Image adapted from "Bubbles" by @Doug88888 Creative Commons license.
How Writers Read: SyllabusThis sophomore-level course introduces students to theoretical methods of reading complex and sophisticated texts. Students will study theories of reading and writing that concern structure, register, genre, intertextuality, and rhetorical concerns. The course presents these theories and correlative methods through readings, and students then practice applying these methods during class discussions and in writing using a series of self-selected texts as the objects of study.
Prerequisite: College Composition II
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For Writing Arts majors:
How Writers Read may be taken instead of Tutoring Writing or Communication Theory as one of the required electives for the Writing Arts major.
How Writers Read counts toward the Creative Writing Minor or the CUGS in Creative Writing.
In you are a Writing Arts major, and you are minoring in Creative Writing, then it is possible to count How Writers Read toward that minor IF you already have taken Communication Theory or Tutoring Writing.
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Instructor: Dr. Drew Kopp
Office: 260 Victoria, 4th floor email: kopp[at]rowan[dot]edu |
Office Hours:
by appointment |
Class Participation
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Success in this course depends on each student
However, occasions for showing up, on time, and having done the work will occur both inside and outside class, especially regarding your reading group responsibilities. Consequently, I will assume that you will be prepared for class, on time, and offer productive, frequent, and meaningful discussion and feedback on both actual and virtual discussions. Key to performing at this level is having something at stake for yourself as a participant in and co-creator of the course. You will articulate what you have at stake in your reading list proposal. |
All work for the course will be presented within a small group collaborative blog set up through Wordpress |
Required Texts
Novel to be read by entire class as beginning of semester: Giovanni's Room, by James Baldwin
This website, especially the lectures, will serve as an electronic text book for the course. I highly recommend that you read and re-read each of the lectures to keep deepening your understanding of the theories we are putting into practice this semester.
I will supply you with the remainder of the required readings for the course, which will be available through Dropbox.
Your proposed reading list will comprise the remainder of the required texts for the course.
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I highly recommend Francine Prose's 2007 book Reading Like a Writer.
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Required Activities
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Using a collaborative Wordpress.com site, each student will generate an inventory and reflection of past readings (along with the range of genres and readerly roles you have played), which will then provide an occasion to propose a reading list that will drive the reading group discussions, the Annotated Bibliography, and the Final Reflection.
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Assignment Breakdown
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Reading Inventory
First practice blog post (Reading for; value graph; summary)
Second practice blog post (close-reading and genre)
Third practice blog post (Intertextual Codes)
Fourth practice blog post (Rhetoric of Narrative)
Blog Posts (1 for each book; 4 total)
Conversation (12 responses--3 per book)
Collaborative Annotated Bibliography and Final Reflection
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2%
5%
5%
2%
2%
2%
2%
36% (9% per blog)
24% (2% per response)
20%
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Grading
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To receive an A in this course, you must accumulate at least 900 points; for a B, 800 points; for a C, 700 points; and a D, 600 points. Please turn in all assignments, even if you believe they are poorly done. The difference between an E grade and 0 is that an E carries points toward the final point total and is assigned for something turned in, while a 0 carries no points and is assigned when no assignment is submitted.
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