Both courses are built around methodology, rather than material. They are designed to improve students' writing ability, and offer nothing in the way of consistency. English 5 is theoretically required for all freshmen, but a high enough verbal SAT or English AP score is sufficient for credit. Even those students who do not place out of English 5 read material of their individual professor's choice. There are few general guidelines from the English Department or anyone else.
Freshman seminars are even more scattered.
Taken by every freshman, they are offered in all disciplines, from Government to Women's Studies. Other than being nominally writing intensive they share no common components. Indeed, they are not even uniformly rigorous, as a simple look at the course descriptions makes clear. The closest Dartmouth comes to the Core is Humanities 1 and 2. Taken freshman fall and winter they fulfill the Freshman Seminar, Literature and Interdisciplinary requirements.