ask questions.
think of answers.
see you tomorrow.
Wednesday, April 22, 2009
Final paper topics
You are welcome to devise your own topic, as long as you run it by me first.
Examine representations of memory and history in one or two of Charles Chesnutt’s tales. To what extent are the African-American characters the “keepers of memory” or “embodiment of history” in these stories? Are Uncle Julius’s tales personal memories or communal ones? What connections can we make between racial identity and national memory?
Choose two or three of Langston Hughes’s poems and craft an argument about the different types of voices that Hughes embodies (colloquial, formal, particular, universal, gendered, racialized, maybe even the voice of musical instruments). Which voices does he use in your chosen poems, and why? How does the reader/listener get drawn in to these poems; what forms are we asked to take?
Analyze the links between performance and gender in Eliot’s “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock.” Prufrock tries on various masks and personae; he imagines himself playing a bit part in a Shakespeare play. How does this sense of self as performance relate to Prufrock’s sense of his gender and sexuality? How does he construct his own masculinity, and how does he imagine his relationship to women or femininity in the poem?
Much of what we know about Hemingway’s characters, and their relationships, come from dialogue rather than from the narrator’s commentary. Using close readings, analyze Hemingway’s use of dialogue. How do these interactions between characters help build up an account of their relationship? Be sure to examine what is said as well as what is excluded from conversation.
Mountain peak, hills like white elephants, clean, well-lighted place: examine representations of place in Hemingway. How are characters’ identities and their development impacted by their physical location (real or imagined)? How does Hemingway use space/place metaphorically? Consider smaller examples of place (the café, the train station, the tent) as well as the iconic places of the titles. You may write on one story or choose to compare.
Analyze the shifts in the narrator’s voice in Their Eyes Were Watching God. At times the narrator seems to speak in a formal and abstract voice; at others she speaks from the perspective of Janie; still other times she speaks in a communal voice. Sometimes Hurston uses direct dialogue; at other times she uses free indirect discourse (see me if you haven’t encountered this term before). How does the narrator’s voice develop over time? Is the narrator’s voice different in each section (Janie’s childhood and her marriage to Logan Killicks, her marriage to Jody, her relationship with Tea Cake, the ending)? If you choose this topic, you may want to use the essay by Henry Louis Gates, Jr. at the end of the novel, as a source. I recommend you come up with your own argument before you read his essay, though.
Analyze images of eyes and vision in Hurston. This novel is highly interested in images of watching: the opening lines describe a man watching ships at a distance; the next scenes shows the entire town watching Janie walk down the street. What kind of power is vision; what kind of encounter between persons is “watching”? How do mundane acts of watching relate to the searing, searching eyes of the title? Why does Hurston title her novel Their Eyes Were Watching God?
Compare the writings of Langston Hughes, Allen Ginsburg, or Jack Kerouac to the poetry of Walt Whitman. All three of these writers explicitly reference Whitman as a major influence—why? What common ideals, imagery, styles, sensibilities, do you find? Where do they diverge? How do these writers compare to Whitman’s sense of national identity? Of personal identity? You may want to look at Whitman’s “The Song of the Open Road” if you choose Ginsburg or Kerouac.
Analyze the role of childhood and memory in The Woman Warrior. Kingston tells the story from an adult’s perspective, but we always have a sense of herself as a child experiencing these stories simultaneously, whether as a character in “Barbarian Reed Pipe” or as the recipient of her mother’s stories in “No Name Woman.” How does the presence of Kingston-as-child, and her relationship to her mother, impact our reading of the tale? Does it change our position as readers to have to imagine her both as authoritative writer and as still-forming child? How are the stories different when they are told to the child or by the child, as opposed to how they are framed by the adult Kingston?
New Morrison Topics:
Analyze the imagery of Eden and "the fall" in A Mercy. Where and how does Morrison use Edenic or Adam and Eve imagery? What kind(s) of "falls" (literal/figurative/vocabulary of falling) do we witness, and what is the cause of the fall? How does she use snake imagery? Is there a Satan? How does her story diverge from the Eden story?
Discuss water imagery in A Mercy. Many events in the novel happen on the shore of a river or bay, on a ship, or involve water in some way. What does water represent for Morrison? Is it related to healing or destruction--to freedom or enslavement--to travel or stasis--to salvation or damnation--or does it invite a more complicated/mixed interpretation?
Analyze stories of birth and origins in A Mercy. We see only a few examples of successful births that lead to healthy children; why? How do we read the birth of Sorrow's child as it relates to all the orphans and foundlings in the tale? If this is also a novel about the "birth" or origins of American culture, how might we relate all of the characters' confused/obscured origins to the origins of the nation?
Examine representations of memory and history in one or two of Charles Chesnutt’s tales. To what extent are the African-American characters the “keepers of memory” or “embodiment of history” in these stories? Are Uncle Julius’s tales personal memories or communal ones? What connections can we make between racial identity and national memory?
Choose two or three of Langston Hughes’s poems and craft an argument about the different types of voices that Hughes embodies (colloquial, formal, particular, universal, gendered, racialized, maybe even the voice of musical instruments). Which voices does he use in your chosen poems, and why? How does the reader/listener get drawn in to these poems; what forms are we asked to take?
Analyze the links between performance and gender in Eliot’s “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock.” Prufrock tries on various masks and personae; he imagines himself playing a bit part in a Shakespeare play. How does this sense of self as performance relate to Prufrock’s sense of his gender and sexuality? How does he construct his own masculinity, and how does he imagine his relationship to women or femininity in the poem?
Much of what we know about Hemingway’s characters, and their relationships, come from dialogue rather than from the narrator’s commentary. Using close readings, analyze Hemingway’s use of dialogue. How do these interactions between characters help build up an account of their relationship? Be sure to examine what is said as well as what is excluded from conversation.
Mountain peak, hills like white elephants, clean, well-lighted place: examine representations of place in Hemingway. How are characters’ identities and their development impacted by their physical location (real or imagined)? How does Hemingway use space/place metaphorically? Consider smaller examples of place (the café, the train station, the tent) as well as the iconic places of the titles. You may write on one story or choose to compare.
Analyze the shifts in the narrator’s voice in Their Eyes Were Watching God. At times the narrator seems to speak in a formal and abstract voice; at others she speaks from the perspective of Janie; still other times she speaks in a communal voice. Sometimes Hurston uses direct dialogue; at other times she uses free indirect discourse (see me if you haven’t encountered this term before). How does the narrator’s voice develop over time? Is the narrator’s voice different in each section (Janie’s childhood and her marriage to Logan Killicks, her marriage to Jody, her relationship with Tea Cake, the ending)? If you choose this topic, you may want to use the essay by Henry Louis Gates, Jr. at the end of the novel, as a source. I recommend you come up with your own argument before you read his essay, though.
Analyze images of eyes and vision in Hurston. This novel is highly interested in images of watching: the opening lines describe a man watching ships at a distance; the next scenes shows the entire town watching Janie walk down the street. What kind of power is vision; what kind of encounter between persons is “watching”? How do mundane acts of watching relate to the searing, searching eyes of the title? Why does Hurston title her novel Their Eyes Were Watching God?
Compare the writings of Langston Hughes, Allen Ginsburg, or Jack Kerouac to the poetry of Walt Whitman. All three of these writers explicitly reference Whitman as a major influence—why? What common ideals, imagery, styles, sensibilities, do you find? Where do they diverge? How do these writers compare to Whitman’s sense of national identity? Of personal identity? You may want to look at Whitman’s “The Song of the Open Road” if you choose Ginsburg or Kerouac.
Analyze the role of childhood and memory in The Woman Warrior. Kingston tells the story from an adult’s perspective, but we always have a sense of herself as a child experiencing these stories simultaneously, whether as a character in “Barbarian Reed Pipe” or as the recipient of her mother’s stories in “No Name Woman.” How does the presence of Kingston-as-child, and her relationship to her mother, impact our reading of the tale? Does it change our position as readers to have to imagine her both as authoritative writer and as still-forming child? How are the stories different when they are told to the child or by the child, as opposed to how they are framed by the adult Kingston?
New Morrison Topics:
Analyze the imagery of Eden and "the fall" in A Mercy. Where and how does Morrison use Edenic or Adam and Eve imagery? What kind(s) of "falls" (literal/figurative/vocabulary of falling) do we witness, and what is the cause of the fall? How does she use snake imagery? Is there a Satan? How does her story diverge from the Eden story?
Discuss water imagery in A Mercy. Many events in the novel happen on the shore of a river or bay, on a ship, or involve water in some way. What does water represent for Morrison? Is it related to healing or destruction--to freedom or enslavement--to travel or stasis--to salvation or damnation--or does it invite a more complicated/mixed interpretation?
Analyze stories of birth and origins in A Mercy. We see only a few examples of successful births that lead to healthy children; why? How do we read the birth of Sorrow's child as it relates to all the orphans and foundlings in the tale? If this is also a novel about the "birth" or origins of American culture, how might we relate all of the characters' confused/obscured origins to the origins of the nation?
Sunday, April 19, 2009
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)