Fall 2022

 
ENG 514, section 1
Introduction to Graduate Studies
CRN 12694, F 1000-1350
Megan Ward
 
Welcome to your graduate studies at OSU! This course familiarizes students with the requirements and timelines of the MA degree; surveys the methods of academic inquiry in literary studies, film, and rhetoric and composition; engages with a variety of criticism and methodologies in those fields; and practices the conventions of academic writing in different genres. The final product of this class will be a mini-thesis, or a first foray into students’ individual areas of study. But throughout we will work broadly, asking how best to ask questions, perform research, and create argumentative structures in order to enter into scholarly conversations. I’m excited to kick off your graduate study with you.
 
ENG 527, section 1
Global Medieval (Pre-1800)
CRN 19635, MW 1400-1550
Tekla Bude
 
In popular culture, the “medieval period” is generally cast as European: a time of Vikings, Crusader knights, and lily-white damsels in distress. In reality, the period spanning the fall of the Western Roman Empire (5th century CE) and the Fall of Constantinople (1453) was a complex millennium of global travel, commerce, and cultural exchange, far more heterogeneous than contemporary television, movies, and medievalising fantasy literature usually depicts. This class will focus on the multifaceted forms of global interchange present in this period. How do the literature, travelogues, and life narratives written in Europe, Africa, and Asia reflect a epoch of political, religious, philosophical, and artistic interpenetration? How do these texts help us to redefine our ideas about the medieval? And how do these texts shed light on modern discourses of the nation-state, debates about race and ethnicity, and the concerns of postcoloniality?
 
ENG 538, section 1
Studies in Modernism
CRN 19633, TR 1000-1150
Neil Davison
 
This course examines intellectual, cultural, and aesthetic aspects of the pre-and-post-World War I era of literature characterized by the practitioners of its day as Modernist. Modernism from its fin de siècle inception onward was a pan-arts movement based on the overarching assertion that 20th-century consciousness mandated new “purified” forms for the arts to match psychoanalytic, gender, race, class, nationalist, and imperialist revisions of 19th-century paradigms of these or what Francois Lyotard later dubbed “master narratives” from a Postmodern perspective. As a studies course, we will narrow our focus to a study of Modernist fiction in particular from 1890’s-1940. Each work studied represents an example of formalist experimentation with former conventions of the novel, novella, or short story that was fundamental to the movement from its beginnings. We will early on trace this formalism as it arises from the overlap of the late-19th-century school of Naturalism with Literary Impressionism/Symbolism; we will also grapple with Modernist Free and Indirect narrative style, stream-of-consciousness, and a late version of Dada/Surrealism. We will examine how these schools represent subjectivity from psychoanalytic, racialized, gendered, and liberal humanist perspectives. Simultaneously we will study political and cultural issues that inform the era along these same lines with the addition in some works of colonial/post-colonial discourse.
 
ENG 580, section 1
Studies in Literature, Culture and Society: Opening Pages and Urgency (Craft)
CRN 19626, F 1000-1250
Sindya Bhanoo
 
In this course, we'll look at works written in different forms— short stories, novels, TV pilots, literary journalism— and pay close attention to opening pages. These crucial pages teach us what a story is about, what details we must pay attention to, and why we must keep reading (or watching). We’ll identify the sense of urgency that is present and consider how the writer carries that urgency through to the very end. Students will submit opening pages, revise them, and be responsible for leading at least one class discussion.
 
ENG 589, section 1
Writing, Literature and Medicine (Craft/Hybrid)
CRN 19627, F 1000-1250
Jen Richter
 
Focuses on contemporary poetry and nonfiction by writers who are also medical professionals, patients, and caregivers. Studies the authors’ different perspectives to consider the griefs and joys, concerns and comforts they have in common with their readers. Encourages a heightened sense of empathy. Explores the body’s struggles and failures, recoveries and triumphs. Develops a practice of thoughtful self-examination through in-depth class discussions and weekly writing prompts.  
 
WR 512, section 1
Current Composition Theory (MA Experience, Pedagogy)
CRN 19631, MW 1000-1150
Ana Ribero
 
Current Composition Theory will introduce students to theories, practices, and principles in Composition Studies—the academic discipline that investigates how writing creates meaning in the world. We will read landmark research that has shaped the ways in which writing is taught and understood, and delve into contemporary theories and practices that problematize the discipline’s intellectual history.
 
WR 517, section 1
Teaching Practicum, English Composition
CRN 10142, F 1500-1650
Kristy Kelly
 
This is a required practicum for graduate students teaching WR 121. Whereas orientation serves as an overview of the curriculum—its objectives, assignment sequence, and theoretical trajectory—this course provides GTAs with more practice in and support for the week-by-week teaching of WR121. 
 
WR 524, section 1
Advanced Fiction Writing
CRN 10544, R 1400-1650
Nick Dybek
 
WR 524 is a graduate-level fiction workshop. We will discuss student fiction (and published fiction) with an eye towards answering two essential questions. First, what experience is this piece of fiction asking us to have? And second, how can that experience be made more potent or successful upon revision? Though we will discuss all elements of the craft of fiction, this quarter we’ll pay particular attention to style, form and aesthetic. Each student will be responsible for two brief presentations.  
 
WR 540, section 1
Advanced Nonfiction Writing (Hybrid)
CRN 13314, T 1800-2050
Elena Passarello
 
WR 540 is the graduate creative writing workshop for students admitted to the MFA program in nonfiction. For this particular section, students will generate five essays in quick succession in response to five creative prompts. These will receive “open” workshops, leading up to the creation of one longer piece near the end of the term, which will receive a formal workshop. Students not enrolled in the MFA nonfiction program must contact the instructor and submit a sample for approval before registering.
 
WR 541, section 1
Advanced Poetry Writing (Hybrid)
CRN 12424, T 1400-1650
David Biespiel
 
Emphasis for Fall Workshop 2022: Foundations. Poets at every level of experience deal with getting part-ways through a poem and getting bogged down, knowing something’s wrong but can’t figure it out, or don’t dare break, change, or revise the poem for fear of losing the “good parts,” then end up just reworking the lines over and over, and ending up with an overworked poem that doesn’t arrive at something fresh for you. Obviously, this is frustrating. You end up thinking you don’t have enough creative imagination or knowledge for solving poems. And: that you’ll never get it either. For Fall Workshop we’re going to attempt to combat that frustration first, by accepting it, and second, by opening up the way you practice writing and opening up the ways you experience the world. What’s the secret? Four foundational principles of poetic composition: noticing, gesturing, patterning, and juxtaposing. Fall Workshop won’t be about efficiency or effectiveness in writing poems. It’ll be about failure. Seeking and exploring failure. By daring to fail, you’ll learn to write poems differently, enjoy the feeling of making poems, and discover a new pleasure in writing. Fall Workshop is designed to hone your concentration on details and the language that comes from those details. Our focus will be almost entirely on making new pieces of writing to be revised later, as well as building upon, and laying the foundation for, recent and upcoming graduate poetry workshops.  
 
WR 573, section 1
Thesis and Dissertation Writing (Remote)
CRN 19632, TR 1600-1720
Sarah Perrault
 
This course assists students who are in the writing stages of their thesis or dissertation. We will identify the expectations in your respective fields, analyze how they are met through writing, and develop achievable plans to meet those expectations. The course also emphasizes the cultivation of productive, healthy habits of writing, including strategies for self-assessment and for managing the mental and physical stresses that accompany such a major project. We will have group discussions, workshops, and individual conferences with the instructor.