| Mark Metzler Sawin, Ph.D. email: mark.sawin@emu.edu |
Course Description & Objectives:
During a short 400 years, Native American tribes, European settlers, enslaved Africans, and world-wide immigrants have grudgingly mixed together in the New World in a process has been alternately horrifically violent and shockingly fair-minded, cruelly exploitative and remarkably equalizing. The nation that has resulted can and should be interpreted in many ways, but regardless of your opinion of the United States, one thing is abundantly clear—it is a stunningly creative, diverse, and inventive nation. This is nowhere more apparent than in America’s literature and in its religious practices—for example, the current anthology of American literature now stretches to five volumes of over 6,000 tightly-printed pages, and conservatively estimated, there are well over 250 distinctive religious denominations meeting during any given week, with multiple-thousands of congregational variants.
This course will focus on the development of the United States from its colonial beginnings to its current superpower status, but though we will address this trajectory in a historical framework, our primary focus will be on the nation’s Christian cultural tradition. Religiously, Christian denominations have dominated the American spiritual landscape and thus we will focus primarily on these groups and traditions, though we will touch on others. Culturally, we will give preference to more canonical literature, but will also spend a good deal of time looking at popular cultural texts that impacted the national identity, even if they were not deemed high culture. The class will progress via weekly themes that are spelled out on the schedule below; do note the assigned texts for each week. Read. Think. Be prepared to discuss. This is important.
The ONE thing I really want from you is informed, creative, original thought. That, in my opinion, is what education is all about. This is not a class in which you can just attend lectures, read the books, and do well. My advice to you is to participate fully. Come to office hours and talk about things. Ask questions and discuss class material with other students. If you have any questions, come see me. Though I’m a newcomer to this city I’ve already found that it is full of wonderful cafés—I would be happy to use them as places to further our discussions.
Requirements & Evaluation:
Exams: There will be two exams; each will consist of a short-answer identification section (IDs) and an essay. The IDs will be key names, words, or phrases that you will be expected to identify and explain in a short answer. To do this successfully you must answer both the “what” and the “so what.” For example, if the term were “Michael Jackson” the “what” would be: a pop star of the 1980s and 1990s whose album “Thriller” was one of the best selling albums ever. The “so what” would be: Jackson is important because he helped bring about a new era in pop music as he helped define the new visual aspect of pop music with his elaborate videos that included story-lines and dance. He also bent both gender and racial lines as his voice and lyrics were often gender neutral (he sang in a higher range than his sister, Janet) and through extensive cosmetic surgery, his own appearance shifted from black to white to freakish. You will be given ten IDs and will be expected to answer five. For the essay you will be expected to answer fully, using concrete examples from the lectures and texts.
Thesis Essays: During the course of this class you will write three thesis essays. A thesis essay is a short writing assignment (450-550 words) that presents a concise, well-articulated and insightful thesis that outlines and/or argues a key point or question raised by the readings and activities covered in class. A good thesis is supported with concrete examples that sere as evidence to prove its argument or statement. I will expect excellence of style, grammar, & thought. During class discussion you may be asked to present your thesis when called upon and you should be able to present and defend it when questioned. This may sound intimidating now, but if done well this process will foster good, informed discussions that may actually be fun. Really.
Participation & Attendance: I take this seriously. Be engaged in discussions and attentive during class. Keep up with the readings and other assignments and participate in class activities; this does constitute a large portion of your grade.
Assignments & Scoring
Exam I = 25%
Exam II = 25%
Thesis Essays (3 x 10%) = 30%
Participation (attendance & quizzes) = 20%
Grades will be based on a ten-point scale:
5 = 100-90% 4 = 89-80% 3 = 79-70% 2 = 60-69% 1 = 59-0%
Reading List: Course Packet available at the Xerox Shop and on line (partially)
Film List: Since the 1920s, films have been a major part of US culture, arguably more important than any other medium until the advent of a mass TV audience in the early-1950s. Because of this, we will examine several films (and a few TV series) as examples of this theme. Below is a large list of films; I will make many of them available to you in the library and we will do screenings of several of them. Please take advantage of these, and bring your friends. They’ll be fun.
