Language and Literature: Learning Outcomes for English and Writing Courses Fall 2015, Spring and Summer 2016 ENGL 114

College Reading, Writing, and Study Skills

LO1 – Develop basic composition skills, including skills in paragraphing, logical arrangement of ideas, and writing a thesis. LO2 – Develop basic proficiencies in grammar, style, and mechanics. LO3 – Examine academic texts to develop note-taking and paraphrasing abilities. L04 – Practice workshopping, peer editing, utilizing the writing center, and engaging with instructors in the feedback process.

ENGL 150

Composition

LO1 – Develop proficiencies in written expression. LO2 – Examine and practice persuasive techniques and related skills in structuring an argument. LO3- Develop written expression, especially in terms of clarity and coherence. LO4 - Improve skills in analyzing written texts, with an eye toward understanding the traits of high quality writing. (This is a core writing competency that will be further developed in ENGL 207.) LO5 - Gain skills in drafting, revising, and editing. (This is a core writing competency that will be further developed in ENGL 207.)

ENGL 200

Literature Matters

LO1 - Introduce students to a central set of problems in contemporary literary studies. LO2 – Identify and interpret what makes a work literary. LO3 – Examine how reading and writing literature influence identity, meaning and value LO4 - Develop strategies for close reading and textual analysis.

ENGL 202

British Literature II: 19th Century to the Present

L01 - Gain a broader understanding of and appreciation for literature, and of British literature specifically written after 1785. L02 - Develop skills in expressing yourself in writing L03 - Practice the process of close reading, or the detailed literary analysis of different forms (genres) of literature L04 - Receive an introduction to the fundamentals of what we do in English literature classes at Drury so that you will develop a foundation on which to grow. ENGL 203

American Literature I: 1620 - 1865

LO1 – Develop the critical thinking skills and literacy habits necessary for success in college, in the English major, and beyond. LO2 - Identify the main periods of 17th, 18th, and 19th American literary production and master the main themes or controversies within each literary period. LO3 –Apply literary analysis to interpret individual literary texts. ENGL 204

American Literature II: 1865 to 1980

LO1 - Understand the main periods of 19th and 20th century literature. LO2 - Explore how literature responded to the social, political, cultural, and economic challenges of the 19th and 20th century. LO3 - Gain the critical thinking and analytical skills offered by humanistic inquiry. LO4 - improve student abilities in reading, analyzing, and writing about literature.

ENGL 207

Expository Writing

LO1 - Improve skills in analyzing written texts, with an eye toward understanding the traits of high quality writing. LO2 - Gain skills in drafting, revising, and editing. LO3 - Develop thoughts and ideas into an interesting, and coherent essay.

LO4 - Improve punctuation and grammar usage, sentence structure, and diction. LO5 - Analyze the arguments of others by learning how to summarize and respond to those arguments. LO6 – Learn how to locate and use academic sources LO7 – Learn how to participate in larger conversations about ideas, both in the classroom and the larger academic world.

ENGL 212

Comparative Mythology

*Still need learning outcomes.

ENGL 236

Ozarks Culture and Folklore

LO1 – Explore the oral and written roots of Ozarks folklore LO2 – Examine aspects and traditions of regional speech habits and diction LO3 – Develop skills in written expression and analysis of regional customs LO4 – Gain experience in working with primary documents, archival collections, and, increasingly, digital repositories of Ozarks history and culture ENGL 253

Grammar and Style

LO1 - distinguish between “grammar” and “style”; to know the difference between what it means to “be wrong” and to “use a nonstandard form”; understand the rhetorical situations that call for “standard” style and those that do not and to explain the difference to readers and writers; understand various meanings of grammar (including descriptive grammar, prescriptive grammar, and “mental grammar.” LO2 - describe English syntax, including identifying the parts of speech (nouns, verbs, prepositions, gerunds, subordinate clauses, etc.) and their functions (subjects, objects, adverbs, object complements, etc.) so that you have the language and abilities to 1) teach grammar to native or nonnative speakers; 2) edit a wide variety of writing and explain to writers why you made the changes you made; and 3) become better writers and editors yourselves. LO3 - understand what is at stake in debates about language and language change, so that you can take informed critical positions about language use and defend them, in schools and universities, in the work place, with professional writers and editors.

LO4 - develop a richer understanding of modern English usage, not as it is prescribed but as it is used by the best living writers of English, and to improve your own understanding of how to write clearly, powerfully, and elegantly. ENGL 266

Creative Writing I: Fiction

LO1 - Learn techniques for and have practice with writing fiction. LO2 - Learn how to develop and integrate character, plot, theme, and setting in the craft of writing fiction. LO3 - Practice writing and revising a mix of short fiction, flash fiction, fiction set in a historical context, and experimental fiction. LO4 – Practice peer-editing, offering constructive feedback, and participating in workshop ENGL 267

Creative Writing I: Poetry

*Still need learning outcomes. ENGL 301

Theory and Practice

LO1 – Provide a foundation for advanced research skills in literary studies. LO2 – Examine central questions in literary studies and provide students with the critical and theoretical background to make sense of these questions. LO3 – Examine, and have written practice with, contemporary schools of literary criticism, including but not limited to studies in New Criticism/formalism, new historical and cultural criticism, reader-response criticism, psychoanalytic criticism, feminist criticism, gender and sexuality studies, African-American criticism, Marxist criticism and combined approaches in literary theory. LO4 – Gain additional skills in writing and argumentation. ENGL 302

Women Writers

*Still need learning outcomes.

ENGL 303

Single Author

LO1 – Gain appreciation for a larger canon of works by a major author. LO2- Examine the author’s historical era and culture and how the discourse of this era and culture circulates in the literature. LO3 – Develop competencies with literary research and analysis. LO4 – Develop abilities in writing and in extended interpretation of texts. ENGL 306

Studies in 16th Through 18th Century Literature

LO1 - Familiarize students with representative writers and eras from the early Renaissance to the late Neoclassical Age. LO2 - Acquaint students with a gender dynamic in the literature that has only been restored and more fully published in recent times. LO3 - Investigate trends and genres in literature, particularly as these trends and genres intersect with the broader sweep of continental European history. LO4 - Investigate in greater depth some of the authors and aspects of course content in a semester paper project.

ENGL 311

Studies in Contemporary Literature

LO1 – Gain experience in reading, discussing, and analyzing novels from representative ‘modes’ of the contemporary (1960s to the present) era of literature. LO2 – Explore “identity” questions regarding the performance of gender, class, and ethnicity as well as “formal” questions regarding narrative experimentation and postmodern practice in the contemporary era. LO3 – Develop awareness of a wide range of contemporary literary techniques and categories, including but not limited to metafiction, minimalism, postmodernism, multiculturalism, post-colonialism, and pastiche. LO4 - Apply literature to contemporary issues and challenges. LO5 - Develop abilities in writing literary criticism by mastering close textual reading.

ENGL 317

African American Literature and Culture

LO1 – Identify the main periods of African American literary production. LO2 – Master the main themes or controversies within each literary period. LO3 – Apply literature to contemporary issues and challenges. LO4 – Develop abilities in writing literary criticism by mastering close textual reading. LO5 – Improve intercultural competencies and abilities in understanding interracial conflict.

ENGL 353

Nature of the English Language

LO1 – Gain a better historical and cultural understanding of the evolution of the English language. LO2 – Examine the common sources and “roots” of the English language as well as how English evolved, or was dispersed, into different regional dialects and practices. LO3 – Develop skills in expressing yourself in writing. LO4 - Practice close analysis of terms and ideas closely related to the study of the English language. ENGL 366

Creative Writing II: Fiction

LO1 - Further acquaint students with techniques for writing fiction and give students ample practice in writing fiction. LO2 – Develop awareness of submitting and marketing your fiction (writing queries, researching literary journals, and entering contests will also be discussed and assigned in this second semester of fiction writing) LO3 – Develop creative capacities LO4 – Practice and develop skills in editing, revising, and participating in workshop and peer-editing sessions. LO5 – Examine fundamentals of craft (gaining additional skill in point-of-view, characterization, descriptions, setting and conflict) and explore topics such as subtext, thematic development, narrative control, crafting alternative structures, plotting with internal/external drivers, and establishing omniscience and psychic distance.

ENGL 375

Land and Literature

LO1 - Analyze our relationship in terms of how this this relationship is captured in a wide variety of literary works. LO2 – Develop skills in articulating and engaging the philosophical assumptions of a literary work. LO3 – Examine questions and themes that include but are not limited to: Can we ever possess a spiritual kinship with the land? Are we just stewards of any land or can we say we possess it or vice versa? Are we meant to live in close proximity to the land as Thoreau might suggest, or is the land (and nature) an indifferent force or presence that we must overcome? What have we lost in our transition to Modernity? What are the tenets of American literary realism, naturalism, and Modernism and how do these literary eras relate to land-based literature? How might we contrast European, American, and Native American perspectives on “living off the land” in representative 19th century and 20th century novels? LO4 - Develop additional skills in critical and personal narrative writing.

ENGL 381

Southern Literature

LO1 - Familiarize students with the historical and cultural backdrop of specific eras of Southern literature. LO2 - Acquaint students with not only the development of “distinctively” Southern prose, but also the poetry and drama of the South. LO3 - Investigate trends and eras in American literature as they relate to Southern authors and culture. LO4 – Develop skills in researching and writing about race, gender, and class in the analysis of representative works of Southern Literature.

ENGL 493

Senior Seminar

LO1 – Re-explore fundamental questions from the undergraduate English and writing curricula (i.e. revisiting ENGL 200 questions, such as what makes a text “literary”? And what makes a literary text “matter”? Revisiting ENGL 301 questions regarding what we do with literary texts and how might theory be used to interpret literature and also connect literary to contemporary issues and challenges). LO2 – Read, analyze, and write extended interpretations of works that reflect major literary eras, with particular emphasis on the evolution of realism, modernism, and postmodernism. LO3 – Gain additional practice in utilizing contemporary literary theory to interpret a range of texts. LO4 – Practice the multi-step process of researching, drafting, revising and polishing a longer textual analysis. LO5 – Practice critical and creative writing in a variety of modes. LO6 – Gain a better cultural understanding of the development of major forms. LO7 – Explore topics that prepare students for teaching, graduate school, and a lifelong appreciation of the complexities and nuances of literature and writing.