ENGL2603 - Imagining America

Semester 2, 2012  |  Credit Points: 6

Coordinator: David Kelly
Phone: +61 2 9351 2214
Email: david.kelly@sydney.edu.au

Description

This course takes as its point of departure the notion of America as fashioned by diverse and even conflicting acts of imagination. Beginning with writers in the mid-19th century and working our way to more recent imaginings of filmmakers and songwriters, we will examine the various ways in which visions of America have been put in play in the national consciousness in prose, poetry, song and film, to construct and to challenge the 'imagined community' of the United States.

Assessments

1x500wd oral presentation (10%), 1x2000wd essay (50%), 1x1500wd take-home exercise (40%)

Textbooks

Poe: selected poems and stories.
Whitman: 'Song of Myself' and other poems.
Dickinson: selected poems.
Twain: The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.
Chopin: The Awakening.
Fitzgerald: The Great Gatsby.
Faulkner: Absalom, Absalom!
Ginsberg: Howl.
Dylan: Highway 61 Revisited (CD).
Eastwood: Unforgiven (film).
Scorsese: Gangs of New York (film)

Classes

1x1-hr lecture/week,
1x2-hr seminar/week

Prerequisites

18 Senior credit points from English or Australian Literature

Prohibitions

ENGL2003

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