Upcoming Undergraduate Topics Course Descriptions 
for Fall Semester: September 3 - December 19, 2008

ENGL 341-01 Asian American Women Writers (4 credits, CRN #41009)
Monday/Wednesday/Friday 1:35- 2:40pm
Prof. Paul Lai

This course takes up texts by Asian American women writers frequently discussed in fields ranging from women’s studies to American literary studies and Asian American studies. In addition to reading these writers for their representations of Asian American women, we will think broadly about how their textual strategies deal with themes such as familial connections, cultural and historical memory, national belonging, and constructions of gender in different contexts. As we study these texts, we will consider how these writers fit within different canons of American literature and women’s literature. In order to understand these texts, we will also think historically about American laws and policies that have characterized Asian immigrant and native-born women in particular ways, from fears in the nineteenth century of Chinese women as prostitutes to the need to acknowledge war brides in the mid-twentieth century and more. In addition to a selection of shorter readings, our primary texts will include the following books: Maxine Hong Kingston’s The Woman Warrior, Jessica Hagedorn’s Dogeaters, Fae Myenne Ng’s Bone, Roberta Uno’s edited collection Unbroken Thread: An Anthology of Plays by Asian American Women, Jane Jeong Trenka’s The Language of Blood, and Sun Yung Shin's Skirt Full of Black.This course fulfills the Human Diversity requirement of the core curriculum and the Diversity Literature requirement for English majors. Prerequisite(s): ENGL 111 and 112 or ENGL 190.

ENGL 481-01 Seminar: Performing for Social Change (4 credits, CRN #40455)
Tuesday/Thursday 3:25 - 5:00pm
Dr. Amy Muse

Jill Dolan argues in Utopia in Performance: Finding Hope at the Theater that “live performance provides a place where people come together, embodied and passionate, to share experiences of meaning making and imagination that can describe or capture fleeting intimations of a better world” (2). In this seminar we will learn more about what goes into performance—aesthetically, ethically, politically—that is aimed toward creating social change. Our reading will include theatre theory, traditional plays and poetry written to address particular social issues (such as apartheid and war), and contemporary forms of performance art (e.g., multi-character monologues by Lily Tomlin and Guillermo Gomez-Peña), community-based documentary drama (e.g., Twilight: Los Angeles 1992 and The Laramie Project), and performance poetry (e.g., Def Poetry Jam). Writing assignments will encourage you to see yourselves as scholars, artists, and citizens, and to write for the public sphere and our local communities as well as the academy.

***Please note: this course will require attendance at about half a dozen theatre and poetry events, as well as a willingness to participate in performance exercises (with our class, not for a public audience).

Prerequisite(s): Completion of five English courses beyond the freshman level, including ENGL 380 Issues in English Studies; or, for non-majors, permission of the instructor and the department chair. This course fulfills the Diversity Literature requirement for English majors. NOTE: English majors are strongly advised to take the 481 seminar as their final English class, if possible. 

Upcoming Undergraduate Topics Course Descriptions for J-Term: January 5 - January 29, 2008

ENGL 295-01 Topics: TBD (2 credits, CRN #10174)
Tuesday/Thursday 9:00am - 12:00pm
Instructor TBD

Please check back for course description!

ENGL 295-02 Topics: TBD (2 credits, CRN #10175)
Tuesday/Thursday 9:00am - 12:00pm
Instructor TBD

Please check back for course description!

ENGL 295-03 Topics: TBD (2 credits, CRN #10176)
Tuesday/Thursday 1:00pm - 4:00pm
Instructor TBD

Please check back for course description!

ENGL 337-01 Topics: Arab Film (4 credits, CRN #10245)
Tuesday/Thursday 1:00 - 4:00pm
Dr. Pamela Nice

Please check back for course description!