2023-2024 Catalogue
English (ENG) Course Descriptions
ENG 101: English Composition: Essays.
Goal: To introduce rhetorical principles that will enable students to produce clear, concise, and effective prose. Through attention to fundamentals of grammar, mechanics, usage, and style, to guide students in writing correct and organized short essays, including essay examinations.
Content: Reading and writing essays.
Prerequisite: Satisfactory completion of College writing proficiency requirement.
Gen. Ed. Category: Foundation Building; Writing.
Credit: 3 hours.
ENG 111: Analyzing Literature.
Goal: Students will read, analyze, and discuss different genres of literature to think critically and strengthen their intellectual curiosity. They will organize and articulate their thoughts and contribute independent judgment to class discussion.
Content: Students will explore various literary genres (short story, poetry, drama) to strengthen their skills in close reading and literary analysis.
Prerequisite: Satisfactory completion of College writing proficiency requirement.
Credit: 3 hours.
ENG 161: Creative Writing.
Goal: By reading and studying models of writing, emulating these models, and using them to inspire their own original work, students will develop their expertise in creative writing.
Content: Reading and writing short stories, poetry, and drama.
Prerequisite: None.
Gen. Ed. Category: Exploring; Thinking and Expressing Creatively; (HUM).
Credit: 3 hours.
ENG 201, 202: Survey of British Literature I, II.
Goal: To introduce students to the general literary characteristics and to the principal authors of British literature.
Content: Survey of British literature: ENG 201, from its beginnings to the 19th century; ENG 202, from the 19th century to the present.
Prerequisites: ENG 101 or permission of instructor.
Credit: 3; 3 hours.
ENG 205: Perspectives on World Literature.
Goal: Through close reading and discussion of literature from primarily non-Western cultures, students explore such topics as the legacy of colonialism in world literature, challenges of cross-cultural literary analysis, and strategies writers use to shape their identities or engender social change. Students will identify issues arising from increasingly complex global connections; analyze how components such as socio-economic status, ethnicity, race, and religion shape beliefs and behaviors; and communicate and interact effectively across cultures.
Content: Each semester this class selects a particular perspective from which to consider authors' use of creative writing to address issues in their lives and the lives of their communities. Such perspectives may include a particular geographical region, cultural phenomenon, or component of writers' identity (for example, African literature, globalization, or expatriated writers).
Prerequisites: ENG 101 or permission of instructor.
Gen. Ed. Category: Synthesizing Perspectives; Diverse & Interdependent World; (HUM).
Credit: 3 hours.
ENG 210: Introduction to Literary Criticism.
Goal: To introduce techniques of literary analysis, including terminology, strategies, and assumptions of recent influential theorists and critics.
Content: Theoretical and literary texts.
Prerequisites: ENG 101, and one of the following: ENG 201, ENG 202, ENG 205, ENG 213, or permission of the instructor.
Credit: 3 hours.
ENG 213: Survey of United States Literature.
Goal: To familiarize students with the range of American literature through intensive study of major American authors and texts.
Content: Writings by important literary figures from America, from the Puritans to modern times.
Prerequisites: ENG 101 or permission of instructor.
Credit: 3 hours.
ENG 217: Readings in African-American Literature.
Goal: Students will read and respond, both orally and in writing, to works from the African-American literary tradition to enhance their abilities to analyze texts and to explore connections among texts, and between texts and the cultures that produced them.
Content: Works by African-Americans such as Frederick Douglass, Zora Neale Hurston, Malcolm X, Jean Toomer, Gwendolyn Brooks, Toni Morrison, and Tayari Jones.
Prerequisites: ENG 101 or permission of instructor.
Gen. Ed. Category: Foundation Building; Speaking.
Credit: 3 hours.
ENG 221: Readings in Race, Class, and Gender.
Goal: This course helps students to understand and analyze how race, class, and gender are expressed on personal, cultural, and historical levels through the analysis of various literary genres such as poetry, short stories, and novels.
Content: Students will read works of literature that explore how the categories of race, class, and gender represent a complex and dynamic relationship between individual experience and socio-historical contexts. Topics will vary.
Prerequisite: ENG 101 or permission of instructor.
Gen. Ed. Category: Foundation Building; Speaking.
Credit: 3 hours.
ENG 280: Writing for Equity.
Goal: Students will use writing as a creative tool to examine and address equity issues in the local Middle Georgia community. From writing for self-reflection to designing participatory art and creative writing experiences with community members through the Lane Center for Social and Racial Equity, students will use various writing strategies to examine their own social identities, critique embedded systems of power and privilege in the U.S. and the Middle Georgia region, and produce creative experiences that call for participants to think deeply about equity issues in their own communities.
Content: In this course, students will practice creative writing and participatory art strategies to examine social and racial equity issues on both the national and regional level. Students will analyze and create participatory art and writing experiences using various visual, performative, and writing methods to engage in self-reflection, creative expression, social critique, and social action. Students in this course will also partner with the Lane Center for Social and Racial Equity to create community-engaged writing experiences.
Prerequisites: ENG 101 or permission of instructor.
Gen. Ed. Category: Exploring; Thinking and Expressing Creatively; (HUM).
Credit: 3.
ENG 291: Directed Independent Study.
Goal: To provide an opportunity for intermediate-level independent study.
Content: Independent work of interest to the student and approved by the instructor and department chair.
Prerequisites: Permission of instructor and program director.
Credit: 1-6 hours.
ENG 300: Literature and Film.
Goal: Students in this course will examine connections between and differences among various works of literature from multiple genres (e.g., short stories, novels, and plays) and film adaptations of those works with the aim of examining both benefits and limitations to storytelling in different modes.
Content: Students will gain the tools and vocabulary to complete both literary and film analysis, and they will use these skills to observe, comment on, and write about effective techniques in each medium.
Prerequisites: ENG 101 and one Exploring general education course.
Gen. Ed. Category: Synthesizing Perspectives; Women's Experiences; (HUM).
Credit: 3 hours.
ENG 302: Digital Culture.
Goal: Students will analyze works of art, literature, film, video games, websites, and other modes of cultural production, in order to better understand their experience of the contemporary digital media landscape.
Content : Students will consider the significant social changes that have taken place since the rise of digital communications, including areas as diverse as copyright and ownership, artistic and literary production, privacy rights, corporate media control, fandom, and grassroots social movements. A history of writing technologies will help students to see the computer as one of many such historical shifts in human consciousness and social institutions.
Prerequisites: ENG 101 and one Exploring general education course.
Gen. Ed. Category: Synthesizing Perspectives; Diverse & Interdependent World; (HUM).
Credit: 3 hours.
ENG 337: Seminar in American Literature.
Goal: To study a movement, theme, genre, era, or writer(s) in American literature. The focus of each seminar will vary. Representative topics might include southern women writers, the American novel, American drama, American modernism and postmodernism.
Content: Texts by poets, dramatists, essayists, and/or novelists as appropriate to topic. Critical essays pertaining to relevant works.
Prerequisites: ENG 210 or permission of instructor.
Credit: 3 hours.
ENG 338: Seminar in British Literature.
Goal: To study a movement, theme, genre, era, or writer(s) in British Literature. Focus of each seminar will vary. Representative topics might include Shakespeare and his contemporaries, 18th century satire, the Romantic era, 19th century female novelists, Victorian and Edwardian drama, modernism.
Content: Texts by poets, dramatists, essayists, and/or novelists as appropriate to topic. Critical essays pertaining to relevant works.
Prerequisites: ENG 210 or permission of instructor.
Credit: 3 hours.
ENG 347: Seminar in World Literature.
Goal: To study a movement, theme, genre, era or writer(s) focusing primarily on works outside the American and English traditions. The focus of each seminar will vary. Representative topics might include Chinese poetry, the African novel, revolutions in world literature, the Russian novel.
Content: Texts by poets, dramatists, essayists, and/or novelists as appropriate to topic. Critical essays pertaining to relevant works.
Prerequisites: ENG 210 or permission of instructor.
Credit: 3 hours.
ENG 353: Seminar in Race, Class, and Gender.
Goal: This seminar explores literary works at the intersections of race, class, and gender with a focus on developing advanced literary analysis and research skills.
Content: A combination of critical, theoretical, and literary texts will explore the dynamic relationship between social, cultural, and historical positioning and literary production. Topics will vary.
Prerequisites: ENG 101, and ENG 221 or sophomore standing.
Gen. Ed. Category: Synthesizing Perspectives; Diverse & Interdependent World; (HUM).
Credit: 3 hours.
ENG 396: Special Topics in English.
Goal: To allow students to concentrate on a major writer, genre, theme, or limited period of literary history.
Content: Topics vary, depending on student needs and interest. Representative special topics might include Writing for the Web, Gothic Literature, or Women in/and Science Fiction.
Prerequisites: ENG 210 or permission of instructor.
Credit: 3 hours. A student may take a maximum of six to eight semester hours (two courses) of special topics in any one field.
ENG 401: Senior Seminar.
Goal: To enable senior English students to apply their accumulated knowledge to critical analysis of selected issues in literary studies. To encourage independent thought and judgment while providing a forum in which students demonstrate their knowledge of current research, communicate that knowledge effectively, and prepare for post-graduate professional opportunities.
Content: Study and discussion of literary and critical texts. Content may vary from year to year.
Prerequisites: Senior standing and successful completion of ENG 201, 202, 205, 210, 213, and one 300-level ENG course, or permission of instructor.
Credit: 3 hours.
ENG 451: Directed Independent Study.
Goal: To allow students to select authors, works, genres, or themes to study in depth.
Content: Varied; a topic agreed upon by student and professor and approved by the program director.
Prerequisites: Permission of the instructor.
Credit: 1-6 hours.
ENG 452/199: Field Study.
Goal: To provide practical experience for students to apply what they have learned.
Content: Student will perform professional, creative, or research functions under professional supervision.
Prerequisites: Permission of the instructor and department chair.
Credit: 1-12 hours.
ENG 499: Honors Thesis. (Fee required).
