Department of English

Faculty of Arts, Chulalongkorn University

2202235  Reading and Analysis for the Study of English Literature

 

Puckpan Tipayamontri

Office: BRK 1106

Office Hours: M 1–3 and by appointment

Phone: 02218-4703

puckpan.t@chula.ac.th

 

Section 1

BRK 307

M 11–12, Th 8–10

 

Tentative Schedule

*asterisked works are mandatory

Week 1

Oct. 28

Reading and Seeing

1: Learning Art and Life

Reading

Weekly 1: Elements in Application
Oct. 31

2: Living Art and Life

Reading
Week 2 Nov. 4

3: Studying History and Life

Reading

Weekly 2: Learning from Experience
Nov. 7

4: Viewing Family and School

Reading

  • *Ethan Canin, "The Palace Thief" (1994) pp. 180–98 (study guide)

Week 3 Nov. 11

5: Second Chances

Reading

  • *Ethan Canin, "The Palace Thief" (1994) pp. 199–209 (study guide)
Weekly 3: Making Character and Destiny
Nov. 14

6: Discoveries and Decisions

Reading

  • *Ethan Canin, "The Palace Thief" (1994) pp. 210–27 (study guide)

Week 4 Nov. 18

Reading and Critiquing

7: Shakespeare: The Drama of Sonnets

Reading

Weekly 4
Nov. 21

8: The Legacy of Shakespeare's Drama and Poetry

Reading


Week 5 Nov. 25

9: Hearing Caliban

Reading

  • *William Shakespeare, The Tempest act 1 scene 2 (c. 1611; Caliban's first appearance; study guide)
    • John Dover Wilson, "The Tempest"
Weekly 5
Nov. 28

10: More Calibans

Reading
Week 6 Dec. 2

11: Symbolic Shakespeare

Reading

  • Isaac Asimov, "The Immortal Bard," Earth Is Room Enough (1954, 1957)
  • Anthony Burgess, "The Muse," The Hudson Review 21.1 (1968; Chula access)
Weekly 6

*Reading response 1 due (Instruction: Read some of the guides on analysis below. Then, putting into practice these tips along with your knowledge and skills of good writing with clarity, logic, specific details, supporting evidence, and unity, write a reading response to one or more of the study questions [in the study guide pages or in the weeklies] for the reading up to and including week 6.

What Is Analysis?
Dec. 5

No class (Father's Day)


Week 7 Dec. 9

Seeing and Critiquing

12: Reportage and Opinion

Reading

Weekly 7

Dec. 12

13: Reality and Myth
Reading

*Students e-mail me before class at least four things we are imprisoned by.
Week 8 Dec. 16

14: Butterfly in Time

Reading

  • *David Henry Hwang, M. Butterfly (1986) act 2 scenes 6–8 (study guide)
Weekly 8
*Quiz 1 in class
Dec. 19

15: Cultural History of Race and Gender

Reading

  • *David Henry Hwang, M. Butterfly (1986) act 2 scene 9–act 3 scene 3 (end; study guide)
    • David Henry Hwang, "Afterword," M. Butterfly (1989)
*Reading response 2 due (Question: Prison Break: We've brainstormed several things we are imprisoned by. See the list below for some prisons people have mentioned. In what way does M. Butterfly break out of prisons?)
Prisons
  • Ignorance
  • Our own imagination, thought, mind, perception
    • Fantasies, myths, stereotypes, prejudice
  • Our own fear (fear of the unknown, of failure, of difficulty, of poverty, of failure, of ridicule, etc.)
  • Our past, the past, past failures
  • Ego
  • Oneself
  • Our body
  • Responsibilities, obligations, duty
  • Laws (common laws, mores, etc.)
  • Conscience, morality
  • Destiny
  • Society
  • Social values, convention
  • Dogma, faith
  • Economic system
  • Government system
  • Innovation, technology
  • Language
  • Education
  • Experience, exposure, knowledge
  • Our historical period
Week 9 Dec. 23

No Class (midterm Week: December 23–27, 2013)

Dec. 26

Midterm Exam (8–10 a.m. in class)  You will be writing two essays in the midterm covering six core texts excluding M. Butterfly which will have its own essay test on Monday, January 13, 2014. Read instructions carefully and follow them. The essay prompt may consist of several questions but what the entire prompt does is give you a topic with a scope. You should formulate a thesis in response to the prompt that enables you to discuss and elaborate on the topic within that scope for the works involved effectively. Structure your essay around that thesis or argument, citing specific acts, scenes, lines, words or information to illustrate and support the points you are making. Again, you do not need to answer every single question in the prompt cluster in order and separately because then the structure will not necessarily be appropriate to your discussion. Rather, your writing should be designed as a coherent unified piece, not unconnected answers to different questions strung together or a bulleted list. The multiple questions are there to help you brainstorm on the topic and to spark critical engagement with it. You should draw on your own close reading of the material, your notes, your discussion about it in and outside of class, and relevant reading and research you have done. Think critically about the material we have encountered and be prepared to think critically on the topic prompted by the test questions as well. Though you should focus on core readings, you do not have to limit yourself to them. Where relevant and useful, you may refer to supplementary texts in the course packet or online. When writing, follow academic conventions and try to be as legible, clear, effective, and compelling as you can. Rest well, eat clean good food, arrive at least fifteen minutes before exam time, and make sure your watch and writing implements are in order. Good luck!

  • Reading Strategies
  • Essay Exam Tips
  • Review literary terms
  • Sample Midterm Questions and Responses
    • Past Midterm Exam Questions
      • Discuss two literary works in which the use of point or view creates irony. What purpose does this point of view serve in the pieces you have chosen? How does the point of view affect your reading of the works?
      • Choose two works and discuss how the authors’ engagement with prior texts and/or readers’ knowledge of relevant contexts (such as history, culture, biography, form, convention) enrich their understanding of the works.
      • Though readers tend to focus on humans or animate things in a literary work, nonliving components are often also very important. Discuss the function of inanimate elements in two works. Give specific examples of lifeless objects and show how they play a significant role in the texts.
      • Choose one work in which time is especially worth noticing. Examine the treatment of time or kinds of time, and show how it shapes the work (ex. how time affects our understanding of the protagonist(s), the main conflict, the pace, tone, or direction of the work). What, if any, is the relationship between different time frames, the past, present, and future?
      • Choose one work in which interior life is especially worth noticing. Examine the treatment of dreams, illusions, fantasies, or imagination, and show how it shapes the work (ex. how a character’s internal dimensions affect our understanding of him or her, how inner life influences the conflict, pace, tone, direction, structure or form of the work). What, if any, is the relationship between such mental life/perception and reality?
    • Sample Midterm & Answers (the gothic experience)
    • Example of Strong Responses (Romantic literature)
    • Sample Midterm Questions (pdf file)
    • Sample Midterm Essay Response
Week 10 Dec. 30

No class (holiday)

Jan. 2

Preservation and Value

16: What Is a New Day?

Reading

  • Alice Walker
    • *"Everyday Use," In Love and Trouble: Stories of Black Women (1973; study guide)
    • "In Search of Our Mothers' Gardens" (1974)

Weekly 10


Week 11 Jan. 6

17: Dead and Living Museums

Reading

  • Alice Walker
    • *"Everyday Use," In Love and Trouble: Stories of Black Women (1973; study guide)
    • "The Civil Rights Movement: What Good Was It?" (1967)
  • Rita Felski, "The Invention of Everyday Life," New Formations 39 (1999)
Weekly 11
Jan. 9

18: Whose War and What's at Stake?

Reading


Week 12 Jan. 13

19: How to Tell Truth and Fiction

Reading

Weekly 12

Jan. 16

No class (Intervarsity Games: January 16–22, 2013)


Week 13 Jan. 20

No class (Intervarsity Games: January 16–22, 2013)

Jan. 23

Reading and Writing

20: Writing about the Past, Present, and Future

Reading

Weekly 13


Week 14 Jan. 27

21: Torture and Writing

Reading

*Reading response 3 due


Weekly 14

Jan. 30

22: Internal External

Reading

  • *J. M. Coetzee, Waiting for the Barbarians (1980) pp. 49–81 (study guide)

Final paper draft due (optional)


Week 15 Feb. 3

23: Reading and Writing Nature

Reading

  • *J. M. Coetzee, Waiting for the Barbarians (1980) pp. 82–95 (study guide)
Weekly 15
Feb. 6

24: Freedom

Reading

  • *J. M. Coetzee, Waiting for the Barbarians (1980) pp. 95–126 (study guide)

Week 16 Feb. 10

25: Writing the Unwritable

Reading

  • *J. M. Coetzee, Waiting for the Barbarians (1980) pp. 126–46 (study guide)
Weekly 16
Feb. 13

26: Writing for the Future

Reading

  • *J. M. Coetzee, Waiting for the Barbarians (1980) pp. 146–80 (study guide)
    • J. M. Coetzee, "The Novel in Africa," The Doreen B. Townsend Center for the Humanities (1998)
Week 17 Feb. 17

Forum

  • If you are planning to use PowerPoint, make sure it is compatible with Microsoft PowerPoint 2007. Also embed or include files of any nonstandard fonts that are in your presentation.

  • Let me know of any other audiovisual needs by 4 p.m. Friday, February 14, 2013.

  • 5-minute individual presentation (15 minutes per panel) followed by

  • 10-minute question and answer session

  • Tentative Schedule

    Session 1: Real Imagination
    11:00–11:25 a.m.
    Presiding: Sujaree Wattanarat
    Speakers: 
    1. "Barbarism and Imagination," Wanwanut Sirijindapun
    2.     "Living in the Future," Sineenart Uparamaiyamas
    3.     "Otherness in Waiting for the Barbarians," Tapanee Chalitapanukul
    Respondent 1: Thawanya Phuaknoi
    Respondent 2: Varisara Sitthisenee
    Respondent 3: Pradthana Wanmee

    Session 2: Symbolic Functions
    11:30–11:55 a.m.
    Presiding: Warunya Ridmad
    Speakers: 
    1.     "Symbolism in 'The Things They Carried,'" Boonbaramee Radsamee
    2.     "The Quilt in Honor of Love and Impartiality in 'Everyday Use,'" Passakorn Tongvijid
     3. "Title," Pimjai Choojun
    4. "Title," Akkarawin Mayuramas
    Respondent 1: Phanida Jirakandjanasith
    Respondent 2: Wanwanut Sirijindapun
    Respondent 3:     Wichayaporn  Laithong
    Respondent 4:     Sujaree Wattanarat

Feb. 20

Forum

8:00–9:55 a.m.

Session 3: Wars: What Are They Good For?
8:00–8:25 a.m.
Presiding: Pimjai Choojun
Speakers: 
1. "The Relation between the Things Soldiers Carried and the War Against the Soldiers," Pradthana Wanmee
2. "War and the Soldier," Wichayaporn Laithong
3. "Justice as Excuse for Empire," Warunya Ridmad

Respondent 1: Passakorn Tongvijid
Respondent 2: Tapanee Chalitapanukul
Respondent 3: Varisara Sitthisenee


Session 4: Pieces in Perspective
8:30–8:55 a.m.
Presiding: Wichayaporn Laithong
Speakers: 
1. "What Makes Gallimard Gallimard," Varisara Sitthisenee
2. "The Quilt in Honor of Love and Impartiality in 'Everyday Use,'" Passakorn Tongvijid
3. "Living in Time," Sineenart Uparamaiyamas

Respondent 1: Boonbaramee Radsamee
Respondent 2: Akkarawin Mayuramas
Respondent 3: Pimjai Choojun
 

 
Session 5: Tortured Sights
11:30–11:55 a.m.
Presiding: Boonbaramee Radsamee
Speakers: 
1. "Victimhood in Waiting for the Barbarians," Phanida Jirakandjanasith 
2. "Identities of the Barbarian Girl," Sujaree Wattanarat
3. "Sight in Waiting for the Barbarians," Thawanya Phouknoi 

Respondent 1: Warunya Ridmad
Respondent 2: Pradthana Wanmee
Respondent 3: Sineenart Uparamaiyamas    

Final paper due February 27


Week 18 Feb. 24

Final Exam (8:30–11:30 a.m.) Dictionaries (electronic or paper) are not allowed in the exam room.

 

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Last updated February 20, 2014