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LITR 5733: Seminar in American Culture American Immigrant Literature University of Houston-Clear Lake Summer 2004 (M, T, Th 3-6pm—1st 5-Weeks Summer Session) * * * A multicultural course with a
unifying theme: the
story of coming to America, becoming
American, and changing America. * Multicultural Short-Fiction Anthology Imagining America: Stories from the Promised Land, 2nd ed. eds. Wesley Brown & Amy Ling (2002, Persea) Multicultural Nonfiction Anthology Visions of America: Personal Narratives from the
Promised Land eds. Brown & Ling (1992, Persea) Poetry
Anthology Unsettling America: An Anthology of Contemporary Multicultural Poetry Eds. Gillan & Gillan (Penguin, 1994) Anglo-American William Bradford, Of Plymouth Plantation (1620-1647, McGraw-Hill) (read with selections from the Exodus of the Bible) Jewish-American Anzia Yezierska, Bread Givers (1925, Persea, 3rd ed.) Instructor: Craig White. Phone: 281 283 3380. Email: whitec@uhcl.edu Course webpage: http://coursesite.uhcl.edu/HSH/Whitec/LITR/4333 (coursesite shared with LITR 4333, undergrad Immigrant Lit course): Student Assignments Midterm 15 June (in-class or email) (30%) Presentations, email / web submissions, attendance, general participation (20%) Final exam 6 July (50%) Percentages are only approximate and not to be construed mathematically but rather as relative weight. Only letter grades are given (also pluses and minuses). Grades are based on quality of writing, judged in comparison with other students’ work, present and past. Your writing will be criticized in the interest of helping you improve. Criticism does not distinguish organization and style from content. Course
Objectives: (In the objectives below, "America" refers primarily to "The United States of America," and "Americans" to citizens or residents of the USA, but of course “America,” “Americas,” or “Americans” may refer more broadly to any nations or peoples living in the Western Hemisphere.) "The
Immigrant Narrative" (Background
to all course objectives) Fundamental to all the course's objectives and related themes is the Immigrant Narrative (a. k. a. "the American Dream narrative"). Most Americans are broadly conscious of its outlines, but no single text tells the whole story. Below is a quick overview, but different characters, generations, or home countries may vary, divide, add to, or share out these stages or their sequence, so be prepared to improvise. · Stage 1: Leave the Old World (“traditional societies” in Europe, Asia, or Latin America). · Stage 2: Journey to the New World (here, the USA & modern culture) · Stage 3: Shock, resistance, exploitation, and discrimination (immigrant experience here overlaps with or resembles the minority experience) ·
Stage 4: Assimilation
to dominant American culture and loss of ethnic identity (departs or differs
from minority experience) · Stage 5: Rediscovery or reassertion of ethnic identity (usu. only partial) Literary Objectives: 1. To comprehend the story of immigration as a fundamental narrative of American literature and culture. (fundamental = constitutive & mythic) 1a. To define
the concept of narrative as a literary
and cultural category 1b. To criticize as well as celebrate the immigrant or American dream narrative. 1c. To explore the immigrant narrative as an organizing principle for studying multicultural literature. (see also Cultural Objective 1a.) 2. To chart the various literary permutations available to the narrative 2a. narrator or viewpoint: Who writes the immigrant narrative? · First-generation? (rare, except among English-speaking peoples) · Second-generation? (standard: the children of immigrants learn English and explore the conflict between ethnic and mainstream identities) · Other? 2b. setting(s): · Homeland? Journey? America? Return to homeland? · "Ethnic enclave" (e. g., ghetto, barrio) as transition or limbo between 2 worlds. 2c. character by generation: to identify and question standard generational roles or identities: · first-generation as “heroic” · second-generation as “divided” · third generation as “assimilated” 3. To become sensitized to immigrant literature’s effects on English and to the variant English styles practiced by different ethnic groups. 3a. Immigrant speech is identifiable as such but, overall, Standard American English seems less affected by immigrant speech than by minority speech. Immigrant speech is expected to conform or assimilate to standard, whereas minority speech may assert its difference. (see Cultural Obj. 1) 3b. In American media it is unacceptable to mock minority speech but acceptable to imitate immigrant speech--e. g., the way most standup comics can do a Middle Eastern or Asian convenience store clerk, such as Apu in the Simpsons. 3c. Cultural comparison: immigrant foods—from German Frankfurters & Hamburgers to Chinese and Italian restaurants—are highly identifiable as mainstream cuisine, while minority foods—from popcorn to Barbecue—are rarely acknowledged as such. On yet another hand, English or dominant-culture food is almost unidentifiable as ethnic; spiciness or its lack has to do with climate, but maybe another reason English food is bland is so it won’t distract from work. Cultural
Objectives 1. To identify the immigrant narrative as the fundamental story-line of the dominant or majority culture in the USA. 1a. American Dream versus American Nightmare: To compare and contrast the immigrant narrative with the minority narrative. · Comparison: immigrants may experience problems of “minority” cultures in the first generation(s), and they may suffer discrimination and marginalization by the dominant culture on account of racial and cultural differences as long as those differences are visible or audible. · Contrast: the “social contracts” of immigrants and minorities differ. Immigrants like the Chinese, Germans, Dominicans, Irish, or Italians voluntarily participate in the “American Dream” migration pattern of immigrating to America for personal freedom and economic betterment, Minority groups, esp. African Americans and Native Americans, involuntarily join the “American Nightmare” through a differing migration pattern or through forced contact or participation. · Mexican Americans, sometimes known as “the ambivalent minority,” have an identity somewhere between the immigrant and minority patterns. Though many Mexicans immigrate to the USA, the states to which they primarily immigrate (such as Texas and California) were once part of Mexico. This land was taken from Mexico in much the same manner as other American lands were taken from Indians. Racially, too, Mexicans may fall in between, as they may be descended from Europeans (dominant immigrant culture) and / or from Indians and / or African Americans (minority groups). 1b. To observe cultural variations in the Immigrant Narrative by different nations, at different historical periods, or under different national conditions. · “National migration,” in contrast to the immigration of individuals or families, especially the “Great Migration” of Pilgrims and Puritans to early North America and their historical model, the ancient Hebrews migrating from Egypt to Canaan. These national groups resist assimilation and intermarriage with the people whose land they occupy, but other elements of the immigrant narrative may continue. American Jews have followed this pattern until recent generations, when intermarriage has increased. · “Internal immigration,” such as the “Great Migration” of African Americans from the Old Confederacy to northern states in the early 20th Century. · “Socioeconomic Immigration,” in which economic success or failure leads families to move from one class or neighborhood to another, with resulting challenges to assimilate to new values, language patterns, courtship patterns, etc. Marriage into another class or ethnic group can repeat this pattern for individuals. 1c. To complicate the dominant European-American culture’s east-to-west direction for migration by including immigrants from South to North (Mexico, the Caribbean) and from “Eastern Lands” (Asia, the Pacific) to the West Coast. 2. To observe and analyze the effects of immigration and assimilation on American cultural units or identities: ·
family: (Old World: extended
family; New World: nuclear family) · generations: generational tensions over assimilation, expectations. (see also Literary Objective 2c.) · gender (usually traditional in homeland, modern in America) · community and laws, especially the change from traditional or family laws and a distant, autocratic state to impersonal laws and a democratic, regulated state · religion: Old World: religion and political/cultural identity closely related; New World: secular state, private religion. · Religion is the cultural factor least susceptible to assimilation. Thus, most Catholic or Islamic immigrants may generally conform to mainstream dominant culture but remain unlikely to convert to Protestant Christianity. · Is the immigrant narrative comparable to a conversion experience? · Finally, How do immigrants change America? 3. To contrast the “New Immigrant Model” with the “Old Immigrant Model.” · “Old Immigrant Model”: because of the danger and cost of journey by boat, past immigrants found it more difficult to return and were expected to cut ties to the Old World in order to assimilate to American culture · “New Immigrant Model”: improved communications and air transportation may enable recent immigrants to feel less pressure to forget the homeland and to assimilate to American culture as rapidly as earlier immigrants · The biculturalism and bilingualism of “New Immigrants” may contribute to or reflect an emerging global identity in which human beings are less defined or restricted by nationality. ·
“Vertical immigration”:
recent tendency of earth societies to organize into a first world-third world,
upper class-lower class, penthouse-street, electronic media-real time division. 4. To acknowledge the international or global nature of immigration. ·
The great waves of immigration
from Europe (17th through 19th centuries) occurred
simultaneously with Europe’s
colonization of Asia, Africa, and the Pacific. ·
Many American, Asian, and European immigrants today come from lands
formerly colonized by Europeans or European-Americans. 5. To use the immigrant experience to "defamiliarize" the American experience. (To "defamiliarize" means to turn something familiar and comfortable into something suddenly strange, to transform the "natural" to the "cultural," and to bring unconscious habit to the level of intellectual analysis.) · What do immigrants see about America that the native-born cannot? (See also Cultural Objectives 6 & 7) 6. To acknowledge and criticize the different values projected on ethnic homelands and on America (examples below are positive / negative):
7. To observe competing economic ideals or states exposed by immigrant literature. 7a. To identify communal or utopian elements such as Bradford’s discussion of the commonwealth and Jewish immigrants’ interests in Marxism, as well as “Old World” concepts of community, social obligations, and limits.. 7b. To discuss the immigrants’ shock at and adaptation to American economic models, variously identified as Social Darwinism, competitive individualism, laissez-faire, freemarket, high-growth capitalism 7c. A surprising feature in immigrant literature (and perhaps elsewhere): the identification of shopping and sexuality. (Consistent with Darwinian survival through competitive sexuality) 7d. To acknowledge the difficulty of stabilizing an American society founded on act of revolution (i. e., leaving the past behind); compare to the nation’s revolutionary founding in the Declaration of Independence, which breaks off ties with the “Mother Country” much as an immigrant does with the Old World. 8.
To monitor the importance of public
education to the assimilation stage of the
immigrant narrative. 8a. To consider the significance of free education as a starting point for the American Dream of economic success. (first rung on the ladder?) 8b. Private schools may more successfully instill “traditional values” and provide stability for chaotic lives, but public education’s secular status, economies of scarcity, and ceaseless innovations may prepare immigrants for the American economic scene. (This may further relate to the struggle over whether to teach Darwinian Evolution in a Social Darwinist state.) Email and webpage contributions This course has a webpage featuring basic information about the course and student models of required assignments. The web address is http://coursesite.uhcl.edu/HSH/Whitec/LITR/4333/. If convenient, install it as a “favorite” on your web browser for easy access. Each student must make three contributions to the webpage through the instructor via email or other electronic means. Required email contributions: 1. Presentation handout or posting 2. Midterm 3. Final exam Email
address: Send all emails to whitec@uhcl.edu. Note the "c" at the end of "whitec." If you send the email to "white" only, it goes to the wrong professor. Contents
and attachments: Try both of the following · Paste the contents of the appropriate word processing file directly into the email message. · “Attach” your word processing file to an email message. (My computer and most of its programs work off of Microsoft Word 2000. The only word processing program my computer appears unable to translate is Microsoft Works, though Microsoft Word is fine, as are most others. If in doubt, save your word processing file in "Rich Text Format" or a “text only” format.) If you have trouble reaching me by email, save your word processing file to a 3½“ floppy disk and give it to me. If you put your name on the disk, I’ll eventually return it to you. Student computer access: Every enrolled student at UHCL is assigned an email account on the university server. For information about your account and password, call the university help desk at 281 283 2828. Reassurances: You are not graded on your expertise in electronic media but on your intelligence in reading literature, discussing it, and writing about it. I’ve tried similar email exercises for several semesters; a few students encounter a few problems, but, if we don’t give up, these problems always work out. Your course grade will not suffer for mistakes with email and related issues as long as I see you making a fair effort. Course
Assignments Take-home / email midterm: Due: By 7pm, Tuesday, 15 June Weight: approximately 30% of final grade Length: 5-10 typed, double-spaced page equivalent Submission format: The midterm must be submitted in electronic form, either by email or on a disk, so that it can be uploaded to the course webpage. Topic assignment: Write a complete essay that applies the concept of “narrative” as a literary and cultural category to the immigrant narrative, the minority narrative, and points between. If these terms seem too monolithic or cold, imagine the assignment as a narrative and analytic description of your learning curve in the opening weeks of this course. What knowledge did you come in with of the course’s subject matter, and how have you learned to receive or process its perspectives? What uses may the course and its organization serve in the study of literature and culture? In any case, this topic will be refined and possibly extended during the opening weeks of the course. Additional requirements: Refer to at least one student midterm from previous semesters Student Presentations, Responses, & Records Every student will lead either one poetry presentation or one video presentation. Students will also be asked to lead the class more informally as “discussion-starters,” “problem-posers,” and “webpage-highlighters.” Poetry
Presentation: The Poetry Presentation assignment relates to Objective 2d. . . . to examine how lyric poems represent different stages of the Immigrant Narrative. The assigned student will introduce, review existing course webpages, read, interpret, and lead a discussion of an assigned poem from the Unsettling America anthology. (Poetry selections appear in the reading schedule below, though some poems may be added or cut according to need.) The interpretation should relate to a course objective (besides 2d) and focus on the poem’s immigrant themes (or, in the case of "minority" poems, the minority themes and their comparisons or contrasts with immigrant themes). Also consider the following subjects concerning the poem: · Identify which generation in the immigrant narrative is speaking. · Identify the "stage" (or combination of stages) of immigrant narrative: Leaving, journeying, the shock of America, assimilation, or reconnection? · Compare to the day’s prose narratives? What does a lyric poem accomplish that a prose narrative cannot? · Many other possible topics may be suggested by the Course Objectives (or beyond). Format
for poetry presentation: 1. 10-12 minute time limit. Approximately ten minutes is the time limit in terms of your presentation itself (i. e., not counting discussion). If some shorter poems do not require 10 minutes, don't feel the need to stretch out your presentation. If your poem is quite long, extra time may be allowed, or consider reading parts of it. 2. You may project notes for your presentation via the course webpage and the multimedia projector, but this is not required. If you choose to do so, make sure instructor has an electronic copy of your presentation notes at least an hour before class. 3. Review one or two student postings from LITR 4333 on your poem. (If no posting exists for your poem, simply acknowledge the situation.) You should use the class computer to link to the undergraduate postings and critique their accomplishments. 4. Before reading the poem, cite one or two course objectives relevant to your interpretation, and begin your interpretation. These objectives and your interpretation may follow or differ from the undergraduate postings, but there should be some reaction on your part. Your interpretation of the poem may be divided before and after the reading of the poem. You may provide some brief biography of the poet (see pp. 385-400), but this is not necessary and may be distracting. Concentrate on the poem itself. Avoid reductive “biographical interpretations” in which the poem is forced to fit the known facts of the poet’s life, though some such connections may be inevitable and helpful. 5. Read the poem aloud. Look up unfamiliar words and practice pronunciations. (Feel free to ask for help beforehand.) Try to read with feeling and comprehension. 6. After reading, briefly complete your interpretation. In general, students are most ready to discuss soon after the reading, so don't lose that opportunity. 7. Begin discussion by asking a question. The best way to begin a discussion is by asking a question. Therefore, your last steps in the poetry presentation (besides leading and responding to discussion) are to wrap up your interpretation and to ask the other members of the class a question relevant to what you've said up to that point. (Sometimes they’ll just sit there, so you might have an extra question ready; sometimes they’ll want to discuss something besides what you asked, but that’s okay; sometimes you have to keep asking and trying different angles until you get a response.) Discussion may go up to 10 minutes beyond the presentation itself. 8. Respondent joins discussion. The “respondent” is first responsible for having read the assigned poem before the class meeting and for having some interpretations in mind. When the presenter asks the question to begin discussion, the respondent should not “jump in” immediately but should watch to see how or if discussion develops before beginning to contribute. The respondent may speak for a minute or two at once or may make two or three briefer remarks during discussion. The respondent is encouraged not to bail out of his or her duties by shrugging that “They’ve already said it.” Video review & highlights This assignment requires watching a videotape as homework but is otherwise undemanding. The instructor has several recent videotapes on subjects relevant to the course. · The designated student will obtain the videotape from the instructor a few days before the presentation, watch at least an hour of it, and cue a part of it to be shown to the class. · In class, the student will introduce the video (subject, setting, panel members) and show a 5-10 minute excerpt. Before showing it, the student should explain why the passage was selected and what subject relevant to our course it develops. · Following the video, the student reviews a highlight or two and begins discussion by asking a question regarding the excerpt. Student leads discussion. “Discussion-Starter” for reading assignment · Identify idea, theme, problem, or issue in the reading assignment. Ideally, relate this idea to a course objective, but not required. · Direct class (page numbers) to one or two brief passages and read selections, briefly commenting on application to opening theme or idea. · (The order of the first two steps may be reversed.) · Ask a question to begin discussion. The question should follow from your reading, but it may also appeal more broadly to the challenges that the text may present to the class. It may also refer to other class readings. · Lead discussion. · No requirements for written summary or email / webpage posting. ”Problem-poser” for professorial instruction This is a new assignment and therefore somewhat vague. Its purpose is to balance the course’s potentially instruction-heavy format with the challenges and questions appropriate to a seminar. The presenter is encouraged to refer class to texts, either for that day or previously. · The designated student identifies a conceptual or practical problem that s/he has considered as the course has proceeded. · The problem may be “conceptual” in terms of questioning a course objective, its expression, or its development by the instructor. Such concepts may well focus on “the immigrant narrative” or its variations. · The problem may be “practical” in questioning the course’s application of its objectives to our readings. · Alternative approach: What course objectives aren’t we discussing and using that we should be? · More broadly: What aren’t we discussing that we should be discussing? What unresolved issue in texts, instruction, or discussion occurs to you? · After identifying the problem (and, ideally, applying it to a course text), the “problem-poser” initiates and leads a discussion by asking a question of the seminar. The question may simply rephrase the problem, or the student may ask for help in formulating the problem by identifying unresolved areas in their own thought. “webpage-highlighter” The designated student will take the class to passage from the undergraduate midterm or final samples and highlight a passage relevant to the day’s reading assignment or to the course’s continuing concerns. This informal presentation may lead to a discussion, but a question is not required. The student is required only to find a passage before the class meeting, to use the class computer to find and highlight the passage, read it over with the class, and to comment about why s/he chose the passage and either what s/he learned from it or how s/he differs from it. Final Exam
Assignment Format:
You may take your final exam either
in-class using paper and ink during the final exam period (6 July,
3-6:59pm) or by email by 9pm. The schedule for email
testing is more flexible, but email students shouldn’t spend more than 3 hours
writing their exam. Both in-class and email exams are open-book and
open-notebook. Assignment: Two essays. Essay 1: Write an essay evaluating the usefulness of the Immigrant Narrative as a model or yardstick for describing multicultural American literature and culture. Where go from here? Research possibilities, teaching possibilities. Text requirements: Highlight several texts from across the semester. You should refer at least briefly to the texts of Essay 2, but also to Asian American literature, and review the minority-immigrant distinctions of the midterm. Essay 2: In readings of Bread Givers, The Exodus, and Of Plymouth Plantation, and elsewhere during the semester (e. g., Crevecoeur, the excerpt from Hunting Mr. Heartbreak), the course has attempted to analyze the USA’s dominant culture. Reviewing these texts, consider the following questions: · What are some of the attractions and repulsions, rewards and punishment that follow such an investigation? Why does the dominant culture tend to resist or elude analysis or even the impulse to analyze? · Describe the most characteristic qualities of the dominant culture. Consider attitudes toward literacy and education, intermarriage, mobility, and the family. · How much is the dominant culture both the same as and different from what we have otherwise studied simply as “immigrant culture.” Final Grade Report (emailed from instructor to
student) Final grades will be submitted to the registrar according to the usual procedures. However, I will email each student a tally of grades. This message should be accurate, but it will be “unofficial” in that none of its information aside from the final grade will be recorded or supported by the university registrar. The message will appear thus: LITR 5733: Seminar in American Culture, UHCL, summer 2004 STUDENT NAME Contact information Absences: Midterm: Grade for presentation, class leadership, email participation, attendance, etc.: Final exam: Course grade: COURSE POLICIES Attendance policy: You are expected to attend every scheduled class meeting. You may take one free cut. Attendance may not be taken systematically, but if you miss more than one meeting, you start jeopardizing your status in the course. If you miss more than two classes (especially early), you are encouraged to drop. Partial absences also count negatively. Even with medical or other emergency excuses, a high number of absences (full or partial) will result in a lower or failing grade. If shockingly absent, return and make contact (281 283 3380) or leave message ASAP. More than one absence affects final grades. You are always welcome to discuss your standing in the course. Class participation: Students' participation is judged less on quantity than on quality and appropriateness to the topic under discussion and the point being pursued. Final course grades may be affected by inappropriate student participation. Such inappropriate participation obviously includes offensive or distasteful remarks and persistent chatting while class is in progress. It may also include interruptions of lecture or discussion with irrelevant or untimely comments or questions. It may also include long-winded "life stories" of limited relevance to the course or interest to students. Academic Honesty Policy: Please refer to the catalog for the Academic Honesty Policy (2003-2004 Catalog, pp. 72-75). 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. Summer 2004 meeting, reading, and presentation schedule IA = Imagining
America (2nd edition) VA = Visions of America UA = Unsettling
America Tuesday, 1 June: introduction; students indicate presentation preferences; some history of immigration Texts: Crevecoeur, Letters from an American Farmer (1782), esp. “What is an American?” Anzia Yezierska, Bread Givers (1925) Olaudah Equiano, The Interesting Narrative of Gustavus Vassa, or Olaudah Equiano, an African (1789) *********** Thursday, 3 June: Examples of the Immigrant Narrative. Anzia Yezierska, “Soap and Water” (IA 105-110) [handout]; Nicholasa Mohr, “The English Lesson” (IA 21-34); Barbara Grizzuti Harrison, “Going Home: Brooklyn Revisited” (VA 158-169); Tahira Naqvi, “Thank God for the Jews” (IA 229-236) Poetry presentation: Joseph Papaleo, “American Dream: First Report,” UA 88 Reader: Respondent: Video review &
highlights: “American Dream Literary Seminar” Presenter: “webpage-highlighter”: *********** Monday, 7 June: Minorities and the immigrant narrative. James Baldwin, from No Name in the Street (VA 284-290); Toni Cade Bambara, “The Lesson” (IA 145-152); Leslie Marmon Silko, “The Man to Send Rain Clouds” (IA 205-209); Louise Erdrich, "American Horse" (IA 210-220) Poetry presentation: Patricia Smith, “Blonde White Women,” UA 77 Reader: Respondent: Poetry presentation: Chrystos, “I Have Not Signed a Treaty with the United States Government,” UA 304 Reader: Respondent: “webpage-highlighter”: *********** Tuesday, 8 June: Non-Mexican Hispanics: Immigrant or Minority? Nicholasa Mohr, “The English Lesson” (IA 21-34); Judith Ortiz Cofer, "Silent Dancing" (VA 179-186) Junot Diaz, "How to Date a Browngirl . . . “ (IA 276-279); Poetry presentation: Jose Angel Villalongo, Sr., “In the Good Old U. S. A.,” UA 328 Reader: Respondent: Poetry presentation: Martin Espada, “Coca-Cola and Coco Frio,” UA 124 Reader: Respondent: Video review &
highlights: “Immigrant Writers’ Impact on American Literature” panel Presenter: “webpage-highlighter”: *********** Thursday, 10 June: Afro-Caribbeans: Immigrant or Minority? June Jordan, “Report from the Bahamas” (VA 305-315); Edwidge Danticat, “Children of the Sea” (IA 98-112); Paule Marshall, “The Making of a Writer: From the Poets in the Kitchen” (VA 82-89); Paule Marshall, “To Da-Duh, in Memoriam” (IA 368-377) Video review &
highlights: Uprooted: Refugess of the Global Economy Presenter: Video review &
highlights: Marcus Garvey biography Presenter: “webpage-highlighter”: *********** Monday, 14 June: Mexican Americans as Immigrants or as Ambivalent Minority? Richard Rodriguez, from Hunger of Memory (VA 229-235); Gary Soto, “Like Mexicans” (VA 301-304); Nash Candelaria, "El Patron" (IA 221-228); Sandra Cisneros, "Barbie-Q" (IA 252-253) Poetry presentation: Pat Mora, “Immigrants,” UA 119 Reader: Respondent: **** Poetry presentation: Tino Villanueva, “Haciendo Apenas la Recoleccion,” UA 191 Reader: Respondent: “webpage-highlighter”: *********** Tuesday, 15 June: in-class or email midterm *********** Thursday, 17 June: Sui Sin Far, "In the Land of the Free" (IA 3-11); Gish Jen, “In the American Society” (IA 158-171); Maxine Hong Kingston, from The Woman Warrior (VA 195-200) Poetry presentation: Nellie Wong, “When I was Growing Up,” UA 55 Reader: Respondent: Poetry presentation: Shirley Geok-lin Lim, “Father from Asia,” UA 19 Reader: Respondent: “webpage-highlighter”: *********** Monday, 21 June: Chitra Divakaruni, “Silver Pavements, Golden Roofs” (70-83); Bharati Mukherjee, “A Wife’s Story” (IA 57-69); Bharati Mukherjee, “Love Me or Leave Me” (VA 187-194) Poetry presentation: Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni, “Restroom,” UA 21-23 Reader: Respondent: Video review &
highlights: “Reinventing the Melting Pot” panel Presenter: “webpage-highlighter”: *********** Tuesday, 22 June: Anzia Yezierska, Bread Givers (1925) Poetry presentation: Louis Simpson, “A Story about Chicken Soup,” UA 245 Reader: Respondent: Video review &
highlights: Early Jewish America Presenter: “webpage-highlighter”: *********** Thursday, 24 June: Anzia Yezierska, Bread Givers (1925); Eva Hoffman, from Lost in Translation: A Life in a New Language (VA 219-228) Video review &
highlights: Immigration history video Presenter: Poetry presentation: Gregory Djanikian, “In the Elementary School Choir,” UA 215 Reader: Respondent: “webpage-highlighter”: *********** Monday, 28 June: selections from the Exodus story in the Old Testament of the Bible (student provides; King James / Revised Standard version preferred); Exodus, chapters 1-15; chapter 16, verses 1-4; chapter 20; chapter 31, verse 12 through chapter 32 complete. Leviticus, chapter 18, verses 1-5 Numbers, chapter 14, verses 1-6; chapters 33. Deuteronomy, chapter 7, verses 1-6; chapter 11, verses 10-17.26-28; chapter 12, verses 2-3; chapter 34.1-6 Joshua, chapter 24 Judges, chapter 2, verses 1-15 Poetry presentation: Michael S. Glaser, “Preparations for Seder,” UA 176 Reader: Respondent: Poetry presentation: Hamod (Sam), “After the Funeral of Assam Hamady,” UA 288 Reader: Respondent: Poetry presentation: Shirley Kaufman, "Next Year, in Jerusalem" UA 48) Reader: Respondent: “webpage-highlighter”: Video review &
highlights: German-Americans Presenter: *********** Tuesday, 29 June: William Bradford, Of Plymouth Plantation (introduction, esp. p. xxii; chapters I-IV). Jonathan Raban, from Hunting Mr. Heartbreak: A Discovery of America (VA, 344-356). Poetry presentation: Lyn Lifshin, “Being Jewish in a Small Town,” UA 144 Reader: Respondent: “webpage-highlighter”: *********** Thursday, 1 July: The Pilgrims, the Hebrew model of national migration, and late Anglo-American culture / vertical immigration. 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, 107 bottom paragraph; 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; 370-1); “webpage-highlighter”: *********** Monday, 5 July: (holiday—no class meeting) *********** Tuesday 6 July: final exam |