Course Description:
What makes a story “American”? In this class, we will read a wide range of novels, speeches, poems, essays, and short stories from 1630 to 1914 that address major recurring themes of U.S. history, including slavery and freedom, conformity and individuality, and tradition and innovation. We will consider how authors used their personal style to inflect broader literary movements and genres, such as abolitionism, Transcendentalism, Gothic horror, and sentimentalism. We will enrich our understanding of this period by exploring unique archival materials at UGA’s Special Collections Libraries.
Learning Outcomes:
After this course, students will be able to:
- Identify major literary movements, and signature features of individual authors’ styles
- Understand how genre conventions inform audience expectations and evolve over time
- Trace recurring themes across works of literature and connect them to cultural contexts
- Discuss how archival documents deepen our knowledge of literary history
- Analyze the form and content of literary texts
| Date | Reading | Assignment |
| W 8/16 | ||
| F 8/18 | Herman Melville, Moby-Dick or the White Whale (1851) 7-54 | |
| M 8/21 | Phillis Wheatley, “On Being Brought from Africa to America” (1773), “A Hymn to the Evening” M-D 54-86 | |
| W 8/22 | William Apess, “An Indian’s Looking-Glass for the White Man” (1833) M-D 86-107 | |
| F 8/25 | Ralph Waldo Emerson, “Self-Reliance” (1841) M-D 107-114 | |
| M 8/28 | David Walker, An Appeal to the Coloured Citizens of the World (1829) Articles I-II M-D 115-136 | |
| W 8/30 | Walker, Articles III-IV M-D 136-151 | |
| F 9/1 | M-D 152-166 | |
| M 9/4 | Labor Day | |
| W 9/6 | Review | Test #1 draft |
| F 9/8 | Edgar Alan Poe, “Life in Death [The Oval Portrait]” (1842) M-D 166-178 | Test #1 final |
| M 9/11 | Margaret Fuller, “The Great Lawsuit” (1843) M-D 179-199 | |
| W 9/13 | Henry David Thoreau, “Resistance to Civil Government” (1849) M-D 199-214 | |
| F 9/15 | M-D 214-235 | |
| M 9/18 | Harriet Beecher Stowe, Ch. XVIII from Dred, a Tale of the Great Dismal Swamp (1856) M-D 235-243 | |
| W 9/20 | Stowe, Ch. XXVII-XXXI M-D 244-250 | |
| F 9/22 | Frederick Douglass, “What to the Slave Means the Fourth of July?” (1852) M-D 250-261 | |
| M 9/25 | Douglass, continued M-D 262-276 | |
| W 9/27 | William and Ellen Craft, Running a Thousand Miles for Freedom (1860) Part I M-D 276-288 | |
| F 9/29 | Crafts, Part II M-D 288-305 | |
| M 10/2 | Review | Test #2 draft |
| W 10/4 | Special Collections Libraries (SCL) visit | Test #2 final |
| F 10/6 | SCL | |
| M 10/9 | No class—work independently | |
| W 10/11 | SCL | |
| F 10/13 | Emily Dickinson, “I Felt a Funeral, in My Brain,” (1862) “After great pain, a formal feeling comes—” (1862) M-D 305-310 | |
| M 10/16 | SCL | |
| W 10/18 | Dickinson, “I Heard a Fly Buzz—When I Died—” (1863), “Much Madness is divinest Sense” (1863) M-D 310-322 | |
| F 10/20 | No class—work independently | Archival Essay draft due |
| M 10/23 | Walt Whitman, “Song of Myself” (1892) Sections 1-25 M-D 322-328 | |
| W 10/25 | Whitman, Sections 26-49 M-D 329-335 | |
| F 10/27 | Fall break | Archival Essay final due |
| M 10/30 | Frances E.W. Harper, Iola Leroy, Or Shadows Uplifted (1892) Ch. I-XI M-D 336-344 | |
| W 11/1 | Harper, Ch. XII-XXII M-D 344-351 | |
| F 11/3 | Harper, Ch. XXIII-XXXIII M-D 351-361 | |
| M 11/6 | Ida B. Wells, Southern Horrors: Lynch Law in All Its Phases (1892) M-D 361-367 | |
| W 11/8 | Paul Laurence Dunbar, “We Wear the Mask” and “An Ante-Bellum Sermon” (1895) M-D 367-379 | |
| F 11/10 | W.E.B. Du Bois, The Souls of Black Folk (1903) Ch. 1-5 M-D 379-390 | |
| M 11/13 | Du Bois Ch. 6-10 M-D 390-396 | |
| W 11/15 | Du Bois Ch. 11-14 M-D 396-404 | |
| F 11/17 | M-D 404-427 | |
| M 11/20 | Review | Test #3 draft |
| W 11/22 | Thanksgiving | Test #3 final |
| F 11/24 | Thanksgiving | |
| M 11/27 | Review | |
| W 11/29 | Review | |
| F 12/1 | Review | |
| M 12/4 | Review |
Assessment:
Participation 10%:
Weekly participation through Top Hat, Perusall, and class discussion is essential to making our class a vibrant learning community. For every class, a pair of students will serve as our “daily expert” readers, helping guide our discussion by identifying key passages and posing questions. When it’s your turn to be one of our daily experts, you should read the text especially carefully and take detailed notes but won’t need to give a formal presentation.
Tests 30%:
We will take three open-note, essay tests which ask you to synthesize concepts we cover in class. You may be asked to analyze quotes we have discussed in class, describe how a text exemplifies a given genre or literary movement, or contrast different authors’ styles. For each test, you will draft initial answers to the questions in class and then have the chance to revise and expand on your answers outside of class. Your final submissions should be about 1,500 words. You will submit your work on eLW.
Archival Essay 30%:
Drawing on our excursions into the Special Collections Libraries, students will choose one of the letters, diaries, broadsides, or engravings that we discussed and write an essay connecting it to one of the texts we read in class. The goal of this essay is to show how the archival document expands our understanding of the chosen literary text. The two documents might share a common theme, take opposed positions on an issue, or address a similar topic in a different medium. You will submit your work on eLW.
Final Exam 30%:
The final exam will give you the opportunity to make connections across all the different texts we have read and ideas we have discussed this semester. Questions may be true/false, multiple choice, fill-in-the-blank, matching, quote analysis, short answer, etc.
