ENGL 003.301/WSTD 006.301

Practicalities:
Days, Time, Room Number: Tues. & Thurs., 9:00-10:30, Bennett Hall, Rm. 321
Instructor:  Stephanie Harzewski
sharzews@english.upenn.edu
Phone: 215-823-6793
Office: Bennett Hall, 4th Fl., #C3
Office Hours: Tuesday, 11:00 AM-1:00 PM and by appointment (arranged via email)
Course listserv address: ENGL003-301-02C@lists.upenn.edu
Syllabus URL: http://www.english.upenn.edu/~sharzews/fall2002syllabus

Course Description:
Only since 1892 did “heterosexual” enter the English vocabulary where it served as a stigmatizing label for non-reproductive, pleasure-oriented perversion.  According to Jonathan Katz, author of the groundbreaking The Invention of Heterosexuality (1995), the association of heterosexuality with perversion continued well into the twentieth century until it was gradually established as a stable sign of “normal sex.”  In a twentieth-century American context, this intensive-writing course investigates how heterosexuality functions as a type of narrative the past century has revised and contested considerably. We will examine how a diverse group of artists and theorists have conceptualized heterosexuality as a code, commodity, institution, and performance. We will consider how and why individuals, including ourselves, have co-opted or resisted certain "straight" narratives as a means of self-fashioning. Readings will be drawn from diverse genres: novels, poems, diaries/journals, short stories, Internet sites, courtship manuals, book reviews, and social theory.

You will learn how to write about a diverse body of literature and develop an assortment of transportable communication skills.  We will develop strategies for writing within limited time and length parameters as well as address writing and anxiety issues (writer’s block, end-of-semester panic, etc.)   Distinctions between writing deliberately intended to be read vs. presented will receive special attention. In order to explore how to maximize writing delivered aloud, each student will contribute an oral presentation.   No midterm or final exam.

Requirements and Grading:
The requirements for this class fall into three categories: Attendance, Preparation and Participation, and Written Work.

Attendance: This is a discussion/workshop-based class and will only succeed if everyone is a fully involved participant. You may miss one class meeting without penalty, but on-time attendance is required at all other class meetings unless you have obtained my permission in advance or can officially document a medical or family crisis after the event. Students with more than 3 unexcused absences will fail the course. Repeated late arrival will lower your participation grade, so be here and be on time.

Preparation and Participation:

• You should read all of the assigned texts before the corresponding class meeting and come to class ready to participate. Since a significant part of the course involves close reading in which sections of works will be read aloud and analyzed, if you forget to bring a text being discussed that day to class, you must tell me before class begins so you can look on with another student.  Repeated failure to bring the germane text to class will lower your participation grade.

• Cell phones & beepers must be turned off in class!

• It is the student’s sole responsibility to obtain class handouts, assignment instructions, etc. in the case of tardiness or unexcused absences.

• It is ok if you are naturally shy or quiet; good listening and the occasional helpful comment can be a better form of participation than constant chatter. But I expect you all to keep up with assignments and to make yourselves productive participants in whatever way best suits you. A third of your final grade will be based on the quality of your preparation and participation.

• Listserv Posts: You will be responsible for a total of three scheduled email postings. These consist of no more than 300 words and should be posted to the class listserv (ENGL001-305-02A@lists.upenn.edu) by 7:30 PM the evening before the next class meeting. One post will briefly introduce another text (a news editorial, website, or poem, for example) and present its thematic or sociological relevance to the course. One will raise questions about the class readings; highlight their central (or perhaps overlooked) issues; or evaluate the degree of success with which they engage the reader.  One will address an issue pertaining to writing (tips for the successful presentation of written material; writer’s block/burnout; methods for revision, for example).  (You may wish to consult the recommended text Ernest Hemingway on Writing as a model.)  You are encouraged to respond to the posting of others in your own post, though this is not obligatory.  These are not meant to be formal or finished essays, but they should be coherent and grammatical; please proofread and edit them before posting. I will not be grading your listserv posts, but I will be archiving them in individual folders, which will become part of your final grade.

• Critical Writing Summary: At times, both in-class and outside, you will be asked to evaluate and comment on the published works of critics. You will submit a 1-2 page critical writing summary (an article chosen from several on Toni Morrison’s Sula), which will serve as an introduction to writing about literary criticism as well as the valuable skills of paraphrase and argumentative strategy identification.

• Essays: There will be four essays for this course of varying lengths:
• Essay #1: 2 pages
• Essay #2: 2-3 pages
• Essay #3: 4 pages
• Essay #4: 5-6 pages


I will grade these, and I will indicate in my comments how the work might be improved. As an important aspect of writing is revision, you will revise the first and the third essays.  You will have an individual paper conference with me to assist in this regard.  Revisions and paper conferences for essay #3, though encouraged, are voluntary.  Your grade for a revised essay will be the average of your grades on the original version and the final version.  Please remember to attach the graded original essay with the revised one.  Late papers will be down-graded a third of a grade for each day they are late.

Papers must be submitted in print form.  No Microsoft Word attachments are accepted!

Grading: Your final grade will be based on the following percentages: 30% for preparation and participation, 70% for written work and your oral presentation. Any penalty for missed classes and tardiness will be deducted from this total.

Books:
Books have been ordered through the House of Our Own Bookstore (3920 Spruce St.). You should purchase copies of all the following:

Albert, Alexa.  Brothel: Mustang Ranch and Its Women.  Ballantine.
Fein, Ellen, & Sherrie Schneider.  The Rules: Time-Tested Secrets for Capturing the Heart of Mr. Right.
     Warner.
Gilman, Charlotte Perkins.  “The Yellow Wallpaper.”  The Feminist Press.
Hemingway, Ernest.  Ernest Hemingway on Writing.  Ed. Larry W. Phillips.  Touchstone.  Recommended.
James, Henry.  “The Beast in the Jungle” and Other Stories.  Dover.
Lunsford, Andrea A.  The Everyday Writer, 2nd spiral-bound edition.
McCullers, Carson.  The Ballad of the Sad Café and Other Stories.  Bantam.
Morrison, Toni.  Sula.  Plume.
Raine, Nancy Venable Raine.  After Silence: Rape and My Journey Back.  Three Rivers Press.

Resources:
The Writing Center (http://www.english.upenn.edu/Writing/WATU/center.html): all kinds of writing assistance and advice provided by grad students from various departments, located on the 4th floor of Bennett Hall. Make an appointment by calling 215-898-8525.

Writers House (http://www.english.upenn.edu/~wh): Kelly Writers House hosts many fun events for readers and writers, all of which are free. For more info, check out their website or call 215-573- WRIT.

Writing Program Home Page (http://www.english.upenn.edu/Writing): general guide to writing courses & resources at Penn.

Tutoring and Learning Resources (http://dolphin.upenn.edu/~dasp/tlrpage.html): Help with all kinds of study skills from time management to reading a lot very quickly. Call 57-EXCEL (573- 9235) for an appointment, email them at learning@dolphin.upenn.edu or drop by during walk-in hours from 12-3 PM daily, Suite 110, High Rise East (3820 Locust Walk).

Counseling and Psychological Services (http://dolphin.upenn.edu/~caps/): Confidential and free individual counseling, support, workshops (on such topics as stress management, eating issues, test anxiety, and relationship issues), and walk-in crisis counseling--all to help you develop greater understanding about yourself and others and to enhance your personal well-being and academic performance. Call 898 - 7021 or stop by their office 133 South 36th Street (near Sansom), 2nd Floor Mellon Building, between 9 AM and 5 PM, Monday - Friday.

Collaborative Writing/Plagiarism: I encourage you to work with one another to become better writers and better thinkers by sharing your ideas and giving feedback on each other's work. However, the work you submit to this class is expected to be your own. When you want to refer to someone else's ideas (even the ideas of someone else in this class), you must properly acknowledge your sources. Sometimes this involves providing appropriate citations in the body of your writing and additional bibliographic information at the end. Other times it involves using footnotes correctly. If you have questions about how to cite a source properly, consult a style manual or ask me. If you submit work that has been copied without attribution from some published or unpublished source, or that has been prepared by someone other than you, or that in any other way misrepresents somebody else's work as your own, you will face severe discipline by the University! Work that is your own work but has been submitted to more than one class for credit is also considered plagiarism unless you have obtained the permission of all course instructors involved prior to handing in the work. For more detailed information, see the College of Arts and Sciences' pages on academic integrity at http://www.sas.upenn.edu/college/rules/academic_integrity.html.

Schedule:

9/5, Thursday:

• Introductions
• “Heterosexuality” as Twentieth-Century Phenomenon
• “The Story of an Hour” by Kate Chopin

• “The Yellow Wallpaper” by Charlotte Perkins Gilman
• Writing Topic: Nuanced Verbs

9/12, Thursday: “The Yellow Wallpaper” continued Writing Topic: Active vs. Passive Voice

Charlotte Perkins Gilman (1860-1935)

9/17: Tuesday: “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” by T.S. Eliot Writing Topic: Writing Anxiety & Burnout Essay #1 Instructions Distributed

T.S. Eliot (1888-1965)

9/19, Thursday:

• Oral Presentation Preparation Discussed
• Writing Topic: Printed Writing vs. Presented Writing
• Paper Checklist Distributed

9/23, Monday: Paper #1 due
 
 

9/24, Tuesday: “The Beast in the Jungle” by Henry James Sign up for Paper Conferences

Henry James (1843-1916),  Painting (1913) by John Singer Sargent

 

9/26, Thursday: “The Beast in the Jungle” continued Writing Topic: Movement in Writing

Ernest Hemingway (1899-1961) on his Second Africa Safari (1953-1954), Photo (1953) by Earl Theisen

10/1, Tuesday:

• “The Snows of Kilimanjaro” by Ernest Hemingway
• Oral Presentations:
Calling Cards and Money” by Beth L. Bailey
GQ: Survey & Publication History

10/3, Thursday: Excerpts from A Spy in the House of Love, Henry & June, and Little Birds by Anaïs Nin

Anaïs Nin (1903-1977)

10/4, Friday: Revised Essay #1 due w/ original
 
 

10/8, Tuesday:  The Ballad of the Sad Café by Carson McCullers Writing in Blue Books for Exams Essay #2 Instructions Distributed

Adrienne Rich (b. 1929)

10/10, Thursday:

• The Ballad of the Sad Café continued

10/14, Monday: Essay #2 due

Cherrie Moraga (b. 1952)

10/15, Tuesday:

• “Compulsory Heterosexuality and Lesbian Existence” by Adrienne Rich
• Oral Presentations:
Popular Women’s Magazines
“Motivations for Pursuing an Acting Career in Pornography” by Sharon A. Abbott

10/17, Thursday: “La Guerra” by Cherrie Moraga Oral Presentations:  “Why Men Seek Out Prostitutes” by Martin A. Monto Escort Services: An Advertising Survey Mail-Order Brides: American Trafficking & Representations Essay #3 Instructions Distributed

Ellen Fein & Sherrie Schneider of The Rules

10/22, Tuesday: The Rules: Time-Tested Secrets for Capturing the Heart of Mr. Right by Ellen Fein & Sherrie Schneider

Alexa Albert, Author of Brothel: Mustang Ranch and Its Women

10/24, Thursday:

• The Rules continued
• Writing Topic: Incorporating Quotations

10/29, Tuesday: Brothel: Mustang Ranch and Its Women by Alexa Albert Oral Presentation: “Inside Nevada’s Brothel Industry” by Kathryn Hausbeck and Barbara G. Brents Sign up for Paper Conferences

Nancy Venable Raine (b. 1946)

10/31, Thursday: Brothel continued

Toni Morrison (b. 1931)

11/5, Tuesday:

• Brothel continued

11/7, Thursday: Oral Presentations:  "The Feminine Mystique" and  Good Housekeeping Ideology Hugh Hefner & the Playboy Enterprise Maxim: Survey & Publication History  Stuff: Survey & Publication History  Read first fifty pages of After Silence: Rape & My Journey Back by Nancy Venable Raine Recommended Reading: “Rape” and “Diving Into the Wreck” by Adrienne Rich

Kate Chopin (1850-1904)

11/12, Tuesday: Continue reading After Silence on your own; no class

11/14, Thursday:

• After Silence by Raine

11/19, Tuesday:

• After Silence continued

11/20, Wednesday: Essay #3 revision w/ graded original due

11/21, Thursday:

• Sula by Toni Morrison

11/26, Tuesday: Sula continued Critical Summary Instructions & Articles Distributed Essay #4 Instructions Distributed

Carson McCullers (1917-1967)

11/28, Thursday: Thanksgiving; No class

12/3, Tuesday:

• Critical Summary due
• Oral Presentations:
• “The Worth of a Date” by Beth L. Bailey
• “Lifting the Veil,” from White Weddings: Romancing Heterosexuality in Popular Culture by Chrys Ingraham
• theknot.com; “Brides and Barbies: Romancing the Clone,” from White Weddings: Romancing Heterosexuality in Popular Culture by Chrys Ingraham
• Erotic Dancing: Perceptions & Industry Motivations
• Writing Topic: End-of-semester time management

12/6, Friday: Essay #4 due

12/12, Thursday: Last date to submit final revision of essay #2