Teaching Tainted Lit

Teaching Tainted Lit
Author: Janet G. Casey
Publisher: University of Iowa Press
Total Pages: 247
Release: 2015-11-15
Genre: Education
ISBN: 1609383737

Popular American fiction has now secured a routine position in the higher education classroom despite its historic status as culturally suspect. This newfound respect and inclusion have almost certainly changed the pedagogical landscape, and Teaching Tainted Lit explores that altered terrain. If the academy has historically ignored, or even sneered at, the popular, then its new accommodation within the framework of college English is noteworthy: surely the popular introduces both pleasures and problems that did not exist when faculty exclusively taught literature from an established “high” canon. How, then, does the assumption that the popular matters affect teaching strategies, classroom climates, and both personal and institutional notions about what it means to study literature? The essays in this collection presume that the popular is here to stay and that its instructive implications are not merely noteworthy, but richly nuanced and deeply compelling. They address a broad variety of issues concerning canonicity, literature, genre, and the classroom, as its contributors teach everything from Stephen King and Lady Gaga to nineteenth-century dime novels and the 1852 best-seller Uncle Tom’s Cabin. It is no secret that teaching popular texts fuels controversies about the value of cultural studies, the alleged relaxation of aesthetic standards, and the possible “dumbing down” of Americans. By implicitly and explicitly addressing such contentious issues, these essays invite a broader conversation about the place of the popular not only in higher education but in the reading lives of all Americans.

A Research Guide to Gothic Literature in English

A Research Guide to Gothic Literature in English
Author: Sherri L. Brown
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
Total Pages: 253
Release: 2018-03-15
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 1442277483

The Gothic began as a designation for barbarian tribes, was associated with the cathedrals of the High Middle Ages, was used to describe a marginalized literature in the late eighteenth century, and continues today in a variety of forms (literature, film, graphic novel, video games, and other narrative and artistic forms). Unlike other recent books in the field that focus on certain aspects of the Gothic, this work directs researchers to seminal and significant resources on all of its aspects. Annotations will help researchers determine what materials best suit their needs. A Research Guide to Gothic Literature in English covers Gothic cultural artifacts such as literature, film, graphic novels, and videogames. This authoritative guide equips researchers with valuable recent information about noteworthy resources that they can use to study the Gothic effectively and thoroughly.

American Literature in Transition, 1910–1920

American Literature in Transition, 1910–1920
Author: Mark W. Van Wienen
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 440
Release: 2017-12-28
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 1108548598

American Literature in Transition, 1910–1920 offers provocative new readings of authors whose innovations are recognized as inaugurating Modernism in US letters, including Robert Frost, Willa Cather, T. S. Eliot, Ezra Pound, Gertrude Stein, H. D., and Marianne Moore. Gathering the voices of both new and established scholars, the volume also reflects the diversity and contradictions of US literature of the 1910s. 'Literature' itself is construed variously, leading to explorations of jazz, the movies, and political writing as well as little magazines, lantern slides, and sports reportage. One section of thematic essays cuts across genre boundaries. Another section oriented to formats drills deeply into the workings of specific media, genres, or forms. Essays on institutions conclude the collection, although a critical mass of contributors throughout explore long-term literary and cultural trends - where political repression, race prejudice, war, and counterrevolution are no less prominent than experimentation, progress, and egalitarianism.

Screening Images of American Masculinity in the Age of Postfeminism

Screening Images of American Masculinity in the Age of Postfeminism
Author: Elizabeth Abele
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
Total Pages: 235
Release: 2015-12-03
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1498525830

This collection of essays presents a sampling of film and television texts, interrogating images of U.S. masculinity. Rather than using “postfeminist” as a definition of contemporary feminism, this collection uses the term to designate the period from the late 1980s on—as a point when feminist thought gradually became more mainstream. The movies and TV series examined here have achieved a level of sustained attention, from critical acclaim, to mass appeal, to cult status. Instead of beginning with a set hypothesis on the effect of the feminist movement on images of masculinity on film and television, these chapters represent a range of responses, that demonstrate how the conversations within these texts about American masculinity are often open-ended, allowing both male characters and male viewers a wider range of options. Defining the relationship between U.S. masculinity and American feminist movements of the twentieth century is a complex undertaking. The essays collected for this volume engage prominent film and television texts that directly interrogate images of U.S. masculinity that have appeared since second-wave feminism. The contributors have chosen textual examples whose protagonists actively struggle with the conflicting messages about masculinity. These protagonists are more often works-in-progress, acknowledging the limits of their negotiations and self-actualization. These chapters also cover a wide range of genres and decades: from action and fantasy to dramas and romantic comedy, from the late 1970s to today. Taken together, the chapters of Screening Images of American Masculinity in the AgeofPostfeminism interrogate “the possible” screened in popular movies and television series, confronting the multiple and competing visions of masculinity not after or beyond feminism but, rather, in its very wake.

Expanding Adaptation Networks

Expanding Adaptation Networks
Author: Kate Newell
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 237
Release: 2017-05-22
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1137567120

This book addresses print-based modes of adaptation that have not conventionally been theorized as adaptations—such as novelization, illustration, literary maps, pop-up books, and ekphrasis. It discusses a broad range of image and word-based adaptations of popular literary works, among them The Wizard of Oz, Alice in Wonderland, Daisy Miller, The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Moby Dick, and Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. The study reveals that commercial and franchise works and ephemera play a key role in establishing a work’s iconography. Newell argues that the cultural knowledge and memory of a work is constructed through reiterative processes and proposes a network-based model of adaptation to explain this. Whereas most adaptation studies prioritize film and television, this book’s focus on print invites new entry points for the study of adaptation.

The Role of the Literary Canon in the Teaching of Literature

The Role of the Literary Canon in the Teaching of Literature
Author: Robert Aston
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 170
Release: 2020-05-12
Genre: Education
ISBN: 1000078922

This book investigates the role of the idea of the literary canon in the teaching of literature, especially in colleges and secondary schools in the United States. Before the term "canon" was widely used in literary studies, which occurred in the second half of 20th century when the canon was first seriously viewed as politically and culturally problematic, the idea that some literary texts were more worthy of being studied than others existed since the beginning of the discipline of the teaching of literature in the 1800s. The concept of the canon, however, extends as far back as to Ancient Greece and its meaning has evolved over time. Thus, this book charts the changing meaning of the idea of the literary canon, examining its influence specifically in the teaching of literature from the beginning of the field to the 21st century. To explain how the literary canon and the teaching of literature have changed over time and continue to change, this book constructs a theory of canon formation based on the ideas of Michel Foucault and the assemblage theory of Manuel DeLanda, illustrating that the literary canon, while frequently contested, is integral to the teaching of literature yet changes as the teaching of literature changes.

Literature, Pedagogy, and Curriculum in Secondary Education

Literature, Pedagogy, and Curriculum in Secondary Education
Author: M. Martin Guiney
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 310
Release: 2017-05-31
Genre: Education
ISBN: 3319521381

This book argues for the importance of literature studies using the historical debate between the disinterested disciplines (“art for art’s sake”) and utilitarian or productive disciplines. Forgoing the traditional argument that literature is a unique spiritual resource, as well as the utilitarian thought that literary pedagogy promotes skills that are relevant to a post-industrial economy, Guiney suggests that literary pedagogy must enable mutual access between the classroom and the outside world. It must recognize the need for every human being to become a conscious producer of culture rather than a consumer, through an active process of literary reading and writing. Using the history of French curricular reforms as a case study for his analysis, Guiney provides a contextualized redefinition of literature’s social value.

Class Lives

Class Lives
Author: Chuck Collins
Publisher: Cornell University Press
Total Pages: 241
Release: 2014-12-18
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 0801454522

Class Lives is an anthology of narratives dramatizing the lived experience of class in America. It includes forty original essays from authors who represent a range of classes, genders, races, ethnicities, ages, and occupations across the United States. Born into poverty, working class, the middle class, and the owning class—and every place in between—the contributors describe their class journeys in narrative form, recounting one or two key stories that illustrate their growing awareness of class and their place, changing or stable, within the class system.The stories in Class Lives are both gripping and moving. One contributor grows up in hunger and as an adult becomes an advocate for the poor and homeless. Another acknowledges the truth that her working-class father's achievements afforded her and the rest of the family access to people with power. A gifted child from a working-class home soon understands that intelligence is a commodity but finds his background incompatible with his aspirations and so attempts to divide his life into separate worlds.Together, these essays form a powerful narrative about the experience of class and the importance of learning about classism, class cultures, and the intersections of class, race, and gender. Class Lives will be a helpful resource for students, teachers, sociologists, diversity trainers, activists, and a general audience. It will leave readers with an appreciation of the poignancy and power of class and the journeys that Americans grapple with on a daily basis.

Teaching Anglophone Caribbean Literature

Teaching Anglophone Caribbean Literature
Author: Supriya M. Nair
Publisher: Modern Language Association
Total Pages: 421
Release: 2012-10-01
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 160329161X

This volume in the Options for Teaching series recognizes that the most challenging aspect of introducing students to anglophone Caribbean literature--the sheer variety of intellectual and artistic traditions in Western and non-Western cultures that relate to it--also offers the greatest opportunities to teachers. Courses on anglophone literature in the Caribbean can consider the region's specific histories and contexts even as they explore common issues: the legacies of slavery, colonialism, and colonial education; nationalism; exile and migration; identity and hybridity; class and racial conflict; gender and sexuality; religion and ritual. While considering how the availability of materials shapes syllabi, this volume recommends print, digital, and visual resources for teaching. The essays examine a host of topics, including the following: the development of multiethnic populations in the Caribbean and the role of various creole languages in the literature oral art forms, such as dub poetry and reggae music the influence of anglophone literature in the Caribbean on literary movements outside it, such as the Harlem Renaissance and black British writing Carnival religious rituals and beliefs specific genres such as slave narratives and autobiography film and drama the economics of rum Many essays list resources for further reading, and the volume concludes with a section of additional teaching resources.

The Oxford Handbook of Medieval Latin Literature

The Oxford Handbook of Medieval Latin Literature
Author: Ralph Hexter
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 657
Release: 2012-01-20
Genre: Literary Collections
ISBN: 0199875197

The twenty-eight essays in this handbook represent the best current thinking in the study of Latin language and literature in the Middle Ages. Contributing authors--both senior scholars and gifted younger thinkers among them--not only illuminate the field as traditionally defined but also offer fresh insights into broader questions of literary history, cultural interaction, world literature, and language in history and society. Their studies vividly illustrate the field's complexities on a wide range of topics, including canonicity, literary styles and genres, and the materiality of manuscript culture. At the same time, they suggest future possibilities for the necessarily provisional and open-ended work essential to the pursuit of medieval Latin studies. The overall approach of The Oxford Handbook of Medieval Latin Literature makes this volume an essential resource for students of the ancient world interested in the prolonged after-life of the classical period's cultural complexes, for medieval historians, for scholars of other medieval literary traditions, and for all those interested in delving more deeply into the fascinating more-than-millennium-long passage between the ancient Mediterranean world and what we consider modernity.