美国文学Introduction

Introduction to the Course

I. Course Objectives

1. 历史背景

Enable the Ss to get a general knowledge about the history of America;

2. 文学运动

Enable the Ss to know the four literary periods and literary movements in American literary history;

3. 作家作品赏析

Enable the Ss to know the background, representative writers and their works of each period in American literary history

4. 文学批评Literary criticism

Enable the Ss to appreciate a literary work from different perspectives

II. How to study literature?

1. Historical Approach

Aims at illustrating the historical development of literature.

2. Thematic Approach

“What is the story, the poem, the play or the essay about?”

2. Analytical Approach

Be familiar with the elements of a literary work, eg: plot, characterization, setting, subject matter, writing style, point of view, etc; answer some basic questions about the text itself.

III.Modes of teaching and learning

1. Lectures

2. Study groups: 12-15 Study groups, 4 students in 1 group and each group is responsible for one writer

Oral presentation and a nswer teacher’s questions in class

Write down the answers to the questions from the teacher and other groups and tell the answers to the students in the next class

Write an essay on the writer or his novels as part of your mid-term exam (one group, one essay) (at least 800 words ) and answer the questions raised from the teacher on the basis of the paper.

IV. Grade determinant

1. In-class performance Attendance 20%

Absent -5, late and ill -3

Study groups: answer questions of the teacher and the other groups

Quiz

2. Mid-term test 20%

Essay

3. Final exam: Close-book test 60%

Types of examination

-Matching the authors with their works

-Multiple choice questions

-True and false statements

-Defining the literary terms or answering questions

-Analyzing the theme, characters and language of a selected reading

V. Reference book

1. Course Book: 曹曼. 美国文学教程

2. Reference Books:

[1] 常耀信. 美国文学选读[Z]. 天津：南开大学出版社，1991.

[2] 常耀信. 美国文学简史[Z]. 天津：南开大学出版社，1990.

[3]吴定柏. 美国文学大纲[Z]. 上海：上海教育出版社，1998

[4]吴伟仁编. 美国文学史及选读（第1、2册）[Z]. 北京：外研社

[5] 童明. 美国文学史外研社

3. Journals:

《外国文学评论》《外国文学研究》《外国文学》

《当代外国文学》《国外文学》

4. 其他外语类核心期刊

Introduction to American literature

1. Ten American Writers winning the Nobel Prize for Literature Sinclair Lewis (1930) Eugene O’Neill(1936)

Pearl Buck(1938) T.S.Eliot (1948)

William Faulkner (1949) Ernest Hemingway (1954)

John Steinbeck (1962) Saul Bellow (1976)

Isaac Bashevis Singer辛格( 1978) Tony Morrison (1993)

2. The classification of different periods

1. Colonial Period

Puritans; Practical

2. The Romantic Age

Confident; divine

3. The Age of Realism

Realistic, mirror the life 4. The Modern Age The war of independence1776-1783 The civil war:1861-1865

WWІ: 1914-1918

WWП:1939-1945

Disappointed; inner