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Instructor: Dr. Dale Rigby Office: 110 A Cherry Hall Office Phone: 745-5781 Home Phone: 393-2017 Email: Dale.Rigby@wku.edu Office Hours: 2-4 MWF @ by appointment
WELCOME to “Advanced Composition”… Advanced Composition? What's That?
Here is how the 2001-2003 WKU course catalog glosses Advanced Composition:
Theory and performance in the essay of ideas with stress on the essay form and coherence, sentence and paragraph design, punctuation, research paper technique, and other writing conventions.
Here is an amendment to that constitution for our upcoming semester:
Theory and performance in the [hybrid genre of creative nonfiction] with stress on [modes from the memoir to experimental critical writing, literary journalism to the nature essay, the personal essay to] the essay of ideas. [Since] the essay form [is both promiscuous and malleable, it often blurs traditional rules governing] coherence, sentence and paragraph design, punctuation, [and] research paper technique. [As such, this class explores how the genre of creative nonfiction complicates] other writing conventions [such as the caveat against using the first person singular in academic writing and the institutional partition twixt fact and fiction.] ***
Our Shared Text:
The Fourth Genre: Contemporary Writers of/on Creative Nonfiction, 2nd ed., compiled by Robert Root & Michael Steinberg (New York: Longman, 2001).
Your (tentative) Portfolio:
Your completed portfolio will be due the first day of finals week, Dec. 10, and should contain (tentatively) the following polished pieces (I will give you a more thorough schedule/syllabus next week after I get a better sense of your own backgrounds and interests).
--your revised “Joys and Horribles” --your weekly informal responses/imitations/exercises (500 words each) --two pieces pitched towards Brevity (up to 750 words each) --a revamped piece of experimental critical writing (1500 words) --a review of a book of creative nonfiction book of your choosing (1200 words) --a piece of literary journalism (1200 words) --a personal essay (2000 words) * * *
For Next Week, August 29:
--Reading: Jocelyn Bartkevicius, “The Landscape of Creative Nonfiction” (225-231) and Bret Lott, “Toward a Definition of Creative Nonfiction” (309-315) --Writing: please post to list-serv by next Tues: 500-word autobiography --Workshop: bring 2 copies of your Joys and Horribles to class
Dale Rigby--English 401/501--Fall 2001
PORTFOLIO: Your final portfolio, due when we meet as a class on Dec. 12 from 6-8 p.m., should include all the drafts leading up to and including the following major projects for the course:
1. your five joys and five horribles (10%) 2. your 500-word autobiographies (10%) 3. your two Brevities (up to 750 words each) (10%) 4. your memoir (5 pages or so) (10%) 5. your personal essay (5 pages or so) (10%) 6. your piece of experimental critical writing (6 pages or so) (15%) 7. your review of a work of creative nonfiction (4 pages or so) (15%)
NOTE: I will help lead an ongoing discussion about these projects in much greater detail on our list-serv as early as this upcoming week.
WEEKLY RHYTHM: You’ll notice from the accompanying schedule that I’ve tried to create a consistent pattern for our semester: 1. you will be held responsible for that week’s assigned reading/s. 2. you will be asked to post a 500-word-or-so reflective response each week to our list-serv: a) these responses need to be posted by Tuesday evening @ 9 p.m, the night before our class; b) you are required to print out the posts of your classmates and bring them to Wednesday’s class. 3. you will be required to bring in four copies each week for your group members of the piece we are working on that evening.
ATTENDANCE/DEADLINES: Though I genuinely loved teaching 401 last fall, there was in retrospect one glitch. So let me clear about this one. I know you all have busy lives; I also know that this is an advanced writing course with a steady and challenging amount of work. And I expect you to be here, week in, and week out… So school is a job. And here the minimum expectations are that you come prepared each and every week to class: that means meeting ALL of the expectations of our Weekly Rhythm…
GRADES: I’d very much prefer to give frequent feedback and sincere response to your drafts without the added onus (for both of us) of affixing traditional letter grades to your attempts at creative nonfiction. What I’d like to do is adopt a version of “portfolio” grading wherein I’ll assess your performance based on the work you hand in on Dec. 12; in tandem with that pedagogy (which allows for as many re-visions as you have time for), you’ll notice that above I’ve given the relative weights I’ll give to the major projects; and then you’ll notice that I’ve played with the portfolio system a little by reserving 20% wiggle room: here I’ll take into consideration issues of attendance, meeting of deadlines, and your role as a member of the class/your workshop group [the goal here is to strongly discourage the procrastatory impulse that can come into play with portfolio grading] AND, PLEASE NOTE, IF THIS DOESN’T MEET YOUR NEEDS, PLEASE FEEL FREE TO SCHEDULE…an appointment with me anytime during the semester and we can have a “if I was giving you a grade right not, in the ballpark, it’d be…and why…”
Dale TOWARDS A SEMESTER SCHEDULE FOR ENGLISH 401
Week 1: 8-22 Reading: Carol Bly, “Mental Image—Or No Mental Image?” Writing: information sheets Workshop: examples of joys and horribles from last year’s students
Week 2: 8-29 Reading: Jocelyn Bartkevicius, “The Landscape of Creative Nonfiction” (225-231); Bret Lott, “Toward a Definition of Creative Nonfiction” (319-315) Writing: 500-word autobiographies posted to list-serv Workshop: Joys and Horribles: 5 joys, 5 horribles (2 copies)
Week 3: 9-5 Reading: Please read closely and bring to class the seven new essays from #10 of Brevity @: http://www.creativenonfiction.org/brevity/brevity.html Writing: focus on your choice of two of the Brevity pieces and post a 500-word reading response where you run your reading through anything from the previous week’s reading of Bartkevicius and Lott that you find helpful and/or provocative in starting to think about the genre of creative nonfiction. Workshop: please bring in 4 copies each of a two potential “Brevities”
NOTE: On Wednesday, Sept. 5, Creative Writing Faculty Annual Reading: Joe Survant (poetry), Nancy Roberts (fiction), and Dale Rigby (nonfiction) will give a reading in 125 Cherry Hall from 2:30-3:30. You are all invited and encouraged to intend!
Week 4: 9-12 Reading: your classmates’ 500-word autobiographies; Patricia Hampl “Memory and Imagination” (259-68); Susan Toth “Going to the Movies” (209-11); Naomi Shihab Nye, “Three Pokes of a Thistle” (135-138) Writing: 500-word reflection using specific examples from your classmates’ autobiographies (and your reading of Hampl and Toth and Nye) to reflect upon “what makes a really good 500-word autobiography.” Workshop: copies of revised Brevities for workshop.
Week 5: 9-19 Reading: Nancy Sommers, “I Stand Here Writing,” (177-184), Mary Clearman Blew, “The Art of Memoir” (232-235) and “The Unwanted Child” (19-29) Writing: please post a revision of your 500-word autobiographies Workshop: copies of revised joys and horribles [see details later]
Week 6: 9-26 Reading: Michael Steinberg, “Chin Music” (185-194); Philip Lopate, “Portrait of my Body” (105-112); Frank Conroy, “Running the Table” (49-53); and Mimi Schwartz, “Memoir? Fiction? Where’s the Line?” (338-43) Writing: to be determined Workshop: a draft of your memoir
Week 7: 10-3 NOTE: (poet Li Young Lee will be giving a reading Tues. evening, Oct. 2, in Cherry Hall—more details later: all encouraged and invited to attend) Reading: Scott Russell Sanders, “The Singular First Person” (329-337); Kathleen Norris, “Celibate Passion” (130-134); Pico Iyer, “Where Worlds Collide” (90-99), Mimi Schwartz, “My Father Always Said” (165-172) Writing: to be determined Workshop: draft of your personal essay NOTE: I will be hosting the local version of what Barnes and Noble calls the “World’s Largest Writing Workshop” at B&N bookstore, 7 p.m., Thursday, Oct. 4. It’s free and you are all encouraged and invited to attend!
Week 8: 10-10 Reading: Emily Chase, “Warping Time with Montaigne,” (373-78) and “Notes from a Journey Toward “Warping Time” (379-386); Mary Elizabeth Pope, “Teacher Training” (403-408) and “Composing Teacher Training (409-416); Scott Russell Sanders, “Cloud Crossing” (152-157) Writing: to be determined Workshop: revised draft of your memoir NOTE: Monday, October 15 is the last day to drop course with a “W.”
Week 9: 10-17 Reading: Michelle Cliff, “History as Fiction, Fiction as History” (37-41); Vicki Hearne, “Can an Ape Tell a Joke” (76-86); John McPhee, “From Birnam Wood to Dunsianne” (117-123); Jesse Wegman, “Six Days” (212-215) Writing: to be determined Workshop: revised draft of your personal essay
Week 10: 10-22 Reading: Jane Tompkins, “Me and My Shadow” (349-363); Marianna Torgovnick, “Experimental Critical Writing” (364-368); Lucia Perillo, “When the Body Begins to Fall Apart on the Academic Stage” (139-141) Writing: to be determined Workshop: draft of your experimental critical writing
Week 11: 10-31 PRESENTATIONS [from here on I’m being necessarily tentative. Not sure how large the class will be, which will inevitably determine somewhat the nature of and dates needed for your presentations of your writer—my thought is to have the bravest folks serve as guinea pigs in week eleven to get the kinks out]
Week 12: 11-7 NO CLASS: I’d like to give us a break from the required drafts this week and to use the class time to require you to attend a talk by noted sociologist Michael Kimmel at 8 p.m. called “School Shootings and Domestic Peace: Cultural Meanings of Masculinity.”
Week 13: 11-14 Reading: Maureen Stanton, “Zion” (417-424) and “On Writing Zion” (425-430); Simone Poirier-Bures, “That Shining Place: Crete, 1966” (387-396) and “Afterword: Writing “The Greece Piece” (397-402) Writing: to be determined Workshop: revised draft of your experimental critical writing
THANKSGIVING BREAK
Week 15: 11-28 PRESENTATIONS
Week 16: 12-5 PRESENTATIONS
Finals Week: Our class meets Wed., Dec. 12, 6-8 p.m. Which will also be when your final portfolios are due.
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