Graduate Course Offerings
Summer Semester 2024 Graduate Courses
Course
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Instructor
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Course Description
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ENGL 6890 |
Dr. Hannah Stevens |
Public policy analysis has been described as the art and craft of “speaking truth to power” (Wildavsky, 1987). In this course, you will learn about policy analysis through in-depth discussion of the crucial components of public policy as well as analytic approaches with the aim of analyzing and identifying the spaces technical communicators do, could, and should occupy in policymaking. |
| ENGL 6920 Bennion Teacher's Workshop June 24-June 28 |
Dr. Susan Grayzel Dr. Molly Cannon |
Objects of War: How Material Culture Helps Us Study and Remember Modern Conflict Mountain West Center for Regional Studies 2024 Bennion Teachers' Workshop |
Fall Semester 2024 Graduate Courses
Course
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Instructor
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Course Description
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ENGL 6330 |
Dr. Phebe Jensen |
Four hundred years after his death, William Shakespeare’s works are studied and performed across the globe, and continually reimagined by literary, visual, and theatrical artists. In this course, students will consider how Shakespeare’s own engagement with pressing social issues of his time has resonated in modern retellings—in film versions of the plays, in the visual arts, and in literature. The class will discuss the nature of Shakespeare’s dramatic achievement in his representation of a variety of themes and practices—colonialism, magic, antisemitism, political ambition, racism, witchcraft, gender and sexual identity—and at the same time, consider the nature of artistic adaptation and influence more broadly. The class will benefit from the visit of a design historian, Ella Hawkins, a specialist in Shakespearean costuming, who herself transforms historical artifacts, including books, into biscuit art. Texts for the class include Shakespeare’s The Tempest, The Merchant of Venice, and Macbeth, along with retellings of these plays by authors including the Caribbean playwright Aimé Cesaire, the Canadian novelist Margaret Atwood, the American director Julie Taymor, and the legendary Japanese director, Akira Kurosawa. |
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ENGL 6410/7410 |
Dr. Rebecca Walton |
ENGL 6410: Introduction to Technical Communication Introduction to Technical Communication is designed to welcome graduate students across the English Department, helping you to develop a foundational understanding of Technical Communication as a field:
Students interested in academic careers will benefit by develop scholarly skills applicable across majors:
Students working in industry in technical communication will benefit by:
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ENGL 6440/7440 |
Dr. Avery Edenfield |
Cultural Research Methods offers an introduction to cultural studies, with an emphasis in how cultural studies frameworks have been, are, and can be applied to technical communication and rhetoric research and practice. The goal of the course is to help you learn how cultural research methods have been applied in academia or industry and learn how to apply them yourself. We will develop a critical vocabulary and knowledge of the ethical, historical, political, and social contexts that impact and are impacted by these frameworks. By the end of the course, you should have a strong foundational understanding of the differences in these methods, understand why each is a valid form of knowledge-making, and understand that there is more research that needs to be done in these areas. While there will be an emphasis on technical communication and rhetoric scholarship in the course, these methods are often applied to literary studies, American Studies, and folklore, as well. I welcome students interested in other areas, and I will work with you to apply these methods to your own research projects. |
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ENGL 6460 |
Dr. Ryan Moeller |
This class will introduce you to several digital writing technologies commonly used in professional writing contexts, including accessibility features in MS Word, Google Docs, and Adobe Acrobat; photo manipulation in Adobe Photoshop; page design in Adobe InDesign, and a digital writing technology of your choice. If you’ve ever wanted to explore an app that might help you with the writing you do, then this class is for you! Weekly discussions will give you the opportunity to apply what you’re learning to texts of your choice, like how to use headings to create linkable document outlines (think interactive tables of contents) and generally more readable texts, how to straighten and crop images in Photoshop, and how to design a newsletter, large document, or a flyer in Adobe InDesign. |
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ENGL 6700 |
Dr. Afsane Rezaei |
This course introduces students to the academic field of folklore studies, an interdisciplinary field located between literature and anthropology. We will review the history of the discipline, the evolution of major theories and approaches in the study of folklore, and what folklorists do today in different academic and public-sector fields. Students will learn about various ideas and keywords in folklore studies (tradition, authenticity, genre, folk group, etc.) and will be introduced to a range of genres of everyday expressive culture, such as folk narratives, beliefs, festivals, and digital forms of folklore. In addition, students will practice writing within the conventions of the field (preparing conference abstracts, book reviews, and bibliographic essays), and will have the chance to pursue folkloristic research into their own topic of interest. |
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ENGL 6770 |
Dr. Lynne McNeill |
Have you ever replied to the familiar greeting "Hello there!" with the traditional online response: "General Kenobi"? Have you ever seen a four-panel image featuring two lines in four different configurations in relation to each other and thought, "I know that web comic!"? Are you currently spiraling down a rabbit hole of royal conspiracies trying to figure out why Kate Middleton photoshopped her own family photo? If you've had any of these experiences, then this is the course for you. If you haven't had any of these experiences, then this is definitely the course for you! This course will offer an in-depth consideration of a rapidly emerging area of folklore studies—folklore and digital culture—and will explore the ways in which we can understand folklore in digital contexts, the ways that digital culture moves offline and into our in-person exchanges, the kinds of folklore we find in digital settings, and the kinds of folk groups we find through the use of communication technologies. We will be looking at familiar forms of folklore such as legends, jokes, and customs, as well as born-digital forms like image macros, TikTok challenges, parody Amazon reviews, creepypastas, and more. We will explore the history of memes, dive into online fan cultures, contemplate Poe's Law, and engage with the changing nature of fieldwork in a very-online environment. It will probably be weird. |
| ENGL 6810 Introduction to Composition Studies M 4:30-7:00 pm In Person |
Dr. Jessica Rivera-Mueller |
This course is designed to help you deepen your understanding of Composition Studies and grow as a writer, writing teacher and/or writing studies scholar. Throughout the course, we will study key moments in the field’s history, explore how multiple ways of knowing have shaped the discipline over time, and examine foundational concepts for work in the field. In doing so, we will question the ways our assumptions about learning to write, teach writing, and study writing inform our own questions about and understandings of composition. In the course, you will have the opportunity to develop a final project that addresses one of your most pressing questions about learning to write or learning to teach writing. This course privileges your questions about learning to write or learning to teach writing because it is designed to foster your current and future development as a writer/teacher/scholar. |
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ENGL 6820: Practicum in Teaching English |
Dr. Beth Buyserie |
This course is designed specifically and required for new graduate instructors teaching English 1010. Our collective goal is to facilitate both short- and long-term teacher growth, preparing teachers for current and subsequent teaching responsibilities through an emphasis on the dialectical relationship between theory and practice. Class begins during the pre-semester orientation where new instructors begin building a community with other teachers, are introduced to resources and curriculum, and are mentored through fall semester teaching preparation. Learning progresses throughout the practicum as we read, analyze, and discuss pivotal texts in composition and rhetorical theory and pedagogy. Participants become reflective practitioners by maintaining a journal tying course concepts to classroom experiences, writing several English 1010 assignments, observing peers and mentors in classrooms and the Writing Center, and consolidating a teaching identity through the creation of a teaching philosophy. |
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ENGL 6884 |
Dr. Jennifer Sinor |
In this graduate creative nonfiction workshop, we will be focused on writing that explores both grief and joy—often at the same time. We will be thinking about how to write the ineffable: experience that exists beyond what words can name. Both euphoria and sorrow challenge the artist to consider how form might be bent, language repurposed, and detail reimagined in order to fasten the limits of living to the page. Ross Gay offers this: “What if joy is not only entangled with pain, or suffering, or sorrow, but is also what emerges from how we care for each other through those things? What if joy, instead of refuge or relief from heartbreak, is what effloresces from us as we help each other carry our heartbreaks?” His words suggest that in the end maybe joy and sorrow are not opposites but sisters. |
Spring Semester 2024 Graduate Courses
Course
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Instructor
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Course Description
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ENGL 6350 |
Dr. Shane Graham |
This course is listed under “American Literature and Culture,” and Langston Hughes is most frequently treated as an American writer. But in this course, we will consider his legacy more broadly and approach Langston Hughes as a global figure who traveled the world and established connections and exchanges with artists everywhere, but especially throughout Africa and the Black diaspora. After briefly surveying the literature and art of the Harlem Renaissance, we will read representative selections of Hughes’s poetry, fiction, drama, autobiography, and non-fiction writing. We will also consider his work as a translator and anthologist who worked tirelessly to make literature from the Caribbean, Africa, South America, Spain, Russia and elsewhere accessible to English-language readers. And we will read widely in theories of cosmopolitanism, transnationalism, translation, diaspora, and cultural identity. Some of the questions that will guide our reading include: How did a pan-African ethos and identity evolve, mature, or come under suspicion throughout the twentieth century, partly as a result of Langston Hughes’s tireless efforts to promote and connect writers from around the Black diaspora? What does “Africa” represent for Hughes and in the work of these artists and intellectuals? What was Hughes’s role in the mid-twentieth century in creating the sense of a global Black community grounded in shared or parallel cultural practices (folksong, dancing, drumming, stories and tales) or interlinked historical circumstances (slavery, colonization, feudalism, segregation and apartheid, dictatorships)? How did the Cold War shape Hughes’s work and his efforts to create cultural bridges around the world? |
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ENGL 6400/7400 |
Dr. Ryan Moeller |
This course will interrogate the role of editor as an advocate for readers or experience designer for readers. Editors work in collaboration with organizations, employers, publishers, style guides, and writers/content creators. We will work together as reader advocates across multiple media, including images/infographics, traditional texts, videos, and digital documents. Students in 6400 will participate in weekly discussions and assignments in Canvas, while students in 7400 will have additional readings, weekly face-to-face meetings, and final projects that challenge them to articulate the relationship between editing, reader advocacy, and social justice. |
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ENGL 6480/7480 |
Dr. Jared Colton |
In this course, we will learn and discuss theories, arguments, and case studies about ethics in technical communication, with a particular focus on communication technologies such as large language models like ChatGPT. Ethical frameworks we will discuss include deontology, virtue, utilitarianism, care ethics, and postmodern/posthuman perspectives. The exigency for interrogating ethical paradigms remains in the following questions: what kinds of ethical frameworks should future technical communicators rely on, what are the underlying ethics and values in emerging technologies, and how do/should technical communicators engage with these technologies in their daily communication? By the end of this course, students should be able to use the major ethical frameworks as a language to discuss ethical problems, make a strong case for applying different ethics to different technology problems, and better understand how to approach such situations in their current and future careers and in their lives at large. For the final project, you will research a communication technology of your choice (possibilities include AI technologies, digital privacy tech, social media, document design technologies, and more) and apply an ethical analysis to that communication technology with the goal of providing recommendations for practicing technical communicators. |
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ENGL 6720/HIST 6720 |
Dr. Lisa Gabbert |
This is a skills-oriented graduate level course designed to offer hands-on ethnographic training for beginning oral/public historians, folklorists, and other types of fieldworkers. Focus is on the documentation of local cultural resources, preservation of documentary materials, and public presentation. Instruction will cover such areas as research ethics, interviewing and sound recording techniques, ethnographic observation, and field note writing. Training will also be provided on the archival organization of fieldwork materials. Course instruction will include lectures, hand-on activities, discussions, and supervised team-based fieldwork. Our class project for the semester will be to document Beaver Mountain Ski Area. |
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ENGL 6740/HIST 6740/ANTH |
Dr. Jeannie Thomas |
*We will explore folk narratives in the context of actual historical folk magic practices—including crystal ball reading, love magic, and spells for health, ideal husbands, small fortunes, buried treasure, and general anti-witch measures. *Along the way, perhaps on a lonely road at night, we’ll encounter some fearsome Irish fairy folk—aka the Good People—and we will explore historical protective and counter folk magic (get ready to turn your clothes inside out). *We will track legendary monsters in their native and folkloric habitats—including the Bear Lake Monster, the Chupacabra, the Mothman, Slenderman, Yeahohs, the Donkey Lady, the Windigo, Sasquatch, the Jersey Devil, and Sharlie. |
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ENGL 6882 |
Dr. Charles Waugh |
The graduate fiction writing workshop will explore a range of contemporary fiction, and give students the opportunity to share their own stories with others and to receive feedback. Since we will have a variety of levels of proficiency in the class, we’ll approach craft from a pedagogical point of view that should be useful to everyone, including those who might one day like to teach fiction writing as well as those who just want to write better fiction. We’ll also investigate how contemporary literary fiction has coopted elements from genres such as YA, sci-fi, fantasy, etc. |
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ENGL 7000 |
Dr. Rebecca Walton |
This class is for anyone who wants to learn about empirical research methods. The instructor of this course brings a rich background of designing and conducting qualitative empirical research with participants ranging from Rwandan nonelite youth to USU undergraduate students to technology early adopters in Kyrgyzstan, drawing upon this background to share lessons learned from her own work. In this class, you'll learn how to craft a research question, how to select appropriate research methods, and how to analyze data for patterns of meaning. You'll evaluate published research, learn about the role of ethics boards like the Institutional Review Board (IRB), become certified to conduct research with human participants, practice collecting and analyzing data, and be challenged to reflect critically and carefully on what makes research "good" and what you believe research is for. The class will meet on Wednesdays from 4:30-7 p.m.; no textbook purchase is required. |
Fall Semester 2023 Graduate Courses
Course
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Instructor
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Course Description
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ENGL 6360 |
Dr. Travis Franks |
This graduate seminar asks students to consider the purposes of a national literary tradition and, more specifically, the role of historical fiction in defining the nation and its literature. This semester, we'll do a deep dive into contemporary Australian historical novels to try and understand how a handful of prominent Aussie writers have, since the 1960s, wrestled with their nation's settler colonial origins and the literary legacies they've inherited from early writers like Henry Lawson. Together, we'll read Lindsay's The Picnic at Hanging Rock, Astley's A Kindness Cup, Malouf's Remembering Babylon, Carey's True History of the Kelly Gang, Eckermann's Ruby Moonlight, Scott's That Deadman Dance, Flanagan's The Narrow Road to the Deep North, and Purcell's The Drover's Wife. |
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ENGL 6410/7410 |
Dr. Rebecca Walton |
ENGL 6410: Introduction to Technical Communication This is an online/hybrid course. Master’s students register for 6410, PhD students for 7410. PhD students are required to attend a face-to-face meeting every week in addition to the online.
Students interested in academic careers will benefit by develop scholarly skills applicable across majors:
Students working in industry in technical communication will benefit by:
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ENGL 6700 |
Dr. Lynne McNeill |
This course introduces students to the academic field of Folklore Studies, an interdisciplinary field located between Literature and Anthropology, between the Humanities and the Social Sciences. We will review the history of the discipline, the evolution of major theories and approaches in the study of folklore, and the many diverse ways in which professional folklorists work in both academic and public-sector arenas. Students in this class will be introduced to a number of different folklore genres, including narrative forms such as folktales and legends; customary forms such as rites of passage and calendar customs; and both tangible and intangible forms, such as folk beliefs and material culture. Students will have the opportunity to pursue their own interests within this broad field of study through a researched essay assignment that will help prepare them for various common forms of academic writing, such as conference abstracts, annotated bibliographies, and thesis proposals. |
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ENGL 6770 |
Dr. Jeannie Thomas |
This course explores supernatural legends from folkloric, historical, and popular perspectives. Topics include:
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| ENGL 6800/7800 Teaching Online This is an online/hybrid course. Master’s students register for 6800, PhD students for 7800. PhD students are required to attend a face-to-face meeting every week in addition to the online. |
Dr. Avery Edenfield |
Through readings, discussion, and independent research, this class explores digital rhetoric including social media, online pedagogy, digital privacy and surveillance, and other aspects of media culture. Throughout the semester, students will contribute to a shared knowledge base and complete a research project.
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ENGL 6820: Practicum in Teaching English |
Dr. Beth Buyserie |
This course is designed specifically and required for new graduate instructors teaching English 1010. Our collective goal is to facilitate both short- and long-term teacher growth, preparing teachers for current and subsequent teaching responsibilities through an emphasis on the dialectical relationship between theory and practice. Class begins during the pre-semester orientation where new instructors begin building a community with other teachers, are introduced to resources and curriculum, and are mentored through fall semester teaching preparation. Learning progresses throughout the practicum as we read, analyze, and discuss pivotal texts in composition and rhetorical theory and pedagogy. Participants become reflective practitioners by maintaining a journal tying course concepts to classroom experiences, writing several English 1010 assignments, observing peers and mentors in classrooms and the Writing Center, and consolidating a teaching identity through the creation of a teaching philosophy. |
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ENGL 6883 |
Dr. Benjamin Gunsberg |
This graduate-level course is designed to help you become better writers and readers of poetry. We will focus our attention on student work as well as poetry written by emerging and established authors. Our conversations will revolve around craft, which means we’ll explore those time-tested techniques that guide and strengthen poets’ efforts. This approach begins with close attention to the language that moves us as well as careful consideration of why it moves us. Class discussion and readings will be supplemented by your efforts to develop a personal aesthetic, one that broadens your understanding of published poetry and enlivens your responses to your classmates’ work. In addition to writing and revising individual poems and reflecting on our readings, you will assemble a final portfolio consisting of your most successful writing. |
Spring Semester 2023 Graduate Courses
Course
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Instructor
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Course Description
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ENGL 6350 |
Dr. Adena Rivera-Dundas |
What makes a text "theory" instead of "nonfiction" or "creative writing"? What would it look like to create theory in, through, and from poetry? What does it mean to our interpretations of history if scholars pull fictional stories out of archival materials? This class will examine five different texts--all published in the last 20 years--that interrogate these questions through innovative and playful bending of generic expectations and form. Written or edited by Black women, these books examine questions of identity, belonging, race, diaspora, queerness, and gender expression through poetry, nonfiction essays, and speculative archives. These texts will act as the jumping off point for conversations about trends in contemporary theory in fields such as Queer Studies, Black Feminism, environmental humanities, archival research, and public humanities. As we explore these texts, we will develop our own collaborative, communal understanding of creative theory through a series of short essays and one longer, full-class project. Texts: Dionne Brand, A Map to the Door of No Return: Notes to Belonging (2002); Kimberly Drew and Jenna Wortham, eds. Black Futures (2021); Alexis Pauline Gumbs, M Archive: After the End of the World (2018); Saidiya Hartman, Wayward Lives, Beautiful Experiments: Intimate Histories of Social Upheaval (2019); andOmise'eke Natasha Tinsley, Ezili's Mirrors: Imagining Black Queer Genders (2018) |
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ENGL 6460/7460 |
Dr. Calvin Pollak |
Studies in Digital Media: Surveillance Rhetorics offers an introduction to digital surveillance as a political and social issue. Over the past 20+ years, our digital privacy and security have come under greater and greater threat. Governments and corporations are gathering more and more user data, and legal protections for privacy have been weakened. In addition, surveillance tools are now widely available on the open market. These threats affect everyone, but they are particularly targeted towards members of marginalized groups. In this course, we focus on how surveillance has been studied in technical communication and rhetoric research. We also examine and critique works from related academic disciplines (e.g. critical data studies, political theory), professional and technical societies (e.g. cryptography, library sciences), and political media (e.g. investigative journalism, policy advocacy organizations). The goal of the course is to help you learn useful frameworks for understanding surveillance, and to begin analyzing and responding to privacy and security issues in your own academic and professional contexts. By the end of the semester, you should have a good grasp of the key terms and debates surrounding government spying policy, corporate data-gathering, and surveillance and privacy technologies, along with a well-developed research project relevant to your academic and professional interests in digital media. |
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ENGL 6720/HIST 6720 |
Randy Williams, Emeritus Fife Folklore Curator |
Oral History & Folklore Fieldwork Methods is an ethnographic training course for beginning fieldworkers. The focus of the documentation is with individuals involved in climate change activism. This course will be taught in a hybrid teaching model (remote and possible F2F) with hands-on ethnographic training for beginning fieldworkers. Instruction will cover research ethics (work to mitigate uneven positions of power), community-driven/involved ethnography, institutional review board (IRB) determinations, CITI certification, interviewing and sound recording techniques, basic fieldwork photography, ethnographic observation, field note writing, transcription work, transcript vetting, and archival organization of fieldwork materials (metadata). Course instruction will include lectures, flipped classroom (students teaching), hands-on activities, discussions, team-based remote fieldwork, and Encoded Archival Description (EAD) guide and digital collection preparation. The focus of the fieldwork is on the documentation of individuals involved in climate change activism. Fieldwork products (interview audio, vetted transcripts, and photographs) will be added to USU Special Collections and Archives’ Fife Folklore Archives FOLK COLL 65 and the digital collection, The Climate Challenge. Required Text: The Oral History Reader, 3rd Edition, Robert Perks and Alistair Thomson, editors. |
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ENGL 6770/HIST 6770 |
Dr. Lynne McNeill |
Have you ever replied to the familiar greeting "Hello there!" in an online space with the traditional response: "General Kenobi"? Have you ever wondered why the myriad examples of digital folk art featuring two llamas wearing striped dresses is a reference to February 26th? Have you ever seen a four-panel image featuring two lines in four different configurations in relation to each other and thought, "I know that web comic!"? If you've had any of these experiences, then this is the course for you. If you haven't had any of these experiences, then this is definitely the course for you! This course will offer an in-depth consideration of a rapidly emerging area of folklore studies—folklore and digital culture—and will explore the ways in which we can understand folklore in digital contexts, the ways that digital culture moves offline and into our in-person exchanges, the kinds of folklore we find in digital settings, and the kinds of folk groups we find through the use of communication technologies. We will be looking at familiar forms of folklore such as legends, jokes, and customs, as well as born-digital forms like image macros, Tiktok challenges, parody Amazon reviews, creepypastas, and more. We will explore the history of memes, dive into online fan cultures, contemplate Poe's Law, and engage with the changing nature of fieldwork in a very-online environment. It will probably be weird. |
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ENGL 6830/7830 |
Dr. Jared Colton |
What makes someone or something persuasive? Why do we find a speaker or writer credible in one context but not in another? When is it not the speaker or writer but the media, history, or environment that makes the communication persuasive? English 6830/7830 will introduce you to rhetoric, rhetorical theory, and rhetorical analysis to address these and many other questions about the nature of persuasion and how meaning is produced. We will study classical and modern theories of rhetoric, from Plato and Aristotle to contemporary feminist, disability, and African-American rhetorics. Lots of rhetoric! We will study how people and communities are persuaded and persuade others through language and other symbols to act; how language and symbols produce meaning; how language and symbols work in organizing communities and human activity; and how rhetorical worldviews (ideologies) shape our understanding of reality. We will also examine noteworthy rhetorical scholars past and present to inform our understanding of the theory. Our study will be conducted through reading, discussion, and application of writings by an extensive range of rhetoricians, philosophers, linguists, and cultural critics. This is an online course, with a weekly 90-minute f2f component for PhD students and interested master’s students. |
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ENGL 6860/7860 |
Dr. Chen Chen |
This is an online/hybrid course. Master’s students register for 6860; PhD students for 7860. PhD students are required to attend a face-to-face meeting every week in addition to online participation. The ability to teach technical and professional communication (or TPC) is increasingly in demand in both academic and industry contexts. In this course, students build a foundation of knowledge and materials to draw upon in the future by a) reading and reflecting upon pedagogical theories and research, b) analyzing others' teaching materials, c) crafting a statement of teaching philosophy, and d) applying that philosophy in the design of teaching materials such as a syllabus and course design. In addition, PhD students will take a lead on a project where we collectively build a set of resources (such as a wiki) to help prepare new teachers who are designing their own professional writing courses. We will decide as a class on how to build and share the resources with the department or the field more broadly. The course is designed around a central question that we will pursue both collectively and individually:
We will approach this question not only in terms of what kinds of content we should teach when teaching TPC but also how we should interact with students through our instructional activities. In turn, we will collectively generate training materials and resources for developing inclusive TPC pedagogy. |
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ENGL 6882 |
Amber Caron |
In this fiction writing workshop students will have the opportunity to share new fiction and provide substantial feedback to their classmates. To supplement workshops, we will also read short fiction by authors working in a variety of modes. Outside of putting words on the page, reading is the most important thing we do as writers, and we must diversify what we read in order to stretch our understanding of what is possible in our own stories. To ground these conversations in the language of our craft, and to work toward a more complete understanding of how stories work—and how the mind works while creating them—we will read George Saunders’s A Swim in the Pond in the Rain, a wonderful book of essays inspired by the author’s two decades of teaching fiction. Students can expect to create a portfolio of work that will include a mix of original stories, craft assignments, and critical reflections. |
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ENGL 6890 |
Dr. Beth Buyserie |
In Spring, English 6890: Studies in Writing and Rhetoric will focus on queer and antiracist pedagogies. Because there is no “one right way” to engage in queer and antiracist pedagogies, students will work both individually and collaboratively to question and create multiple approaches for these intersectional pedagogies that acknowledge power, challenge normativity, and enhance everyday teaching practices. We’ll begin the course with some “big picture” concepts to help us gain a better understanding of how racism and normativity function as parts of systems and structures; this work will help us better understand how our own teaching is both influenced by these systems and can simultaneously challenge those systems. Then we’ll shift the course to focus on pedagogical practices. For example, how might we think about our grading and feedback from queer and antiracist perspectives? How might our teaching of research or text analysis change when we’re questioning power and normativity in sources? As we engage in these questions, we’ll read texts like bell hooks’ Teaching to Transgress and Stacey Waite’s Teaching Queer. My hope for this class is that we can make intentional changes in our pedagogies that allow all our students to learn the content more deeply and equitably. I also want this to be a space where we can ask thoughtful questions and support each other’s learning. |
Fall Semester 2022 Graduate Courses
Course
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Instructor
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Course Description
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ENGL 6340 |
Dr. Christine Cooper-Rompato |
This course covers a remarkable area of medieval Catholic women writers’ literary and spiritual work: visionary writings. Medieval women wrote of their visions of heaven, purgatory, and hell, as well as their intimate conversations with Christ, Mary, and the saints. In this course we will explore some of the most surprising work the Middle Ages has to offer—with readings by authors including Margery Kempe, Julian of Norwich, and St. Bridget of Sweden, as well as readings by men about visionaries, including the Life of Christina the Astonishing, a medieval woman who, according to her biography, was resurrected after death. She subsequently tried to live a purgatory on earth by throwing herself into ovens and torturing her body. Eventually, the local townspeople tried to tie her to a tree but she lactated holy oil so they released her. Expect to be amazed and fascinated by the lives, beliefs, and writings of these women! Assignments include a seminar paper (with scaffolded steps including abstract, annotated bibliography, etc.) and oral presentations. |
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ENGL 6410/7410 |
Dr. Rebecca Walton |
ENGL 6410: Introduction to Technical Communication This is an online/hybrid course. Master’s students register for 6410, PhD students for 7410. PhD students are required to attend a face-to-face meeting every week in addition to the online.
Students interested in academic careers will benefit by develop scholarly skills applicable across majors:
Students working in industry in technical communication will benefit by:
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ENGL 6440/7440 |
Dr. Calvin Pollak |
Cultural Research Methods offers an introduction to cultural studies, with an emphasis in how cultural studies frameworks have been, are, and can be applied to technical communication and rhetoric research and practice. The goal of the course is to help you learn how cultural research methods have been applied in academia or industry and learn how to apply them yourself. We will develop a critical vocabulary and knowledge of the ethical, historical, political, and social contexts that impact and are impacted by these frameworks. By the end of the course, you should have a strong foundational understanding of the differences in these methods, understand why each is a valid form of knowledge-making, and understand that there is more research that needs to be done in these areas. While there will be an emphasis on technical communication and rhetoric scholarship in the course, these methods are often applied to literary studies, American Studies, and folklore, as well. I welcome students interested in other areas, and I will work with you to apply these methods to your own research projects. |
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ENGL 6700 |
Dr. Afsane Rezaei |
This course introduces students to the academic field of folklore studies, an interdisciplinary field located between literature and anthropology. We will review the history of the discipline, the evolution of major theories and approaches in the study of folklore, and what folklorists do today in different academic and public-sector fields. Students will learn about various ideas and keywords in folklore studies (tradition, authenticity, genre, folk group, etc.) and will be introduced to a range of genres of everyday expressive culture, such as folk narratives, beliefs, festivals, and digital forms of folklore. In addition, students will practice writing within the conventions of the field (preparing conference abstracts, book reviews, and bibliographic essays), and will have the chance to pursue folkloristic research into their own topic of interest. |
| ENGL 6710/HIST 6710 Folklore Space and Place: Folklore and Landscape W 4:30-7:00 pm Face-to-Face |
Dr. Lisa Gabbert |
Landscapes are human creations writ large. As physical, emergent, co-authored, and creative texts, people create landscapes through story, song, language, and material culture. At the same time landscapes evoke meanings, memories, and values for people in what noted anthropologist Keith Basso calls the “interanimation” between people and place. How do people create landscapes, what meanings do they evoke, and how are they culturally variable and contextually specific? In what ways does folklore “vivify” the landscape? These are the questions and issues we will explore this semester. |
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ENGL 6820: Practicum in Teaching English |
Dr. Beth Buyserie |
This course is designed specifically and required for new graduate instructors teaching English 1010. Our collective goal is to facilitate both short- and long-term teacher growth, preparing teachers for current and subsequent teaching responsibilities through an emphasis on the dialectical relationship between theory and practice. Class begins during the pre-semester orientation where new instructors begin building a community with other teachers, are introduced to resources and curriculum, and are mentored through fall semester teaching preparation. Learning progresses throughout the practicum as we read, analyze, and discuss pivotal texts in composition and rhetorical theory and pedagogy. Participants become reflective practitioners by maintaining a journal tying course concepts to classroom experiences, writing several English 1010 assignments, observing peers and mentors in classrooms and the Writing Center, and consolidating a teaching identity through the creation of a teaching philosophy. |
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ENGL 6884 |
Dr. Jennifer Sinor |
The graduate fiction writing workshop will explore a variety of contemporary fiction, and give students the opportunity to share their own stories with others and to receive feedback. Since we will have a variety of levels of proficiency in the class, we’ll approach craft from a pedagogical point of view that should be useful to everyone, including those who might one day like to teach fiction writing as well as those who just want to write better fiction. We’ll also investigate how contemporary literary fiction has coopted elements from genres such as YA, sci-fi, fantasy, etc. |
Spring Semester 2022 Graduate Courses
Course
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Instructor
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Course Description
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ENGL 6400/7400 |
Dr. Ryan Moeller |
This course will interrogate the role of editor as an advocate for readers or experience designer for readers. Editors work in collaboration with organizations, employers, publishers, style guides, and writers/content creators. We will work together as reader advocates across multiple media, including images/infographics, traditional texts, videos, and digital documents. Students in 6400 will participate in weekly discussions and assignments in Canvas, while students in 7400 will have additional readings, weekly face-to-face meetings, and final projects that challenge them to articulate the relationship between editing, reader advocacy, and social justice. |
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ENGL 6480/7480 |
Dr. Jared Colton |
In this course, we will explore accessibility through a lens of disability studies and the ethics of technology. We will gain a strong understanding of disability and accessibility rhetorics scholarship and practice, and we will discuss and practice rhetorical and legal standards of effective and accessible design (such as WCAG 2.0) through an “intervention” assignment with the Center for Innovative Design and Instruction at USU, for which you will caption education videos and take inaccessible PDF documents used at USU and make them accessible for screen reading software (great for your resume/CV/portfolio, btw). By the end of the course, you should have a good understanding of disability studies theory, be able to make a strong case for accessible design, have improved your video production and HTML skills (don’t worry, we’ll assume you know nothing about HTML), and understand how to approach multiple technologies and rhetorical situations for accessibility. |
| ENGL 6630 Film & Pop Culture M, 4:30-7:00 pm |
Dr. Brian McCuskey |
This graduate seminar on popular culture explores the genre of detective stories, both its history and its theory, in both literature and film. We will read primarily British and American fiction, although we will begin in ancient Greece and head toward France and Argentina. The main goal of the course is to trace the evolution of the genre across a range of authors, forms, and contexts: e.g. Sophocles, Edgar Allan Poe, Wilkie Collins, Arthur Conan Doyle, G. K. Chesterton, Agatha Christie, Dashiell Hammett, Raymond Chandler, Carolyn Keene, Jorge Luis Borges, Alain Robbe-Grillet, Patricia Highsmith, and Paul Auster. We will also watch detectives ply their trade at the movies and on television, in both adapted and original stories, from Bogart to Marge Gunderson. Our overarching goal is to develop ideas—and, eventually, theories—about the genre’s underlying symbolic structure and recurring effects. |
| ENGL 6720/HIST 6720 Oral History & Fieldwork Methods R, 4:30-7:00 pm |
Dr. Lisa Gabbert |
This course teaches the basics of conducting ethnographic and oral history fieldwork and is conducted as practicum, meaning that it involves significant hands-on experience and practice. Students will work on a pre-determined group project with the goal of creating a born-digital collection to be deposited in the Fife Folklore archives. Topics and skills be covered include audio recording, interviewing techniques, the taking of fieldnotes, ethics, IRB requirements, photography, transcription practices, and the generation of metadata. We also will cover research design, issues of representation, and the role of reflexivity in ethnographic work. |
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ENGL 6740/HIST 6740 |
Dr. Lynne McNeill |
This course introduces students to the study of folk narrative through a deep dive into two of the major narrative genres: folktales and legends. Commonly distinguished from each other by their complex relationships to truth, these narrative forms of folklore have been at the base of folkloristic study since the inception of the field. Students will gain an understanding of the history of fairy tale scholarship, the uses of contemporary legend scholarship, and the no-longer-new (but still occasionally contentious) study of the traditional personal experience narrative. |
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ENGL 6810 |
Dr. Joyce Kinkead |
English 6810 focuses on the scholarship of writing studies. Students become acquainted with scholars, forums, themes, and methods of the field. We will also be engaging in developing research projects that can come to fruition by semester’s end with professional dissemination. Another goal is to review writing studies programs evident across the nation as well as the writing about writing movement. Additionally, we will discuss the undergraduate research imperative and its integration in writing studies and how as teachers we can work with students on research in writing studies. Teaching composition, naturally, will also be a discussion topic. In sum, the seminar addresses both theory and practice coupled with pragmatic information about the field (e.g., professional organizations, conferences, and journals.) Biography: Dr. Kinkead is Distinguished Professor of English and has directed the USU Composition Program and the Writing Center; additionally, she created the Writing Fellows Program, Undergraduate Teaching Fellows, and University Research Fellows. She was a founding member of the National Writing Centers Association (now the IWCA) and editor of The Writing Center Journal. A Fellow of the Council on Undergraduate Research, the 2013 Carnegie Professor for Utah, and the 2018 D. Wynne Thorne Career Researcher, Kinkead has several books on writing including the forthcoming A Writing Studies Primer and Researching Writing (2016). |
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ENGL 6883 |
Dr. Michael Sowder |
English 6883 is an advanced poetry-writing workshop. Accordingly, much of the work of the semester will involve reading and responding to each other’s work in a rigorous yet supportive environment. Writing workshops were for me the most exciting and rewarding courses I took in college and grad school, and I hope this one will be as rewarding for you. As you probably know, world literature began with poetry—deriving from religious ritual, magical spells, chants, and incantations. Other forms of creative writing—novels, fiction, and creative nonfiction—derived from poetry. Poetry employs the tools of creative writing in the most intense, compressed, and sophisticated ways possible. If you study the poetry of the last several millennia, you’ll sharpen and hone your writing in whatever genre you ultimately choose to write in. During the semester, we will hold weekly poetry workshops, and we’ll will focus our reading on two seminal American poets, Walt Whitman and Emily Dickinson. These two nineteenth-century poets are often thought of as the grandfather and grandmother of contemporary American poetry, having broken with older traditional forms of poetry in English. Grades will be based on a chapbook of poems turned in at the end of the semester, a short essay analyzing a poem by Whitman or Dickinson, and class participation. |
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ENGL 7000 |
Dr. Rebecca Walton |
This class is for anyone who wants to learn about empirical research methods. The instructor of this course brings a rich background of designing and conducting qualitative empirical research with participants ranging from Rwandan nonelite youth to USU undergraduate students to technology early adopters in Kyrgyzstan, drawing upon this background to share lessons learned from her own work. In this class, you'll learn how to craft a research question, how to select appropriate research methods, and how to analyze data for patterns of meaning. You'll evaluate published research, learn about the role of ethics boards like the Institutional Review Board (IRB), become certified to conduct research with human participants, and be challenged to reflect critically and carefully on what makes research "good" and what you believe research is for. Graduate students who are not enrolled in the Technical Communication and Rhetoric doctoral program should email the instructor to describe their interest in the course and request approval to register. |
Fall Semester 2021 Graduate Courses
Course
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Instructor
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Course Description
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ENGL 6360 |
Dr. Shane Graham |
When Bob Marley, Peter Tosh, Jimmy Cliff, and others became superstars in the 1970s, they simultaneously turned reggae into an enduring symbol of Jamaica’s unique African-derived cultural identity, and made it into an international form embraced all over the world. Reggae as theme and source of aesthetic values has also been heavily influential in literature and film from the Caribbean and beyond. The songs and texts we will encounter will require us to learn to read new languages, among them Jamaica Creole and Iyaric or “Dread Talk”—the language of Rastafari, an Afro-syncretic religion that emerged from the urban ghettos of Jamaica in the 1930s. Our “texts” may include: lots of reggae songs; Marlon James’s Booker Prize-winning, not-at-all brief novel A Brief History of Seven Killings; Marcia Douglas's Marvellous Equations of the Dread: A Novel in Bass Riddim; the graphic novel Dread & Alive: Duppy Conqueror; poems by Linton Kwesi Johnson, Derek Walcott, Malika Booker, Roger Robinson, Colin Channer, Ishion Hutchinson, Shara McCallum, and others; the documentary film Who Shot the Sheriff?; the feature film Small Axe: Alex Wheatle; and quite a few academic essays and works of cultural theory. |
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ENGL 6410/7410 |
Dr. Rebecca Walton |
ENGL 6410: Introduction to Technical Communication This is an online/hybrid course. Master’s students register for 6410, PhD students for 7410. PhD students are required to attend a face-to-face meeting every week in addition to the online.
Students interested in academic careers will benefit by develop scholarly skills applicable across majors:
Students working in industry in technical communication will benefit by:
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ENGL 6700 |
Dr. Afsane Rezaei |
This course introduces students to the academic field of folklore studies, a field that rests somewhere between the humanities and social sciences. The class covers a range of genres of everyday traditional expression, as well as various ideas, keywords, and enduring debates in the discipline (and as a result, has a heavy reading load). We will examine the history of the field, the evolution of major theories and approaches, and how they are utilized in folklore and adjacent fields today. In addition, students will practice writing within the conventions of the field, preparing conference abstracts, writing book reviews and bibliographic essays, and pursuing folkloristic research into their own topic of interest. As part of the course, students will also work for 8-10 hours on the undergraduate student genre collection at the Fife Folklore Archives. |
| ENGL 6770/HIST 6770 Folklore Seminar: Legend and the Supernatural R 4:30-7:00 pm Blended Face-to-Face |
Dr. Jeannie Thomas | This course explores supernatural legends from cultural, popular, historical, and folkloric perspectives. Topics include:
6770 is a graduate seminar course, topics vary according to instructor, and the course is repeatable for credit. |
| ENGL 6800/7800 Teaching Online Online This is an online/hybrid course. Master’s students register for 6800, PhD students for 7800. PhD students are required to attend a face-to-face meeting every week in addition to the online. |
Dr. Avery Edenfield |
This is an online/hybrid course. Master’s students register for 6800, PhD students for 7800. PhD students are required to attend a face-to-face meeting every week in addition to the online. If you pursue an academic career, you may well be assigned or given the opportunity to teach online, and even nonacademic workplaces use online training. This course prepares you to meet these challenges confidently in settings ranging from K–12 to post-secondary to corporate training. The class will meet online, so it will offer you the opportunity to learn about online writing instruction experientially. We will ask questions such as these:
In addition to meeting online with ENGL 6800 students, students in 7800 will also meet in person for one hour each week in a virtual discussion (Zoom). Students in 6800 are welcome to sit in on those meetings if they choose. |
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ENGL 6820: Practicum in Teaching English |
Dr. Beth Buyserie |
This course is designed specifically and required for new graduate instructors teaching English 1010. Our collective goal is to facilitate both short- and long-term teacher growth, preparing teachers for current and subsequent teaching responsibilities through an emphasis on the dialectical relationship between theory and practice. Class begins during the pre-semester orientation where new instructors begin building a community with other teachers, are introduced to resources and curriculum, and are mentored through fall semester teaching preparation. Learning progresses throughout the practicum as we read, analyze, and discuss pivotal texts in composition and rhetorical theory and pedagogy. Participants become reflective practitioners by maintaining a journal tying course concepts to classroom experiences, writing several English 1010 assignments, observing peers and mentors in classrooms and the Writing Center, and consolidating a teaching identity through the creation of a teaching philosophy. |
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ENGL 6882 |
Dr. Charles Waugh |
The graduate fiction writing workshop will explore a variety of contemporary fiction, and give students the opportunity to share their own stories with others and to receive feedback. Since we will have a variety of levels of proficiency in the class, we’ll approach craft from a pedagogical point of view that should be useful to everyone, including those who might one day like to teach fiction writing as well as those who just want to write better fiction. We’ll also investigate how contemporary literary fiction has coopted elements from genres such as YA, sci-fi, fantasy, etc. |
Spring Semester 2021 Graduate Courses
Course
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Instructor
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Course Description
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ENGL 6350 |
Dr. John Gamber |
This course will focus on speculative fiction (SF) by authors of color (including Native American, African American, Latinx, and Asian American). We will engage with both primary literary texts and secondary works of theory and criticism providing insight into the intersections of Ethnic Studies and SF. |
|
ENGL 6460 |
Dr. Ryan Moeller |
Teaches students how to quickly evaluate, learn, and use writing technologies used by professional communicators, including photo manipulation software (Adobe Photoshop), advanced document design software (Adobe InDesign), basic coding in HTML and CSS, and screencasting tools. Required course materials: a 4-month subscription to LinkedIn Learning (access to LinkedIn Learning through an institutional subscription like your local public library is fine!). You should also have regular access to a computer that will run Adobe InDesign and a web browser at the same time. |
| ENGL 6720/HIST 6720 Oral History & Fieldwork W, 4:30-7:00 pm |
Randy Williams, Emeritus Fife Folklore Curator |
Oral History & Folklore Fieldwork Methods is an ethnographic training course for beginning fieldworkers. The focus of the documentation is with individuals involved in climate change activism. This course will be taught in a hybrid teaching model (remote and possible F2F) with hands-on ethnographic training for beginning fieldworkers. Instruction will cover research ethics (work to mitigate uneven positions of power), community-driven/involved ethnography, institutional review board (IRB) determinations, CITI certification, interviewing and sound recording techniques, basic fieldwork photography, ethnographic observation, field note writing, transcription work, transcript vetting, and archival organization of fieldwork materials (metadata). Course instruction will include lectures, flipped classroom (students teaching), hands-on activities, discussions, team-based remote fieldwork, and Encoded Archival Description (EAD) guide and digital collection preparation. The focus of the fieldwork is on the documentation of individuals involved in climate change activism. Fieldwork products (interview audio, vetted transcripts, and photographs) will be added to USU Special Collections and Archives’ Fife Folklore Archives FOLK COLL 65 and the digital collection, The Climate Challenge. Required Text: The Oral History Reader, 3rd Edition, Robert Perks and Alistair Thomson, editors. |
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ENGL 6760/4700 |
Dr. Afsane Resaei |
From quilting to cosplay, from roadside shrines to yard art and graffiti, folk art is all around us. This course explores various forms of everyday artistry as venues for individual and groups' creative expressions, while examining the relation of material objects with history, market, and cultural heritage. We will also address how different forms of folk art and material culture are intertwined with individual and collective expressions of gender, ethnic, and racial identities, as well as the role of folk art in politics, activism, and peace/conflict. The course draws on analytical approaches from folklore, anthropology, cultural studies, and other related fields. Lectures and discussions will be supplemented with films, (virtual!) field trips, and other activities. The course is cross-listed with ENG 6760, but will have different requirements for undergraduate students. |
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ENGL 6770/HIST 6770 |
Dr. Lisa Gabbert |
This folklore class examines interrelationships between festivals and monsters. As anthropologist Victor Turner has noted, festivals are arenas in which society enacts the subjunctive tense; that is, an arena in which society acts as “what if?” Monsters and monstrosity are closely connected to festival, related as they are to themes of giganticism and ambivalence, and closely connected to legend and belief. We will look at several case studies of festivals that involve monsters, including the Krampus phenomenon in Austria; the Namahage of Japan, and Sharlie, the lake monster found in Idaho’s winter carnival. We will explore how these intersect with tourism and festive terror, covering theories of festival, the carnivalesque, the play frame, and legendry. Students will produce conference papers based on their own research. |
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ENGL 6830/7830 |
Dr. Keith Grant-Davie |
This course introduces you to a set of analytical tools and theoretical lenses that describe how rhetoric (the art of using communication to influence people) operates. We will read and discuss rhetorical theory and use it to try to explain what may be going on in whatever interesting examples of rhetorical discourse we encounter during the term. The concepts and strategies addressed in this course are fundamental enough that we will readily see them at work in the many kinds of discourse that surround us, including interpersonal conversation, group discourse, literary texts, corporate communication, and politics. Required texts for the class: Borchers, T., and Hundley, H. (2018). Rhetorical Theory: An Introduction, 2nd ed. Long Grove, IL: Waveland Press. 10-digit ISBN: 1-4786-3580-0; 13-digit ISBN: 978-1-4786-3580-2. Foss, S. K. (2018). Rhetorical Criticism: Exploration and Practice, 5th ed. Long Grove, IL: Waveland Press. www.waveland.com. 10-digit ISBN: 1-4786-3489-8; 13-digit ISBN: 978-1-4786-3489-8.
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ENGL 6860/7860 |
Dr. Avery Edenfield |
The ability to teach technical and professional communication (or TPC) is increasingly in demand in both academic and industry contexts. In this course, students build a foundation of knowledge and materials to draw upon in the future by a) reading and reflecting upon pedagogical theories and research, b) analyzing others' teaching materials, c) crafting a statement of teaching philosophy, and d) applying that philosophy in the design of teaching materials such as a syllabus and course design. |
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ENGL 6884 |
Dr. Jennifer Sinor | Possibilities of Narrative Form
In this graduate nonfiction writing workshop, students will have the opportunity to write both linear and lyric form. The focus of the course will be on the benefits and drawbacks found in the pursuit of various forms; we will also examine the organic relationship between form and content. This course will not offer students an introduction to creative nonfiction. It is assumed that students have that background. A student may complete work that fits into their thesis project as long as the work can stand on its own. The final portfolio will include two essays accompanied by introductions that provide critical reflection on decisions made about form |
Fall Semester 2020 Graduate Courses
Course
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Instructor
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Course Description
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ENGL 6360 |
Cooper-Rompato, C. |
The purpose of the course will be to discuss how and why modern writers rewrite and adapt medieval texts with new purposes in mind. We will start the course by reading several of the most important Norse sources for mythology and history: The Poetic Edda, The Prose Edda, and the Vinland Sagas (i.e., The Saga of Erik the Redand the Saga of the Greenlanders). We’ll then turn to three modern fiction texts that draw directly from the Eddas’ accounts of Norse mythology, namely Neil Gaiman’s Norse Mythology (2017) and American Gods (2001) and Rick Riordan’s Magnus Chase and the Gods of Asgard: The Sword of Summer (2015). We’ll then finish out the class with two modern texts that draw on the Vinland Sagas for inspiration—Nancy Marie Brown’s nonfiction study, The Far Traveler: Voyages of a Viking Woman (2008) and Makoto Yukimura’s historical manga Vinland Saga (Book 1) (2006, English trans. 2013) Lively class discussion will be the goal, and students will also give oral presentations and write a seminar paper on a topic of their choice. All readings will be in English; no knowledge of Old Norse is necessary! (Although I bet if you take this class you will want to learn it!) |
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ENGL 6410/7410 |
Walton, R |
ENGL 6410/7410 is designed to welcome graduate students across the English Department. Whether you're curious about the field of Technical Communication specifically or just want to learn how to assess a field by its scholarship, this online course is for you. * Conducting secondary research to inform problem solving in the workplace * Developing a broader understanding of the field, beyond their own career experience * Learning how theoretical frameworks can inform and improve practice |
|
ENGL 6440/7440 |
Edenfield, A. |
This class will serve as a survey of cultural research methods that apply to contemporary practices in technical communication and rhetoric. For this class, we will focus on methods that include feminisms/womanisms, gender theory, queer theory, postcolonial theory, critical race theory, and disability studies. Each of these methods will be examined through the lens of "the social justice turn” in technical communication. |
| ENGL 6700 Folklore Theory/Method M, 4:30-7:00 pm |
Rezai, A. |
This course is designed to introduce students to the discipline of Folklore Studies, a field that rests somewhere between the humanities and social sciences, and that encompasses all forms of everyday traditional expression such as fairy tales, folk beliefs, holiday customs, rumors and legends, internet memes, jokes, the supernatural, festivals, folk music, foodways, and much more. |
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ENGL 6770 |
McNeill, L |
This course will offer an in-depth consideration of a rapidly emerging area of folklore studies: folklore and digital culture. It explores the ways in which we can understand folklore in the digital contexts, the kinds of folklore we find in digital settings, the kinds of folk groups we find through the use of communication technologies, how fieldwork changes in an online environment, and the ways humans make meaning in diverse technological contexts. Topics covered will include memes, creepypasta, rumor and legend, and social media. Students in this course will also work with the Digital Folklore Project (DFP), tracking trends via Twitter, making monthly field notes, preparing digital exhibits for past years, and creating the digital archive itself with training from the Digital Initiatives team from Merrill-Cazier Library. |
| ENGL 6820 Practicum in Teaching English TR, 10:30-11:45am |
Buyserie, B. | This course is designed specifically and required for new graduate instructors teaching English 1010. Our collective goal is to facilitate both short- and long-term teacher growth, preparing teachers for current and subsequent teaching responsibilities through an emphasis on the dialectical relationship between theory and practice. Class begins during the pre-semester orientation where new instructors begin building a community with other teachers, are introduced to resources and curriculum, and are mentored through fall semester teaching preparation. Learning progresses throughout the practicum as we read, analyze, and discuss pivotal texts in composition and rhetorical theory and pedagogy. Participants become reflective practitioners by maintaining a journal tying course concepts to classroom experiences, writing several English 1010 assignments, observing peers and mentors in classrooms and the Writing Center, and consolidating a teaching identity through the creation of a teaching philosophy. |
| ENGL 6882 Fiction Writing W, 4:30-7:00 pm |
Rogers, N. |
English 6882 is an advanced fiction workshop. To encourage the discipline and focus necessary for original writing, each student will develop their own writing goals and weekly schedule. We will look to the writing of Audre Lorde to help us generate community values that will ground our workshop discussion. For inspiration, we will study contemporary literature with a special focus on socially-conscious speculative fiction. Students will produce two pieces of fiction and a craft essay on a work of their choice, a novel or story collection that will fuel their own writing this semester. |
| ENGL 6890 Studies in Writing and Rhetoric (Rhetorics of Pedagogy) R, 4:30-7:00 pm |
Rivera-Mueller, J. |
This course is designed to help you rhetorically examine pedagogical theories and practices. We will ground this study in an explicit focus on agency—the capacity to act. Throughout the course, we will study interdisciplinary theories of agency to rhetorically examine how the actions of teachers, students, and curricula are conceptualized in composition pedagogies. Doing so will help us address the following questions: Where is agency (for teachers, students, and curricula) located in composition pedagogies? What are the aims and expected outcomes that result from conceptualizing agency in these ways? What is at stake when we conceptualize agency in these ways? As a participant in the course, you will have the opportunity to develop a scholarly project that applies your rhetorical understandings of pedagogy. While our collective study will focus on composition pedagogies, the rhetorical insights we reach can be applied to a variety of contexts, including literature and creative writing pedagogies. This course privileges your questions about the rhetorics of pedagogy because it designed to foster your current and future development as a scholar and teacher. This course is a great fit for people who care about pedagogy and would like a context to examine pedagogy from a rhetorical perspective. |
Spring Semester 2020 Graduate Courses
Course
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Instructor
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Course Description
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ENGL 6350
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Crumbley, P |
This graduate seminar will focus on the poetry and letters of May Swenson at a time when the USU English Department is taking steps to honor Swenson and her family. The university’s interest centers on Swenson’s biography, most specifically her early life in the house her father built at the foot of Old Main Hill, her experience as an English major at Utah State, and her achievement of international fame as a poet. The class will take this biography into account but concentrate on the broad concept of home that surfaces through poems and letters as Swenson’s local, regional, national, and global sense of place, as well as her family role, sexual identity, spiritual orientation, and artistic purpose. Students in the class will formulate their own understanding of the many homes that figure in Swenson’s writing and investigate the particular expression of home that appeals most to them. Seminar members will also consult with students in Landscape Architecture and the English department to help shape Swenson’s legacy as work goes forward with the development of Swenson Park on the site where the family home once stood. |
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ENGL 6400/7400 |
Grant-Davie, K |
If you receive an advanced degree from this department, you will almost certainly need editing skills, no matter what you do next. This course is your chance to learn those skills or, if you already have editing experience, to sharpen and refine them. It will help you reevaluate your editing practices and how you justify them. We will practice and discuss many aspects of editing—from crafting language at the sentence level on up to shaping whole documents for rhetorical effect, organization and content, graphics, and document design. You will learn how to reread your writing productively and how to expand or condense it as needed. We will encounter many editorial “rules” in this course. You and/or the people you encounter as an editor may have quite strong opinions about these rules. In our online class discussions, we will consider the merits of these rules, examining them to see if we can find better support for them than statements like “I’ve always done it this way” or “I just think it sounds better.” We will find some instances where there are two or more perfectly acceptable, equally effective ways to write something, but we will still make a habit of seeing if we can find good reasons to prefer one way over another. The course is designed mainly for students in the online Master of Technical Communication program and for doctoral students in the Technical Communication & Rhetoric program. The course materials will be biased towards tech/professional communication. Students from literature & writing, creative writing, American studies, or folklore are very welcome to take the course and should find it quite helpful. However, we will not address editing skills that are specific to creative writing, e.g., editing fiction for narrative pacing or plot development—skills that are better developed in an ENGL 6880 creative writing workshop course. ENGL 6400 will have two required texts:
ENGL 7400 will require those two texts and one more:
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ENGL 6480/7480 |
Edenfield, A | Study of theoretical aspects of technologies affecting writing in social and professional contexts. This course will include readings in gender theory, queer theory, and rhetoric of technology, with an intentional focus on race, class, sexual orientation, and gender identity. This course could stand in as a foundational course in modern gender and sexuality theory and prepares students for further work in this area. |
| ENGL 6720/HIST 6720 Oral History & Fieldwork T, 4:30-7:00 pm |
Morales, E |
Fieldwork is one of the primary means by which folklorists engage with and analyze cultures. Conducting it can take us into the inner workings of a society, participating in their events, exploring their rituals, and bonding with their community. Properly done fieldwork can be the difference between an ethnography that provides an insightful look into a vibrant culture and one that arrives at erroneous conclusions. But what are the best methods to use? How do we navigate our status as researchers while respecting the communities we study? This course provides hands-on ethnographic training for beginning fieldworkers. Instruction will cover oral history, research ethics, institutional review board (IRB) theory (including CITI certification), interviewing and sound recording techniques, basic fieldwork photography, ethnographic observation and participant-observation, field note writing, transcription work, transcript vetting, and archival organization of fieldwork materials. Course instruction will include lectures, hands-on activities, discussions, team-based fieldwork, and preparation for a public presentation. |
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ENGL 6770/HIST 6770 |
Thomas, J |
This course explores supernatural legends from cultural, popular, historical, and folkloric perspectives. Topics include:
6770 is a graduate seminar course, topics vary according to instructor, and the course is repeatable for credit. |
|
ENGL 6883 |
Gunsberg, B |
This graduate-level course is designed to help you become better writers and readers of poetry. We will focus our attention on student work as well as poetry written by emerging and established authors. Our conversations will revolve around craft, which means we will explore those time-tested techniques that guide and strengthen poets’ efforts. This approach begins with close attention to the language that moves us as well as careful consideration of why it moves us. Class discussion and readings will be supplemented by your efforts to develop a personal aesthetic, one that broadens your understanding of published poetry and enlivens your responses to your classmates’ work. In addition to writing and revising individual poems, you will assemble a final portfolio consisting of your most successful writing. This class provides structure and support for your talent to flourish; you provide the effort. At minimum, I expect you to participate in class discussion, complete reading and writing assignments on time, and offer smart feedback to your classmates. The effort you expend throughout the semester—the care with which you select your words, the time you devote to revision, the attention you give to readings, and the consideration you give to your classmates’ writing—will shine in the quality of the poetry you produce and enrich our time together.
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ENGL 7000 |
Walton, R |
This class is for anyone who wants to learn about empirical research methods. The instructor of this course brings a rich background of designing and conducting qualitative empirical research with participants ranging from Rwandan nonelite youth to USU undergraduate students to technology early adopters in Kyrgyzstan, drawing upon this background to share lessons learned from her own work. In this class, you'll learn how to craft a research question, how to design a research study, and how to write about your methods and findings. You'll evaluate published research, learn about the role of ethics boards like the Institutional Review Board (IRB), become certified to conduct research with human participants, and be challenged to reflect critically and carefully on what makes research "good" and what you believe research is for. Graduate students of any major are welcome. |
Fall Semester 2019 Graduate Courses
Course
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Instructor
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Course Description
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ENGL 6340 |
McCuskey, B |
Victorian Social Networks: Village, Town, and City In this seminar, we will explore the growth of social networks in England over the course of the nineteenth century, from the changing village of Highbury in Jane Austen’s Emma (1815), to the booming 1830s town of Middlemarch in George Eliot’s retrospective 1872 novel, to the chaotic city of London in Charles Dickens’s Bleak House (1853). What relationships, hierarchies, and conflicts emerge and develop? What happens to individual psychology, as social networks grow larger and more complex? How do moral choices become more and more difficult? How does the form of the novel change to accommodate this growth and pose these questions? While the course focuses on these three novels, treating them as a trilogy, we will also mix in a variety of short lyric poetry, helping us to think further about both literary form and cultural history. |
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ENGL 6600 American Studies in Theory & Method |
Holt, K |
Are you interested in interdisciplinary studies? Do you want to learn more about different methods and disciplinary approaches for studying American culture? Do you want to explore issues related to race, class, gender, the environment, social justice, music, film, media, and visual art in your academic work? This course introduces students to various practices of American cultural studies, with an emphasis on interdisciplinary research. Although it focuses specifically on the field of American Studies, this course is open to any students interested in interdisciplinarity. The first half of the course covers the history of interdisciplinary studies and current debates in the field of American Studies. Readings cover a range of topics including race and ethnicity, gender and sexuality, class, environmental studies, immigration, civil rights, and social justice. For the second half of the class, we engage in a series of “labs” where students have the chance to apply the critical theories and interdisciplinary methods studied in the first half of the class to examine specific works of literature, archival materials, music, and film. This course also introduces students to important practices for graduate study and professional development, which include applying for conferences and research funding, composing a CV, working with archives and special collections, maintaining effective research records, assembling a thesis committee, writing a thesis proposal, and working with faculty. These topics will be team-taught in four joint-sessions with another course, ENGL 6700: Introduction to Folklore Studies, which may require some scheduling adjustments for students who are not enrolled in the Folklore and American Studies master’s program. Students registering for ENGL 6000: Introduction to American Studies who not enrolled in the Folklore and American Studies master’s program should contact Dr. Keri Holt to manage any scheduling issues. Students will be required to write a formal research paper and give a presentation about their paper at the end of the semester, setting a solid foundation for work in future graduate courses and conference presentations. |
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ENGL 6700 |
McNeill, L | This course is designed to introduce students to the discipline of Folklore Studies, a field that rests somewhere between the humanities and social sciences, and that encompasses all forms of everyday traditional expression such as fairy tales, folk beliefs, holiday customs, rumors and legends, internet memes, jokes, the supernatural, festivals, folk music, foodways, and much more. The first half of this course covers the history of the discipline and provides an introduction to the ongoing scholarly questions and approaches that folklorists use in their research. For the second half of the class, we engage in a series of “labs” where students have the chance to apply the critical theories and interdisciplinary methods studied in the first half of the class to examine specific forms of folklore. This course also introduces students to important practices for graduate study and professional development, which include applying for conferences and research funding, composing a CV, working with archives and special collections, maintaining effective research records, assembling a thesis committee, writing a thesis proposal, and working with faculty. These topics will be team-taught in four joint-sessions with another course, ENGL 6600: Introduction to American Studies, which may require some scheduling adjustments for students who are not enrolled in the Folklore and American Studies master’s program. Students registering for ENGL 6700: Introduction to Folklore Studies who are not enrolled in the Folklore and American Studies master’s program should contact Dr. Lynne McNeill to manage any scheduling issues. Students will be required to write a formal research paper and give a presentation about their paper at the end of the semester, setting a solid foundation for work in future graduate courses and conference presentations. |
| ENGL 6740 Folk Narrative/Method M, 4:30-7:00 pm |
Morales, E | Our childhood exposure to folk and fairy tales shapes our morality, frames our perceptions of gender, and influences our philosophical beliefs. While Disney films sanitize these stories, the earliest oral versions were often gory, involving dismemberment, cannibalism, and even incest. In recent years, however, numerous television series and films have begun revisiting these tales, targeting them for a more adult audience, using all of the earlier blood, death, gore, and then some. Yet, how can folk and fairy tales lend themselves to these extremely different tellings? What changes and what stays the same?
This course will provide an overview of narrative folklore, exploring the main genres, and pairing texts with their modern day interpretations. We will trace and discuss their transformation from oral to print to film, examining the changes brought on from the new mediums, context, and audience, delineating variations in motifs and conventions. Our analysis will also look at story structure, meaning, and function, using methodologies derived from literary theory, folklore studies, gender studies, psychoanalysis, and film studies. Material will cover the canon of Aesop, Grimm, and Perrault, but also incorporate indigenous narratives from the Americas, Asia, Pacific, and Africa in order to engender a holistic understanding of how narrative functions in different cultures. In the process, we will problematize issues of childhood, “mature content,” cultural representation, ownership & appropriation, colonialism through narrative, sexuality, femininity & masculinity, children’s literature, ethnocentrism, and censorship. |
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ENGL 6884 |
Sinor, J |
In this graduate nonfiction writing workshop, students will have the opportunity to write both linear and lyric form. The focus of the course will be on the benefits and drawbacks found in the pursuit of various forms; we will also examine the organic relationship between form and content. This course will not offer students an introduction to creative nonfiction. It is assumed that students have that background. Students may complete work that fits into their theses projects as long as the work can stand on its own. Additionally, students will have the opportunity to write and publish literary journal reviews with NewPages and will create a collaborative performance piece to be shared at Helicon West on December 5. The final portfolio will include two essays accompanied by introductions that provide critical reflection on decisions made about form. |
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ENGL 6810 |
Rivera-Mueller, J |
This course is designed to help you study your work as a writing teacher and deepen your understanding of Composition Studies. As a participant in the course, you will have the opportunity to develop a scholarly project that addresses one of your most pressing questions about learning to write or learning to teach writing. Throughout the course, we will examine foundational and contemporary composition scholarship to support the development of these projects. We will ground this study in an explicit focus on inquiry—the questions and the methods for pursuing questions that shape this field. This course privileges your questions about learning to write or learning to teach writing because it is designed to foster your current and future development as a writer/teacher/scholar. This course is a great fit for people who care about writing pedagogy and would like a context to study a particular aspect of their teaching. |
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ENGL 6410/7410 |
Walton, R |
ENGL 6410/7410 is designed to welcome graduate students across the English Department. Whether you're curious about the field of Technical Communication and Rhetoric specifically or just want to learn how to assess a field by its scholarship, this online course is for you. *How to trace scholarly conversations across the publications of a field * Conducting secondary research to synthesize how existing scholarship can inform problem solving in the workplace * Developing a broader understanding of the field, beyond their own career experience * Learning how theoretical frameworks can inform and improve practice |
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ENGL 6470/7470 |
McLaughlin, J |
The first half of this course will explore the power of metaphor in marketing and approaching potential customers. The second half will examine in detail how to develop proposals based on customer requests for proposals. The intimate relationship of the two topics will become clear as the methods of how to frame a proposal argument revolve around the underlying metaphors which drive customer decisions. PhD students will combine the study of metaphors with an examination of how archetypes interact with marketing decisions and customer behavior. |
| ENGL 6800/7800 Teaching Online Online |
Grant-Davie, K | If you pursue an academic career, you may well be assigned or given the opportunity to teach online, and even nonacademic workplaces use online training. This course prepares you to meet these challenges confidently in settings ranging from K–12 to post-secondary to corporate training. The class will meet online, so it will offer you the opportunity to learn about online writing instruction experientially. We will ask questions such as these:
What range of forms can online writing instruction take, and what range of students does it serve? How do instructors need to change their roles and adapt their material and teaching methods as they move from face-to-face instruction to online instruction? What are the best practices for managing online classes and discussion forums effectively and efficiently? What learning theories underlie those best practices? What can instructors do to create presence and build community in their online classes? How are technologies being used in online writing instruction? What options do instructors have for responding to student work and assessing it in online classes? What should instructors know about issues of ownership and plagiarism in online classes? In addition to meeting online with ENGL 6800 students, students in 7800 will also meet in person for one hour each week on the Logan campus. Students in 6800 are welcome to sit in on those meetings if they choose. The class will require just one text: Boettcher, J. V., & Conrad, R.-M. (2016). The online teaching survival guide: Simple and practical pedagogical tips (2nd ed.). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. Additional readings will be posted online. |
| ENGL 6820: Practicum in Teaching English TR: 10:30-11:45am |
Buyserie, B. | This course is designed specifically and required for new graduate instructors teaching English 1010. Our collective goal is to facilitate both short- and long-term teacher growth, preparing teachers for current and subsequent teaching responsibilities through an emphasis on the dialectical relationship between theory and practice. Class begins during the pre-semester orientation where new instructors begin building a community with other teachers, are introduced to resources and curriculum, and are mentored through fall semester teaching preparation. Learning progresses throughout the practicum as we read, analyze, and discuss pivotal texts in composition and rhetorical theory and pedagogy. Participants become reflective practitioners by maintaining a journal tying course concepts to classroom experiences, writing several English 1010 assignments, observing peers and mentors in classrooms and the Writing Center, and consolidating a teaching identity through the creation of a teaching philosophy. |
Summer Semester 2019 Graduate Courses
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Instructor
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Course Description
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ENGL 6420/7420 |
Moeller, R |
User experience design (UXD) is an iterative, user-centered design process aimed at creating experiences that users want to interact with. Experiences range from physical products, software applications, games, and websites to presentations, marketing and public relations materials, written documents of all sorts, and classroom-based activities. In this course, you will learn the basic methods of UX design—planning > research > design > testing—as well as how to include other stakeholders (from users to co-workers and employers) in your design processes. You will be required to apply what you learn to a specific design project of your choice, and weekly discussions will focus on reporting your UXD successes and challenges to the class for feedback and support. You should plan to order the required textbook, The User Experience Team of One (Kindle version available), well in advance of the start of this 7-week course, so we can hit the ground running.
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Spring Semester 2019 Graduate Courses
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Instructor
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Course Description
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ENGL 6630 |
Gonzalez, C |
Speculative cinema is a well-established genre of American filmmaking whose foundations continue to resonate in our current movie-going experience. Non-white characters and actors, however, have a less firmly-rooted place in this area of film. Only recently have we begun to see significant progress concerning representation of people of color in science fiction, fantasy, horror, dystopia, and other speculative genres. What do these developments tell us about the history of films and filmmaking in the US? What does our present situation reveal about our current moment in history and American culture itself? What does it portend for our future? This course seeks to answer these and other questions by surveying a host of exemplar cinematic scenes, closely examining many speculative films in full, and contemplating theoretical positions put forth by leading scholars in the area. |
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ENGL 6720/HIST 6720 |
McNeill, L |
This is a graduate level course designed to help students further their research by providing both a practical and theoretical introduction to fieldwork in Folklore Studies. This is accomplished first through hands-on ethnographic training, focusing on the documentation of local cultural resources through a collaborative service learning project. We also will be reading ethnographies on folklore-related subjects, reading about practical issues such as research design, and doing more theoretical readings on a variety of issues such as ethics, reflexivity, and issues of representation. |
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ENGL 6760/HIST 6760 |
Gabbert, L | 6760 Folk Art and Material Culture is cross-listed with 4700 Folk Material Culture and so is a graduate/undergraduate course. We will be looking at folkloristic approaches to the study of folk art and material culture, including an emphasis on individual artists, the role of creativity in tradition, artistic processes, tools, and materials, and the importance of cultural context. Some time will be spent deconstructing the categories of “art” and “folk art.” Topics range from pottery, textiles, and mortuary art to yard art, tattoos, and home altars. Books include William Warner Wood’s Made in Mexico: Zapotec Weavers and the Global Ethnic Art Market (Indiana University Press 2008), Jon Kay’s Folk Art and Aging: Life-Story Objects and their Makers (Indiana University Press 2016), and Jeannie Banks Thomas’ Naked Barbies, Warrior Joes, and other Visible Forms of Gender (University of Illinois Press 2003). Students taking this course for graduate credit will be required to write a substantial research paper. |
| ENGL 6770HIST 6770 Folklore Seminar R, 4:30-7:00 pm |
Morales, E |
The Hawaiian luau brings up visions of flower leis, tiki torches, grass skirts, coconut bras, young female dancers shaking their hips, and men twirling staffs of fire. This description, however, stopped being about Hawaii with the mention of “tiki”—that comes from New Zealand. Also, in hula, women do not shake their hips—that is Tahitian, nor do men use the fire staff—that is Samoan. The modern luau is really a pan-Polynesian spectacle, but how did it become this way? And what effects has it had on Polynesian cultures?
Through an approach that integrates Pacific Studies, Ethnochoreology, Folklore, Anthropology, and Critical Race Theory, this course will explore the impacts of colonialism, cultural appropriation, cultural commodification, and tourism on the people of Polynesia. We will survey the territories of Hawaii, Tahiti, New Zealand, Samoa, Tonga, and the Cook Islands, examining their individual countries/cultures and the ways in which colonialism and the encroachment of modernity affected the indigenous of each archipelago. We will probe the cultural renaissance spurred forth by dance and performance, the creation and limitations of diasporic communities around the globe, and examine how Polynesians used the interest from the touristic luau to perpetuate their culture, creating hundreds of groups devoted to Polynesian dance around the world, complete with a global network of festivals. While Polynesia is the focus of this course, we will cover concerns relevant to all indigenous and colonized populations. |
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ENGL 6883 |
Sowder, M |
English 6883 is an advanced poetry-writing workshop. Accordingly, much of the work of the semester will involve reading and responding to each other’s work in a rigorous yet supportive environment. Writing workshops were for me the most exciting and rewarding courses I took in college and grad school, and I hope this one will be as rewarding for you. As you probably know, world literature began with poetry—deriving from religious ritual, magical spells, chants, and incantations. Other forms of creative writing—novels, fiction, and creative nonfiction—derived from poetry. Poetry employs the tools of creative writing in the most intense, compressed, and sophisticated ways possible. If you study the poetry of the last several millennia, you’ll sharpen and hone your writing in whatever genre you ultimately choose to write in. In addition to our weekly workshops, we’ll also read several contemporary books of poetry, beginning with a famous twentieth-century collection, Ariel, by Sylvia Plath, and a collection by her equally famous—and infamous—husband, Ted Hughes’s, Birthday Letters. We’ll also read The Best American Poetry of 2017, a fantastic collection of contemporary poems. Ross Gay’s exuberant A Catalogue of Unabashed Gratitude will lighten our mood after Plath and Hughes. In addition, we’ll read a book by our own professor Ben Gunsberg and a collection of mine, House Under the Moon. These works will help us deepen our understanding of the diversity of styles and themes of contemporary poetry and help us see how it achieves its power. Grades will be based on a chapbook of poems turned in at the end of the semester and class participation.
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ENGL 6830/7830 |
Colton, J |
What makes someone or something persuasive? Why do we find a speaker or writer credible in one context but not in another? English 6830/7830 will introduce you to rhetoric, rhetorical theory, and rhetorical analysis in order to answer these and many other questions about the nature of persuasion. We will study classical and modern theories of rhetoric, from Plato and Aristotle to contemporary feminist and digital rhetorics. Lots of rhetoric! We will study how people are persuaded and persuade others through language and other symbols to act, how language and symbols produce meaning, how language and symbols work in organizing communities and human activity, and how rhetorical worldviews (ideologies) shape our understanding of reality. We will also examine noteworthy rhetorical scholars past and present to inform our understanding of the theory. Our study will be conducted through reading, discussion, and application of writings by an extensive range of rhetoricians, philosophers, linguists, and cultural critics. This is an online course, with a weekly one-hour f2f component for PhD students and interested master’s students |
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ENGL 6860/7860 |
Edenfield, A |
The ability to teach technical and professional communication (or TPC) is increasingly in demand in both academic or industry contexts. In this course, students build a foundation of knowledge and materials to draw upon in the future by a) reading and reflecting upon pedagogical theories and research, b) analyzing others' teaching materials, c) crafting a statement of teaching philosophy, and d) applying that philosophy in the design of teaching materials such as a syllabus and course design. |
Fall Semester 2018 Graduate Courses
Course |
Instructor |
Course Description |
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ENGL 6882: Graduate Fiction Writing Workshop |
Waugh, C |
The graduate fiction writing workshop will explore a variety of contemporary fiction, and give students the opportunity to share their own stories with others and to receive feedback. Since we will have a variety of levels of proficiency in the class, we’ll approach craft from a pedagogical point of view that should be useful to everyone, including those who might one day like to teach fiction writing as well as those who just want to write better fiction. We’ll also investigate how contemporary literary fiction has coopted elements from genres such as YA, sci-fi, fantasy, etc.
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| ENGL 6820: Practicum in Teaching English TR: 10:30-11:45am |
Branum, L | This course is designed specifically and required for new graduate instructors teaching English 1010. Our collective goal is to facilitate both short- and long-term teacher growth, preparing teachers for current and subsequent teaching responsibilities through an emphasis on the dialectical relationship between theory and practice. Class begins during the pre-semester orientation where new instructors begin building a community with other teachers, are introduced to resources and curriculum, and are mentored through fall semester teaching preparation. Learning progresses throughout the practicum as we read, analyze, and discuss pivotal texts in composition and rhetorical theory and pedagogy. Participants become reflective practitioners by maintaining a journal tying course concepts to classroom experiences, writing several English 1010 assignments, observing peers and mentors in classrooms and the Writing Center, and consolidating a teaching identity through the creation of a teaching philosophy. |
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English 6770 (002) (cross-listed with 3710): Folklore Seminar Subtitle: Language and Folklore |
McLaughlin, J | All folklore research starts with a text. Even when dealing with visual arts, there is the moment when a person is asked, "What does that mean?" and a text follows. This course will develop tools that you can use to understand in greater depth and detail the linguistic aspects of the texts that form the basis of folklore. From the fundamentals of language structure to the advanced world of metaphor and performance we will examine how a greater understanding of the linguistic structure of a text will lead to a greater understanding of the underlying meaning of that text. Please note that Folklore graduate students should only take this seminar if they are registered for Digital Folklore as well. |
| ENGL 6770 (001): Folklore Seminar Subtitle: Digital Folklore Thursdays: 4:30-7:00pm Ray B. West 214 |
McNeill, L |
This course will offer an in-depth consideration of a rapidly growing area of folklore studies: folklore and digital culture. It explores the ways in which we can understand folklore in a digital context, the kinds of folklore we find in digital settings, the kinds of folk groups we find through the use of technologically mediated communication, how fieldwork changes in an online environment, and the ways humans make meaning in diverse technological contexts. The Internet is a really cool, really weird place. Brace yourselves. |
| ENGL/HIST 6700: Folklore Theories and Methods Mondays: 4:30-7:00pm |
Gabbert, L |
A graduate level survey of various ideas, keywords, enduring issues, and approaches in the discipline of folklore. Includes history of the discipline, evolution of ideas in folkloristics, and contemporary theory. |
| ENGL/HIST 6600: American Studies Theory and Methods Wednesdays: 4:30-7:00pm |
Holt, K | Are you interested in interdisciplinary studies? Do you want to learn more about different methods and disciplinary approaches for exploring American culture? Do you want to explore issues of race, class, gender, the environment, social justice, media studies, music, film, and visual art in your academic work? This course introduces students to various practices of American cultural studies, with an emphasis on interdisciplinary research. Although we focus specifically on the field of American studies, this course is open to any student who is interested in contemporary critical debates and interdisciplinary cultural studies. The first half of the course covers the history of interdisciplinary studies and current debates in the field of American Studies, as well as specific examples of interdisciplinary work involving literary studies, history, folklore, film studies, archival research, and more. Readings cover a range of topics including immigration, studies of race and ethnicity, gender and sexuality, environmental studies, class issues, the US borderlands, and debates involving ethics and social justice. For the second half of the course, we will focus specifically on issues related to graduate studies and professionalization, including how to apply for conferences, composing a CV, working with special collections and other archival sources, maintaining careful research records, improving your academic writing, assembling a thesis committee, and working with faculty. We will also review the requirements and process for writing a thesis proposal. All first-year students in this course will write a sample thesis proposal as their final project. Students who have already written a thesis proposal will write a final paper related to their thesis work. |
| ENGL 6440/7440: Cultural Research Methods This is an online/hybrid course. Master’s students register for 6440, PhD students for 7440. PhD students are required to attend a face-to-face meeting every week in addition to the online. |
Colton, J |
Do you want to explore how gender, race, and disability impact all aspects of technical communication and rhetoric? If so, then this course is for you! We will survey various cultural research methods that apply to contemporary practices in technical communication and rhetoric. These methods include feminism, LGBTQ theory, critical race theory, disability studies, and others. Do not worry if you are unfamiliar with any of these research frameworks; this course will introduce you to them and give you the opportunity to apply them to contemporary issues (whether in professional communication, teaching, or culture at large). The goal of the course is to help you learn how to apply these cultural research methods in academia or industry. By the end of the course, you will have a strong foundational understanding of the differences in these research frameworks and why each is a valid form of knowledge making. While there will be an emphasis on technical communication and rhetoric scholarship in the course, these methods are often applied to literary studies, American Studies, and folklore. I welcome students interested in other areas and will work with you to apply these methods to your own research projects. |
| ENGL 6410/7410: Introduction to Technical Communication This is an online/hybrid course. Master’s students register for 6410, PhD students for 7410. PhD students are required to attend a face-to-face meeting every week in addition to the online. |
Walton, R | ENGL 6410/7410 is designed to welcome graduate students across the English Department. Whether you're curious about the field of Technical Communication specifically or just want to learn how to assess a field by its scholarship, this online course is for you.ENGL 6410 will help you to develop a foundational understanding of Technical Communication as a field:
In this course, you'll also develop scholarly skills applicable across majors:
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ENGL 6340: British Literature and Culture Subtitle: Shakespeare and Early Modern Science, Medicine, and Magic |
Jensen, P | In this course students will examine selected plays of Shakespeare through the lens of early modern science, which proposed a radically pre-modern understanding of human physiology, psychology, and the relationship between self and environment. The class will meet for most of the semester in Special Collections in the Merrill-Cazier Library, where we will be examining our rich collection of early modern scientific books—herbals, dietaries, books of secrets, and works on medicine, astrology, and cosmology—in order to consider how that material illuminates Shakespeare’s plays (Romeo and Juliet, The Tempest, The Taming of the Shrew, King Lear, Macbeth, and Othello.) The class will work together to write, design, and put up a library exhibit in late November that will showcase USU’s rare books and draw connections between early modern science and Shakespeare’s work. |
Summer Semester 2018 Graduate Courses
Course |
Instructor |
Course Description |
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| ENGL 4750/6750: Fife Folklore Workshop Subtitle: Slenderman and Creepypasta Note: this course also counts for the Master of Technical Communication degree. Note: Grad students should enroll in the 6000-level number for 3 credits. June 18-June 22, 2018 9:00am-5:00pm |
McNeill, L | Description: The theme of the 2018 Fife Folklore Workshop is the online genre of creepypasta (online horror art and stories) in general, and the specific case of Slender Man in particular. Created in 2009, the character of Slender Man has taken the Internet by storm, leading to numerous legends, beliefs, stories, depictions, costumes, pranks, and even a small number of real-world crimes. Slender Man is an excellent case study for folklorists and other scholars interested in the role of technology within tradition, and in the pervasive power of networked communication to affect personal and cultural beliefs. The workshop's visiting scholars are among the leading researchers on the Slender Man phenomenon, and all are contributors to a new volume, Slender Man Is Coming: Creepypasta and Contemporary Legends on the Internet, due out from USU Press in 2018. Presentation topics will include narrative formation, offline manifestations of belief, children's games, and the acting out of legendary material. The workshop will also screen the 2017 HBO documentary Beware the Slender Man. |
| ENGL 6890: Studies in Writing and Rhetoric—The 2018 Bennion Teacher’s Workshop on “Revolution, Representation, Propaganda: Discovering Democracy in the 18th-Century Atlantic.” June 4-8, 2018 9:00am-5:00pm |
Gossard, J | Description: Various forms of media have long served as catalysts of revolution and change. The 2018 Bennion Teachers' Workshop will focus on media and the experiments with representative governments that emerged from the violent upheavals of revolution at the end of the eighteenth century in the United States, France, and Haiti. Participants will explore the topic through an immersive role-play simulation of the American Revolution ("Reacting to the Past") that will offer a broad background on social, ideological, and political forces. The workshop will critically examine the uses of revolutionary-era media, including propaganda, newspapers, and pamphlets. Participants will collaborate in a cumulative project to create an educational resource website on comparative Atlantic Revolutions. |
Spring Semester 2018 Graduate Courses
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Instructor
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Course Description
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ENGL 6330: Topics in Literary Studies (Subtitle: Haunted by History: The Deep Eighteenth Century) |
Burkert, M |
The breakout Broadway musical Hamilton is a hip-hop retelling of the American Revolution and the founding of the Republic, but it’s also more than that: it’s a meditation on how we mythologize historical figures, how we grapple with the darkest aspects of our history, and how we can simultaneously recognize the legacies of that past in our present while remaking the world to reflect our own values. This course takes Hamilton as an entry point into an examination of the ways our twenty-first-century world is haunted by the ghosts of history—from distinctively modern forms of scientific inquiry, individual rights, and representative governments, to finance capitalism, colonialism, and slavery. We will read texts from the long eighteenth century (1660-1800) in conversation with more recent adaptations and responses that grapple with the present’s ambivalent relationship to the past: Aphra Behn’s anti-slavery novella Oroonoko (1688) and its adaptations for the stage from 1696 to 1999; Daniel Defoe’s novel Robinson Crusoe (1719) with J. M. Coetzee’s postcolonial reimagining, Foe (1986); and Margaret Cavendish’s early science fiction work The Blazing World (1666) alongside Neal Stephenson’s speculative historical novel about England’s scientific revolution, Quicksilver (2003). Along the way, we will explore what theater scholar Joseph Roach calls “the deep eighteenth century:” the unfinished business of the Enlightenment that lingers spectrally in the corridors of modernity. The final course project will likewise collapse past and present, as the class develops an online digital exhibition that blends historical research with analysis of literary and cultural sources from library databases and Special Collections. |
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ENGL 6400/7400: |
Grant-Davie, K |
If you receive an advanced degree from this department, you will almost certainly need editing skills, no matter what you do next. This course is your chance to learn those skills or, if you already have editing experience, to sharpen and refine them by reevaluating your editing practices and how you justify them. (Teaching this course has improved my own writing.) We will practice and discuss many aspects of editing—from crafting language at the sentence level to shaping whole documents for rhetorical effect, organization and content, graphics, and document design. You will learn how to reread your writing productively and how to expand or condense it as needed. The course is designed mainly for students in the online Master of Technical Communication program and for doctoral students in the Theory & Practice of Professional Communication program. The course materials will be biased towards tech/professional communication. Students from literary studies, creative writing, American studies, or folklore are very welcome to take the course and should find it quite helpful. However, we will not address editing skills that are specific to creative writing, e.g., editing fiction for narrative pacing or plot development—skills that are better developed in an ENGL 6880 creative writing workshop course. All students in ENGL 6400 and 7400 will meet online. Students in 7400 will also meet in person on the Logan campus each week, and students in 6400 are welcome to sit in on those meetings if they choose. We will read the following two texts plus additional readings:
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ENGL 6460/7460: |
Colton, J | Over 41 million Americans (or 15% of the total U.S. population) “have some level of disability" (U.S. Census Bureau), and according to the U.S. Department of Education, the number of college students with disabilities has increased phenomenally since 1978. Older Americans also stand to benefit from assistive technologies and other features of accessible design. In this course, we will explore accessibility through a lens of disability studies and social justice, which provide additional contexts for understanding the importance of accessibility within physical and digital environments. We will discuss and practice rhetorical and legal standards of effective and accessible design (such as WCAG 2.0), through an “intervention” assignment with the Center for Innovative Design and Instruction at USU, for which you will take inaccessible PDF documents used at USU and make them accessible for screen reading software (great for your resume/CV, btw). Largely, we will focus on considering and producing rhetorically effective closed-captions (with Camtasia and other software) to movies, youtube videos, and online educational videos—not as an afterthought but as a vital part of the video production process. By the end of the course, you should have a good understanding of disability studies theory, be able to make a strong case for accessible design, have improved your video production and design skills, and understand how to approach multiple technologies and rhetorical situations for accessibility. |
| ENGL 6480/7480: Advanced Editing (PhD students sign up for 7480 and will also meet face-to-face once a week) Online (MTC), Hybrid (PHD) |
Colton, J |
This class offers an introduction to the relationships among technology, rhetoric, culture, and writing, with a specific emphasis on digital and “new” media. The emergence of digital writing and new media networks has brought into question the usefulness of traditional rhetorical concepts. For example, once defined as only the gestures accompanying the speech of a rhetor, delivery now includes the technological medium of expression (social and mobile media, video, audio). We have moved from traditional terms such as “the rhetorical situation” (speaker-message-audience) to posthumanist frameworks interested in rhetorical circulation and velocity, where digital file formatting is considered a rhetorical choice anticipating how your text, video, or images will be sampled and remixed by others. As researchers and practitioners of digital writing and rhetoric, we will take into account the important role of these new media and digital writing practices (yes, including Facebook and Twitter!). This course will question assumptions of culturally neutral, celebratory, determinist, and value-free narratives of technology. We will develop critical vocabulary and knowledge of the ethical, historical, political, and social contexts that influence our everyday use of writing technologies. |
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ENGL 6600: |
Holt, K. |
Are you interested in issues involving race, class, gender, the environment, social justice, media studies, music, film, and visual art? Do you like to use different methods and approaches in your academic work? This course introduces students to the practice of cultural studies, with an emphasis on the methods and practice of interdisciplinary research. Although we focus specifically on the field of American studies, this course is open to any student who is interested in contemporary critical debates and interdisciplinary approaches. The first half of the course covers the history of interdisciplinary studies and current debates in the field of American Studies. The second half of the course focuses on case studies of interdisciplinary work that engage with literary studies, American folklore, American music and ballad traditions, film studies, personal narratives, archival research, and more. Readings cover a range of topics including Native American studies, immigration and US borderlands, gender and sexuality, environmental studies, class issues, and debates involving ethics and social justice. Readings include Dinaw Mengestu’s The Beautiful Things That Heaven Bears, Philip Deloria’s Indians in Unexpected Places, Américo Paredes’s With a Pistol in His Hand, and more. |
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ENGL 6720: |
Gabbert, L |
This course covers the basic skills needed to conduct beginning graduate-level fieldwork. Students will obtain hands-on experience with recording equipment, including cameras and digital recording kits. We will cover a variety of techniques and methods, including observation, participant-observation, and interviewing, as well as the recording of fieldnotes. In addition, we will cover fieldwork ethics and theorize the problems of IRB (Institutional Review Board/Human Subjects). Finally, we also will read several works that utilize fieldwork as a primary research tool. Students are required to complete a series of fieldwork assignments as well as a final paper. |
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ENGL/HIST 4700 & ENGL 6760: Material Culture and Folk Art |
Thomas, J |
How is meaning generated and communicated through objects? This course explores folk forms and their relation to culture, history, and narrative. We will explore objects from different cultures and time periods in relation to questions including:
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ENGL 6770: Seminar in Folklore and Folklife, When da Folk came to Harlem |
Shively, S |
We will study the tensions, rewards, and challenges in the lives of African American people and culture as a consequence of the Great Migration of African Americans from the rural South to the urban North after World War I. How does daily life change when people migrate? What traditions did people bring with them? What new patterns did they adopt? In what ways are the popular images of Southern African American life (slow, poverty, residual plantation culture, field labor, etc.) and of urban city life (jazz, the club scene, dance, vibrant street life, etc.) constructed? In what ways are they genuine? Primary source materials will include literature (poetry, fiction, nonfiction, drama, film), visual art, music, dance, and journalism. Creative work by Zora Neale Hurston, Langston Hughes, Sterling Brown, Nella Larsen, Aaron Douglas, Ma Rainey, and many others! We will study secondary sources that have examined historical, sociological, aesthetic, and gendered aspects of African American popular culture. Opportunities for research projects will be available for students in folklore, literature and writing, American studies, history, technical and professional writing. This course is crosslisted as History 6770. |
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ENGL 6883: Graduate Seminar in Poetry Writing |
Sowder, M |
ENGL 6883 is a poetry-writing workshop in which students will write poetry and share their work for critique in a supportive yet rigorous environment. The class will study contemporary poetry, focusing on the 2017 edition of The Best American Poetry, in addition to reading outstanding individual books of contemporary poetry, including award-winning works by poets Edward Hirsch and Paisley Rekdal, both of whom will be visiting campus in the spring. Students will complete a chapbook of poems as their final project. The class will also focus on the submission of poems for publication. |
Fall Semester 2017 Graduate Courses
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Instructor
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Course Description
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ENGL 6330: Topics in Literary Studies (Subtitle: Detective Fiction and Film) |
McCuskey, B |
How many degrees of separation are there between Oedipus and Veronica Mars? This graduate seminar explores the genre of detective fiction, both its history and its theory, in both literature and film. We will read primarily British and American fiction, although we will begin in ancient Greece and head toward France and Argentina. The main goal of the course is to trace the evolution of the genre across a range of authors, forms, and contexts: Sophocles, Edgar Allan Poe, Wilkie Collins, Arthur Conan Doyle, G. K. Chesterton, Agatha Christie, Dashiell Hammett, Raymond Chandler, Carolyn Keene, Jorge Luis Borges, Alain Robbe-Grillet, Patricia Highsmith, and Paul Auster. We will also watch detectives ply their trade at the movies and on television, in both adapted and original stories, from Bogart to Marge Gunderson. Our overarching goal is to develop ideas—and, eventually, theories—about the genre’s underlying symbolic structure and recurring effects. |
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ENGL 6350 |
Crumbley, P |
This course concentrates on the poetry of four major American poets: Emily Dickinson, Marianne Moore, Elizabeth Bishop, and May Swenson. The word “Dissent” that appears in the course title puns on the interplay of “dissent” and “descent” so central to the critical and scholarly practice of positioning each poet within an American female poetic tradition, or line of descent, while simultaneously arguing that each one in her own way rebels or dissents from that tradition. As a consequence, the class will examine key features of a poetic tradition that may be traced as far back Anne Bradstreet at the same time that we identify the manner in which each poet challenges that tradition. Doing so will require that we tease out the ways in which each poet reflects and subverts prevailing cultural norms. In the final weeks of the semester, we will pay special attention to Swenson’s contributions and departures from this tradition in an effort to assess her importance. The culminating project for the course will be the development of individual displays or exhibits linking Swenson to one or more of these American women poets. Students will also complete ten-page research papers to accompany their exhibits. The exhibits will be displayed in Merrill-Cazier Library and other locations around campus. |
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ENGL 6700: Folklore Theory and Methods |
McNeill, L | This course will introduce students to the field of academic folklore studies. We will cover major genres of folklore, the history of the discipline, theories and approaches, and dominant themes. Many students find folklore studies to be a surprisingly contemporary and relatable field, one that can pair well with other areas of interest such as literature, history, and anthropology. Students will have the opportunity to pursue folkloristic research into their own topics of choice, all while exploring this unique (and fun!) field of study.
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| ENGL 6740: Folk Narrative (Subtitle: The Fairy Tale) Wednesdays, 4:30-7:00 pm |
Schwabe, C | Although this course will touch on all of the principal narrative genres in folk tradition, its main focus will be on the fairy tale. Why do fairy tales appear in almost every culture across the globe and why are they so popular? Undoubtedly because they encapsulate in (usually) succinct form many of the most pressing concerns of human existence: family conflict, the struggle for survival, sexual desire, the quest for happiness, among many others. This course explores why writers and readers have been attracted to the fairy-tale form through a study of its key elements and its uses in adult and children’s literature, book illustration, film, television, and the Internet. Special attention will be given to the German Children’s and Household Tales, along with French, Italian, Danish, English, and selected non-Western fairy tales. Works of contemporary mainstream scholars, such as Jack Zipes, Maria Tatar, Donald Haase, and Maria Warner, and various critical lenses will be applied to the tales to reveal multiple methods of analyzing the texts. Students can expect to read and analyze some of the most popular fairy tales from each of the major collections in Western Europe, augmented by postmodern retellings and adaptations in literature and the media. |
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ENGL 6800/7800 |
Grant-Davie, K. |
What range of forms can online writing instruction take, and what range of students does it serve? How do instructors need to change their roles and adapt their material and teaching methods as they move from face-to-face instruction to online instruction? What are the best practices for managing online classes and discussion forums effectively and efficiently? What learning theories underlie those best practices? What can instructors do to create presence and build community in their online classes? How are technologies being used in online writing instruction? What options do instructors have for responding to student work and assessing it in online classes? What should instructors know about issues of ownership and plagiarism in online classes? In addition to meeting online with ENGL 6800 students, students in 7800 will also meet in person for one hour each week on the Logan campus. Students in 6800 are welcome to sit in on those meetings if they choose. The class will require just one text: Boettcher, J. V., & Conrad, R.-M. (2016). The online teaching survival guide: Simple and practical pedagogical tips (2nd ed.). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. Additional readings will be posted online. |
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ENGL 6820 |
Dethier, B | This course is designed specifically for graduate instructors teaching English 1010. It focuses on the theory and practice of teaching writing but also prepares graduate instructors for further teaching responsibilities. We schedule it for two class periods, but the second period is usually reserved for outside speakers and special presentations. Participants complete some of the English 1010 assignments as well as a final synthesis paper, and they share some of their best ideas in a half-hour presentation to the class. Required of all new English graduate instructors and must be taken with the pre-semester Orientation. |
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ENGL 6884: Creative Nonfiction Workshop |
Sinor, J. |
This graduate course is primarily a creative writing workshop focused on making and responding to literary art. A background in creative writing is not required but recommended. This fall, we will be focusing on non-linear form, specifically the braided essay. Students will spend the semester studying the braided form—essays that move between three strands (a research strand, a site visit, and a personal strand) and that are bound by metaphor or image. They will write a twenty-plus-page braided essay. In this class, students will be introduced to archival work, the use of primary and secondary source materials in creative writing, living research, scene reconstruction, and creating characters out of real and historical figures. Site visits are required, as is extensive interviewing. The result—a complex woven piece that pursues a difficult question in a unique and compelling way—is one of the most engaging and popular forms of literary nonfiction being written today. |
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ENGL 7000: Advanced Research Methods |
Moeller, R |
This course is designed to survey major methods for conducting research in English across academic and nonacademic settings, covering the following topics:
We will study qualitative methods (ethnographies, fieldwork, and case studies), quantitative methods (surveys, experiments, and simple statistical analyses), and mixed methods approaches to research and apply each to a problem that you identify in your area/field. Upon completing this course, you should be able to
describe the landscape of current research in your field. |
Summer Semester 2017 Graduate Courses
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Course Description
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ENGL 6890: Studies in Writing and Rhetoric, Bennion Teachers’ Workshop |
Rivera-Muller, J. Andersen, S |
This one-week course will run as the Bennion Teachers’ Workshop. The workshop is titled Protest Literature: Civil Rights, Democracy and Social Justice. Our study will begin with Civil Rights Era literature, but workshop participants can examine any site of protest literature in their individual projects. Launching our exploration of the relationship between protest literature and social activism, keynote speaker Dr. Margaret Whitt will engage workshop participants in conversations about literature from her book, Short Stories of the Civil Rights Movement. Participants will consider how protest literature from the Civil Rights Movement can shape our lives as teachers, readers, writers, and citizens. Throughout the week, USU scholars from multiple disciplines will lead sessions focusing on a range of protest texts—including poetry, graphic novels, art, historical objects, music, drama, and film—to help us examine contemporary understandings of protest literature. With a spotlight on bringing the workshop experience to the classroom, the workshop leaders will facilitate coursework with practical application for teachers. Please see brochure for additional details, and feel free to contact Jessica Rivera-Mueller for further information (jessica.riveramueller@usu.edu). Tuition Scholarships for the Bennion (ENGL 6890, Summer): Scholarships in the amount of $750 towards tuition and fees are available for graduate students enrolling for academic credit. Scholarship funds are limited, so please apply early. Email the Mountain West Center for Regional Studies at mwc@usu.edu or call 435-797-0299 for scholarship applications. |
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ENGL 6810: Introduction to Composition Studies |
Rivera-Mueller, J. |
This introduction to composition studies course is focused on teacher-inquiry. The workshop is designed to help you study your work as a writing teacher and deepen your understanding of Composition Studies. As a participant in the workshop, you will have the opportunity to develop a scholarly project that addresses one of your most pressing questions about learning to write or learning to teach writing. Throughout the workshop, we will examine foundational and contemporary composition scholarship to support the development of these projects. This course is a great fit for people who care about writing pedagogy and would like a context to study a particular aspect of their teaching. Please feel free to contact Jessica Rivera-Mueller for further information (jessica.riveramueller@usu.edu). |
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ENGL/HIST 6750: Field School for Cultural Documentation |
Gabbert, L. |
Overview: The 2017 Field School for Cultural Documentation is a collaboration between the University of Wyoming, Utah State University, and the Library of Congress. It is an intensive, multi-week, residential workshop designed to provide participants with basic ethnographic fieldwork skills, including participant observation, interviewing, the writing of field notes, ethics, and archiving best practices. Students will work collaboratively on a designated project with nationally known faculty from the American Folklife Center, the University of Wyoming’s American Studies Program, and Utah State University’s Folklore Program and Special Collections and Archives. Project: Participants will interview and document the traditions of owners, guests, and workers of the historic TriangleX dude ranch (http://trianglex.com), near Jackson Hole, Wyoming, and located inside Grand Teton National Park. Folklorist Andrea Graham, of the University of Wyoming, who has spent much of her career working with ranching communities, will lead the project. Participants should commit to at least three weeks. Two weeks will be spent in residence in Grand Teton National Park taking classes and conducting fieldwork, and another week or so at home will be spent processing materials and writing final reports. Audience: The Field School for Cultural Documentation is designed for anyone with an interest in learning basic ethnographic skills. Students, community scholars, and the general public are encouraged to apply. Room and Board: The field school will be held from July 30-Aug. 12, 2017 in Grand Teton National Park, Wyoming. Participants will be housed at the University of Wyoming’s AMK Ranch (https://www.nps.gov/grte/learn/historyculture/amk.htm), which is located inside the park. This is a bunkhouse-style sleeping quarters with a communal kitchen and shared bathrooms. Participants are required to be in residence for the duration of the field school, but may find alternate room and board at their own expense. Participants are responsible for their own transportation to and from Grand Teton National Park. Funding opportunities: Room and board at the AMK ranch likely will be covered. Additional scholarship monies are available for all USU students to help offset transportation and other costs. Additional forms of assistance for USU students, such as summer tuition waivers, may become available as the spring semester develops. |
Spring Semester 2017 Graduate Courses
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Instructor
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Course Description
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ENGL 6340 |
Burkert, M. |
In this course, we’ll explore how our 21st-century world is haunted by the legacies of the long 18th century (1660-1800)—from distinctively modern forms of scientific inquiry, individual rights, and representative governments, to party politics, finance capitalism, colonialism, imperialism, and slavery. We will read texts from the period in conversation with more recent adaptations and responses that grapple with our ambivalent relationship to the past. Readings include John Gay’s crime musical The Beggar’s Opera (1728) alongside Bertolt Brecht’s anti-capitalist satire, The Threepenny Opera (1928); Aphra Behn’s anti-slavery novella Oroonoko (1688) and its many adaptations for the stage from 1696 to 1999; Daniel Defoe’s novel Robinson Crusoe (1719) paired with J. M. Coetzee’s postcolonial reimagining, Foe (1986); Margaret Cavendish’s proto-science fiction The Blazing World (1666) in conversation with Neal Stephenson’s speculative historical novel about England’s scientific revolution, Quicksilver (2003); and Lin-Manuel Miranda's Broadway hit Hamilton. The final course project will be a digital exhibition that blends historical research with analysis of primary sources from library databases and Special Collections. |
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ENGL 6350 |
Shively, S. |
This course will be a multi-genre study of selected works of American literature on the topic of crime and punishment. Texts will include Herman Melville’s classic novel Billy Budd, Richard Wright’s frightening and influential Native Son, Ernest J. Gaines’s novel A Lesson Before Dying, Truman Capote’s innovative journalistic book In Cold Blood, an anthology of prison writing, young adult literature by Walter Dean Myers, and the contemporary memoir Orange is the New Black, by Piper Kerman. While the course will be grounded in literature, we will incorporate aspects of American Studies including diverse source materials (music, correspondence, visual images, media) as well as interdisciplinary aspects of the topic (psychology, race, gender, sexuality, sociology, folklore, religion, history, law). |
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ENGL 6400/7400 |
Grant-Davie, K. |
If you receive an advanced degree from this department, you will almost certainly need editing skills, no matter what you do next. This course is your chance to learn those skills or, if you already have editing experience, to sharpen and refine them by reevaluating your editing practices and how you justify them. (Teaching this course has improved my own writing.) We will practice and discuss many aspects of editing—from crafting language at the sentence level to shaping whole documents for rhetorical effect, organization and content, graphics, and document design. You will learn how to reread your writing productively and how to expand or condense it as needed. All students in ENGL 6400 and 7400 will meet online. Students in 7400 will also meet in person on the Logan campus each week, and students in 6400 are welcome to sit in on those meetings if they choose. We will read the following two texts plus additional readings:
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| ENGL 6440/7440 Studies in Culture and Professional Communication (PhD students sign up for 7400 and will also meet face-to-face once a week) Online/Hybrid |
Colton, J. | |
| HIST 6710 Space, Place, Folklore: Folklore and Landscape Tuesday, 4:30-7:00 pm |
Gabbert, L. |
This course examines intersections between folklore and landscape. How does folklore “vivify” landscape? We begin with cultural geographer Yi-Fu Tuan’s well-known distinction between “space” as empty and “place” as full of meaning and then examine how various kinds of folklore, such as stories, place names, festival, and material culture create local place-based meanings. As we move through the semester, we also will interrogate how local meanings are contested. Topics include Native American perspectives, tourism, and migration. A field trip or two also is likely in order. Students may either conduct a library or fieldwork based research project. Books:
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ENGL/HIST 6760, ENGL/HIST 4700: Folk Art, Traditional Art, & Material Culture |
McNeill, L. |
This course will cover the topics of folk art and folk material culture, defined quite broadly. We will consider a wide range of materials: from traditional art to refrigerator magnets, from roadside shrines to cosplay. The physical manifestations of our informal creative expressions surround us—in this class we’ll learn to see things we normally overlook, and find artistry in unexpected places. As a class we’ll take numerous small-scale field trips to sites in and around campus, seeking to engage the material world in person, as well as in theory. Please note that students in the Folklore program may only take this class if they are registered for the other two seminars (ENGL 6770 and ENGL 6710).
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ENGL/HIST 6770 |
Thomas, J. |
This course explores supernatural legends and belief narratives. We will explore them from cultural, popular, historical, and folkloric perspectives. Topics include: -Legends, such as the local St. Ann’s Retreat stories, and scholarly approaches to them -Zombies and the movies -Hauntings and “hag ridings” -Witches in tourism and everyday life -Vampires, forensic pathology, and fans -Marie Laveau and nineteenth-century New Orleans voodoo Media treatments of UFOs, NDEs, and the paranormal Note that 6770 is repeatable for credit when taught on a different topic. |
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ENGL 6860/7860 |
Walton, R. |
This course will prepare you to design and teach classes in technical and professional communication (TPC). If you are a professional working in industry, this course will equip you to teach courses in two-year colleges, opening new paths for applying and expanding your experience in the field. If you are intending to pursue a doctorate in TPC or a related field, this course will equip you to begin your doctoral studies ready to teach classes in your own field. If you are a graduate student in folklore, literature and writing, or American studies, this course will expand the range of courses you can teach, equipping you with a foundational understanding of the TPC field and providing an environment in which you can confidently develop requisite materials such as a syllabus and course design. If you are a secondary education teacher, this course will not only prepare you for college-level teaching but also allow you to select readings, design assignments, and develop activities that could allow you to bring TPC education into your high school classroom. You will build a foundation of knowledge and materials to draw upon by 1) reading and reflecting upon theories and research relevant to pedagogy, 2) analyzing others' teaching materials, 3) crafting a statement of teaching philosophy to make explicit your approach to pedagogy, and 4) applying that philosophy in the design of materials such as a syllabus and course design. Thus, you will engage deeply with theory and develop practical skills, engaging with material relevant to teaching in general and to TPC pedagogy in particular. All students in ENGL 6860 and 7860 will meet online. Students in 7860 will also meet in person on the Logan campus each week, and students in 6860 are welcome to sit in on those meetings if they choose. |
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ENGL 6883 |
Gunsberg, B. |
This graduate-level course is designed to help you become better writers and readers of poetry. We will focus our attention on student work as well as poetry written by emerging and established authors. Our conversations will revolve around craft, which means we will explore those time-tested techniques that guide and strengthen poets’ efforts. This approach begins with close attention to the language that moves us and, moreover, careful consideration of why it moves us. Class discussion and readings will be supplemented by your efforts to develop a personal aesthetic, one that broadens your understanding of published poetry and enlivens your responses to your classmates’ work. In addition to writing and revising individual poems, you will assemble a final portfolio consisting of your most successful writing. Required texts: - A Poet's Handbook, Mary Oliver - Best American Poetry, 2016, David Lehman and Edward Hirsch -Instant Winner, Carrie Fountain -Selected essays from Tony Hoagland, Louise Gluck, and Stephen Dunn |
Fall Semester 2016 Graduate Courses
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Instructor
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Course Description
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ENGL 6330 |
Cooper-Rompato, C | When you hear the words “fantasy literature,” what do you think of? Orcs and wizards, alternative worlds, magic and dragons? How did this strange and wonderful genre develop, and where is it headed? In this class, we’ll consider the “forefathers” of the genre, the medievalists J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis, with an eye toward how the genre has grown in the last sixty years. How does the atheist Philip Pullman rewrite the Christian narratives of Tolkien and Lewis? How has the Jamaican author Nalo Hopkinson pioneered the new genre of “Urban Fantasy”? What does contemporary children’s fantasy literature have to offer? We’ll consider how fantasy’s other worlds actually explore this world’s pressing questions of religion, gender, race, class, and disability. We’ll also consider the cross-over between fantasy and other forms of speculative fiction. Readings include The Fellowship of the Ring (J.R.R. Tolkien), The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe (C.S. Lewis), Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone (J.K. Rowling), The Golden Compass (Philip Pullman), Sister Mine (Nalo Hopkinson), Sisters Grimm (Michael Buckley). Please note that this is a cross-listed class; there are four graduate seats open in a senior seminar (ENGL 5300), which allows for 21 undergraduates. Grads will attend Tu/Th class with the undergraduates, and you will also meet for one hour outside of class/week, where we will discuss extra primary and secondary readings. Grads will also be expected to give presentations and lead class discussion several times, as well as write a 20-page seminar paper. |
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ENGL 6350/6440/7440 |
Funda, E. | Thomas Jefferson called farmers “the chosen people of God” and claimed that they were inherently virtuous, the best citizens for the new republic. Even if we think Jefferson’s claims exaggerated, there’s no denying that the American imagination has endowed farming with profound and enduring symbolic significance. This course is based on the theory that no other occupation —with perhaps the exception of motherhood—so fully spans the imaginative range of human experience or is so profoundly invested with symbolic significance in our culture, even by those who have never worked or lived on a farm. Thus, farming is a kind of imaginative shopping cart into which we carry around a whole host of rather romanticized ideas, expectations, and beliefs. It is a shimmering ideal and a cardinal experience, one that has been endowed with meaning deeper than merely placing seed into soil. Understanding how our culture continues to mythologize the American Farm— even as farm history is fraught with significant controversies and tensions—can offer insights into everything from public policy to the popularity of country music to current “back to the land” & “local food” movements. Therefore, this interdisciplinary course will examine the story of the American farm in literature, history, mythology, art, film, folklore, music, and popular culture in order to consider how and why our culture idealizes rural landscape and lifestyle so fully, even in our increasingly urban nation. |
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ENGL 6410/7410 (Online) |
Walton, R. | Course Description: ENGL 6410/7410 is designed to welcome graduate students across the English Department. Whether you're curious about the field of Technical Communication and Rhetoric specifically or just want to learn how to assess a field by its scholarship, this online course is for you. ENGL 6410 will help you to develop a foundational understanding of Technical Communication and Rhetoric as a field: - Major theories underlying the scholarship, such as rhetorical theory and new materialism - Major research topics explored through this scholarship, from social justice to workplace writing genres - Tensions and concerns at the heart of the field, especially relationships between industry and academia In this course, you'll also develop scholarly skills applicable across majors: - How to trace scholarly conversations across the publications of a field - How to recognize topics of recent and growing interest (i.e., promising topics for your own scholarship to advance the field) - How to visually represent an academic field - How to craft a literature review (a central component of research publications and presentations) |
| HIST 6600 American Studies Theory and Methods Note that this class is open to all American Studies and English students. American Studies students must take this class. |
Grieve, V. | Course Description: This class will teach students how American Studies scholars think, argue, research, and write. Students will trace the changing definition of American Studies as a field, from the "myth and symbol" school to projects spanning both American continents. They will study their field's relationship to twentieth-century social movements and related theoretical categories, including cultural studies, and class; feminism, gender, and sexuality; and anti-colonialism, post-colonialism, race, and ethnicity. American Studies is an interdisciplinary field that investigates American culture and society in all their complexity. Building on a foundation of history and institutions, literature and the arts, and race and ethnicity, the students in this class will bring a range of disciplinary approaches to bear on their efforts to analyze and interpret America's past and present. |
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ENGL 6700 |
Gabbert, L. |
This is a graduate level survey course largely organized around a “keywords” approach to the discipline. A “keywords” approach means that we will learn about the field in terms of concepts and organizing ideas that are important in understanding both the history of folklore studies and its contemporary manifestations. We will spend some time on the intellectual origins the discipline and its evolution, but we also will read a number of recently published books in order to see which foundational ideas still have purchase today and why. The aim of the course is to offer beginning graduate students some literacy in bibliographical, theoretical, and methodological fields of knowledge over which folklorists should have solid control. Finally we will review the use of scholarly tools such as journals, indices, bibliographies, and archival resources that will be useful in the formulation of a solid research program. |
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ENGL 6460/6770/7460 |
McNeill, L. |
This course will offer an in-depth consideration of a rapidly emerging area of folklore studies: folklore and digital culture. It explores the ways in which we can understand folklore in a digital context, the kinds of folklore we find in digital settings, the kinds of folk groups we find through the use of communication technologies, how fieldwork changes in an online environment, and the ways humans make meaning in diverse technological contexts. The Internet is a really cool, really weird place. Brace yourselves. |
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ENGL 6820 |
Dethier, B. |
This course is designed specifically for graduate instructors teaching English 1010. It focuses on the theory and practice of teaching writing but also prepares graduate instructors for further teaching responsibilities. We schedule it for two class periods, but the second period is usually reserved for outside speakers and special presentations. Participants complete some of the English 1010 assignments as well as a final synthesis paper, and they share some of their best ideas in a half-hour presentation to the class. Required of all new graduate instructors. |
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ENGL 6882 |
Waugh, C. | The graduate fiction writing workshop will explore a variety of contemporary fiction, and give students the opportunity to share their own stories with others and to receive feedback. Since we will have a variety of levels of proficiency in the class, we’ll approach craft from a pedagogical point of view that should be useful to everyone, including those who might one day like to teach fiction writing as well as those who just want to write better fiction. We’ll also investigate how contemporary literary fiction has coopted elements from genres such as YA, sci-fi, fantasy, detective, etc. |
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ENGL 6830/7830 (Online) |
Moeller, R. |
Rhetoric means a number of things these days; most commonly, it means “empty speech” or “the inability to act.” However, in this course, we will study rhetoric as the persuasive means that call an individual or community to action by asking the following questions: - What does it take to change someone’s mind (metanoia)? - What must the circumstances be to facilitate this change (kairos)? - What is the interaction between the call to action, the circumstances surrounding the call, and the individual whose mind is changed (rhetoric)? In order to answer these questions, we will investigate the computer game industry via rhetorical theory. The computer game industry is one of the leading catalysts of change in our culture: it drives innovation across technological, economic, consumer, and cultural sectors. It has become a multi-billion dollar industry, and it has surpassed the film industry in gross sales and influence. Yet, at its most basic level, it relies upon rhetoric to get you to buy a game and/or a gaming platform, and it relies upon rhetoric to get you to move a game piece; play a card; or push a button on a keyboard, controller, or mobile device in order to advance the gameplay of whatever game you are playing. At more advanced levels, we will study how game design—often in non-verbal, procedural ways—induces us to accept certain assumptions, value judgments, relationships, and actions as appropriate and others as not, thereby influencing the world views of a generation of gamers. This is what McAllister calls the mass culture force of computer games. The class will teach you to notice and critique the rhetoric of games. You will learn to ask how a game supposes you—as a player—should think about other people and values and choices and decide whether you can accept those suppositions. For example, do you want to embrace the persona the game encourages you to embrace? Are your values and identity represented by the game and the player character, or are you forced to adopt alternative values and identifications as you play the game? What lasting effects do these rhetorical devices have on you as a player? on your gameplay? In this course, you will be required to play, read about, and think about games and rhetorical theory. Readings will include scholarship on rhetorical theory and the rhetoric of games and a novel. No prior experience with gaming or rhetoric is necessary. You should be prepared to access and play at least one game for the entire semester. You will be assessed in class discussions and activities, several short papers, and a longer final paper. |
Spring Semester 2016 Graduate Courses
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Instructor
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Course Description
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ENGL 6350 |
Cooper-Rompato, C. | This course focuses on Geoffrey Chaucer, “the Father of the English language,” and his amazing fourteenth-century experiment in English, the Canterbury Tales. We will read a number of the tales in Middle English and explore contemporary scholarship on them. We will encounter talking chickens, a flying mechanical horse, a giant with two heads, lovers in a pear tree, a “nether” kiss… yes, the Canterbury Tales has it all! Along the way we will also learn quite a bit about late medieval English history and culture. Course work includes presentations and a seminar paper. Required Text: Riverside Chaucer: Canterbury Tales (used copies available used from Amazon quite inexpensively). No previous experience with medieval literature and/or Middle English necessary. All are welcome! |
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ENGL 6350 |
Crumbley, P. | This course is dedicated the study of Beat literature, with a special emphasis on Beat poetry. Students in the course will study the major literary works that contributed to the Beat movement and develop projects using materials contained in the Beat Collection archived in USU Special Collections. This is a vast collection of small magazines, experimental publications, broadsides, limited-edition books, and Beat scholarship. The course will begin by looking at the Beat Collection and considering strategies for making use of it. Members of the class will then dedicate the next five weeks to reading a brief introduction to Beat culture, Jack Kerouac’s The Dharma Bums, and a sampling of works by other major Beat writers. The next five weeks will be spent selecting materials from the Beat Collection that will become the basis for a curated exhibit at Merrill-Cazier Library and a final paper. The final five weeks will be dedicated to the exhibit and the paper. |
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ENGL 6400/7400 (Online) |
Grant-Davie, K. | If you receive an advanced degree from this department, you will almost certainly need editing skills, no matter what you do next. This course is your chance to learn those skills or, if you already have editing experience, to sharpen and refine them. It will help you reevaluate your editing practices and how you justify them. We will practice and discuss many aspects of editing—from crafting language at the sentence level on up to shaping whole documents for rhetorical effect, organization and content, graphics, and document design. You will learn how to reread your writing productively and how to expand or condense it as needed. The course is designed mainly for students in the online Master of Technical Communication program and for doctoral students in the Theory & Practice of Professional Communication program. The course materials will be biased towards tech/professional communication. Students from literary studies, creative writing, American Studies, or folklore are very welcome to take the course and should find it quite helpful. However, we will not address editing skills that are specific to creative writing, e.g., editing fiction for narrative pacing or plot development—skills that are better developed in an ENGL 6880 creative writing workshop course. All students in ENGL 6400 and 7400 will meet online. Students in 7400 will also meet in person on the Logan campus each week, and students in 6400 are welcome to sit in on those meetings if they choose. We will read the following two texts plus additional readings: ● Rude, C. & Eaton, E. (2010). Technical editing (5th ed.). Boston: Pearson/Longman. ● Williams, J. M. & Colomb, G. G. (2010). Style: Lessons in clarity and grace (10th ed.). Boston: Pearson/Longman. |
| ENGL 6440/7440 Advanced Seminar in Cultural and Professional Communication Materialism>Remediation>Networks: How critical cultural theory (re)mediates communication (PhD students sign up for 7450 and will meet face to face once a week) Online and Hybrid |
Moeller, R. | In this Advanced Seminar in Culture and Professional Communication, we will study critical cultural theory for what it has to say about the ways we communicate and study communication across a variety of genres, technologies (media), and sites. We will begin with Benjamin’s seminal article, “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction” (1936), continue discussing materialist theory and play theory, and end with a comparison of Actor-Network Theory and Activity Theory by way of Spinuzzi’s Network (2010). Doctoral students will be exposed to a number of primary readings (Foucault and Deleuze & Guattari) and theories (materialism, remediation, network theory) that have demonstrated a lasting and profound impact on the fields of technical communication and rhetoric. Many of these readings will be appropriate for your Comprehensive Exams and Dissertations. Master’s students will be exposed to a number of theoretical texts that will inform your analyses of cultural artifacts, including Literature and Digital Media. Several former Master’s students have reported that this course has prepared them well for their work in PhD programs across the country. Students will be responsible for weekly readings and discussions, including regular blog posts, Tweets, and wiki updates as well as a final seminar project that applies course materials and readings to their research sites. Required texts: • Bolter, J.D. & Grusin, R. Remediation: Understanding New Media • Delueze, G. and Guattari, F. Thousand Plateaus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia • Dyer-Witheford, N. Cyber-Marx: Cycles and Circuits of Struggle in High Technology Capitalism • Foucault, M. Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison • McAllister, K.S. Game Work: Language, Power, and Computer Game Culture • Spinuzzi, C. Network: Theorizing Knowledge Work in Telecommunications |
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ENGL 6450/7450 (Online) |
Hailey, D. |
This is a seminar in document design using visual art, video, animation, and simulations. While the class will spend time discussing traditional document design and publication process, it will spend more time examining Information Architecture and Content Design and Management. |
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ENGL 6460/7460 |
Hailey, D. |
This class will examine digital media as a large topic. Students will be introduced to • History of publication in general. • History of digital publication. • Generalized overview of digital publication. • Overview of specifics in digital publication. • And overview of genres in digital publication. |
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ENGL/HIST 6720 |
Gabbert, L. |
This course covers the basic skills needed to conduct beginning graduate-level fieldwork. Students will obtain hands-on experience with recording equipment, including cameras and digital recording kits. We will cover a variety of techniques and methods, including observation, participant-observation, and interviewing, as well as the recording of fieldnotes. In addition, we will cover fieldwork ethics and theorize the problems of IRB (Institutional Review Board/Human Subjects). Finally, we also will read several works that utilize fieldwork as a primary research tool. Students are required to complete a series of fieldwork assignments as well as a final paper. |
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ENGL 6770 |
Siporin, S. | What many consider the most important book in the world, the Bible, is also one of the world’s richest compilations of folklore. The Bible contains “remnants of myths, of stories accounting for the origin of human customs and place-names, of family sagas, tribal legends, national epic, royal history, wisdom or morality tales, prophetic calls and missions, satires, parables, archival histories, and cultic stories.” Our task will be to explore what a folkloric perspective on the Bible can add to our understanding of its meaning. Texts: • The Bible, any edition. • Alan Dundes, Oral Lit as Holy Writ: The Bible as Folklore • Susan Niditch, Folklore and the Hebrew Bible • Robert Pinsky, The Life of David • David Grossman, Lion's Honey: The Myth of Samson |
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ENGL 6800/7800 |
Grant-Davie, K. |
If you’re planning a career in academia, it’s quite likely that at some point you will be assigned or given the opportunity to teach online. This course gives you the training to meet that challenge confidently. I have been teaching online since 2003 and have co-edited two books on the subject of online education in technical communication. We will read the more recent of the two as well as a selection of scholarly articles about online education. Your written assignments will lead you to raise and try to answer your own questions about online writing instruction (OWI) in settings ranging from K–12 to post-secondary to corporate training—depending on your background, needs, and interests. The class will be taught online, so it will offer you the opportunity to learn about online education experientially. These are some of the main questions that will drive the class: What range of forms can online education take, and what range of students does it serve? What is causing the spread of online education? How do instructors need to change their roles and adapt their material and teaching methods as they move from face-to-face instruction to online instruction? What are the best practices for managing online classes and discussion forums effectively and efficiently? What learning theories underlie those best practices? What can instructors do to create presence and build community in their online classes? How are technologies being used in online education? What options do instructors have for responding to student work and assessing it in online classes? What should instructors know about issues of ownership and plagiarism in online classes? What issues face instructors who not only teach online but also administer online writing programs? We will read the following two texts plus additional readings: ● Cargile Cook, K., & Grant-Davie, K. (Eds.) (2013). Online education 2.0: Evolving, adapting, and reinventing online technical communication. Amityville, NY: Baywood. ● Boettcher, J. V., & Conrad, R.-M. (2010). The online teaching survival guide: Simple and practical pedagogical tips. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. Students in 7400 will also read this text: ● Palloff, R. M., & Pratt, K. (2011). The excellent online instructor: Strategies for professional development. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. |
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ENGL 6810 |
Kinkead, J. | This course focuses on the scholarship of writing studies. Students become acquainted with scholars, forums, themes, and methods of the field. We will also be engaging in hands-on work, developing research projects that can come to fruition by semester’s end. In previous classes, students' projects have been professionally presented or published. Another goal is to review writing studies programs evident across the nation as well as the writing about writing movement. Additionally, we will discuss the undergraduate research imperative and its integration in writing studies and how as teachers we can work with students on research in writing studies. Teaching composition, naturally, will also be a discussion topic. In sum, the seminar addresses both theory and practice coupled with pragmatic information about the field (e.g., professional organizations, conferences, and journals. |
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ENGL 6883 |
Gunsberg, B. | This graduate-level course is designed to help you become better writers and readers of poetry by exposing you to a wide range of poetry written by your peers and by established authors. I’m pleased to report that a number of the published poets we will read have agreed to join us via Skype for our discussion of their books. Our conversations will revolve around craft, which means we will explore time-honored categories and techniques as well as more recent developments in the field. Similar to other “workshop” courses, this course offers many opportunities for you to share your work in small and large groups. You are expected to comment generously on your classmates’ poems both in writing and during class discussion. In this way, you will cultivate a personal aesthetic and expand the breadth of your critical vocabulary. Beyond writing and revising individual poems on a weekly basis, you will give a short presentation, and assemble a final portfolio consisting of your most successful writing. Because this is a graduate course, I expect you to submit 3-5 of these poems to a literary journal before the conclusion of the semester. |
Fall Semester 2015 Graduate Courses
Course
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Instructor
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Course Description
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ENGL 6350 |
Graulich, M. | This course will explore 19th- and 20th-century feminist writers and artists who focus on domestic women’s arts such as quilting, gardening, cooking as valuable modes of self-expression and communication. We will read works by Sarah Orne Jewett, Dorothy Canfield (Fisher), Eliza Calvert Hall, Faith Ringgold, Alice Walker, Rebecca Harding Davis, and Elizabeth Stuart Phelps. We will also read many works by Mary Wilkins Freeman and Emily Dickinson, readily available online. Readings will also include theoretical works by Alice Walker, Bettina Apheker, Adrienne Rich, Virginia Woolf, Elaine Showalter, Elaine Hedges, and myself, as well as poems, stories, and essays by many other women. Visual artists include quiltmakers, sampler embroiderers, hair wreath makers, Edmonia Lewis, Lilly Martin Spencer, Mary Hallock Foote, Mary Cassatt, Cecelia Beaux, Georgia O’Keeffe, Judy Chicago, and Faith Ringgold. Requirement will include discussion leading, a few very short essays to share with classmates, a long seminar paper. I am very flexible about genres: memoir, personal essay, story quilts, etc. Everyone will be required to make a quilt square as well. This class will require a number of handouts as well as specific editions of texts; please get the proper editions but several of these are available used and inexpensive online. Contact Dr. Graulich directly at melody.graulich@usu.edu for the booklist. |
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ENGL 6360 |
Graham, S. | In the mode of writing known as "magical realism," fantastic or supernatural elements are introduced into a story, only to become an accepted and mundane part of the social world of the fiction. We will explore first the origins of magical realist fiction, and then the ways in which the mode of magical realism has been put to use by English-language writers from Africa and South Asia. Our reading list will include the following novels: Gabriel García Márquez, One Hundred Years of Solitude; Isabel Allende, Eva Luna; Salman Rushdie, Midnight's Children; Zakes Mda, The Heart of Redness; and Helen Oyeyemi, White is for Witching. We will read short stories and essays by Franz Kafka, Jorge Luis Borges, Alejo Carpentier, Julio Cortázar, Amos Tutuola, and Ben Okri. And we will encounter critical and theoretical essays from the reader Magical Realism: Theory, History, Community and elsewhere. Among the questions we will try to answer this semester: How does magical realism respond to, mimic, or depart from naturalism and social realism? What is the relationship between magical realism and Modernism, Postmodernism, and postcoloniality? Why does magical realism so often seem to arise at the same time that nations wrestle with authoritarian states and/or experience civil strife? What distinguishes magical realism from science fiction or fantasy? What distinguishes it from expressions of religious or cosmological belief? |
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ENGL 6410/7410 |
Walton, R. | This course will introduce you to many of the major contemporary theories of written discourse that influence research in professional communication. We will explore how communication has been differently defined and circumscribed and why these differences matter to people who study and produce writing in the workplace. You will develop a deep, complex understanding of the field of professional communication by reading seminal works on the history of the field, value of technical and professional communication, ethical and social responsibilities of professional communicators, research questions driving the field, and professional communication skills. We will explore questions such as, “How do practitioners understand their roles in ways both similar to and different from scholars? How do our perceptions of what texts are and how they function in organizational life affect the ways we enact our roles as practitioners and scholars? How are professional communicators implicated within wider systems inside and outside organizations? What kinds of questions do researchers in professional communication ask, and how do those questions affect the outcome of research?” To convey your developing knowledge of the field, you will create a verbal and visual representation of the broader field, as well as an in-depth exploration of a particular topic that is of central concern to the field of professional communication and is relevant to your own interests as a scholar and/or practitioner. |
| ENGL 6420/7420 Usability Studies and Human Factors in Professional Communication: User Experience Design (PhD students sign up for 7420 & will also meet face to face once a week) Online and Hybrid |
Hailey, D | I plan to teach effectiveness in instruction and training. Students will examine texts on online training and instruction from an historical perspective, beginning with the early arguments about online instruction but including approaches that have proven affective. One of these approaches will be ProcessPreservation, a specialized heuristic developed by me for capturing critical skills for archiving, quality control, and just-in-time training. For more information, please contact Professor Hailey directly at david.hailey@usu.edu . Course: |
| ENGL 6470/7470 Studies in Specialized Documents (PhD students sign up for 7470 & will also meet face to face once a week) Online and Hybrid |
Hailey, D. | I plan to have the class explore the impact of HTML5 and CSS3 on contemporary publication. The exploration will include examining code in HTML5 and IPUB3, which is HTML5 in eBook format. For more information, please contact Professor Hailey directly at david.hailey@usu.edu . |
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ENGL 6480/7480 |
Colton, J. |
This class offers an introduction to the relationships among technology, rhetoric, culture, and writing, with a specific emphasis on digital and “new” media. The emergence of digital composition and new media networks has brought into question the usability of traditional rhetorical concepts. For example, once defined as only the gestures accompanying the speech of a rhetor, delivery now includes the technological medium of expression. We have moved from traditional terms such as “the rhetorical situation” (speaker-audience-exigency-constraints) to posthumanist frameworks interested in rhetorical circulation and velocity, where digital file formatting is considered a rhetorical choice anticipating how text, video, and images will be circulated, sampled, and remixed by others. As researchers of technical communication and rhetoric, we must take into account the important role of these new media and digital writing practices. This course will question assumptions of culturally neutral or value-free narratives of technology, whether celebratory, determinist, or somewhere in between. We will develop critical vocabulary and knowledge of the ethical, historical, political, and social contexts that influence our everyday use of these technologies. |
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ENGL/HIST 6700 |
McNeill, L. |
What do Slender Man, jump rope rhymes, Little Red Riding Hood, bathroom graffiti, Grumpy Cat, and funeral potatoes all have in common? They're all folklore! How is it possible to study so many diverse and awesome things within a single academic field? Take this course and find out. We'll be discussing the history of folklore studies as an academic discipline (an exciting global journey through the fields of anthropology, literature, linguistics, and history), the definition of folklore (definitely not as simple as you might think), and some major theories and approaches to understanding forms of cultural expression that are often overlooked (and undervalued) by other disciplines. |
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ENGL/HIST 6740 |
Siporin, S. |
A genre approach to oral literature, focusing on the folktale, legend, ballad, and epic, as well as non-European genres. The methods are: comparative, structural, psychoanalytical, and ethnographic. Plan on significant amounts of reading, writing, listening, and talking. |
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ENGL 6760/4760 |
Gantt, P. | This class explores the unique worlds of southern material culture and the individuals or groups who create it. It also expands on southern material culture to analyze that of other regions. We will examine questions such as: What differences are there between art and craft? What forms does material culture take? Who are the artists who make it? Under what circumstances is it created? What does it mean to its creators? How does it provide insight into the many cultures of a changing region or nation? How does it signify in the larger culture? How does it relate to our own worlds? |
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ENGL 6820 |
Dethier, B. |
This course is designed specifically for graduate instructors teaching English 1010. It focuses on the theory and practice of teaching writing but also prepares graduate instructors for further teaching responsibilities. We schedule it for two class periods, but the second period is usually reserved for outside speakers and special presentations. Participants complete some of the English 1010 assignments as well as a final synthesis paper, and they share some of their best ideas in a half-hour presentation to the class. Required of all new English graduate instructors and must be taken with the pre-semester Orientation. |
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ENGL 6884 |
Sinor, J. | In this graduate creative writing workshop, we will be focusing on the short form. After studying examples of flash literary nonfiction and exploring the elements of the subgenre, we will spend the majority of our time in writing workshop where students will submit their essays and give and receive feedback. By the end of the semester, students will have produced a chapbook of linked flash nonfiction, bound by theme, inventive in form, and at least twenty-five pages in length. Along the way, we will address formal and informal research, lyric structure, and compression of narrative. For those interested in writing long-form essays, we will consider ways to weave shorter pieces into longer essays, chapters, or even thesis projects. |
Summer 2015 Graduate Courses
Course
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Instructor
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Course Description
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ENGL 5400/6470 |
Walton, R. | This workshop will teach you how to represent yourself professionally through resumes, portfolios, and social media. You will learn what hiring managers look for in electronic portfolios, how research on recruiters’ skimming processes can help you optimize your resume, and how to apply best practices in resume and portfolio design. In this workshop, you will develop a well-designed, attractive, and easy-to-skim resume for print and online use. You will also develop or update your professional online presence through a portfolio website. You will leave the workshop with tangible products (including a resume and an online portfolio) as well as a better understanding of how to use social media and visual design strategies to represent yourself professionally. No prior knowledge of web design is required for this class. For more details, contact Rebecca.walton@usu.edu. |
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ENGL 6470/7470 |
McLaughlin, J. | This course will focus on the process of preparing proposals and grants for submission. It will look at broader underlying issues such as the similarities and differences between the two types of submission, fundamental principles of style and organization for maximum customer impact, and common writing pitfalls to avoid. It will place a heavy emphasis on looking at the experiences and recommendations of veteran proposal and grant writers. For more details, contact nuwitaivottsi@yahoo.com. |
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ENGL/HIST 6750, ENGL/HIST 4750 |
Gabbert, L. & Williams, R. | This is an intensive, three week graduate level course offered during the first summer session of 2015. This 3-credit course fulfills the fieldwork requirement (Eng/Hist 6720) for students enrolled in the folklore program. The course is limited to 12 students. The Field School for Cultural Documentation offers hands-on ethnographic training for beginning fieldworkers. Focus is on the documentation of local cultural resources, the preservation of documentary materials, archival collection production, and public presentation. Professionals from the Library of Congress and Utah State University will cover such areas as research ethics, interviewing and sound recording techniques, ethnographic observation, and fieldnote writing. Training will also be provided on the archival organization and description of fieldwork materials gathered. Registration is by permission only. For more information, please contact lisa.gabbert@usu.edu and see the following website: https://archives.usu.edu/folklo/fieldschool2015.php. |