The English Blog
May 17, 2012
May 8, 2012
April 5, 2012
Fall 2012 - New Professor Devin Griffiths & New Courses
Assistant Professor Devin Griffiths joins the
Department of English Faculty - Fall 2012
Check out the new course concepts for ENGL 262 and ENGL 425.
English 262: The Literary Technologies of Memory, 1800-1950
Course Description:
Can books think? Can they remember? Our memory and our sense of the past is mediated by complicated neurological circuits, dispersed over millions of cells throughout the brain, generated through complex circuits of neurological impulse. And yet, when we are asked to describe our past, we tell simple stories and describe vivid scenes. This class will explore how literature shapes the stories we use to describe our selves, our past, and our environments. We will read a range of authors, from George Eliot and Charles Dickens, to Virginia Woolf and James Joyce, who explore how the mind works through imaginative fiction. A key focus of this course will be to examine how insights drawn from cognitive science, psychology and sociology can help us to understand the British novel as a technology of memory – a tool that teaches how to make sense of what happened and how to remember it.
Engl. 425: Victorian Radicalism
Course Description:
The Victorians were recast by the twentieth century as stifled radical conservatives, afraid of everything from sex to leggy furniture. But the Victorians lived in an age of rapid social and cultural shift – they advanced an earth-shattering theory of evolution, perfected the modern serial, and responded to waves of social revolution with radical reforms. Most importantly, they worked out how to incorporate political radicalism into civic life through an expanded franchise and stable print ecology that coordinated the radical, conservative and moderate press. This class will explore the literary, scientific, and religious radicalism of the Victorian period and consider how it has shaped political and popular culture today. A key component of the course will be to connect readings for the class to digital forums including major print publications and blogs. Coursework will include weekly online blogging assignments and a final critical research project.
Readings will include works by William Godwin, Wordsworth and Coleridge, Elizabeth Braddon, George Eliot, Elizabeth Gaskell, and George Gissing. Critical readings may include selections from Anne Cvetkovich, Hayden White, Judith Butler, Peter Bürger, Thomas Kuhn, Bruno Latour and Joanna Drucker.
March 30, 2012
NARRATIVE STUDIES courses offered in Fall 2012
Cat. 1 — Introduction to Narrative Media
COLT 101 — Masterpieces and Masterminds: Literature & Thought of the West
CTCS 190 — Introduction to Cinema
CTCS 191 — Introduction to Television and Video
CTIN 309 — Introduction to Interactive Entertainment
ENGL 261 — English Literature to 1800
ENGL 262 — English Literature Since 1800
ENGL 263 — American Literature
FACS 150 — Visual Culture and Literacy I
THTR 125 — Text Studies for Production
Cat. 2 — Writing and Narrative Forms
CTWR 412 — Introduction to Screenwriting, and
CTWR 415a — Advanced Writing
ENGL 303 — Introduction to Fiction Writing
ENGL 305 — Introduction to Creative Nonfiction
ENGL 405* — Fiction Writing
THTR 365 — Playwriting I
Cat. 3 — Popular Culture and Ethnicity
AMST 200 — Introduction to American Studies and Ethnicity
CTCS 393 — History of the American Film, 1946-1975
ENGL 392 — Visual and Popular Culture
HIST 380 — American Popular Culture
MUSC 400 — The Broadway Musical: Reflections of American Diversity, Issues and Experiences
MUSC 420 — Hip-Hop Music and Culture
MUSC 460 — Film Music: History and Function From 1930 to the Present
THTR 405 — Performing Identities
Cat. 4 — Narrative in Cross-Cultural Perspective
CTCS 200 — History of the International Cinema I
ENGL 445 — The Literatures of America: Cross-Cultural Perspectives
ITAL 446 — Italian Cinema and Society
THTR 211*** — Theory and Practice of World Theatre II
Cat. 5 — Western Narrative in Historical Perspective
ENGL 424* — English Literature of the Romantic Age (1780-1832)
ENGL 430 — Shakespeare
ENGL 440** — American Literature to 1865
SPAN 304 — Survey of Fiction (taught in Spanish)
THTR 301*** — Greek and Roman Theatre
Cat. 6 — Contemporary Fiction and Drama
COLT 420 — The Fantastic
ENGL 375 — Science Fiction
ENGL 463 — Contemporary Drama
*Prerequisite required
**Corequisite required
***Recommend preparation suggested
Senior Honors - Spring 2012
Join us for the Honors Presentations
Thursday, April 5, 2012
Taper Hall of Humanities, Room 420
Beginning at 2:00 PM
2:00, Daniel Rios
Thesis: “From Eden to Babel: Los Angeles Fiction and the Transnational Dialogics of Ethnicity”
Readers: Professors Thomas Gustafson and William Handley.
2:30, Alysha Owen
Thesis: “If the Glove Fits: The Martial versus the Marital Hand and the Importance of Hand Imagery in Shakespeare”
Readers: Professors Emily Anderson and Rebecca Lemon
3:00, Julia Cooperman
Thesis: “Vigilant Virgins and Matron Martyrs: Literary Representations of the Chaperone in Victorian and Edwardian Fiction”
Readers: Professors Kate Flint and James Kincaid
3:30, Aishlin Cortell
Thesis: Beastly Women and Womanly Beasts: Animals, Lesbians, and the Modern Subject in Djuna Barnes and Tanizaki Junichiro
Readers: Professors Joseph Boone and Akira Lippit
4:00, Jace Brittain
Thesis: “The Rest Is Schweigen: German Romantic Translations of Hamlet”
Readers: Professor David Lloyd and Dr. Ross Scimeca
February 21, 2012
February 13, 2012
February 10, 2012
CFP: Center for Feminist Research Seminar on the Politics of Popular Music
NEW DIRECTIONS IN FEMINIST SCHOLARSHIP
2012-13 Seminar Theme: “Gender, Race, Sexuality and the Politics of Popular Music”
Seminar Director: Professor Karen Tongson
Each year, USC Dornsife’s Center for Feminist Research sponsors an interdisciplinary research seminar broadly related to feminist topics, themes, or methods. The seminar’s theme in 2012-2013 is “Gender, Race, Sexuality and the Politics of Popular Music,” and will be directed by Professor Karen Tongson (English and Gender Studies). We are now inviting applications from USC faculty and advanced graduate students to become 2012-2013 New Directions Fellows.
Faculty fellows are awarded research stipends of $2500 and graduate student fellows receive $1000 to pursue their own research related to the seminar’s annual theme. The 2012-2013 seminar will bring together scholars, writers, and practitioners from a range of disciplines and schools at USC—from Dornsife, Annenberg, Thornton, and Lucas, among others—to explore critically the effects and affects of popular music in transnational and trans-regional contexts.
Seminar Description:
Popular music is catchy and crass, an infectious mass idiom that makes us dance, sing along, and purportedly abandon our cares. And yet for generations, across national and regional boundaries, popular music has also functioned as a barometer of dissent; as a call to rebellion, action and revolution for the disenfranchised. Historically, popular music has not only scored, but also incited transformative movements like national revolutions, as well as feminist, civil rights, and queer rebellions.
More recently, however, popular music has also been employed by oppressive regimes to subdue and subjugate so-called “enemy combatants,” and “agitators.” Listen, for example, to the heavy metal “blasts” used by the U.S. military during operations for the Gulf wars, or to the high-decibel sound devices used by local law enforcement to disperse protesters in the Occupy movement throughout the U.S., as well as in several recent uprisings throughout the globe. This seminar hopes to explore the full range of popular music’s political, aesthetic and affective incarnations, from its uses as a cultural imperialist medium, to its reclamation by communities for whom it may not be intended.
Scholars working on popular music, broadly defined, from within a range of historical periods, and employing different national, transnational and comparative frameworks are encouraged to apply. We are especially interested in approaches to popular music that take into account its relationship to other arts, disciplines and media formations.
Applicants should submit a CV of no more than four pages, and a two-page description of their ongoing or proposed research on gender, race, sexuality and popular music by March 14, 2012 to Rebecca Das: cfr@usc.edu. Next year’s Fellows will be announced by mid-April.
New Directions in Feminist Scholarship Seminars offer a setting where faculty and advanced graduate students pursuing related research can work intensively on their own ongoing projects in a collegial atmosphere that encourages productive experimentation and provides both intellectual and material support. During the course of the academic year, New Directions Fellows participate in a series of workshop sessions focused on the development and presentation of their own work. Fellows are expected to meet in seminar at least six times during the academic year. They are also expected to participate in related public seminar events.
February 8, 2012
Undergraduate Bulletin Board, February 2012 update
*** GRANT WRITING JOB OPPORTUNITY, HUNTINGTON BEACH ***
Spring 2012
The consulting firm Seliger + Associates, is seeking someone with unusually strong reading, writing, and editing skills, and that description might apply to English graduates. Below is our ad for a grant writing administrative assistance.
If you have any questions or comments, please feel free to reply to call me at 425.223.8484. Thanks very much for your help.
Jake Seliger
seligerj@seliger.com
The Story's Story -- http://jseliger.com
Grant Writing Confidential -- http://blog.seliger.com
425.223.8484
Job Description: Grant Writing Administrative Assistant
Employer: Seliger + Associates Grant Writing
Summary: Seliger + Associates Grant Writing seeks a Grant Writing Administrative Assistant to edit written proposals and other material, read Requests for Proposals (RFPs) for technical content, interact with clients, answer phones, prepare proposal submission packages, conduct
grant and grant source research, and perform other general office assignments and related duties.
Skills needed:
• Extremely strong writing and editing knowledge.
• The ability to read and synthesize material from complex documents. Most of your work at Seliger + Associates will entail reading and editing complex documents, working to prepare proposal submission packages, and communicating by phone and e-mail with clients or potential clients.
• The ability to read closely, extreme attention to detail, and the ability to focus on tasks.
• Knowledge of Microsoft Office and related computer software.
• The ability to conduct database research and organize research results.
Location: Huntington Beach, California, with the potential for partial telecommuting.
At-Will Position: Please note that this is an at-will position.
Required: B.A. in any field, especially one that imparts strong