The Immigrant’s Story

LITR 5733: Seminar in American Culture

Summer 1999  (T & R 1800-2029 [6-8:30pm]—9-Weeks Session)

A multicultural course with a unifying theme: the narrative of

coming to America, becoming American, and changing America:

*  generational conflicts  * 

* the family and the nation *

* ethnicity & gender  *

*the shock of America and the memory of the homeland*

Short-Fiction Anthology

Imagining America: Stories from the Promised Land

eds. Wesley Brown & Amy Ling (1992, Persea)

Non-Fiction Anthology

Visions of America: Personal Narratives from the Promised Land

eds. Brown & Ling (1992, Persea)

Anglo-American

William Bradford, Of Plymouth Plantation (1620-1647, McGraw-Hill)

Mexican-American

Jose Antonio Villareal, Pocho (1959, Anchor)

Dominican-American

Julia Alvarez, How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents (1992, Plume)

Chinese-American

Amy Tan, The Joy Luck Club (1989, Ivy)

Irish-American

Frank McCourt, Angela’s Ashes: A Memoir (1997, Simon & Schuster)

Vietnamese-American

Lan Cao, Monkey Bridge (1997, Penguin)

Instructor: Craig White.      Phone: 281 283 3380.       Email: whitec@uhcl.edu

Students who have taken previous offerings of LITR 5733 may register for  additional sections featuring different topics—contact instructor.

LITR 5733: Seminar in American Culture          UHCL, summer 1999

Topic: The Immigrant’s Story

University of Houston - Clear Lake, Summer 1999 (9-weeks session)

Tuesdays & Thursdays, 1800-2029 [6-8:30pm], Bayou 3233

Instructor: Craig White   Office: 1529-4 Bayou   Phones: (281) 283-3800

Office Hours: 1130—1230 (11:30am—12:30pm); 1700-1800 (5-6pm) TR

& by appointment

email: whitec@uhcl.edu

Caveat: Data stated and contracts implied in this syllabus may change with minimal notice with fair hearings at class meetings.

Course Objectives

As LITR 5733: Seminar in American Culture is a Literature course emphasizing a cultural aspect of American literature, its course objectives are provisionally divided into Literary and Cultural categories, though of course these categories overlap.

Literary Objectives:

1. To describe the story of immigration as a fundamental narrative of American literature and culture.

a. To define the concept of narrative as a literary and cultural category

b. To criticize (rather than merely celebrate) the immigrant or American dream narrative.

c. To explore the narrative of immigration as an organizing principle for the study of multicultural literature.

2. To chart the various permutations available to the narrative

a. viewpoint: first-generation? Second-generation? Other?

b. setting(s): homeland? America? Other destinations? (American or global)

c. character: see viewpoint above; to identify and question the categorization of first-generation as “heroic,” second-generation as “divided,” third generation as “assimilated.”

d. terms of immigration: escape from homeland, welcome to America; torn from homeland, repulsion from America;

3. To distinguish fictional and non-fictional modes of the immigrant narrative

a. What signs of difference alert the reader whether the narrative is fictional or non-fictional?

b. How do narrative, viewpoint, and setting change in fictional or non-fictional modes?

4. To become sensitized to immigrant literature’s effects on English or to the variant English styles practiced by different ethnic groups.

Cultural Objectives

1. To observe and analyze the effects of immigration and assimilation on American cultural units or identities:

a.      family

b.      generations

c.      gender (usually traditional in homeland and revolutionary in America)

d.      community (including neighborhood)

e.      religion

2. To celebrate and criticize the different values projected on ethnic homelands and on America (examples below are positive / negative):

3. To complicate the dominant culture’s east-to-west direction for migration by including immigrants from the South to the North (Mexico, the Caribbean) and from the East to the West (Asia, the Pacific).

4. As a multicultural course, to contrast the voluntary “American Dream” migration pattern of immigration exhibited by American ethnic groups (Chinese, English, Dominican, etc.) with the involuntary “American Nightmare” pattern of forced participation exhibited by American minority groups (esp. African Americans and Native Americans but also Mexican Americans, “the ambivalent minority”).

5. To identify the new immigrant who, because of improved communications and transportation, may not feel the same pressures to forget the homeland and to assimilate to American culture to the same degree as earlier immigrants; to question how much this new, permanently bicultural identity may relate to an emerging global identity.

6. To relate the immigrant narrative and situation to colonial and postcolonial pressures in the homeland.

7. To identify utopian elements in the immigrant narrative, as with Bradford’s discussion of the commonwealth and Jewish immigrants’ interests in Marxism.

Graded Work

Research project

Students have a choice of two options for their research projects.  Option 1 is a traditional 10-15 page research paper relevant to the course.  Option 2 is a journal of research and reflections concerning a variety of materials relevant to the course.

On July 1, all students will declare their intentions regarding which option they choose by handing in a one-page research proposal in which they suggest their plans, describe what they’ve achieved so far, and ask any questions.

On July 27, all research projects (either option) are due.

Option 1 (research paper) requirements

The topic is open, but it must have some relevance to the course—that is, any member of the class reading your essay would be able to recognize the relevance of the text or major themes.  The topic is not being limited any further because some of you may plan to develop your paper as a chapter for a thesis.

In terms of research, you must incorporate references to at least three secondary resources.  At least one of these must be from literary criticism or theory.  Additional sources may be from areas such as history, American studies, or cultural studies.

Follow MLA style for documentation and mechanics.

Option 2 (journal) requirements

If you choose the journal option, you are not choosing an option that involves less work than the traditional research paper option.  You are expected to do just as much work and your writing will be judged by similar standards.  However, the writing may be less centrally or consistently focused on one subject, thus allowing you to pursue several subjects which may or may not cohere.  All the same, I expect to witness some good absorption and expression of research and well-polished if exploratory writing in what you turn in.  (Which may be to say, the journal I will read should not be restricted to your first drafts.)  Students choosing this option should continue to check in with the instructor as the session progresses to make sure that their work is adequately rigorous.  The following items or elements should be included, but some changes in proportions may be permitted according to your interests and discoveries. (Page lengths are only suggestions for minimal lengths.)

·        Brief autobiography and complete primary bibliography of an immigrant author, with some secondary bibliography. (2-4 pages?)

·        Review of at least three secondary sources having to do with immigrant literature, however broadly or specifically focused.  These articles might pertain to our class readings or to your research on an ethnic group or an immigrant author. (At least one page each.  Head report with bibliographic citation, followed by a review of the scholar’s argument, evidence, and usefulness.) (total: at least 3 pages)

·        Review of history of immigration and immigrant literature by a particular ethnic group (e. g., Italian-American, Chinese-American, Caribbean-American, Mexican-American), including a bibliography.  (The bibliography may be embedded in the text of this review.) (3-5 pages?)

·        The following elements are more optional: reflection on your own family’s immigration history (2-4 pages; interviews with family members?); interviews with recent immigrants regarding immigrant experience plus their reading habits (3-5 pages; regarding reading habits, what literature do they find relevant to their experience?)

·        Other possible items may be mentioned as the semester progresses.  In any case, your journal altogether should come to about 20 typed or printed-out pages.  To read this limit you may expand on any of the categories above.  Also consider combining categories—for instance, your “immigrant author” could be from the “ethnic group” you also investigate.

Final exam

Date & time: 29 July, 6-8:30pm

Type of exam: Essay.  (1 or 2 essays; some choice may be offered.)

Format: open-book and open-notebook

Purpose: To demonstrate quality of reading, mastery of course ideas, and abilities to combine ideas and texts in a limited context.

Course Policies

Attendance policy: You are expected to attend every class meeting.  You may take one free cut.  Attendance is not taken systematically, but more than one absence jeopardizes your status in the course.  If you keep cutting or missing, you should drop the course.  Even with medical or other emergency excuses, a high number of absences or partial attendances results in a lower or failing grade.  If shockingly absent, return and make contact (281 283-3380) ASAP in normal office hours or leave message.  If you miss more than two classes (especially early!), consider dropping, unless prior arrangements are made.  You are always welcome to discuss your standing in the course.

Academic Honesty Policy: Please refer to the catalog for the Academic Honesty Policy (1998-99 Catalog, pp. 70-72).  Plagiarism—that is, using research without citations—will result in a grade penalty or failure of the course. Copying someone else's test leads to heavy losses of credit for the test and the course in general.  Refer to the UHCL catalogue for further details regarding expectations and potential penalties.

Disabilities: If you have a disability and need a special accommodation, consult first with the Health Center and then discuss the accommodation with me.

Incompletes: A grade of "I" is given only in cases of documented emergency late in the semester.  An Incomplete Grade Contract must be completed.

Make-up exam policy: Ask way in advance for times before the regular exam.  Professor has the right to refuse accommodations requested on short notice.

Reading & meeting schedule, summer 1999

IA = Imagining America: Stories from the Promised Land

VA = Visions of America: Personal Narratives from the Promised Land

Tuesday, 1 June: introduction

Thursday, 3 June: Anzia Yezierska, “Soap and Water” (IA 105-110); Nicholasa Mohr, “The English Lesson” (IA 21-33); Louise Erdrich, “American Horse” (IA 196-206); Barbara Grizzuti Harrison, “Going Home: Brooklyn Revisited” (VA 158-169); June Jordan, “Report from the Bahamas” (VA 305-315)

Tuesday,  8 June: Julia Alvarez, How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents; Charles Alexander Eastman, “The Ghost Dance War” (VA 1-7).  At 8 pm, our class will be visited by Lakota Sioux medicine man Peter Catches (Zintkala Oyate), who is visiting UHCL.

Thursday,  10 June: Julia Alvarez, How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents; Paule Marshall, “The Making of a Writer: From the Poets in the Kitchen” (VA 82-89); Paule Marshall, “To Da-Duh, in Memoriam” (IA 351-360)

Tuesday,  15 June: Book of Exodus, from the Bible (student provides); Bernard Malamud, “The German Refugee” (IA 34-44); Adrienne Rich, “Split at the Root: An Essay on Jewish Identity” (VA 90-105); Sonia Pilcer, “2G” (VA 201-206); Eva Hoffman, from Lost in Translation: A Life in a New Language (VA 219-228); Mikhail Naimy, “His Grace” (IA 111-116); Tahira Naqvi, “Thank God for the Jews” (222-229)

Thursday,  17 June: Vivian Gornick, “To Begin With” (VA 74-81); Anton Shammas, “Amerka, Amerka: A Palestinian Abroad in the Land of the Free” (VA 291-300); William Bradford, Of Plymouth Plantation (introduction, p. xxii; chapters I-IV).

Tuesday,  22 June: Of Plymouth Plantation (V, 29-32;VI, 45 middle paragraph; VII, 49-50, 57; VIII, 59-61; IX; X; XI, 83-89; XII, 96-100; XIV, 128-129, 132-134, 143-146; XV, 160-161; XIX, 224-232; ch. 21, p. 62; XXIII, 281-283; XXXII, 351; XXXIII, 364-368); Joan Didion, “The White Album” (VA 245-268); Jonathan Raban, from Hunting Mr. Heartbreak: A Discovery of America (VA, 344-356)

Thursday,  24 June: Minorities and the immigrant narrative. James Baldwin, from No Name in the Street (VA 284-290); Toni Cade Bambara, “The Lesson” (IA 139-145); Leslie Marmon Silko, “The Man to Send Rain Clouds” (IA 191-195)

Tuesday,  29 June: Maxine Hong Kingston, from The Woman Warrior (VA 195-200); Amy Tan, The Joy Luck Club

Thursday,  July 1: Amy Tan, The Joy Luck Club; Mei Mei Evans, “Gussuk” (IA 230-243); research proposals due

Tuesday,  6 July: Jose Antonio Villareal, Pocho; Richard Rodriguez, from Hunger of Memory (VA 229-235);

Thursday,  8 July: Jose Antonio Villareal, Pocho; Gary Soto, “Like Mexicans” (VA 301-304)

Tuesday,  13 July: Mary Gordon, “’I Can’t Stand Your Books’: A Writer Goes Home” (VA 212-218) Frank McCourt, Angela’s Ashes: A Memoir

Thursday,  15 July: Frank McCourt, Angela’s Ashes: A Memoir

Tuesday,  20 July: Lan Cao, Monkey Bridge

Thursday,  22 July: Lan Cao, Monkey Bridge

Tuesday,  27 July:; Bharati Mukherjee, “A Wife’s Story” (IA 64-75); Bharati Mukherjee, “Love Me or Leave Me” (VA 187-194); research projects due

Thursday,  29 July: final exam (6-8:30).  See description above.