LIT: Literature

LIT 100. Popular Culture: Reading Culture as Text. 3 Credits.

An introduction to analyzing and interpreting everyday cultural expressions within diverse social, historical, economic, and political contexts.
Gen Ed Attribute: Humanities Distributive Requirement.
Typically offered in Fall & Spring.

LIT 101. Contemporary Issues Through Literature. 3 Credits.

This lecture-style course links the study of various genres of literature from a range of time periods (texts included on the syllabus can range from medieval to contemporary) to contemporary events and issues.
Gen Ed Attribute: Humanities Distributive Requirement.
Distance education offering may be available.
Typically offered in Fall & Spring.

LIT 165. Topics in Literature. 3 Credits.

A course designed to develop awareness of literature as being central to all the arts, to increase levels of literacy and critical faculties, and to broaden understanding of the human condition.
Gen Ed Attribute: Humanities Distributive Requirement, Writing Emphasis.
Distance education offering may be available.
Typically offered in Fall & Spring.

LIT 199. Transfer Credits. 1-10 Credits.

Transfer Credits.
Repeatable for Credit.

LIT 200. American Literature I. 3 Credits.

Survey of representative American writers from Colonial times to 1860, including Bradstreet, Taylor, Franklin, Poe, Thoreau, Hawthorne, and Melville.

LIT 201. American Literature II. 3 Credits.

A survey of representative American writers from 1860 to the present, including Whitman, Twain, James, Crane, Eliot, Frost, Hemingway, and Faulkner.

LIT 202. African American Literature I. 3 Credits.

A survey of African American writing from the Middle Passage through the first decade of the 20th century. Authors include Wheatley, Equiano, Douglass, Jacobs, Wells-Barnett, Du Bois, Washington, Chesnutt, Weldon Johnson, and others, with an emphasis on the historical contexts of slavery and Jim Crow and on the oral/vernacular roots of the black literary tradition.
Gen Ed Attribute: Writing Emphasis.
Typically offered in Fall.

LIT 203. African American Literature II. 3 Credits.

Continuation of LIT 202. A survey of African American writing from the Harlem Renaissance to the present. Authors include Hughes, Hurston, Wright, Ellison, Baraka, Brooks, Sanchez, Morrison, Butler, and others, with an emphasis on the historical forces and social and cultural movements that have shaped black writing in the 20th and 21st centuries.
Gen Ed Attribute: Diversity Requirement, Writing Emphasis.
Typically offered in Spring.

LIT 204. New Black Women Writers in America. 3 Credits.

Survey of black women writers of America. Examines themes and influences on American and African-American literary contexts.
Gen Ed Attribute: Writing Emphasis.

LIT 205. Harlem Renaissance. 3 Credits.

This course examines the historical and cultural movement of the 1920's known as the Harlem Renaissance.

LIT 207. Life and Times of Frederick Douglass. 3 Credits.

This course examines the courageous life and times of an American reformer and his influence on slavery, abolitionism, suffrage, and temperance movements in the development of America.
Gen Ed Attribute: Writing Emphasis.
Typically offered in Fall & Spring.

LIT 213. Asian American Literature. 3 Credits.

Survey of representative Asian American authors from their earliest works at the turn of the twentieth century to contemporary works, examined in the context of the changing cultural, economic, and political experiences of Americans of Asian descent.
Gen Ed Attribute: Diversity Requirement, Writing Emphasis.

LIT 219. Literature for Young Children. 3 Credits.

A critical study of the literature for young children for prospective specialists in early grades.
Gen Ed Attribute: Humanities Distributive Requirement.
Distance education offering may be available.
Typically offered in Fall & Spring.

LIT 220. Children's Literature. 3 Credits.

A critical study of literature for children, setting standards for evaluation and appreciation.
Gen Ed Attribute: Humanities Distributive Requirement.
Distance education offering may be available.
Typically offered in Fall & Spring.

LIT 230. English Literature I. 3 Credits.

A survey of English literature from Anglo-Saxon writing through the 18th century.
Gen Ed Attribute: Writing Emphasis.

LIT 231. English Literature II. 3 Credits.

A survey of English literature of the 19th and 20th centuries.
Gen Ed Attribute: Writing Emphasis.

LIT 250. Victorian Attitudes. 3 Credits.

A study of 19th-century attitudes toward social changes as expressed in art, architecture, literature, and nonfiction prose.
Gen Ed Attribute: Interdisciplinary Requirement.

LIT 269. The Literature of Roguery. 3 Credits.

A historical study of the rogue in fiction with emphasis on the satiric view of society. Among writers studied are Defoe, Thackeray, Donleavey, and Kerouac.

LIT 272. New Fiction. 3 Credits.

Fiction published in the last 10 years.
Gen Ed Attribute: Writing Emphasis.

LIT 274. Feminist Poetry. 3 Credits.

A study of poetry espousing the feminist cause and exploring the feminist response. Techniques and attitudes of such poets as Plath, Sexton, Rich, Morgan, Wakoski, and Kumin.
Gen Ed Attribute: Writing Emphasis.
Typically offered in Fall.

LIT 294. Topics in Digital Literature and Culture. 3 Credits.

This is a variable topic course that will examine the ways in which digital culture is shaping our understanding of the literary. Depending on the topic offered, it may include some attention to 1) born-digital forms of literature, such as new-media poetry, interactive fictions, or games; 2) digital methods in the study of literature (e.g. digital editions of print literature, database research methods, networked study of literature), or 3) the perspective that literature (e.g. speculative fiction) can provide on digital culture.
Pre / Co requisites: LIT 294 requires a prerequisite of WRT 120 or WRT 123.
Distance education offering may be available.
Typically offered in Fall & Spring.
Repeatable for Credit.

LIT 300. Colonial and Revolutionary Literature. 3 Credits.

Writers of Colonial and Revolutionary America.

LIT 302. Development of the American Novel. 3 Credits.

Beginnings of the American novel to Frank Norris.
Gen Ed Attribute: Writing Emphasis.
Typically offered in Fall, Spring & Summer.

LIT 303. Intro to Multi-Ethnic American Literature. 3 Credits.

American ethnic, racial, and national groups in American literature and the contributions of creative literary artists representing these cultures.
Gen Ed Attribute: Diversity Requirement, Writing Emphasis.

LIT 304. American Jewish Novel. 3 Credits.

A study of major American Jewish novelists: Cahan, Singer, Roth, Potok, Bellow, Malamud, Wallant, and Wiesel. No knowledge of Yiddish or Hebrew necessary.

LIT 305. Modern American Drama. 3 Credits.

American drama from the early 1900's to the present, with emphasis on the development of the American theater as seen in such major dramatists as O'Neill, Odets, Wilder, Miller, Williams, and Albee.

LIT 306. Modern American Novel. 3 Credits.

The novel in America from Dreiser to the present.
Gen Ed Attribute: Writing Emphasis.

LIT 307. Modern American Poetry. 3 Credits.

Major 20th-century American poets.

LIT 309. Thoughts/Writings of Martin Luther King. 3 Credits.

Examines and analyzes the writings of Dr. King and their relationship to the themes he pursued and the leadership role he achieved.
Gen Ed Attribute: Interdisciplinary Requirement.

LIT 310. African American Novel I. 3 Credits.

A study of the African American novel from the genre's beginnings in the 1850s through to the Harlem Renaissance of the 1920s and 30s. Authors include William Wells Brown, Harriet Wilson, Frances Harper, Charles Chesnutt, and Nella Larsen, examined in the context of slavery, Reconstruction, Jim Crow, and other historical experiences of African Americans.

LIT 311. African American Novel II. 3 Credits.

A study of the African American novel from Richard Wright's Native Son (1940) to the present. Works including Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man (1952) and Toni Morrison's Beloved (1987) are examined in the context of changing cultural and political experiences of African Americans in the twentieth and twenty-first century.

LIT 328. Old English Language and Literature. 3 Credits.

An introductory study of the language (450-1150 A.D.) through a reading of religious and secular poetry and prose.

LIT 329. Medieval Women's Culture. 3 Credits.

This is a study of writings by medieval women and their contribution to the development of medieval culture.
Typically offered in Fall, Spring & Summer.

LIT 331. Chaucer. 3 Credits.

An interpretation of Canterbury Tales and Troilus and Criseyde.

LIT 335. Shakespeare I. 3 Credits.

Reading, analysis, and discussion of selected histories and tragedies. Discussion of critical approaches to the plays and of the historical and intellectual climate of the times.
Gen Ed Attribute: Writing Emphasis.
Typically offered in Fall & Spring.

LIT 336. Shakespeare II. 3 Credits.

Reading, analysis, and discussion of selected comedies and nondramatic poems. Discussion of critical approaches to the works and of the historical and intellectual climate of the times. This course can be taken before LIT 335.
Gen Ed Attribute: Writing Emphasis.
Typically offered in Fall & Spring.

LIT 337. Literature of the Enlightenment. 3 Credits.

A critical consideration of 18th-century writers, exclusive of the dramatists.
Gen Ed Attribute: Writing Emphasis.
Typically offered in Fall & Spring.

LIT 338. Restoration and 18th Century Drama. 3 Credits.

British drama from the reopening of the theaters in 1660 to 1800.
Gen Ed Attribute: Speaking Emphasis.
Typically offered in Fall & Spring.

LIT 339. 18th Century British Novel. 3 Credits.

The British novel from Defoe to Austen.
Gen Ed Attribute: Writing Emphasis.
Typically offered in Fall & Spring.

LIT 340. The Romantic Movement. 3 Credits.

Wordsworth, Coleridge, Byron, Shelley, Keats, and their contemporaries in the light of social background and critical doctrine.
Gen Ed Attribute: Writing Emphasis.

LIT 341. 19th Century British Novel. 3 Credits.

The British novel from Austen to Hardy.

LIT 342. Victorian Literature. 3 Credits.

Victorian thought and culture in poetry and nonfiction prose.
Gen Ed Attribute: Writing Emphasis.

LIT 344. Modern British Novel. 3 Credits.

The novel in England from Conrad to the present.

LIT 360. Special Topics Children's/Young Adult Literature. 3 Credits.

In depth study of key genre, theme, or topic in children's or young adult literature.

LIT 364. Modern Irish Literature. 3 Credits.

Major literary writers of Ireland from 1840 to the present: George Moore, Synge, Yeats, Joyce, Shaw, O'Casey, Beckett, Behan, and Seamus Heaney.

LIT 365. Short Fiction. 3 Credits.

Analysis and interpretation of short fiction.

LIT 367. Comedy and Humor. 3 Credits.

Through analysis of videos, literary texts, essays, memes, and other cultural artifacts, this course explores the role of humor in society, combining multiple disciplinary approaches.
Gen Ed Attribute: Interdisciplinary Requirement.
Typically offered in Spring.

LIT 370. Urbanism and the Modern Imagination. 3 Credits.

Covers a variety of responses of contemporary writers, artists, and planners to the rise of the modern city.
Gen Ed Attribute: Interdisciplinary Requirement, Writing Emphasis.

LIT 372. African American Urban Literature. 3 Credits.

Focuses on representations of twentieth century urban life in a variety of African American texts including poetry, film, graphic novels, and short stories.

LIT 398. Young Adult Literature. 3 Credits.

A critical study of literature, including nonprint media, for young adults, focusing on helping prospective teachers develop familiarity with young adult literature and how it may be used in the middle school and high school classroom, stressing gender roles and multicultural issues.
Distance education offering may be available.
Typically offered in Fall & Spring.