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ENGED-GE.2577 Teaching American Literature in the 21 Century: Tradition and
Innovation FALL 2012
Mondays 6:45-8:25
Meyer 261
English Education
Department of Teaching and Learning
Steinhardt School of Culture, Education, and Human Development
New York University
Professor Susan L. Schlechter
[email protected]
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Office: 239 Greene Street, 4 floor
Office Hours: Mondays 4:30 to 6:30
to be arranged in person or email
or contact staff at 212-998-5470
or if that time does not work, speak with me and we will arrange another day/time
Course Overview
• What are the possibilities for choices for an American Literature course?
• What is multicultural education about and why does it concern me, an English teacher?
• What is my own reading history? What are my reading interests?
• What has my education, both in school and out, taught me about American literature?
• Who are my students? How do I make connections between the literature I teach and my
students’ needs for a rich and developing literacy?
•What are the layers of a classroom that need to be addressed to reflect diversity and difference
both in literature and in the students?
Required texts
•To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee, HarperCollins, March 2002
•Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Mark Twain
•Their Eyes Were Watching God, Zora Neale Hurston, Perennial Classics, HarperPerennial,
1998, ISBN 0060931418
•Black Boy, Richard Wright, HarperPerrenial, 1998
•Talking Race in the Classroom, Jane Bolgatz, Teachers College Press, 2005.
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•The Light in Their Eyes: Creating Multicultural Learning Communities, Sonia Nieto, 10
Anniversary Ed., Teachers College Press, 2010,
•Unsettling America: An Anthology of Contemporary Multicultural Poetry, ed by M.M. Gillan and
J. Gillan, Penguin Books, 1994
•Playing in the Dark: Whiteness and the Literary Imagination, Toni Morrison, Vintage, 1993
You will choose two of the following:
•Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry, Mildred D. Taylor, Puffin Books, 1976, ISBN 01400384510 (wait
for class discussion about this and the following three texts)
•The Watsons Go to Birmingham—1963, Christopher Paul Curtis, A Yearling Book, 1995, ISBN
0440414121
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•Kindred, Octavia E. Butler, 25 Anniversary Ed., Beacon Press, 1979.
•Chains, Laurie Halse Anderson, Simon and Shuster, 2010.
You will choose one of the following:
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•We Can’t Teach What We Don’t Know: White Teachers, Multiracial Schools, 2 Edition, Gary R.
Howard, Teachers College, 2006.
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ENGED-GE.2577/Teaching American Lit. in the 21 Century/Fall 2012
Professor Susan L. Schlechter
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•Diversity and the New Teachers: learning from experience in urban schools, Catherine
Cornbleth, Teachers College, 2008.
•English Journal, January 2005 ( class blackboard)
•Interactive Phases of Curricular and Person Re-Vision with Regard to Race, Peggy McIntosh,
Working Paper No. 219, Wellesley College Center for Research on Women, 1990. (class
blackboard)
• Additional Essays on Class Blackboard
Recommended Texts for Further Study
•The Skin That We Speak: Thoughts on Language and Culture in the Classroom, Lisa Delpit,
The New Press,2002
•Rethinking American Literature, eds. Lil Brannon and Brenda M. Greene, NCTE, 1997.
•Becoming Multicultural Educators: Personal Journey Toward Professional Agency, ed. Geneva
Gay, Jossey-Bass, 2003.
•From Totems to Hip-Hop, ed. Ishmael Reed, Thunder’s Mouth Press, 2003
•Uncle Tom’s Cabin, Harriet Beecher Stowe
•Native Son, Richard Wright
•Notes of a Native Son, James Baldwin
•Go Tell It on the Mountain, James Baldwin
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•Multicultural Education: Issues and Perspectives, 5 edition update, James A. Banks and
Cherry A McGee Banks, Jossey-Bass, 2005.
Paper Clips (dvd)
•4 Little Girls (dvd), Spike Lee
•Reading Native American Literature: A Teacher’s Guide, Bruce A. Goebel, NCTE, 2004.
•Un-Standardardizing Curriculum: Multicultural Teaching in the Standards-Based Classroom,
Christine E. Sleeter, Teachers College Press, 2005
•Walking the Road: Race, Diversity, and Social Justice in Teacher Education, Marilyn CochranSmith, Teachers College Press, 2004.
•We’ve Got A Job: The 1963 Birmingham Children’s March, Cynthia Y. Levinson, Peachtree
Publishers, 2012.
•The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America’s Great Migration, Isabel Wilkerson,
Random House, 2010.
•True to the Language Game: African American Discourse, Cultural Politics, and Pedagogy,
Keith Gilyard, Routledge, 2011.
Processes/Expectations for the Course
•You will need to attend every class. On time. If that is not possible, you should notify me before.
We build a learning community, and your absence does not just affect you but your small and
large group members. Everyone counts.
•Timely handing in of written work is necessary. Learning is organized to build on your
knowledge from the first class.
•Read-alouds: to be discussed in class, choices taken from Unsettling America
•Reading assignments: all reading assignments should be done with the following questions in
mind: do I have questions about the content of the text from either a comprehension or
ideological point of view? does the text challenge beliefs that I hold? If so, is it possible for me to
locate and name the belief(s) and/or what I feel challenged about?
•Written work
All written work that is handed in must be typed and double-spaced. Pages numbered
after the first page. Traditional academic requirements apply. Questions? Ask me and/or consult
the MLA or other style sheet.
Writing for the class blackboard begins after the first class. Required every week which
includes both a contribution and a response to another class member’s posting.
•Projects
There will also be two projects in addition to individual papers and postings on the class
blackboard. They will be discussed in class.
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ENGED-GE.2577/Teaching American Lit. in the 21 Century/Fall 2012
Professor Susan L. Schlechter
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•Assessment
Everyone in the class should be capable of B+ or better work. A work is exceptional and
displays effort and thought beyond the fulfilling of the assignment. At midterm I will notify anyone
whose work is below B+. You are always welcome to make an appointment to discuss the quality
of your work as well as any issues pertaining to teaching and learning in this course.
Course Schedule
Monday, September 10, 2012
Introductions: Who are we?
What knowledge do we need to have about our self and our students in order to teach and learn
with them?
Letting Walt Whitman and Langston Hughes set the stage.
Looking to the past and the ideas we inherit and looking to our future as teachers in our own
classroom.
Assignment: Reading: 1. half of To Kill a Mockingbird (if you can stop reading)
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2. The Light in Their Eyes, 10 Anniversary Edition, Series Forward ix-xii AND pages 1-31, “The
Sociopolitics of Schooling…” and “Introduction.”
3. “Autobiography: Straight Up and with a Twist,” page 25 of English Journal (January, 2005) on
class blackboard.
4. Writing to be handed in: I suggest you read the second and third reading assignments
BEFORE beginning the writing assignment.
1. Introduce yourself in all your own multicultural diversity. What are all the social
markers that mark you as a person: gender, what we refer to as “race,” ethnicity, age,
class, and as many other social markers as you care to explore.
2. If you were asked to talked without preparation about American Literature, what are
some of the authors, the texts, the ideas that would come to mind.
3. What does multicultural education mean to you, if anything?
4. What literature do you remember reading in middle or high school? What literature do
you remember reading in college?
5. Any texts or teachers or classes stand out in your memory as important to your
thinking about literature
5. Blackboard posting: this first week you will find a Discussion Board for To Kill a Mockingbird.
Before you begin reading the novel, please post if you have read this text before. What do you
recall about reading it, in school or out, memories of what you thought about the text. If you have
never read it before, then start reading it and post some of your responses as you read. For the
first few weeks please sign all your postings with your full name. As we come to know each
other, your first name will be sufficient.
Monday, September 17, 2012
(religious holiday for some; to be discussed)
Ongoing thinking and talking about such terms as “cultural literacy,” “multiculturalism,”
“multicultural education.”
Developing ideas of multicultural education
Talking about race
Class guidelines: how shall we learn with each other? What is the role of talk and listening in
classrooms?
To Kill A Mockingbird
Assignment: Readings: •Finish TKAM
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•The Light in Their Eyes, Prologue to 10 Anniversary Edition and Chapter 1
•Talking Race in the Classroom, First paragraph of “Acknowledgements,” Chapters 1-2
•“Culture, Not Race, Explains Human Diversity,” Mark Nathan Cohen, Course Documents, Class
Blackboard
•“Do Races Differ? Not Really Genes Show,” Natalie Angier, New York Times, August 22, 2000,
Course Documents, Class Blackboard
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ENGED-GE.2577/Teaching American Lit. in the 21 Century/Fall 2012
Professor Susan L. Schlechter
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•“Still Too Hot to Touch,” Matt Bai, New York Times, July 24, 2010 Course Documents, Class
Blackboard
• Go online and get statistics of the children in the New York City Public Schools. What
communities do they come from? How does your website “describe” the students?
Monday, September 24, 2012
Inherited beliefs
Reading and responding: what English teachers help students to do
Talking about TKAM with all the layers
Developing ideas of multicultural education; what do our readings make us think about?
Assignment: Reading: Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Chapters 1-18 (to be discussed in class)
Reading and writing: as you read Huck Finn, keep a list both of your responses to parts of the
book that leap out at you to be discussed as a reader and then as a teacher, what issues might
you anticipate that you would want to be prepared to help your students discuss.
•The Light in Their Eyes, Chapters 2-3
•”The Courthouse Ring: Atticus Finch and the limits of Southern Liberalism,” Malcolm Gladwell,
The New Yorker, August 10, 2009, Course documents, Class blackboard
•“White Privilege,” Peggy McIntosh, Course documents, Class blackboard
Monday, October 1, 2012
Talking about race in Huckleberry Finn
Teaching controversial texts, this one being one of the most contested.
Assignment: Huckleberry Finn, rest of text (to be discussed)
Talking Race in the Classroom, Chapters 3-4
Assignment: Rickman and Ebonics, “Suite For Ebony and Phonics,” Class Blackboard
Writing assignment to be discussed in class
Go on NCTE web site for ideas about the teaching of controversial literature.
For further reading: Adventures of Huckleberry Finn: a case study in critical controversy, ed. by
Gerald Graff and J. Phelan, Bedford Books, 1995.
Monday, October 8, 2012
Continue discussion of Huck Finn
What is a dialect?
Language diversity as another aspect of diversity.
How do we create classrooms to talk about difficult topics?
Assignment: Their Eyes Were Watching God
Talking Race…, Chapters 5 and 6
October 16: no class/fall break
Monday, October 22, 2012
Discussion of Their Eyes Were Watching God
Assignment: 3 Essays from English Journal: “Taking a Cultural-Response Approach…”, “From
Totems to Hip-Hop,” “Journey toward Multiculturalism,” Course documents/Class blackboard
Midterm projects
Talking Race in the Classroom, Chapter 7
Monday, October 29, 2012
Presentation of class projects. Hand in the written portions.
How are our understandings of multicultural literacy developing?
Assignment: Chapters 1-5 of Part One of Black Boy
The Light in their Eyes, Chapters 4 and 5
Monday, November 5, 2012
Language, literacy and power
Discussion of Black Boy
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ENGED-GE.2577/Teaching American Lit. in the 21 Century/Fall 2012
Professor Susan L. Schlechter
Assignment: Finish Part One of Black Boy
Light in their Eyes, Chapters 6,7,Epilogue
Choose either Diversity…or We Can’t Teach…
Amount of reading in each text to be discussed in class.
Monday, November 12, 2012
Black Boy
Assignment: Read Playing in the Dark.
What strategies do you have for reading challenging texts?
Monday, November 19, 2012
Playing in the Dark
Assignment: Re-read Playing in the Dark
Peggy McIntosh’s Curriculum Re-Vision (Course documents)
More reading of Diversity…and We Can’t Teach…
Writing to be handed in next week: topic to be discussed in class
Monday, November 26, 2012
Playing in the Dark
McIntosh and Morrison have a conversation
What happens when you re-read?
What is curriculum? What is the canon?
Assignment: Reading choices (to be discussed in class):
Choice: two or more: The Watsons Go to Birmingham—1963
Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry
Kindred
Chains
Finish (if we have not already) Diversity and We Can’t Teach…
Monday, December 3, 2012
Book discussions
Assignment: Paper Clips or 4 Little Girls
Additional readings to be discussed
Monday, December 10, 2012
Class Projects
“Cultural and Political Vignettes in the English Classroom: Problem-Posing, Problem-Solving,
and the Imagination,” Jacqueline Darvin, English Journal, NCTE, November, 2009, Course
documents
Additional readings to be discussed
Monday, December 17, 2012 Final Exam
Class Projects and Celebrate Our Learning
Any student attending NYU who needs an accommodation due to a chronic,
psychological, visual, mobility and/or learning disability, or is deaf of hard of hearing
should register with the Moses Center for Students with Disabilities at 212-998-4980, 240
Greene Street, www.nyu.edu/csd
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