This course will ask how African American writers sustain and manipulate a culturally specific literary tradition at various historical moments, ranging from the Colonial period to the post-Civil Rights era.

This course looks at selected plays by significant 20th Century American playwrights, with attention to dramatic form, historical context, influence and innovation. Students read at least one play per week. Requirements include participation in discussion sections, papers, a midterm and final. (Gen.Ed. AL)

Close reading and analysis of novels to achieve an awareness of the aesthetic and social characteristics of the modern novel and a critical appreciation of the possibilities and varieties of point of view, time, and psychology in literary modernism. (Gen. Ed. AL)

A seminar in writing poetry for students who demonstrate familiarity with the basics of imagery, rhythm, and form. Students write regularly, read and criticize one another's writing, read in contemporary poetry.

A seminar in writing poetry for students who demonstrate familiarity with the basics of imagery, rhythm, and form. Students write regularly, read and criticize one another's writing, read in contemporary poetry.

A seminar in writing short stories and other fiction for students who demonstrate familiarity with the basis of scene and story. Students write regularly, read and criticize one another's writing, read in contemporary fiction.

A seminar in writing short stories and other fiction for students who demonstrate familiarity with the basis of scene and story. Students write regularly, read and criticize one another's writing, read in contemporary fiction.

Introduction to the epic as complex and comprehensive literature -- which includes romance, drama, history. Gods and goddesses, kings and queens, heroes and heroines, ships and swords. Cultures and nations celebrating their past, present, and future.

An introduction to digital culture, visual images, audio content, archives, and new media. Critical approaches include a focus on formal analysis, historical perspective, reception and audience, and cultural theory.

Seminar-sized course in literary and rhetorical criticism. Organized around themes, it stresses analysis from critical and theoretical perspectives that sharpen understanding of texts, their contexts, and our reading of them. This course fulfills the Junior-Year Writing Requirement. See the English Department course description guide for various sectional sub-titles and descriptions. https://www.umass.edu/english/undergraduate-english-courses