Week 1 (January 9th – 11
th)
• Introduction/syllabus. Dipping toes: poetry.
READ: (poetry) Margaret Atwood, “you fit into me”; Al Purdy, “Lament for the Dorsets”
Week 2 (January 16
th
– 18
th)
• Form; metaphysical conceit. Textual analysis: close reading.
READ: (poetry) Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Sonnet 43 [“How do I love thee? Let me count the ways”];
William Shakespeare, 130 [“My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun”]; Edna St. Vincent
Millay, “[What lips my lips have kissed, and where, and why]”
Broadview Pocket Book, “Writing about Literature / Writing about Texts”
IMPORTANT: Response Paper due at the end of class JANUARY 17th
Week 3 (January 23
rd
– 25
th)
• Voice; metaphor; theme. Prewriting and brainstorming: the outline. MLA citation.
Avoiding faulty paraphrase.
READ: (poetry) Ted Hughes, “The Though-Fox”; Seamus Heaney, “Digging”; Lorna Crozier, “Carrots”
and “Onions”; Jackie Kay, “In My Country”; Don McKay, “Some Functions of a Leaf.”
Broadview Pocket Guide, “MLA Style”
Week 4 (January 30th
– February 1
st)
• Imagery; self-reflexivity. Argumentative purpose: thesis statement strategies. Textual
evidence/integrating quotes. Dipping toes: prose.
READ: (poetry) Anne Carson, “On Walking Backwards”; Agha Shahid Ali, “The Wolf ’s Postscript to
“Little Red Riding Hood””; Karen Solie, “Sturgeon”; Billy-Ray Belcourt, “Colonialism: A
Love Story”
Broadview Pocket Guide, “Citation and Documentation”
IMPORTANT: Close Reading due JANUARY 29th at 11:59 PM
Week 5 (February 6
th
– 8
th)
• Plot vs narrative; narration. Grammar grind: sentence structure.
READ: (short fiction) Margaret Atwood, “Happy Endings”; Alistair MacLeod, “As Birds Bring Forth
the Sun.”
Broadview Pocket Guide, “Grammar”
Week 6 (February 13
th
– 15
th)
• Time, space, and place; interiority. Grammar grind: punctuation and pronouns.
READ: (short fiction) Kate Chopin, “The Story of an Hour”; James Kelman, “Acid”; Amy Hempel,
“Weekend”; Tobias Woolf, “Bullet in the Brain.”
Broadview Pocket Guide, “Punctuation”
IMPORTANT: Short Essay due FEBRUARY 16th at 11:59 PM
Week 7 (February 19
th
– 23
th) ***Winter Break – NO CLASSES***
4 of 7
Week 8 (February 27
th
– 29th)
• Dialogue; suspense; characterization.
READ: (short fiction) Flannery O’Connor, “A Good Man is Hard to Find”; James Joyce, “Araby”;
Madeline Thein, “Simple Recipes”
Week 9 (March 5
th
– 7
th)
• Confession and reflection; writer and reader: analyzing audience. Analyzing rhetorical
situation. Quotation vs paraphrase.
READ: (nonfiction) George Orwell, “Shooting an Elephant”; Ivan Coyote, “Tomboys Still”
IMPORTANT: Midterm Exam written during class on MARCH 8th
Week 10 (March 12
th
– 14
th)
• Dipping toes: screenwriting. Adaptation/page-to-screen. Essay format and structure.
READ: (screenplay) Spike Lee, Do the Right Thing
Broadview Pocket Guide, “Academic Writing: Essays and Arguments”
Week 11 (March 17
th
– 21
st)
• Motif and archetype. Screenwriting concluded.
READ: (screenplay) Spike Lee, Do the Right Thing (continued)
Week 12 (March 26
th
– 28
th)
• Proofreading and editing. Exam prep.
READ: Richard Van Camp, “the uranium leaking from port radium and rayrock mines is killing us)
IMPORTANT: Long Essay due MARCH 28th at 11:59 PM
Week 13 (April 2
nd
– 4
th)
• The novel as a genre. Settler colonialism. Argumentative and persuasive strategies. The
thesis statement, part 2.
READ: (novel) Richard Van Camp, The Lesser Blessed (first half)
Week 14 (April 9
th
– 11
th)
• Character types. Transgenerational trauma. The novel: concluded. Exam prep; final
thoughts. Fin.
READ: (novel) Van Camp, The Lesser Blessed (second half)

In these poems throughout this syllabus. Choose two texts and explore how irony is used to ampify some aspects of the reader's experience. . Does the irony mislead the
reader while building towards a surprising moment in the narrative? Is the irony used to build suspense
as the reader waits for something to occur?