[Next week
brings a new semester, the last of my 11th year at Fitchburg State
University. So this week brings a series of spring 2016 preview posts, this
time focused on the texts we’ll be reading in my spring courses. I’d love to
hear about your spring syllabi, and other spring plans, in comments!]
I’ll be teaching
another section of our graduate
program’s Intro to Literary Theory course this spring, but as that
hyperlink indicates I’ve blogged about that one before and remain comfortable
with its readings. On the other hand, I’ll be teaching another
new Adult Learning in the Fitchburg Area (ALFA) course as well, and as with
the fall’s contemporary
short story course this is one for which I’m still developing the readings.
So I’d love your input!
I like to
alternate more literary ALFA courses with more historical/AmericanStudies ones,
so it’s time for the latter. This time I’m planning to focus for the course’s
five weeks on under-remembered histories and stories behind periods and events
we generally remember well; so, for example, we have many collective memories
of the American Revolution, but for that week I’ll ask us to read and analyze
figures like Quock
Walker and Annis
Stockton, to consider both what they can help us see about the Revolution
and what other histories and issues they add to the conversation.
I know I want
that week on the Revolution, and one on the Civil War (probably focusing on Chinese
American Civil War soldiers, although I’m open to suggestions!). But
honestly, the course’s other three weeks remain open—I’m thinking one pre-Revolution
and two post-Civil War, but those are just starting points, and ones for which
I haven’t narrowed down the list of possible figures and histories either. The
course starts on Friday, January 29th, so I’ll need to make my
decisions pretty quickly—but again, I’d love to hear any suggestions or ideas
of yours as I do so! Help make my Spring 2016 semester that much more fresh and
meaningful, please!
Special NeMLA
preview this weekend,
Ben
PS. What are you
teaching/reading this spring? Other spring plans you’d share?
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