Fall
2008
English 503: Theory of Writing: Remembering the Present
Professor Lewis Warsh
Thursdays, 4:10 to 6:00 PM
Writing theory is an all encompassing endeavor. It must take
into account both the past and the present while pointing
instructively towards the future. Many great 20th century
theorists were fiction writers and poets themselves--their
theoretical work derived from their practice as creative writers.
One goal of this course is to develop and articulate our own
sense of what we want to do as writers and what we expect
as readers. We will use the ideas expressed in these essays
to inspire and inform our own work.
Another goal is to create a dialogue between ourselves and
these authors. Ezra Pound's notable quote (I'm paraphrasing)
: "Don't take advice from anyone who hasn't written a
great work" is something to keep in mind. What gives
anyone the right to theorize? One of the ongoing threads in
this class will be an attempt to understand the place of theory
in our work as writers, beginning with the inescapable question:
“Is it necessary?”
Among the authors we will read are Henry James, E.M. Forester,
Virginia Woolf, Ezra Pound, Laura Riding, Gertruce Stein,
Roland Barthes, Alain Robbe-Grillet, Walter Benjamin, M.M.
Bakhtin, Tzvetan Todorov, Maurice Blanchot, James Baldwin,
Charles Olson, Frank O’Hara, Ralph Ellison, Amiri Baraka,
Henry Louis Gates Jr., Jack Kerouac, Gary Snyder, Allen Ginsberg,
Lyn Hejinian.
English 523: Fiction Writing
Workshop: Starting Points in Fiction
Professor Han Ong (Visiting Writer)
Thursdays, 6:10 to 8:00 PM
In this class we will take a look at the initial sources of
inspiration writers use and build upon in crafting a novel
or short story. For some writers, it's a premise: "What
if ...?" For others, it's a plot, a sequence of events
one leading to the other; this can be true of writers who
use newspaper articles as their jumping off point. Character
is key for some; for example, they want to write a piece about
their grade school teacher, who was important in their life.
Some writers hear a stretch of dialogue and that's where they
begin. Yet others are compelled by place, setting; this might
be true of some immigrant or foreign writers trying to recapture
a lost world, for example. Oftentimes, where we start in our
writing forecasts what the strengths of the work are going
to be, as well as the weaknesses. By querying their own starting
points, each student in class will begin to understand why
it is that he or she runs into a set of problems in the middle
of the writing process, which is different for every writer.
This way, too, they can begin to identify elements that they
need to strengthen to make their novel or story a more integrated
and satisfying whole.
Han Ong is the author of two novels:
Fixer Chao (2001) and The Disinherited (2004),
both published by Picador USA. He has been the recipient of
Guggenheim and MacArthur Fellowships, as well as a fellowship
to the Cullman Center for Scholars and Writers at the New
York Public Library. His writing has appeared in the Washington
Post, Natural History, BOMB, and the journal
Conjunctions. He is also the author of more than three
dozen plays, which have been produced across the country at
such venues as the Joseph Papp Public Theater, Berkeley Rep,
and the American Repertory Theater.
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English 524: Poetry Writing Workshop: Writing the Long
Poem: Everything We Know
Professor Lewis Warsh
Tuesdays, 6:10 to 8:00 PM
The long poem is a place where we can include everything:
knowledge of ecology and politics, all the various emotional
states and upheavals that we’ve experienced, annotation
of the present moment and the passage of time. Each student
will initiate what might be a long poem of several pages or
even a book-length poem written and accumulated over the course
of the semester. We'll discuss the ways of bringing together
data by direct observation and journal writing, by reading
the newspaper (which is a kind of daily poem), and by sustaining
a rhythm, a feeling, a theme. We'll pay attention to ways
of improvisation, how to translate daily life into poetry,
and how to use repetition and variation. We'll use as models
some of the great long poems of the last century, most notably
Paterson by William Carlos Williams, The Skaters
and Three Poems by John Ashbery, A by Louis
Zukofsky and Midwinter Day by Bernadette Mayer. Mostly
we'll look closely at each other's work, give each other feedback
and advice, and share each other's concerns regarding the
importance of poetry in the world.
English 525: Play Writing Workshop: The Art of Playwriting
Professor Jessica Hagedorn
Wednesdays, 6:10 to 8:00 PM
In this workshop, we will explore what it means to write
for the theatre, how to create characters who engage and surprise
us, how to develop an ear for the poetry of ordinary speech,
and how to develop an appreciation for the power of silence.
Expect in-class writing and visualization exercises, close
readings and discussions of plays, monologues and excerpted
scenes by major contemporary playwrights; expect to write
a five-to-ten minute piece to be performed, using your fellow
students as actors. Guest speaker and field trip to one Off-Broadway
play, TBA. Registration limited.
English 527: Professional Writing Workshop: Grant Writing
Professor John Killoran
Thursdays 6:10 - 8:00 pm
This course is designed not only for English graduate students
but also for students from other disciplines and for professionals
who seek to develop their skills as persuasive professional
writers.
Behind much of the work conducted by cultural agencies, businesses,
nonprofits, and researchers are successfully grant proposals.
The grant proposal is essentially a persuasive document, and
this course thus approaches grant writing through a rhetorical
perspective. A rhetorical perspective offers not just a wily
way with words but a means of responding to a rhetorical situation,
of generating successful ideas. The rhetorical perspective
helps students define the problem, analyze the audience, and
invent the arguments that best present their case. Specifically,
in the course, students will...
1. identify a problem on campus or in their organization,
social and cultural communities, or research field;
2. analyse potential sponsors who might share the goal of
solving the problem;
3. and plan, draft, and revise a grant proposal.
The course is designed for those seeking to write grant proposals
for cultural agencies, business RFPs, nonprofits, and research.
However, students will develop knowledge and skills that can
be applied broadly to the various kinds of writing required
in their careers.
English 579: Seminar in Special Studies: Virginia Woolf
and Modernism
Professor Patrick Horrigan
Mondays, 6:10 to 8:00 PM
Virginia Woolf (1882-1941) is one of the most challenging
and beautiful writers in the English language. Every time
she began work on a new novel, she renewed her ambition to
reinvent the genre and to make it penetrate to depths of human
experience never before tried by writers of fiction. The course
will trace the path from her early, tentatively realistic
fiction (The Voyage Out), through her experimental
short fiction of the late teens and early 1920s ("The
Mark on the Wall," "An Unwritten Novel"), to
the achievement of her high modernist style in four major
novels: Jacob's Room, Mrs. Dalloway, To the
Lighthouse, and The Waves. Woolf was also an innovator
in the art of the essay, and we will read some of her most
famous works in the genre, including "Modern Fiction,"
"On Being Ill," and her revolutionary (and very
funny) manifesto for women writers, A Room of One's Own.
Because Woolf was keenly interested in painting and was intimately
associated with a circle of avant-garde artists, special emphasis
will be placed on the intersection between verbal and visual
art in her life and work.
Field trips to the Museum of Modern Art and the Berg Collection
of the New York Public Library (which houses the largest collection
of Woolf manuscripts in the world) will be arranged. In addition
to on-going class discussion, students will write a series
of short essays in response to the readings, and one longer
critical essay or creative term project.
English 641: Literacy and Basic Writing
Professor Donald McCrary
Wednesdays, 4:10 to 6:00 PM
In this course we will attempt to identify and understand
what constitutes literacy in the academy and how "basic
writers" are positioned within and against this term
in their struggle to acquire academic discourse, a term we
will also examine. We will investigate our own assumptions
about literacy and test those assumptions against academy
dictates and practices. We will problematize "basic writing"
in relation to theories and methods of teaching basic and
college writing. For example, is the social constructionist
approach viable, or should students' primary languages be
included in the instruction and production of college writing?
What is the relationship between reading and writing, and
how might one inform the other? How might orality be utilized
in the classroom to help students increase their awareness
of standard English? How do we offer cohesive, productive
instruction when students within the same class have different
levels and types of literacy? Authors we might read include
Delpit, Bourdieu, Bizzell, and Heath. The course will be particularly
beneficial for students who plan to teach in academic institutions
with students from diverse linguistic backgrounds.
English 646: Individual and Small Group Writing Instruction
Professor Patricia Stephens
Tuesdays, 4:10 to 6:00 PM
This course is designed to introduce tutors and teachers
to the theories and practices of tutoring writing (online,
face-to-face, one-to-one, and small groups). Though our work
in this class will help all tutors/teachers expand their repertoire
of theoretical and pedagogical knowledge about tutoring writing
in general, we will also focus on some of the specific needs
of writers who use the LIU/Brooklyn Writing Center. As we
familiarize ourselves with the curriculum and pedagogy of
the Writing Program and interdisciplinary writing concerns
(through WAC) on campus, we will locate the work we do at
our Writing Center within the broader historical and institutional
contexts of writing centers, in general. Throughout the semester,
the course will address practical concerns about tutoring:
structuring sessions and setting goals; assessing, diagnosing
and responding to student writing; learning strategies to
teach planning, drafting, revising, proofreading and editing;
learning strategies to work on specific grammatical concerns;
helping students with reading comprehension; working with
ESL concerns; noticing interpersonal dynamics and maintaining
boundaries; respecting and responding to cultural and ethnic
differences; working as an online tutor, and facilitating
small group sessions. We will also explore connections between
writing center histories and institutional politics in order
to understand how particular practices emerge within specific
contexts. Students interested in pursuing a specific topic
not included in the general readings (such as writing center
administration) are encouraged to do so, with permission from
the instructor. Classes will be conducted as seminars/workshops
so that all students have the opportunity to participate in
class presentations, mock tutorials, etc. All students are
required to tutor for one hour per week during the semester
and attend staff development meetings at the Writing Center.
Each of you will write an observation report of a session
conducted by another tutor and audio/video tape one session
with a student (for use in a self-study).
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