English Department Fall Course Descriptions

MW 10–11:50 am (In-Person) Shonkwiler

What is a literary text? What are we doing when we read literature? How do we engage it, judge it, interpret it, or use it in our lives? This course uses such questions to develop the knowledges and skills of literary study. Content will include fiction, poetry, and drama. We will pay close attention to language and literary form, including learning some of the basic vocabulary of literary study. We will consider how close reading helps to engage with the world and how the skills of reading help us think critically about all kinds of forms, literary or otherwise. Participation and class discussion are crucial. Critical writing skills will be stressed throughout the semester.

TuTh 2–3:50 pm (In-Person) Holl 

As an introduction to the English major, this course offers students practice and instruction in the strategies and critical vocabularies of literary and cultural studies. As we read works of poetry, drama, fiction, nonfiction, and cultural texts from various time periods and cultural contexts, we will hone our skills in close reading, analysis, research, and careful writing. Course requirements include active participation, short writing assignments, three papers, and a presentation.

F 11–11:50 am (Hybrid) Hawk 

This course will help students to understand their Humanities major, get the most from that major based on their own interests, and prepare for employment post-graduation. Many students wait till their senior years to think about careers, when some important prep work should be done much earlier. English 203 aims to jump start students’ thinking about what they want to do with their degrees while they still have plenty of time to choose particular courses, arrange internships, and investigate possibilities.

TuTh 8–9:50 am (In-Person) Hawk

This course serves as an introduction to British literature from the early medieval period up to the eighteenth century (c.500-1700). Along the way, we will encounter such sights as a talking tree, a headhunter heroine, Arthurian romances, raucous religious plays, a mad king, the world of faerie, a sympathetic devil, and at least one sexy flea. With works sometimes familiar and sometimes foreign, we will explore what literature reveals about storytelling, adaptation, cultural values, history, as well as past and present assumptions about the world. Readings will be in modern translation, although we will look at examples of texts in their original languages—including Old, Middle, and early modern English.

MTh 12–1:50 pm (In-Person) Duneer

This course is an introduction to a broad range of writers, genres, and themes that have helped shape an evolving American literary tradition. We will attempt to situate course readings within major historical, cultural, and literary movements: Exploration; Puritanism; Revolution and Enlightenment; Romance, Transcendentalism, and the American Gothic; Slavery and Race; Realism and Naturalism; the Harlem Renaissance; Modernism, Postmodernism and Contemporary Multicultural Literature. We will consider writers’ responses to philosophical, social, and political debates, while keeping an open mind to the ways in which texts resist categorization, and how authors imaginatively blend tradition and innovation to express the complexity and diversity of American experience. Requirements include active participation, reading quizzes, informal writing, an exam, and a formal paper.

TuTh 10–11:50 am (In-Person) Abbotson

Over the semester we shall look at a variety of texts produced for children, including poetry, fairy tales, film clips, picture books, and novels. We shall consider, throughout, authors' attitudes toward and depictions of children, alongside issues of identity, gender, and race, as we develop the necessary critical understanding and skills to reach a better awareness of how our culture views, and, in a sense, creates the child. Requirements include active attendance, reading quizzes and response papers, 2 critical essays (4-6 pages), a short class presentation, short answer midterm and final. This course satisfies the General Education Elective distribution.

TuTh 10–11:50 am (In-Person) Hopkins

Workshop-based course in which students will practice and hone their creative skills via the writing, sharing, and discussion of their own creative work. Students will read and practice writing in a variety of genres, modes, and forms.

MW 2–3:50 pm (In-Person) Staff

MW 10–11:50 am (In-Person)

MW 2–3:50 pm (In-Person)

Tu 4–5:50 pm (Hybrid)

Th 4–7:50 pm (In-Person)

W 4–5:50 pm (Hybrid)

TuTh 10–11:50 am (In-Person) Zornado

We will read literary and other texts from both Eastern and Western traditions that explore contemplative ways of understanding the self and the world. We will compare Christianity with Buddhism and examine how each tradition addresses questions of meaning, suffering, and awakening. We will read, compare, and contrast various philosophical, literary, and religious responses to enduring human questions. Class discussion and group work will help us draw connections across academic disciplines, historical periods, and famous statements about life’s “big questions.” Successful students will demonstrate engagement with the material through active participation, reading quizzes, and three papers totaling 20–25 pages.

TuTh 2–3:50 pm (In-Person) Shonkwiler 

What books captivated the American reading public and had a profound impact on the twentieth century? What can our reading of them today tell us about the concerns of the time…and about our culture now? Beginning with Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle, the novel that exposed the meatpacking industry to a revolted public in 1906, we will read bestsellers—fiction and nonfiction—that changed the ways Americans saw themselves. These books taught skills of self-help, exposed conditions of poverty, confronted the enormity of the atomic bomb, attacked racial and social injustice, inspired the modern environmental and feminist movements, and fueled the “culture wars” on college campuses. Class meetings will focus on the close reading of each text. We will analyze works for their meaning and significance and also consider secondary sources about their historical impact.

TuF 12–1:50 pm (In-Person) Jalalzai

This course introduces students to the field of literary and cultural criticism and theory and to various debates waged by literary and cultural critics about what constitutes effective and meaningful ways to read texts. By the end of the course, students shall be able to identify the primary terms and underlying principles of certain schools of theory (including some classical theories, Formalism, Structuralism, Post-Structuralism, Psychoanalysis, Feminism/Gender Studies, Marxism, Postcolonial, and Critical Race Studies). Students will come to see that critical perspectives construct particular understandings of reality. Students shall also begin to develop their own critical positions regarding the study and creation of literature as well as the issues raised by these approaches. This course requires a heavy reading load of often difficult material. You should be willing to wade through sometimes perplexing concepts that may at first confuse you. This course is an initial step in the process of understanding complicated ideas that you will encounter as you continue to analyze and engage the world. Requirements include active participation, two papers, presentation, and final exam.

MW 2–3:50 pm (In-Person) Shonkwiler

Based on reading several literary novels of the past twenty years, we will consider the formal, historical, and political pressures upon contemporary fiction. Many contemporary novels are self-consciously artful in their use of narrative perspective, temporality, imagery, or characterization; many posit an increasingly strange relationship between fiction and reality. Their concerns range from how to be a person, to why and whose stories matter, to anxieties about the environment, technology, social inequality, the burden of history, and the future of American political and cultural decline. Authors are likely to include Percival Everett, Mohsin Hamid, Patricia Lockwood, Ling Ma, Daniel Mason, Sayaka Murata, George Saunders. Coursework will include in-class writings, two longer papers, and a final exam. Texts will need to be purchased in paperback (not ebook) form.

MW 4–5:50 pm (In-Person) Staff

MW 10–11:50 am (In-Person) Abbotson

Modern drama began with the social problem plays of Henrik Ibsen that shocked audiences with their candor. Covering seminal dramatists from Ibsen and Chekhov through to current contemporary writers such as Suzan Lori-Parks and Tony Kushner, this course will be organized around major social issues to which dramatists have responded. One difficulty in assessing drama is understanding the semiotics of performance, so I shall supplement the course with videos of play performances that we shall also critique. Requirements include active attendance, quizzes and short response papers, a presentation, midterm, final, one research essay (6-10 pages), and attendance at a live play.

TuTh 4–5:50 pm (In-Person) Holl

This course will examine Shakespeare’s histories and comedies through a queer lens, as we focus on, as queer theorist Madhavi Menon puts it, “all that militates against the obvious, the settled, and the understood.” As we discuss the ways that Shakespeare constructs and stages issues of desire, identity, and temporality in The Merchant of Venice, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Measure for Measure, The Merry Wives of Windsor, Richard II, Richard III, and 1 Henry IV, we’ll also read works of queer criticism and early modern poetry and prose that provide a queer-historicist context. Course requirements include active participation, several short response papers, one research paper, and two exams.

TuTh 4–5:50 pm (In-Person) Boren 

This course focuses on the craft of fiction writing. The primary texts will be student-produced fiction, which we will use to explore various techniques, such as characterization, scene construction, plot, diction, point of attack, dialogue, symbol, imagery, and language precision. In addition to student work – work in progress – we will also examine non-student, published work. Regular attendance, active verbal and written participation, revision of written work, and peer critique through workshop are required elements of this class. At the end of the semester, students will turn in a portfolio of written work. (Prereq. Eng. 220)

MW 10–11:50 am (In-Person) Shipers

This class is an intermediate poetry workshop where we will read, discuss, and steal techniques from a wide variety of contemporary poets, including some whose work is delightfully weird. Along the way, we will read individual poems, short craft essays, and books by three debut authors, as well as devote a substantial portion of class time to discussing student work. Attendance, thoughtful reading, poem drafts, commenting on classmates’ work, collaborating in small groups to lead class discussion, and thorough revision are all required elements of the course.

M 12–1:50 pm (In-Person) Shipers 

This course focuses on the basic principles of producing RIC’s very own literary and art journal, Shoreline. Topics include what a literary magazine is and does; various forms of marketing; inviting and judging submissions for the annual fall literary contest; and sponsorship, promotion, and attendance at a literary event (reading, discussion, or workshop). Requirements include attendance and active participation, informal writing assignments, and a class presentation. Because some of the Shoreline production work will occur outside of our weekly class sessions, students will need to plan accordingly in order to complete their tasks.

TuTh 10–11:50 am (Hybrid) Michaud 

How do professional writers… write? What skills, knowledge, practices, and dispositions do they bring to their work? Practically, how do they conceptualize, develop, research, and produce a publishable piece? 

These are the questions we’ll consider in this class as we practice writing with one another. This is a practice class. Students will produce a few substantive pieces of writing on topics of their own choosing and engage in all stages of the writing process (planning, drafting, revising, seeking feedback, collaborating, editing, and publishing). 

We will also explore how AI can support this work—using it as a tool for drafting, research, and revision while developing critical awareness of its possibilities and limitations.

TuTh 2–3:50 pm (In-Person) Zornado

ENGL 460W serves as the culminating experience for English majors, integrating advanced research, sustained writing, critical reflection, and professional preparation. This section of the capstone represents a shared inquiry into how meaning, knowledge, and authority are produced in contemporary culture at the intersection of technology and artificial intelligence, memory and trauma, representation and narrative, and environmental and social instability. Through seminar discussion, independent research, and intensive writing workshops, students examine how writers, artists, and scholars respond to conditions of technological mediation, historical disruption, and ecological crisis. The course emphasizes intellectual formation as a central dimension of career readiness. Students develop the ability to conduct sustained inquiry, evaluate sources critically, use digital and AI tools responsibly, revise substantially, and communicate complex ideas to diverse audiences. The capstone portfolio documents each student’s development as a thinker, writer, and ethical agent in a rapidly changing world. 25-30 pages of writing.

M 4–6:50 pm (In-Person) Quintana Vallejo

This introductory course serves as the basis for the cultural and literary criticism needed for graduate study in English. We will review the most influential theoretical approaches and methods of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries (including deconstruction, structuralism, poststructuralism, postcolonial theory, feminism, Marxism, critical race theory, and gender/queer theory). Our objective is to form a foundation of cultural and literary theory that enables the development of research skills and an understanding of topics and methods. The class requires students to participate and lead discussions, make presentation, and an end-of-semester research project.

Tu 4–6:50 pm (Hybrid) Michaud

What does it mean to become an expert writer? And what if expertise is less about mastery than about practice, struggle, and change over time? 

This course explores writing as a form of knowledge-making and a site of ongoing personal and professional development. Drawing on research in the field of Writing Studies, we will examine how writers acquire expertise, how expectations for “good writing” are shaped by context and discipline, and how moments of difficulty, breakdown, and failure are central to learning. We will also consider how emerging technologies, including generative AI, are reshaping what writers do and what counts as expertise. 

Designed for students with no prior background in or knowledge of Writing Studies, the course invites you to investigate your own writing practices while engaging key theories and research about how writing works and how writers grow.

Coursework includes informal writing, a presentation, and a research-based project.

W 4–6:50 pm (In-Person) Boren

This course focuses on fiction and literary nonfiction writing. The primary texts will be student-produced prose, which we will use to explore various techniques such as characterization, scene construction, plot, diction, point of attack, dialogue, symbol, imagery, and language precision. In addition to student work – work in progress – we will also examine craft by considering non-student, published work through the writer’s eye, discussing theories of narrative craft, and viewing/hearing readings from published writers. Classes will include group workshop, one-on-one tutorials, and individualized reading lists, so students may pursue their areas of particular interest.