their eyes were watching god essay thesis

Their Eyes Were Watching God Zora Neale Hurston

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Their Eyes Were Watching God Essays

The importance of dreams laura lee, their eyes were watching god.

Throughout the history of black American culture, the pursuit of dreams has played a pivotal role in self-fulfillment and internal development. In many ways an individual's reactions to the perceived and real obstacles barring the path to a dream...

Getting in Touch with the Feminine Side Judd Salamat

In 1937, upon the first publication of Their Eyes Were Watching God, the most influential black writer of his time, Richard Wright, stated that the novel ìcarries no theme, no message, [and] no thought.î Wrightís powerful critique epitomized a...

Living for Yourself in Their Eyes Were Watching God Theoderek Wayne

Through Janie's growth from a girl so far removed from any identity that she doesn't know her own race, to a woman strong enough to return to her hometown that wants nothing more than to revel in her miseries, Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were...

Their Eyes Were Watching God: Double Consciousness as an Indicator of Growth Meagan Bass

Zora Neale Hurston's novel, Their Eyes Were Watching God, utilizes a struggle W.E.B. Du Bois describes as "double consciousness" to chart the journey of Janie Crawford into selfhood. In "The Souls of Black Folk," Du Bois describes African...

A Voice of Abandonment Emily Flynn

In Zora Neale Hurston's novel Their Eyes Were Watching God, Janie is encouraged to develop her own personality throughout the book, and she is forced into constant movement down roads after being abandoned by her grandmother and her three...

Uses of Metonymy in Their Eyes Were Watching God Anonymous

In Their Eyes Were Watching God, Zora Neale Hurston uses metonymy several times in order to express motifs which appear throughout the novel. For instance, one of the clearest examples of metonymy, the porch, appears as a whole or general entity,...

The Alpha Female Aaron Chan

The Alpha Female

Zora Neale Hurston's 1937 novel Their Eyes Were Watching God shows the Southern black women not as the weak and submissive slaves of their husbands, but rather, Eyes traces the development of Janie as the independent black woman....

Nature's Role in Their Eyes Were Watching God Anonymous

"It [the tiny bloom] had called her to come and gaze on a mystery. From barren brown stems to glistening leaf-buds; from the leaf-buds to snowy virginity of bloom. It stirred her tremendously" (13). Zora Neale Hurston, an African-American author,...

Community and Identity Justin Hamilton

Over the course Zora Neale Hurston's novel, Their Eyes Were Watching God, Janie resides in several communities, each of which play an important role in the story, and serve as essential influences on Janie's life. At different stages in her life,...

The Use of Name Significance in Their Eyes Were Watching God Zachary Isaac Goldman

With their significance ranging from one’s place of origin to one’s occupation, last names have been used to distinguish and describe individuals for centuries. In the novel Their Eyes Were Watching God, Zora Neale Hurston, the author, experiments...

In Search of Voice Abraham G Berhane

As the old adage goes, it is not what one says, but how they say it that matters most. In Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God, the novel’s protagonist, Janie Crawford, is immersed in a journey to establish her voice and,...

The Sound of Silence Benjamin Keni Cook Piiru

In Their Eyes Were Watching God, Zora Neal Hurston uses language as a tool to show the progression of the story. Throughout the novel, Hurston uses a narrative style that is split between poetic literary prose and the vernacular of Southern...

Finding True Love in Their Eyes Were Watching God Laura Jean Kepko

The novel Their Eyes Were Watching God is a story of one woman’s growth as a person physically, emotionally, and intellectually while on a journey for life fulfillment. Throughout the novel a theme illustrating the value of finding true love and...

Mules in Their Eyes Were Watching God Anonymous

When Nanny tells her young, naïve granddaughter Janie Crawford, “de nigger woman is de mule uh de world so fur as Ah can see,” (14) she is merely setting the stage for a number of connections between humans and animals that communicate Hurston’s...

The Multiple Meanings of "Their" in Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God Anonymous 10th Grade

In Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston, Hurston leaves part of the title ambiguous and therefore open to interpretation. Throughout the novel, the characters mention or allude to God, or a “god.” The multiple meanings of the word “...

Love in Their Eyes Were Watching God Anonymous 12th Grade

In Zora Neale Hurston’s novel, Their Eyes Were Watching God, the reader sees one character’s journey towards figuring out love. Janie Crawford, the protagonist, deciphers through experience what love actually is. Through her text, Hurston...

Folklore in Their Eyes Were Watching God Anonymous 12th Grade

Zora Neale Hurston wrote Their Eyes Were Watching God in seven weeks while she was in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, researching the country’s major voodoo gods and studying as an initiate under the tutelage of Haiti’s most well-known Voodoo hougans...

Hurston's and Larsen's Commentary on Racial Loyalty Foster Cheng College

Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston and Passing by Nella Larsen both feature black females as their main characters. Hurston’s novel follows a woman named Janie through her life, while Larsen’s follows Clare, a black woman who...

New Voices in the Harlem Renaissance Wei Dai College

Despite disparities in the poetic styles of Sterling Brown and Arna Bontemps, each author was equally effective in conveying the “new voice” of the black American during the Harlem Renaissance. The idea of a more suitable expression for African...

“Hope, Hopelessness and Despair”: An Analysis of Realism, Naturalism and Romanticism in Their Eyes Were Watching God Abbey Crowley 10th Grade

The 1930s: a pivotal point in the birth of literary modernism. After Sigmund Freud’s publication of studies of human emotion through psychoanalysis in the early 1900s, writing was forever changed. Authors added masks of character development...

Women’s Empowerment: Their Eyes Were Watching God and Love Medicine Anonymous College

In the novels Their Eyes Were Watching God and Love Medicine , Hurston and Erdrich (respectively) use the characterization of the women to promote women’s empowerment and self-fulfillment. Lulu can be seen within Erdrich’s work as the...

Nanny, Leafy, and Strength over Slavery in Their Eyes Were Watching God Anonymous College

Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God follows Janie Crawford’s journey through three marriages and her search for freedom, independence, and love through black womanhood in the 20th century. In the beginning of the novel, Hurston,...

Hurston and Her Novel's Critics: Racism, the Harlem Renaissance, and the Disputed Merits of The Eyes Were Watching God Rochelle Ann Maloney College

“The sensory sweep of her novel carries no theme, no message, no thought. In the main, her novel is not addressed to the Negro, but to a white audience whose chauvinistic tastes she knows how to satisfy” – Richard Wright.

Although Zora Neale...

Sore Must Be The Storm That Could Abash the Little Bird': Janie’s Perseverance in Their Eyes Were Watching God Anonymous College

The novel Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neal Hurston is known for being a prominent piece of feminist literature. It is full of recurring symbols and metaphors, which Hurston uses as an outlet to express her most important messages. She...

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• > New Essays on Their Eyes Were Watching God
• > Introduction

Book contents

• Frontmatter
• Series Editor's Preface
• 1 Introduction
• 2 The Personal Dimension in Their Eyes Were Watching God
• 3 “Crayon Enlargements of Life”: Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God as Autobiography
• 4 The Politics of Fiction, Anthropology, and the Folk: Zora Neale Hurston
• 5 Power, Judgment, and Narrative in a Work of Zora Neale Hurston: Feminist Cultural Studies
• Notes on Contributors
• Selected Bibliography

1 - Introduction

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 March 2011

IN Dust Tracks on a Road, an autobiography written at the urging of her editor, Bertram Lippincott, Zora Neale Hurston expresses some dissatisfaction with her second novel, Their Eyes Were Watch ing God, which was published in 1937. She says of the novel:

I wrote “Their Eyes Were Watching God” in Haiti. It was dammed up in me, and I wrote it under internal pressure in seven weeks. I wish that I could write it again. In fact, I regret all of my books. It is one of the tragedies of life that one cannot have all the wisdom one is ever to possess in the beginning. Perhaps, it is just as well to be rash and foolish for a while. If writers were too wise, perhaps no books would be written at all. It might be better to ask yourself “Why?” afterwards than before.

Hurston voices the frustrations of an artist brought up in an oral culture like that of her birthplace, Eatonville, Florida, a source of inspiration throughout her writing career and, as she informs us on her autobiography's first page, the first black community in America “to be incorporated, the first attempt at organized self-government on the part of Negroes in America.” In Eatonville, as Hurston writes in Their Eyes Were Watching God, storytellers sat on the porch of Mayor Joe Clarke's (Starks's in the novel) store and “passed around pictures of their thoughts for the others to look at and see” (48).

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• Introduction
• By Michael Awkward
• Edited by Michael Awkward
• Book: New Essays on Their Eyes Were Watching God
• Online publication: 01 March 2011
• Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511570346.002

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84 Their Eyes Were Watching God Essay Topic Ideas & Examples

🏆 best their eyes were watching god topic ideas & essay examples, 📌 most interesting their eyes were watching god topics to write about, 👍 good research topics about their eyes were watching god, ❓ their eyes were watching god essay questions.

• Tea Cake and Janie in Their Eyes Were Watching God – an Integral Character The role of Tea Cake remains to be crucial in the story as well as in the whole life of Janie as his passion, creativity, and desire to create the best living conditions promote safety […]
• Jody Sparks in Hurston’s “Their Eyes Were Watching God” Joe’s entry into Janie’s life is at an appropriate moment, since Janie is on the verge of breaking up with her former husband due to mistreatment, and Joe creates the opportunity that Janie has been […]
• Zora Neale Hurston: Their Eyes Were Watching God One of the peculiar features of the work is the form chosen by the author. Just like a mule, Janie is forced to work in the field with her husband.
• Review of “Their Eyes Were Watching God” Book The paper will discuss how Hurston exemplifies the Harlem movement in her book.’Their Eyes Were Watching God is an award-winning novel first published in the late 1930s and is considered one of the classics of […]
• Identity in Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God In the story, the author offered a comprehensive discussion of identity, its elements, importance, and relation to modernism. These two elements contribute to the fact that a person has a particular position in society, and […]
• Janie’s Search for Her Freedom and Independence in Their Eyes Were Watching God by Z. N. Hurston Though Janie does not feel her duty to clear out herself, she explains the story of her life to her friend. The reader observes the development of Janie’s character and the changes in her attitude […]
• African American Studies. “Their Eyes Were Watching God” by Hurston Janie’s appreciation of her independence is depicted when she refuses to be bound to Logan for the rest of her life because of material things.
• “Their Eyes Were Watching God” by Zora N. Hurston When Janie decides to move in with Tea Cake, she secretly conceals two hundred dollars in her shirt pocket, and fears to reveal the secret to Tea Cake. Tea Cake’s role in the novel is […]
• The Life of Zora Neale Hurston As Hurston later glorifies in her literary works, the town was the first to offer African Americans the chance to live freely and independent of the Whites, as they desired.
• One Woman’s Search for her Self-Identity. A Review of Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston Janie’s maturity of voice is a direct indicator of her inner growth, and the activities at the courtroom may be plotted too much as to draw the parallels in her inner self.
• The Use of Symbolism and Metaphors in “Their Eyes Were Watching God” by Zora Hurston
• The Use of Silence to Gain Power, and Power to Gain Voice in “Their Eyes Were Watching God” by Zora Neale Hurston
• True Love in “Their Eyes Were Watching God” by Zora Neale Hurston
• The Transformation of Janie in “Their Eyes Were Watching God” by Zora Neale Hurston
• The Significance of the Blue Dress in Hurston’s “Their Eyes Were Watching God” and “Seraph on the Suwa”
• The Struggle for Fulfillment in “Their Eyes Were Watching God” by Zora Neale Hurston
• Woman’s Search for Identity in Hurston’s “Seraph on the Suwanee” and “Their Eyes Were Watching God”
• The Sentiment of Oprah, Not Hurston in “Their Eyes Were Watching God”
• The Love and Relationship Dynamic in “Their Eyes Were Watching God” by Zora Neale Hurston
• The Life of American Women in Zora Neale Hurston’s “Their Eyes Were Watching God”
• The Dilemma of Control in “Their Eyes Were Watching God” and “Stranger in a Strange Land”
• The Life and Education of Zora Neale Hurston and Her Literary Work “Their Eyes Were Watching God”
• The Theme of the Individuality and Strength of Women in “Their Eyes Were Watching God” and “The Woman Warrior”
• What It Was Like to Live as a Black Woman in Zora Neale Hurston’s “Their Eyes Were Watching God”
• The Harlem Renaissance in “Their Eyes Were Watching God” by Zora Neale Hurston
• The Use of Motifs of Settings, Language, and Symbols in “Their Eyes Were Watching God” by Zora Neale Hurston
• The Problem of the Female: Marriage and “Sistergirl” Relationships in Zora Neale Hurston’s “Their Eyes Were Watching God”
• The Use of Southern Language and Dialect in “Their Eyes Were Watching God”
• The Unimportance of Riches in a Relationship, Portrayed in Zora Neale Hurston’s “Their Eyes Were Watching God”
• The Literary Symbols of Racial Health in “Their Eyes Were Watching God” by Zora Neale Hurston
• The Meaning of Love and Marriage in “Their Eyes Were Watching God” by Zora Neale Hurston
• The Issue of Domestic Violence in Zora Neale Hurston’s Novel “Their Eyes Were Watching God”
• The Three Marriages and Three Lessons in Hurston’s Book “Their Eyes Were Watching God”
• Voice and Language in “Their Eyes Were Watching God”
• The Role of Female as Explored in “The House of Mirth” and “Their Eyes Were Watching God”
• The Discrimination of Blacks by Whites in the Novel “Their Eyes Were Watching God” by Zora Neale Hurston
• Zora Hurston’s “Their Eyes Were Watching God” as a Creation Story
• The Depiction of Marriage in “Their Eyes Were Watching God” by Zora Neale Hurston
• Tone Analysis From a Passage in “Their Eyes Were Watching God” by Zora Neale Hurston
• The Concept of Idea in “Their Eyes Were Watching God” by Zora Neale Hurston
• The Value of Silence in “Their Eyes Were Watching God”
• The Maturity of Janie Through Her Marriage to Logan Killicks in “Their Eyes Were Watching God”
• The Use of Clothing in the Novel “Their Eyes Were Watching God” by Zora Neale Hurston
• The Theme of Friendship in Hurston’s “Their Eyes Were Watching God”
• Universal Themes of Womanhood Nora Zeale Hurston’s “Their Eyes Were Watching God”
• Women’s Inferiority to Men in “Their Eyes Were Watching God”
• Use of Metaphors in “Their Eyes Were Watching God” by Zora Hurston
• The Effects of Attitudes in “Their Eyes Were Watching God” by Zora Neale Hurston
• The Human Nature’s Quest for Happiness in “Their Eyes Were Watching God” by Zora Neale Hurston
• Wright’s Critiques on Hurston’s “Their Eyes Were Watching God”
• The Need for Power and Recognition of Joe in “Their Eyes Were Watching God” by Zora Neale Hurston
• The Imagery of Creation Myths in “Their Eyes Were Watching God” by Zora Neale Hurston
• Using Vernacular to Reflect Self Image in Zora Neale Hurston’s “Their Eyes Were Watching God”
• In What Ways Does Janie Violate Typical Gender Boundaries in “Their Eyes Were Watching God”?
• How Does Janie Develop Her Ideas of Love in “Their Eyes Were Watching God”?
• Why Do People Today Love “Their Eyes Were Watching God”?
• How Does Love Influence Our Lives in the Story of “Their Eyes Were Watching God”?
• What Are Traditional Stereotypes of Men and Women in “Their Eyes Were Watching God”?
• In What Ways Does Janie Fit the Typical Feminine Stereotype in “Their Eyes Were Watching God”?
• Is “Their Eyes Were Watching God” Primarily an Anti-Racism Novel?
• How Does Janie’s Identity Vacillate Between White and Black Factions in “Their Eyes Were Watching God”?
• To What Extent Is Janie’s Life Already Determined at Birth in “Their Eyes Were Watching God”?
• How Did Slaves’ Positions as a Sub-Class, Those Not Considered Human at All, Affect Nanny’s Outlook on Life?
• Does Joe Succeed in Achieving His Goals in “Their Eyes Were Watching God”?
• Why Does Janie Feel So Trapped in Her First Two Marriages in “Their Eyes Were Watching God”?
• How Is Race Generally Linked to Class in “Their Eyes Were Watching God”?
• Why Is Janie Happy Living With the Lowest of the Low Social Classes – The Migrant Workers in the Everglades?
• What Is the Significance of the Title “Their Eyes Were Watching God” to the Novel?
• Does Tea Cake Free Janie or Is It Just the Escape From Her First Two Husbands in “Their Eyes Were Watching God”?
• Why Did Hurston Include Mrs. Turner in “Their Eyes Were Watching God”?
• How Is Death Associated With Freedom, Especially in Janie’s Last Two Marriages in “Their Eyes Were Watching God”?
• What Does the Idea of the Horizon Symbolize for Janie in “Their Eyes Were Watching God”?
• How Does Janie’s Experience Under the Pear Tree Set Up Her Dreams in “Their Eyes Were Watching God”?
• What Role Does Mrs. Turner Play in “Their Eyes Were Watching God”?
• How Do Janie’s Visions and Hopes for Her Future Differ From the Hopes of Her Peers in “Their Eyes Were Watching God”?
• What Is the Role of the Porch Sitters in “Their Eyes Were Watching God”?
• How Does the Mule’s Treatment in Eatonville Reflect the Condition of the Black Female in “Their Eyes Were Watching God”?
• Is There a Moral in the Novel “Their Eyes Were Watching God”?
• How Does the Porch Work as a Personified Symbol in “Their Eyes Were Watching God”?
• Is Nanny a Sympathetic Character in “Their Eyes Were Watching God”?
• At What Point Does the Division Between Men’s Activities and Women’s Activities Break Down in “Their Eyes Were Watching God”?
• Who Does the Pronoun in the Title Refer to in “Their Eyes Were Watching God”?
• Is Hurston’s Vision of God Religious or Secular in “Their Eyes Were Watching God”?
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Home — Essay Samples — Literature — Their Eyes Were Watching God — The Theme of Love Versus Independence in Their Eyes Were Watching God

The Theme of Love Versus Independence in Their Eyes Were Watching God

• Categories: Their Eyes Were Watching God

About this sample

Words: 1397 |

Published: Jun 29, 2018

Words: 1397 | Pages: 3 | 7 min read

Table of contents

Figuring out what love is, final thoughts, works cited.

• Bloom, H. (Ed.). (2008). Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God. Infobase Publishing.
• Hemenway, R. E. (Ed.). (1977). Zora Neale Hurston: A Literary Biography. University of Illinois Press.
• Hurston, Z. N. (2006). Their Eyes Were Watching God. Harper Perennial Modern Classics.
• Karanja, V. W. (1996). Voice and Vision in Their Eyes Were Watching God. CLA Journal, 39(3), 367-381.
• Lauter, P., Alberti, J., Gura, P. F., Kornbluh, M., & Wallace, D. R. (Eds.). (2013). The Heath Anthology of American Literature, Vol. E: Contemporary Period (1945 to Present). Cengage Learning.
• Leflore, N. M. (2018). I’se Regusted, Say’s I: Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God as a Foundation for Black Women’s Agency. Studies in the Novel, 50(3), 353-368.
• Lowe, J. (1996). Alice Walker, Zora Neale Hurston, and the Odyssey of Self-Discovery. African American Review, 30(4), 631-643.
• Neal, L. (1997). Zora Neale Hurston and the Black Female Literary Tradition. Indiana University Press.
• Patel, P. R. (2015). Representation of Gender and Race in Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God. International Journal of Applied Research, 1(11), 99-104.
• Wall, C. A. (1999). Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God: Black Novel of Sexism. The Southern Literary Journal, 31(2), 47-61.

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Hurston, Zora Neale. Their Eyes Were Watching God. Harper Perennial Modern Classics, 2006.

Their Eyes Were Watching God is a novel written by Zora Neale Hurston and published in 1937. Set in the early 20th century, the novel tells the story of Janie Crawford, an African American woman on a quest for self-discovery and [...]

When first published in 1937, Hurston’s novel about a black woman’s journey for self-independence was denounced by male critics. However, the triumphant return of Their Eyes Were Watching God in 1978 enlightened the minds of [...]

From the very beginning of literature, dreams have been a recurring theme, symbolizing hope, desires, and aspirations. Zora Neale Hurston, in her renowned novel "Their Eyes Were Watching God," masterfully juxtaposes different [...]

“Somebody got to think for women and chillum and chickens and cows. I god, they sho don’t think none theirselves.” a Feminist reading from Zora Neale HurstonTheir Eyes Were Watching God is a novel written by Zora Neale Hurston [...]

When Nanny tells her young, naïve granddaughter Janie Crawford, “de nigger woman is de mule uh de world so fur as Ah can see,” (14) she is merely setting the stage for a number of connections between humans and animals that [...]

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S18 Tuesday and Thursday 2-3:15 p.m.

Jodi Andrews

In this composition class, students will critically analyze essays about food, food systems and environments, food cultures, the intersections of personal choice, market forces and policy and the values underneath these forces. Students will learn to better read like writers, noting authors’ purpose, audience organizational moves, sentence-level punctuation and diction. We will read a variety of essays including research-intensive arguments and personal narratives which intersect with one of our most primal needs as humans: food consumption. Students will rhetorically analyze texts, conduct advanced research, reflect on the writing process and write essays utilizing intentional rhetorical strategies. Through doing this work, students will practice the writing moves valued in every discipline: argument, evidence, concision, engaging prose and the essential research skills for the 21st century.

ENGL 221.S01 British Literature I

Michael S. Nagy

English 221 is a survey of early British literature from its inception in the Old English period with works such as "Beowulf" and the “Battle of Maldon,” through the Middle Ages and the incomparable writings of Geoffrey Chaucer and the Gawain - poet, to the Renaissance and beyond. Students will explore the historical and cultural contexts in which all assigned reading materials were written, and they will bring that information to bear on class discussion. Likely themes that this class will cover include heroism, humor, honor, religion, heresy and moral relativity. Students will write one research paper in this class and sit for two formal exams: a midterm covering everything up to that point in the semester, and a comprehensive final. Probable texts include the following:

• The Norton Anthology of English Literature: The Middle Ages. Ed. Alfred David, M. H. Abrams, and Stephen Greenblatt. 9th ed. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2012.
• The Norton Anthology of English Literature: The Sixteenth Century and Early Seventeenth Century. Ed. George M. Logan, Stephen Greenblatt, Barbara K Lewalski, and M. H. Abrams. 9th ed. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2012.
• The Norton Anthology of English Literature: The Restoration and the Eighteenth Century. Ed. George M. Logan, Stephen Greenblatt, Barbara K Lewalski, and M. H. Abrams. 9th ed. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2012.
• Gibaldi, Joseph. The MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers. 6th ed. New York: The Modern Language Association of America, 2003.
• Any Standard College Dictionary.

ENGL 240.S01 Juvenile Literature Elementary-5th Grade

Monday, Wednesday and Friday noon-12:50 p.m.

April Myrick

A survey of the history of literature written for children and adolescents, and a consideration of the various types of juvenile literature. Text selection will focus on the themes of imagination and breaking boundaries.

ENGL 240.ST1 Juvenile Literature Elementary-5th Grade

Randi Anderson

In English 240 students will develop the skills to interpret and evaluate various genres of literature for juvenile readers. This particular section will focus on various works of literature at approximately the K-5 grade level. We will read a large range of works that fall into this category, as well as information on the history, development and genre of juvenile literature.

Readings for this course include classical works such as "Hatchet," "Little Women", "The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe" and "Brown Girl Dreaming," as well as newer works like "Storm in the Barn," "Anne Frank’s Diary: A Graphic Adaptation," "Lumberjanes," and a variety of picture books. These readings will be paired with chapters from "Reading Children’s Literature: A Critical Introduction " to help develop understanding of various genres, themes and concepts that are both related to juvenile literature and also present in our readings.

In addition to exposing students to various genres of writing (poetry, historical fiction, non-fiction, fantasy, picture books, graphic novels, etc.) this course will also allow students to engage in a discussion of larger themes present in these works such as censorship, race and gender. Students’ understanding of these works and concepts will be developed through readings, research, discussion posts, exams and writing assignments designed to get students to practice analyzing poetry, picture books, informational books and transitional/easy readers.

ENGL 241.S01: American Literature I

Tuesday and Thursday 12:30-1:45 p.m.

This course provides a broad, historical survey of American literature from the early colonial period to the Civil War. Ranging across historical periods and literary genres—including early accounts of contact and discovery, narratives of captivity and slavery, poetry of revolution, essays on gender equality and stories of industrial exploitation—this class examines how subjects such as colonialism, nationhood, religion, slavery, westward expansion, race, gender and democracy continue to influence how Americans see themselves and their society.

Required Texts

• The Norton Anthology of American Literature: Package 1, Volumes A and B Beginnings to 1865, Ninth Edition. (ISBN 978-0-393-26454-8)

ENGL 283.S01 Introduction to Creative Writing

Steven Wingate

Students will explore the various forms of creative writing (fiction, nonfiction and poetry) not one at a time in a survey format—as if there were decisive walls of separation between then—but as intensely related genres that share much of their creative DNA. Through close reading and work on personal texts, students will address the decisions that writers in any genre must face on voice, rhetorical position, relationship to audience, etc. Students will produce and revise portfolios of original creative work developed from prompts and research. This course fulfills the same SGR #2 requirements ENGL 201; note that the course will involve a research project. Successful completion of ENGL 101 (including by test or dual credit) is a prerequisite.

ENGL 283.S02 Introduction to Creative Writing

Jodilyn Andrews

This course introduces students to the craft of writing, with readings and practice in at least two genres (including fiction, poetry and drama).

ENGL 283.ST1 Introduction to Creative Writing

Amber Jensen, M.A., M.F.A.

This course explores creative writing as a way of encountering the world, research as a component of the creative writing process, elements of craft and their rhetorical effect and drafting, workshop and revision as integral parts of writing polished literary creative work. Student writers will engage in the research practices that inform the writing of literature and in the composing strategies and writing process writers use to create literary texts. Through their reading and writing of fiction, poetry and creative nonfiction, students will learn about craft elements, find examples of those craft elements in published works and apply these elements in their own creative work, developed through weekly writing activities, small group and large group workshop and conferences with the instructor. Work will be submitted, along with a learning reflection and revision plan in each genre and will then be revised and submitted as a final portfolio at the end of the semester to demonstrate continued growth in the creation of polished literary writing.

• 300-400 level

ENGL 424.S01 Language Arts Methods grades 7-12  

Tuesday 6-8:50 p.m.

Danielle Harms

Techniques, materials and resources for teaching English language and literature to middle and secondary school students. Required of students in the English education option.

AIS/ENGL 447.S01: American Indian Literature of the Present 

Thursdays 3-6 p.m.

This course introduces students to contemporary works by authors from various Indigenous nations. Students examine these works to enhance their historical understanding of Indigenous peoples, discover the variety of literary forms used by those who identify as Indigenous writers, and consider the cultural and political significance of these varieties of expression. Topics and questions to be explored include:

• Genre: What makes Indigenous literature indigenous?
• Political and Cultural Sovereignty: Why have an emphasis on tribal specificity and calls for “literary separatism” emerged in recent decades, and what are some of the critical conversations surrounding such particularized perspectives?
• Gender and Sexuality: What are the intersecting concerns of Indigenous Studies and Women, Gender and Sexuality Studies, and how might these research fields inform one another?
• Trans-Indigeneity: What might we learn by comparing works across different Indigenous traditions, and what challenges do such comparisons present?
• Aesthetics: How do Indigenous writers understand the dynamics between tradition and creativity?
• Visual Forms: What questions or concerns do visual representations (television and film) by or about Indigenous peoples present?

Possible Texts

• Akiwenzie-Damm, Kateri and Josie Douglas (eds), Skins: Contemporary Indigenous Writing. IAD Press, 2000. (978-1864650327)
• Erdrich, Louise, The Sentence. Harper, 2021 (978-0062671127)
• Harjo, Joy, Poet Warrior: A Memoir. Norton, 2021 (978-0393248524)
• Harjo, Sterlin and Taika Waititi, Reservation Dogs (selected episodes)
• Talty, Morgan. Night of the Living Rez, 2022, Tin House (978-1953534187)
• Wall Kimmerer, Robin. Braiding Sweet Grass, Milkweed Editions (978-1571313560)
• Wilson, Diane. The Seed Keeper: A Novel. Milkweed Editions (978-1571311375)
• Critical essays by Alexie, Allen, Cohen, Cox, King, Kroeber, Ortiz, Piatote, Ross and Sexton, Smith, Taylor, Teuton, Treuer, Vizenor, and Womack.

ENGL 472.S01: Film Criticism

Tuesdays 2-4:50 p.m.

Jason McEntee

Do you have an appreciation for, and enjoy watching, movies? Do you want to study movies in a genre-oriented format (such as those we typically call the Western, the screwball comedy, the science fiction or the crime/gangster, to name a few)? Do you want to explore the different critical approaches for talking and writing about movies (such as auteur, feminist, genre or reception)?

In this class, you will examine movies through viewing and defining different genres while, at the same time, studying and utilizing different styles of film criticism. You will share your discoveries in both class discussions and short writings. The final project will be a formal written piece of film criticism based on our work throughout the semester. The course satisfies requirements and electives for all English majors and minors, including both the Film Studies and Professional Writing minors. (Note: Viewing of movies outside of class required and may require rental and/or streaming service fees.)

ENGL 476.ST1: Fiction

In this workshop-based creative writing course, students will develop original fiction based on strong attention to the fundamentals of literary storytelling: full-bodied characters, robust story lines, palpable environments and unique voices. We will pay particular attention to process awareness, to the integrity of the sentence, and to authors' commitments to their characters and the places in which their stories unfold. Some workshop experience is helpful, as student peer critique will be an important element of the class.

ENGL 479.01 Capstone: The Gothic

Wednesday 3-5:50 p.m.

With the publication of Horace Walpole’s "The Castle of Otranto " in 1764, the Gothic officially came into being. Dark tales of physical violence and psychological terror, the Gothic incorporates elements such as distressed heroes and heroines pursued by tyrannical villains; gloomy estates with dark corridors, secret passageways and mysterious chambers; haunting dreams, troubling prophecies and disturbing premonitions; abduction, imprisonment and murder; and a varied assortment of corpses, apparitions and “monsters.” In this course, we will trace the development of Gothic literature—and some film—from the eighteenth-century to the present time. As we do so, we will consider how the Gothic engages philosophical beliefs about the beautiful and sublime; shapes psychological understandings of human beings’ encounters with horror, terror, the fantastic and the uncanny; and intervenes in the social and historical contexts in which it was written. We’ll consider, for example, how the Gothic undermines ideals related to domesticity and marriage through representations of domestic abuse, toxicity and gaslighting. In addition, we’ll discuss Gothic texts that center the injustices of slavery and racism. As many Gothic texts suggest, the true horrors of human existence often have less to do with inexplicable supernatural phenomena than with the realities of the world in which we live. 

ENGL 485.S01: Undergraduate Writing Center Learning Assistants 

Flexible Scheduling

Nathan Serfling

Since their beginnings in the 1920s and 30s, writing centers have come to serve numerous functions: as hubs for writing across the curriculum initiatives, sites to develop and deliver workshops and resource centers for faculty as well as students, among other functions. But the primary function of writing centers has necessarily and rightfully remained the tutoring of student writers. This course will immerse you in that function in two parts. During the first four weeks, you will explore writing center praxis—that is, the dialogic interplay of theory and practice related to writing center work. This part of the course will orient you to writing center history, key theoretical tenets and practical aspects of writing center tutoring. Once we have developed and practiced this foundation, you will begin work in the writing center as a tutor, responsible for assisting a wide variety of student clients with numerous writing tasks. Through this work, you will learn to actively engage with student clients in the revision of a text, respond to different student needs and abilities, work with a variety of writing tasks and rhetorical situations, and develop a richer sense of writing as a complex and negotiated social process.

Graduate Courses

Engl 572.s01: film criticism, engl 576.st1 fiction.

In this workshop-based creative writing course, students will develop original fiction based on strong attention to the fundamentals of literary storytelling: full-bodied characters, robust story lines, palpable environments and unique voices. We will pay particular attention to process awareness, to the integrity of the sentence and to authors' commitments to their characters and the places in which their stories unfold. Some workshop experience is helpful, as student peer critique will be an important element of the class.

ENGL 605.S01 Seminar in Teaching Composition

Thursdays 1-3:50 p.m.

This course will provide you with a foundation in the pedagogies and theories (and their attendant histories) of writing instruction, a foundation that will prepare you to teach your own writing courses at SDSU and elsewhere. As you will discover through our course, though, writing instruction does not come with any prescribed set of “best” practices. Rather, writing pedagogies stem from and continue to evolve because of various and largely unsettled conversations about what constitutes effective writing and effective writing instruction. Part of becoming a practicing writing instructor, then, is studying these conversations to develop a sense of what “good writing” and “effective writing instruction” might mean for you in our particular program and how you might adapt that understanding to different programs and contexts.

As we read about, discuss and research writing instruction, we will address a variety of practical and theoretical topics. The practical focus will allow us to attend to topics relevant to your immediate classroom practices: designing a curriculum and various types of assignments, delivering the course content and assessing student work, among others. Our theoretical topics will begin to reveal the underpinnings of these various practical matters, including their historical, rhetorical, social and political contexts. In other words, we will investigate the praxis—the dialogic interaction of practice and theory—of writing pedagogy. As a result, this course aims to prepare you not only as a writing teacher but also as a nascent writing studies/writing pedagogy scholar.

At the end of this course, you should be able to engage effectively in the classroom practices described above and participate in academic conversations about writing pedagogy, both orally and in writing. Assessment of these outcomes will be based primarily on the various writing assignments you submit and to a smaller degree on your participation in class discussions and activities.

ENGL 726.S01: The New Woman, 1880–1900s 

Thursdays 3–5:50 p.m.

Katherine Malone

This course explores the rise of the New Woman at the end of the nineteenth century. The label New Woman referred to independent women who rebelled against social conventions. Often depicted riding bicycles, smoking cigarettes and wearing masculine clothing, these early feminists challenged gender roles and sought broader opportunities for women’s employment and self-determination. We will read provocative fiction and nonfiction by New Women writers and their critics, including authors such as Sarah Grand, Mona Caird, George Egerton, Amy Levy, Ella Hepworth Dixon, Grant Allen and George Gissing. We will analyze these exciting texts through a range of critical lenses and within the historical context of imperialism, scientific and technological innovation, the growth of the periodical press and discourse about race, class and gender. In addition to writing an argumentative seminar paper, students will complete short research assignments and lead discussion.

ENGL 792.ST1 Women in War: Female Authors and Characters in Contemporary War Lit

In this course, we will explore the voices of female authors and characters in contemporary literature of war. Drawing from various literary theories, our readings and discussion will explore the contributions of these voices to the evolving literature of war through archetypal and feminist criticism. We will read a variety of short works (both theoretical and creative) and complete works such as (selections subject to change): "Eyes Right" by Tracy Crow, "Plenty of Time When We Get Home" by Kayla Williams, "You Know When the Men are Gone" by Siobhan Fallon, "Still, Come Home" by Katie Schultz and "The Fine Art of Camouflage" by Lauren Johnson.