonplace Document. We will workshop your prototypes in class.

    Monday, March 11

    Do the (very short) reading carefully so that you are prepared for an in-class exercise working on transitions.

    Wednesday, March 13

    Today will will have a peer review of skeleton papers. In your group's OneDrive folder, upload a document that contains a current version of one of your papers that removes the body paragraphs except for the first (transition) sentence of each one. Your version should have a title, first paragraph, transition sentences, last paragraph, and bibliography. In class, you will share this skeletal paper with a group and work through a set of questions to evaluate it.

    Friday, March 15

    Friday writing: PAPER DUE BY EMAIL ATTACHMENT at 9:00 p.m.

    SPRING BREAK

    Monday, April 1

    We will begin looking at Dubliners in class today. Because of the break, the reading is short, and you have no other written assignment for today.  

    Wednesday, April 3

    Assignment, from the reading routine, due by 10:00 the night before class in your Commonplace Document:

    • Group 1: prepare discussion prompts
    • Everyone else: enter commonplace notes

    Friday, April 5

    All revised submissions of incomplete work from assignments due before Spring Break are due today by 9:00 p.m. Let me know if you submit any such work for me to review.

    • Joyce, "The Dead," from Dubliners

    Assignment, from the reading routine, due by 10:00 the night before class in your Commonplace Document:

    • Group 2: prepare discussion prompts
    • Everyone else: enter commonplace notes

    Monday, April 8

    • Michael Levenson, "Living History in 'The Dead'" (PWeb Documents)

    • Parker, "Historicism and Cultural Studies" (Pweb Documents)

    Assignment, from the reading routine, due by 10:00 the night before class in your Commonplace Document:

    • Group 3: prepare discussion prompts
    • Everyone else: enter commonplace notes

    Wednesday, April 10

    Assignment, from the reading routine, due by 10:00 the night before class in your Commonplace Document:

    • Group 4: prepare discussion prompts
    • Everyone else: enter commonplace notes

    Friday, April 12

    • Jones, "Marie"

      • From The Unfree World (Grinnell class project about Lost in the City): Howard University

    Assignment, from the reading routine, due by 10:00 the night before class in your Commonplace Document:

    • Group 1: prepare discussion prompts
    • Everyone else: enter commonplace notes

    Monday, April 15

    Assignment, from the reading routine, due by 10:00 the night before class in your Commonplace Document:

    • Group 2: prepare discussion prompts
    • Everyone else: enter commonplace notes

    Wednesday, April 17

    • McQueen, Small Axe: "Education" 

    Assignment, from the reading routine, due by 10:00 the night before class in your Commonplace Document:

    • Group 3: prepare discussion prompts
    • Everyone else: enter commonplace notes

    Friday, April 19

    Friday writing: Submit the creative response to your Commonplace Document by 9:00 p.m.

    Monday, April 22

    By 10:00 the night before class, enter your final paper prototypes into your Commonplace Document. We will workshop your prototypes in class.

    Wednesday, April 24

    Your assignment is to work on your papers. In class, we'll have a collective reading of your creative responses.

    Friday, April 26

    Friday writing: PAPER DUE BY EMAIL ATTACHMENT at 9:00 p.m.

    This is also the deadline for pre-portfolio revisions in addition to the one that is due a week from this day. To be clear: you can always revise everything for the portfolio, and you can also (optionally) revise any one paper by next Friday. This is the deadline for other (optional) revisions beyond all of those chances to revise, just so I can spread out the grading and give every paper my careful attention.

    For all revisions, please highlight the changes you have made in revision or otherwise mark them so I can easily see exactly how the new version differs from the previous one. (Do not describe your revisions in general terms; make the changes clearly visible on the page. Here is some technical advice for doing so! [pdf])

    Monday, April 29

    • Library day! We will meet in the second-floor classroom of Burling Library to talk about research skills in general and the annotated bibliography assignment in particular.

    By 10:00 the night before class, enter your end-of-term reflection into your Commonplace Document. In conferences this week, we will discuss your reflection as well as your paper.

    Wednesday, May 1

    We will be doing conferences all week, so there is no written assignment for today. In class time, we will do a mock workshop of annotated bibliography entries. I will provide some annotated bibliography entries for you to evaluate as a way of solidifying expectations for this assignment.

    Friday, May 3

    Friday writing: this is the last day to turn in an optional pre-portfolio revision of one of your papers. It is due by 9:00 tonight as an email attachment. (Any additional pre-portfolio revisions are due a week earlier.) Please highlight the changes you have made in revision or otherwise mark them so I can easily see exactly how the new version differs from the previous one. (Do not describe your revisions in general terms; make the changes clearly visible on the page. Here is some technical advice for doing so! [pdf])

    Monday, May 6

    Today will will have a peer review of research products. In your group's OneDrive folder, upload a document that contains a) two full entries for your annotated bibliography and b) two paragraphs taken from current versions of your papers in which you quote an external source.

    Wednesday, May 8

    Today will will have a peer review of skeleton papers. In your group's OneDrive folder, upload a document that contains a current version of one of your papers that removes the body paragraphs except for the first (transition) sentence of each one. Your version should have a title, first paragraph, transition sentences, last paragraph, and bibliography. In class, you will share this skeletal paper with a group and work through a set of questions to evaluate it.

    Friday, May 10

    All revised submissions of incomplete work from assignments due after Spring Break are due today by 9:00 p.m. Let me know if you submit any such work for me to review.

    Last class day! We will wrap up the term and address any remaining questions about the final portfolio.

    Wednesday, May 15

    PORTFOLIO DUE BY EMAIL ATTACHMENT AT NOON