This course is all about the major elements that comprise specifically American versions of modern fiction. While stylistics and narrative form – such as Faulkner’s rupturing of narrative time in his work that, in turn, “ruptures” American realism – have informed class discussion, we have also discussed the discourses and contexts that have shaped American fiction in the 20th and 21st centuries.
In the first term, the class completed team blogs, in which various foundational discourses and mythologies were explored, such as the frontier myth and exceptionalism. In the second term, students are being given more latitude to choose assignments that suit their research interests. Many student have chosen the blog option, which offers the following topics for exploration:
The American Culture Industry
American Narrators
American Sexuality
American Postmodernism
War and Sacrifice
American Humor
Make-Your-Own-Topic (preferable choice, actually)
Here is a list of blogs-in-progress
