**For non-English majors hoping to fulfill pre-health requirements, please note that upper-division English courses numbered ENGL 100 – 119 require only ENGCOMP 3/Writing I in order to enroll!
Lower Division Courses in English (Freshman, Sophomore)
Critical Reading and Writing
English 4W / Various Instructors
| Introduction to literary analysis, with close reading and carefully written exposition of selections from principal modes of literature: poetry, prose fiction, and drama. Minimum of 15 to 20 pages of revised writing.
Fulfills a preparatory requirement for the English major and a lower-division requirement for the Creative Writing minor.
Fulfills Writing II requirement.
Additional sections of English 4W may open if the waitlist fills. |
Introduction to Creative Writing
English 20W / Various Instructors
| Designed to introduce fundamentals of creative writing and writing workshop experience. Emphasis on poetry, fiction, drama, or creative nonfiction depending on wishes of instructor(s) during any given term. Readings from assigned texts, weekly writing assignments (multiple drafts and revisions), and final portfolio required.
Fulfills a lower-division requirement for the Creative Writing minor.
Fulfills Writing II requirement.
Additional sections of English 20W may open if the waitlist fills. |
Upper Division Courses in English
Literatures in English Before 1500
**No courses available in Summer 2024. Summer 2024 degree candidates should plan to complete this requirement in Spring 2024.
Literatures in English 1500-1700
**No courses available in Summer 2024. Summer 2024 degree candidates should plan to complete this requirement in Spring 2024.
Literatures in English 1700-1850
Crime, Culture, and In/Justice
Topics in Literature, circa 1700 to 1850
English 169 / Prof. Turner
| This course is motivated by two realities: the enormous popularity of true crime stories and police procedurals in contemporary media and the simultaneous fact of the U.S.’s status as the world’s largest jailor. Prison abolitionists working today emphasize the importance of understanding that the prison itself has a history: it is a product of human design, rather than a natural part of society. In this course, we’ll focus on the prison system’s inception in eighteenth-century Europe, when incarceration was first theorized as a more humane form of punishment than alternatives such as execution or transportation. In doing so, we’ll follow the lead of prison abolitionists to highlight incarceration’s non-inevitability. Our readings will be guided by some key questions: Why has criminality been such a popular subject for mass culture, both today and in the past? What role have cultural objects played in the transformation of institutions like the modern prison? And, finally, how might writing—and the arts broadly—help us to both imagine and build a more just world?
Not open to students who completed ENGL 169 with Prof. Turner in Fall 2023. |
Literatures in English 1850 – Present
50 Shades of Sex in American Popular Literature
American Popular Literature
English 115A / Hoegberg
| This course will take as its primary materials the pornographic texts and romance novels of the 20th and 21st century US. We will trace representations of sex and sexuality from the pulp fiction of the early century to the rise of the popular romance novel, and into texts that are still popular today. Our study will culminate with the international bestseller Fifty Shades of Grey (2012) and we will consider its effects on contemporary American discourse around sex. Some of the questions we may consider over the course of the quarter include: Who decides what “sex” is, and what it isn’t? Why do some materials get classified as “obscene” and others make their way into the mainstream? What different kinds of sex, sexuality, and sexual people are portrayed in our source materials, and how? What is the aesthetics of sex in popular literature, and how might it reflect and/or inform U.S. culture and politics? |
Historical Fiction on the Big and Little Screens **ONLINE COURSE**
Studies in Visual Culture
English 118C / Whittell
| This course will consider contemporary representations of historical periods, in particular the 18th and 19th centuries–films/shows that may include Persuasion (2022), Bright Star (2009), Portrait of a Lady on Fire (2019), The Favourite (2018), Bridgerton (2022), Our Flag Means Death (2022) and Belle (2013). Brief excerpts of historically relevant texts and theory by Lauren Berlant, Edward Glissant, Jose Muñoz, Edward Said, and Eve Kosofsky-Sedgwick will help us clarify our questions. Central to this course are questions of how we approach historical adaptation. What questions or problems does historical adaptation allow us to think through? How do we reclaim historical narratives from a canon dominated by white, cishet voices? What are the aesthetic and theoretical problems that arise when we try to imagine histories outside of these canons? Can you adapt history without reproducing it? |
American Horror Stories from Sleepy Hollow to The Sunken Place **ONLINE COURSE**
Interdisciplinary Studies of American Culture
English 177.2 / Ridder
| This course will focus on American horror stories across media, from early Gothic literature to contemporary film and television. Exploring ghost stories, tales of transfiguration, and strange, “monstrous” forms, we will ask: How is American fiction haunted? What does the horror genre reveal about distinctly American fears and anxieties? Together, we will analyze how horror narratives evolved alongside major historical events and social movements and consider the social, political, and cultural implications of representations of race, gender, sexuality, science, and religion in U.S. horror fiction. As we do so, we will also interrogate our long-standing fascination with (even delight in!) feeling scared.
Some possible texts: Washington Irving’s “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” (1820), Edgar Allen Poe’s “The Fall of the House of Usher” (1839), Edith Wharton’s The Eyes & Afterward (1910), James Whale’s Frankenstein (1931), Don Siegel’s Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956), Shirley Jackson’s We Have Always Lived in the Castle (1962), Octavia Butler’s Kindred (1979), Excerpts from Carol Clover’s Men, Women, and Chainsaws (1992), Jordan Peele’s Get Out (2019) |
Recent Fiction and Extractivism
Topics in Literature, circa 1850 – present
English 179 / Swanson
| Extractivism, often defined as an economic model predicated on industrial-scale natural resource extraction, has been studied and analyzed through disciplinary lenses such as economics, policy, history, and environmental studies. But in recent years the environmental humanities and ecocriticism have also joined the fray, analyzing how literary texts and cultural objects grapple with this concept and its impacts on environment and society. While attending to the actual, material impacts of natural resource extraction, students will employ an ecocritical analysis of texts to interrogate the ways in which extractivism modulates our views of social relations and attitudes toward nonhuman nature. Study will explore literature (primarily American texts from the past fifty years) that representationally highlights and critiques extractive logics. Through analyzing such texts, we will consider how extractivism becomes discursively interwoven with other historical forces like imperialism, settler colonialism, and racial capitalism, while also considering the extent to which extractivism is a disparate phenomenon.
This course is eligible for credit on the Literature & Environment minor. |
Gender, Race, Ethnicity, Disability, and Sexuality Studies
Historical Fiction on the Big and Little Screens **ONLINE COURSE**
Studies in Visual Culture
English 118C / Whittell
| This course will consider contemporary representations of historical periods, in particular the 18th and 19th centuries–films/shows that may include Persuasion (2022), Bright Star (2009), Portrait of a Lady on Fire (2019), The Favourite (2018), Bridgerton (2022), Our Flag Means Death (2022) and Belle (2013). Brief excerpts of historically relevant texts and theory by Lauren Berlant, Edward Glissant, Jose Muñoz, Edward Said, and Eve Kosofsky-Sedgwick will help us clarify our questions. Central to this course are questions of how we approach historical adaptation. What questions or problems does historical adaptation allow us to think through? How do we reclaim historical narratives from a canon dominated by white, cishet voices? What are the aesthetic and theoretical problems that arise when we try to imagine histories outside of these canons? Can you adapt history without reproducing it? |
Crime, Culture, and In/Justice
Topics in Literature, circa 1700 to 1850
English 169 / Prof. Turner
| This course is motivated by two realities: the enormous popularity of true crime stories and police procedurals in contemporary media and the simultaneous fact of the U.S.’s status as the world’s largest jailor. Prison abolitionists working today emphasize the importance of understanding that the prison itself has a history: it is a product of human design, rather than a natural part of society. In this course, we’ll focus on the prison system’s inception in eighteenth-century Europe, when incarceration was first theorized as a more humane form of punishment than alternatives such as execution or transportation. In doing so, we’ll follow the lead of prison abolitionists to highlight incarceration’s non-inevitability. Our readings will be guided by some key questions: Why has criminality been such a popular subject for mass culture, both today and in the past? What role have cultural objects played in the transformation of institutions like the modern prison? And, finally, how might writing—and the arts broadly—help us to both imagine and build a more just world?
Not open to students who completed ENGL 169 with Prof. Turner in Fall 2023. |
American Horror Stories from Sleepy Hollow to The Sunken Place **ONLINE COURSE**
Interdisciplinary Studies of American Culture
English 177.2 / Ridder
| This course will focus on American horror stories across media, from early Gothic literature to contemporary film and television. Exploring ghost stories, tales of transfiguration, and strange, “monstrous” forms, we will ask: How is American fiction haunted? What does the horror genre reveal about distinctly American fears and anxieties? Together, we will analyze how horror narratives evolved alongside major historical events and social movements and consider the social, political, and cultural implications of representations of race, gender, sexuality, science, and religion in U.S. horror fiction. As we do so, we will also interrogate our long-standing fascination with (even delight in!) feeling scared.
Some possible texts: Washington Irving’s “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” (1820), Edgar Allen Poe’s “The Fall of the House of Usher” (1839), Edith Wharton’s The Eyes & Afterward (1910), James Whale’s Frankenstein (1931), Don Siegel’s Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956), Shirley Jackson’s We Have Always Lived in the Castle (1962), Octavia Butler’s Kindred (1979), Excerpts from Carol Clover’s Men, Women, and Chainsaws (1992), Jordan Peele’s Get Out (2019) |
Imperial, Transnational, and Postcolonial Studies
Historical Fiction on the Big and Little Screens **ONLINE COURSE**
Studies in Visual Culture
English 118C / Whittell
| This course will consider contemporary representations of historical periods, in particular the 18th and 19th centuries–films/shows that may include Persuasion (2022), Bright Star (2009), Portrait of a Lady on Fire (2019), The Favourite (2018), Bridgerton (2022), Our Flag Means Death (2022) and Belle (2013). Brief excerpts of historically relevant texts and theory by Lauren Berlant, Edward Glissant, Jose Muñoz, Edward Said, and Eve Kosofsky-Sedgwick will help us clarify our questions. Central to this course are questions of how we approach historical adaptation. What questions or problems does historical adaptation allow us to think through? How do we reclaim historical narratives from a canon dominated by white, cishet voices? What are the aesthetic and theoretical problems that arise when we try to imagine histories outside of these canons? Can you adapt history without reproducing it? |
Genre Studies, Interdisciplinary Studies, Critical Theory
50 Shades of Sex in American Popular Literature
American Popular Literature
English 115A / Hoegberg
| This course will take as its primary materials the pornographic texts and romance novels of the 20th and 21st century US. We will trace representations of sex and sexuality from the pulp fiction of the early century to the rise of the popular romance novel, and into texts that are still popular today. Our study will culminate with the international bestseller Fifty Shades of Grey (2012) and we will consider its effects on contemporary American discourse around sex. Some of the questions we may consider over the course of the quarter include: Who decides what “sex” is, and what it isn’t? Why do some materials get classified as “obscene” and others make their way into the mainstream? What different kinds of sex, sexuality, and sexual people are portrayed in our source materials, and how? What is the aesthetics of sex in popular literature, and how might it reflect and/or inform U.S. culture and politics? |
Computing in Literature: From Secret Poetry Codes to Computer Coding **ONLINE COURSE**
Interdisciplinary Studies in Literature
English 118A / Sherrill
| This course will focus on the theoretical origins of computing in literature, from its origins in the 18th-century to the present day. Primary texts will include: Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels, Tom Stoppard’s Arcadia, selections from the archive of female computing pioneer Ada Lovelace, the graphic novel The Thrilling Adventures of Lovelace and Babbage, the film Hidden Figures, and Chat GPT poetry. Students will also be introduced to the core texts of digital humanities and learn how to create their own machine-reading AI models for historical handwriting. No experience with computing is necessary. |
Historical Fiction on the Big and Little Screens **ONLINE COURSE**
Studies in Visual Culture
English 118C / Whittell
| This course will consider contemporary representations of historical periods, in particular the 18th and 19th centuries–films/shows that may include Persuasion (2022), Bright Star (2009), Portrait of a Lady on Fire (2019), The Favourite (2018), Bridgerton (2022), Our Flag Means Death (2022) and Belle (2013). Brief excerpts of historically relevant texts and theory by Lauren Berlant, Edward Glissant, Jose Muñoz, Edward Said, and Eve Kosofsky-Sedgwick will help us clarify our questions. Central to this course are questions of how we approach historical adaptation. What questions or problems does historical adaptation allow us to think through? How do we reclaim historical narratives from a canon dominated by white, cishet voices? What are the aesthetic and theoretical problems that arise when we try to imagine histories outside of these canons? Can you adapt history without reproducing it? |
Crime, Culture, and In/Justice
Topics in Literature, circa 1700 to 1850
English 169 / Prof. Turner
| This course is motivated by two realities: the enormous popularity of true crime stories and police procedurals in contemporary media and the simultaneous fact of the U.S.’s status as the world’s largest jailor. Prison abolitionists working today emphasize the importance of understanding that the prison itself has a history: it is a product of human design, rather than a natural part of society. In this course, we’ll focus on the prison system’s inception in eighteenth-century Europe, when incarceration was first theorized as a more humane form of punishment than alternatives such as execution or transportation. In doing so, we’ll follow the lead of prison abolitionists to highlight incarceration’s non-inevitability. Our readings will be guided by some key questions: Why has criminality been such a popular subject for mass culture, both today and in the past? What role have cultural objects played in the transformation of institutions like the modern prison? And, finally, how might writing—and the arts broadly—help us to both imagine and build a more just world?
Not open to students who completed ENGL 169 with Prof. Turner in Fall 2023. |
American Horror Stories from Sleepy Hollow to The Sunken Place **ONLINE COURSE**
Interdisciplinary Studies of American Culture
English 177.2 / Ridder
| This course will focus on American horror stories across media, from early Gothic literature to contemporary film and television. Exploring ghost stories, tales of transfiguration, and strange, “monstrous” forms, we will ask: How is American fiction haunted? What does the horror genre reveal about distinctly American fears and anxieties? Together, we will analyze how horror narratives evolved alongside major historical events and social movements and consider the social, political, and cultural implications of representations of race, gender, sexuality, science, and religion in U.S. horror fiction. As we do so, we will also interrogate our long-standing fascination with (even delight in!) feeling scared.
Some possible texts: Washington Irving’s “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” (1820), Edgar Allen Poe’s “The Fall of the House of Usher” (1839), Edith Wharton’s The Eyes & Afterward (1910), James Whale’s Frankenstein (1931), Don Siegel’s Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956), Shirley Jackson’s We Have Always Lived in the Castle (1962), Octavia Butler’s Kindred (1979), Excerpts from Carol Clover’s Men, Women, and Chainsaws (1992), Jordan Peele’s Get Out (2019) |
Creative Writing Workshops
Unlike during Fall, Winter, and Spring quarters, Summer creative writing workshops operate based on OPEN enrollment. No application needed!
Creative Nonfiction Across Genres and Forms
Topics in Creative Writing
English M138 / Solis
| This course explores the vast terrain of creative nonfiction. We will analyze formal techniques for producing creative nonfiction narratives across different mediums and genres, from true crime podcasts to profiles of places and people, from music to memoir writing. How do we define creative nonfiction? What does creative nonfiction offer us as a method, and how do some writers trouble the category? Writers we may read include David Wong Louie, Hanif Adburraqib, Myriam Gurba, Billy-Ray Belcourt, and Virginia Woolf. In addition to reading and discussing work by these and other writers, students will work to hone their own creative skills through a final narrative nonfiction project. Thinking through our own writing processes and experiences, we will ask: What do we write about and why? Where does our writing come from? What do we owe to the people we write about? What are some unique challenges of producing creative nonfiction narratives?
This course is eligible for credit on the Professional Writing minor or the Creative Writing minor. |
Senior Seminars
Senior seminars are not typically offered during Summer Sessions. Summer 2024 degree candidates in need of a seminar should contact the English undergraduate advising office ASAP about seminar credit.