Readings

Each collaboratively written reading will be at least 500 words, wherein you must

1) use specific, textual evidence from the narrative being read (not included in the 500 word count)

2) apply the method, which means you must employ the specialized vocabulary of the method, and present the carefully crafted statements that disclose the meaning of that specialized vocabulary as you apply the method to the text (that is, to the specific textual evidence you are working with)

Your reading group will provide you with a working structure to help you deepen your understanding of each method you are practicing in this course. Each reading you compose collaboratively provides you with an opportunity to present what you have read in the light of a given method, and to share the challenges you have undergone practicing a given reading method.

Each collaboratively written reading should be at least 500 words, and ought to include:

--specific textual details from the selected text (not included in the 500 word count quotations from the text);

--specific terms and definitions from the method at hand for that reading.

Each reading group will ideally consist of four students. Each group member is expected to strive to support the others in keeping and honoring each other's word in the matter of:

1) reading the works on the group reading list in a timely manner;
2) collaborating in the composition of each reading.

Composing a Reading

Each student within a reading group is responsible for writing one of four engaging, thoughtful, and even provocative readings for each book. However, each student must write using a different method for each of the four readings they will write.

So, given that there are four readings for each of our four books, let's say that Sinclair writes the first reading for the first book (the first book that I have assigned you to read), Kromer writes the second reading, Pistorius writes the third, and Beatrice writes the fourth.

Then when they begin to read the second book, Kromer writes the first reading, Pistorius the second, Beatrice the third, and Sinclair the fourth.

For the third book Pistorius writes the first reading, Beatrice the second, Sinclair the third, and Kromer the fourth.

For the fourth book, Beatrice writes the first, Sinclair the second, Kromer the third, and Pistorius the fourth.

You may include external links and images/videos that are appropriate for the discussion you are having.

Book 1: A1, B2, C3, D4

Book 2: B1, C2, D3, A4

Book 3: C1, D2, A3, B4

Book 4: D1, A2, B3, C4

The first reading (reading for mimesis and theme)

In this reading you will share your initial reading experience that should derive from at least the first half of the book, focusing on the method presented by McKee to determine possible premises, and the controlling and counter ideas that structure the conflict of the narrative.

In the first reading you will use specific textual evidence to:

Introduce the text, sharing what you were seeking to discover/learn about reading/writing by reading this particular work; that is, share what issues concerning how you "read for" are at stake in this reading;
Share what you have determined to be the premise of the narrative (the question that the narrative is responding to in some way--see McKee), sharing the process by which you uncovered this premise (perhaps sharing several possible premises, weighing each until you find the best fit);
Provide a summary of the narrative, which must include workable expressions of the controlling and counter ideas as far as you can tell what they might be (for how to locate the controlling idea (and counter idea) in a narrative and how to write each out as a complete sentence--see McKee pages 114-117);
Include a preliminary graph of the text to help begin to articulate how the controlling and counter ideas appear to structure the conflict of the narrative;
If you have not completed reading the text, speculate where you project the narrative is going based on what you have already read,
and share discoveries and insights that have occurred in the process of composing the reading.

Texts associated with this method include, primarily McKee, and secondarily Culler.

The second reading (close-reading for genre and the synthetic register)

For the second reading, you will move away from reading the text at the mimetic and thematic registers. That is, rather than reading for the sheer experience of the aesthetic emotion a text is meant for you to experience (reading for the "deep meaning" as given for us to experience by the controlling idea of the narrative in conflict with the counter idea), you are to grapple with the synthetic register by looking carefully at surprising details in the text that might diverge from the genre the narrative participates in.

You are to inquire into: If you were to "speak back" to the text (after the first reading), what would you say? What questions do you have for it? What is the text bringing you to experience and think/project about, especially to the degree it participates in a particular genre and/or challenges generic expectations?

In this reading you should attempt to identify the genre--the context and purpose of the value that controls or governs that genre--so that you can reveal what surprising elements in the text might challenge conventional expectations and significances. Keep in mind that generic expectations are what Gallop calls "projections."

Normally, we read in such a way that ignores surprising elements in the text, elements that challenge generic expectations, but when we attend to those surprising elements, we notice our projections and can begin to challenge them. This is precisely what you are to do in this reading! And by challenging your customary projections, you may in fact transform your rhetorical stance in some way. Share that in the reading!

In this second reading you will use specific textual evidence to:

summarize the main idea of the text (the controlling and counter ideas from the last act's climax);
present the genre the text participates in, sharing the patterns the genre brings readers to expect in the text: what is the controlling value that shapes the genre? What are the substantive and stylistic features that make up the genre?
read closely a sequence (or a pattern of sequences) of the narrative to reveal details we ordinarily overlook, which will allow you to explore at least one of the following codes in the narrative:

the semic code
the hermeneutic code
the proairetic code

You may complete and share in the reading a value graph of a portion of the text--this is different from graphing the narrative structure for the first reading. This is a tool that can aide you in discovering and applying the codes at work in the text.

Please see Silverman, pages 250 to 270 of Chapter 6, for an explication of these codes, which are also introduced in the conversation concerning intertextuality, which you will write about in the third reading. See Mamet and Butler for approaches that use primarily the proairetic code.

you might also explore how rhetorical figures of speech and thought (tropes and schemes) are at work in the text of the narrative. Please see Register,
and share discoveries and insights that have occurred in the process of composing the reading.

Texts associated with this method include Gallop, and Silverman. Mamet and Butler provide methodological approaches that employ the semic, hermeneutic, and especially the proairetic codes.

The third reading (close-reading for intertextuality)

The third reading requires you to explore what is called intertextuality, that is, how the text participates in the symbolic and cultural codes that shape the text and that shape who we are as readers and writers. Your aim here is to build upon the work accomplished in the second reading (wherein the semic, hermeneutic, proairetic codes were examined) to now reveal the degree to which symbolic and cultural codes (networks of controlling values) are at work, wherein traces of other texts are embedded within the language, which in turn presuppose a multitude of other texts (the "intertext") and their values--see Silverman 270-283).

To accomplish writing this third reading, you will use specific textual evidence to:

unfold and reveal the symbolic and cultural codes building upon the work done in the second reading (working through either the semic, the hermeneutic, the proairetic codes, and in some cases, examining the use of rhetorical figures of speech and thought);
flesh out as many systems of oppositions that structure the text (the symbolic code),
articulate several different networks of controlling values that the text reinforces in the reader who fails to question the cultural code,
and share discoveries and insights that have occurred in the process of composing the reading.

Texts associated with this method: Silverman and Culler

The fourth reading (reading for the rhetorical dimension of narrative)

Here is where you attempt to distinguish the relationships between narrators and addressees you have found through your reading of the text. A "writerly" reading grants access to articulating how a narrator addresses an addressee, while at the same time disclosing clues to a capable reader.

In this fourth reading you will use specific textual evidence to:

demonstrate how the text works to interpellate an actual reader to become a submissive reader of the narrative, a reader who reinforces the "classic text";
identify the roles of narrator(s) and narratee(s) and the relationships between the two;
illustrate how the text allows for a submissive reader to break free from its submissive role, to resist and even critique the role the narrative assigns it to play;
explore what impact reading the rhetorical dimension of the narrative had on you as a reader (on how and what you "read for"),
and share discoveries and insights that have occurred in the process of composing the reading.

Texts associated with this method include Seitz,Rabinowitz, Phelan, and Culler.

Collaboration in composing each reading for the course

While there is always a lead writer for each reading, all group members are required to support the lead writer by supplying specific textual evidence and attempts to apply the method to that specific textual evidence.

In any case, you are to aim for your contributions to grapple with the theoretical concepts of the course (derived from the assigned readings/lectures, but dealing in some way with issues of audience, register, genre, and intertextuality), and challenge the lead writer to deepen and extend their reading using the method. There is so much each method promises to reveal, it is impossible for any single reading to cover everything. Therefore, you have to be willing for your contributions to be diminished or even set aside for the final version.

It is crucial that the lead writer preserve the "working draft" that indicates the group's contributions.

Assessment

The key criteria for evaluating these collaborative readings will involve measuring clear indications that each lead writer has fulfilled the directions, and has done complete work in a timely manner.