ENGL 480
RELIGION, RACE, AND SEX IN AMERICAN LITERATURE
AND LAW
FALL 2004
Joan DelFattore
Class hours: Mon. 2-5
062 Memorial Hall
Office hours: M 10-11:45, T 2-4, R 6-8
831-2987 (office)
E-mail: jdel@udel.edu
737-7124 (home)
Homepage: www.english.udel.edu/jdel
DESCRIPTION
This
course explores literature, lawsuits, and historical background dealing
with three of the most contentious topics in American culture: racial
equity, religious
freedom and diversity, and the various forms of human sexuality.
In each segment of
the course, students will analyze the differing uses of language,
the varying background
assumptions, and the conflicting thematic representations of these issues
as they appear
in a range of literary and legal texts from the seventeenth through the
twenty-first
centuries. Students will also analyze and respond to documentary
videotapes,
audiotaped excerpts from Supreme Court oral arguments, and feature-film
treatments
of conflicts over race, religion, and sexuality in America.
As a seminar, this course requires significant
student participation. In many instances
throughout the course, students will not all read the same thing, and the
students’ exchange
of information and viewpoints will form an important part of the seminar
experience. At the
end of the semester, students will write a final paper based on independent
research on any
one of a wide range of topics (see below).
TEXTS
All students will read the
following texts:
Maya Angelou, I Know Why the
Caged Bird Sings
Joan DelFattore, The Fourth
R: Conflicts Over Religion in America’s Public
Schools
Peter
Irons, The Courage of Their Convictions
Arthur
Miller, The Crucible
Alice
Walker, The Color Purple
Each
student will sign up to read one of these two narratives:
Frederick
Douglass, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass
Linda
Brent (Harriet Jacobs), Incidents in the Life of a Slave-Girl
Each
student will sign up to read one of these four texts:
Margaret
Atwood, The Handmaid’s Tale
Timothy
LaHaye, Left Behind
Azar
Nafisi, Reading Lolita in Teheran
Chaim
Potok, The Chosen
When class assignments require students to sign up for different readings,
sign-up sheets will be passed around in class the week before the due date,
and students will be equally divided among the alternatives. If you
have a strong preference about any assignment, you’re welcome to e-mail
me at any time, and I’ll sign you up for your preferred reading before the
list circulates in class.
TECHNOLOGY
From time to time, I will send messages to the class list (engl480-011-04F@udel.edu),
which sends mail to your UD account number. As an example, if a student
discovers that one of the online readings is no longer at the url I’ve provided
in this syllabus, I’ll e-mail the class list to let all of you know what
to do about that reading. Because the class meets only once a week,
it’s particularly important for me to be able to get in touch with all of
you with clarifications, suggestions for assignments you’re working on, and
so forth. It is your responsibility to check your UD account regularly.
If you would like to change your UD e-mail address, you may do so by going
to www.udel.edu/network and typing in your current username and password;
but you cannot use your aol, comcast, or other e-mail account for this purpose.
Several of the short readings are online, and unless otherwise instructed,
you are expected to print out that material and bring it to class
along with the rest of that week’s readings. Even if there is a cost
for the printing, it is much less than students had to spend for the anthology
we used before this material became available online. Instead of typing
out long url strings, you may prefer to go to my homepage (see above) and
scroll down to ENGL 480, where you’ll find an online version of this syllabus
with links to all the readings.
This class requires independent Internet research. In the unlikely
event that any student does not know how to do Internet research, help is
available from the staff at the computing centers.
Students who do not have their own computers, printers, and Internet access
are welcome to use any of the computing sites on campus. Questions
about activating e-mail accounts or getting access to the UD library databases
from off-campus should be addressed to the staff at the computing centers
or to the computer hotline at 831-6000. You can also find answers to
many questions at the IT help center: www.udel.edu/help.
ATTENDANCE POLICY
Short Version: If I’m here, you’re here.
Long Version: The schedule for this class involves a tradeoff.
On one hand, students receive three credits for a class that meets only
once a week. On the other hand, each class meeting is three hours
long, which means that missing even one of them is comparable to missing
three traditional MWF classes or two traditional TR classes. Moreover,
participation in class discussions is a major element of the seminar requirement
for the English major, and that cannot be fulfilled merely by reading the
material and handing papers to the instructor. Absences will therefore
be excused only in cases of serious illness or family emergencies.
Car trouble, arguments with significant others, hangovers, social events,
ennui, the need to catch up on work or sleep, appearances on reality TV shows,
or abduction by creatures from another planet are not justifications for
excused absences. (Students may argue that the last two are redundant.)
Moaning about the three-hour periods is optional but immature, since they
are part of an arrangement whose benefits you are also enjoying. Arriving
late and leaving early are not options except under unusual circumstances.
To avoid a lot of grief, please do not remain in this course if your work
schedule, ride home, or social life will not allow you to meet these standards.
Students will lose three points toward the final grade for each unexcused
absence, and anyone who repeatedly arrives late or leaves early will lose
points for the cumulative loss of class time. If students are absent
without an acceptable reason when oral presentations are due and then hand
in the written notes later, they will receive only half credit for the assignment.
To avoid a lot of grief, please do not remain in this course if your work
schedule, ride home, or social life will not allow you to meet these standards.
GRADING
Written assignments for class: 4 assignments @ 7 points each =
28 points
2 assignments @ 10 points each = 20 points
1 assignment @ 12 points =
12 points
Final paper:
40 points
Final grade: 95-100 = A, 90-94 = A-, 87-89 = B+, 83-86 = B, 80-82
= B-,
77-79 = C+, 73-76 = C, 70-72 = C-, 67-69 = D+, 63-66 = D, 60-62 = D-, 0-59
= F
Note: The written assignments are meant to be presented in class,
not simply handed in for a grade. Students who hand in a written assignment
following an unexcused absence when that assignment was discussed in class
will receive a maximum of half credit for the assignment. Conversely,
students who are present for class but do not hand in the assignment in
writing at that time will lose up to half the points unless other arrangements
are made with the instructor.
SCHEDULE
NOTE: All written work must be typed.
Please bring each week’s readings to class, including those printed from
the Internet.
Sept. 13: Introduction to the course
Preliminary discussion of literature and law relating to religious liberty
and
diversity
Assignment of cases to be read for next week
Assignment due next week:
Read The Crucible
Read http://teacher.scholastic.com/upfront/issue/articles/7witch.html
Read the chapter of The Courage of Your Convictions you signed up
for:
Chapter 1 (Gobitis v. Minersville School District, pp. 15-35),
Chapter 9 (Epperson v. Arkansas, pp. 207-30),
Chapter 15 (Jaffree v. Wallace, pp. 357-78).
Type brief answers to the following questions (total of one to two double-
spaced pages):
What were the facts of the case you read about? Who sued whom, and
why?
What did the court say? What were the most important reasons for the
ruling?
7 points
Sept. 20: Discussion of The Crucible
Small-group work to prepare panel presentations on the lawsuits
Panel presentations
Assignment handed in
Circulation of sign-up sheet for next week’s readings
Assignment due next week:
Read the book you signed up for:
Margaret Atwood, The Handmaid’s Tale
Timothy LaHaye, Left Behind
Azar Nafisi, Reading Lolita in Teheran
Chaim Potok, The Chosen
Type one to two pages, double-spaced,
discussing the view of religion
that seems to prevail in the book you read. How is religion presented
in the
book, and how does it affect the lives of the main characters?
7 points
Sept. 27: Small-group work to prepare panel presentations on the
readings
Panel presentations
Assignment handed in
Introduction to next week’s reading
Circulation of sign-up sheet for next week’s reading
Assignment due next week:
Read Chapter 1 of The Fourth R
Read the additional chapters you signed up for:
Chapters 2, 3 (violent 19th-century religious wars)
Chapters 5, 6 (the Supreme Court’s 1960s school-prayer decisions)
Chapters 11, 12 (the rise of the equal access model)
Chapters 13, 14 (recent lawsuits over the application of equal access)
Read Chapters 15, 16
Write one to two pages, double-spaced, answering the following questions
about the two chapters you signed up to read. Do not include Chapters
1,
15, and 16, which everyone is reading.
In your opinion, who were the three most important people in the chapters
you read? What did each of them do to earn that distinction?
In your opinion, what is the main point of the events you read about?
In a
paragraph or two, explain the significance of what was happening.
Don’t recite or summarize the events described in the chapters; try to
get to the underlying meaning or importance of what was going on.
7 points
Oct. 4: Discussion of Chapter 1 of The Fourth R
Small-group work to prepare panel presentations on Chapters 2 through 14
Panel presentations
Assignment handed in
Discussion of Chapters 15, 16
Tape: excerpts from the Supreme Court oral argument in one of the
cases
discussed in the book (students’ choice)
Preliminary discussion of the theme of racial bias and equity in American
literature and law
Circulation of sign-up sheet for next week’s readings
Assignment due next week:
Read the book you signed up for:
Frederick Douglass, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass
Linda Brent, Incidents in the Life of a Slave-Girl.
Type one to two pages, double-spaced, answering the following questions:
What kind of person is the author/narrator? Give three specific examples
from the text to support your answer.
Based on this particular text, what would you conclude was the single worst
element of slavery as practiced in the U.S.?
7 points
Oct. 11: Small-group work to prepare panel presentations on the narratives
Panel presentations
Assignment handed in
Documentary videotape: Found Voices
Further slave narratives, oral and written, are available online at
http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/vfshtml/
Assignment due next week:
Read I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings
Oct. 18: Discussion of I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings
Videotape of parole board hearing
Preliminary discussion of the cases for next week
Circulation of sign-up sheet for next week’s readings
Assignment due next week:
Read Chapter 5 of The Courage of Their Convictions (Bates v. Little
Rock, pp.
105-127)
Read the case you signed up for:
Dred Scott v. Sandford
http://usinfo.state.gov/usa/infousa/facts/democrac/21.htm
Plessy v. Ferguson http://usinfo.state.gov/usa/infousa/facts/democrac/33.htm
Gebhart v. Belton http://www.english.udel.edu/jdel/gebhartvbelton.html
Brown v. Board http://www.nps.gov/brvb/pages/decision54.htm
Type brief answers to the following questions regarding the case you signed
up
for (total of one to two double-spaced pages):
What were the facts of the case? Who sued whom, and why?
What did the court say? What were the main reasons for the decision?
10 points
Oct. 25: Small-group work to prepare panel presentations on the various
decisions
Panel presentations
Assignment handed in
Tape of the Supreme Court oral argument in Cooper v. Aaron
Documentary videotape: Ten Years After Brown
Preliminary discussion of themes of sexuality in American literature and
law
Assignment due next week:
Read “Textbook Controversies Based on Content, Values, and Viewpoint”
http://www.english.udel.edu/jdel/textbooks.html
Select one of the controversies discussed in the essay and find three online
sources giving further information about it. Print out the first page
of each
online source and any other pages you consider especially important.
There
is no need to print out the whole thing, especially if it’s lengthy.
Type a brief
summary (one to two double-spaced pages) of what you found and bring it
to
class prepared to discuss it first in a small group and then with the class.
Suggestions for online research (feel free to use one, all, or none of these):
Type the title of a challenged book or keywords for a dispute into the
Search box of Google, Yahoo!, etc. and see what comes up.
Go to Lexis/Nexis and click on News or Guided News Search. (The Quick
News Search is less likely to work.) Search under General News in
major newspapers, full text. Be sure to adjust the time frame or
Lexis/Nexis will go back only six months. When you choose keywords,
try to think of words that would appear in a news article; for instance,
news stories rarely give the name of a lawsuit, but they do tend to
mention the names of the key players and the title of the challenged
material.
Go to www.amazon.com, www.barnesandnoble.com, or a similar
bookseller website. Type the title of a challenged book in the Search
box, then click on the book when it appears. Click on the link for
additional product details and scroll down to find editorial reviews (i.e.,
professional reviews) and comments by ordinary readers.
Three hits on Google, Yahoo! or whatever, three news articles, three
reviews, three online items you find by some other means, or any
combination thereof will satisfy the assignment.
12 points
Nov. 1: Discussion of “Textbook Controversies”
Small-group work to prepare panel presentations on the various controversies
Panel presentations
Assignment handed in
In-class reading of Heather Has Two Mommies, Daddy’s Roommate,
Nappy
Hair, and Dick and Jane readers
Assignment due next week:
Read The Color Purple
Nov. 8: Discussion of The Color Purple
Documentary videotape: The Hollywood Censorship Wars
Circulation of sign-up sheet for next week’s assignment
Assignment due next week:
Do the assignment you signed up for:
Skim through John Cleland’s Fanny Hill: Memoirs of a Woman of
Pleasure for about two hours. There’s no need to read every
word, but be
sure to get a clear sense of the book’s style and content. Then read
the
Supreme Court’s decision in Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure v.
Massachusetts,
http://www.colby.edu/govt/faculty/jrr/go314/memoirs.html
Watch the film Carnal Knowledge. You can either rent it from
a videostore
or watch it in the media department in the basement of Morris Library.
Then read the Supreme Court’s decision regarding the film in Jenkins
v.
Georgia,
http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/cgi-bin/getcase.pl?court=us&vol=418&invol=153.
After reading the novel or watching the film, and reading the relevant
Supreme Court case, type one to two double-spaced pages answering the
following questions:
How would you assess the type and intensity of the sexual expression in
the book or film?
On what grounds did the Supreme Court make its decision as to whether
the material is obscene?
Do you agree with the Court’s conclusions? Why or why not?
10 points
Nov. 15: Small-group work to prepare panel presentations on the novel
and film and the
related court cases
Panel presentations
Hand in assignments
Assignment due next week:
Read Chapters 13 (LaFleur v. Cleveland Board of Education) and 16
(Hardwick v. Bowers) of The Courage of Their Convictions
Nov. 22: Discussion of the two lawsuits
Videotape: Damned in the USA
Assignment:
Work on the final paper
Nov. 29: Presentation of final papers
Dec. 6: Presentation of final papers
PAPER TOPICS
Option 1: Read one of the novels listed below and then look up at
least one book of literary criticism or three articles that analyze it.
Based on your own interpretation of the novel and the ideas you glean from
the critical sources, write five to seven double-spaced pages addressing the
following questions:
1. In two or three paragraphs, summarize what
the novel is about – not only the
main events, but also its
themes and message.
2. How does this novel present religion, race, or sex?
3. How does this novel’s presentation of this
theme compare and contrast with
the material
we used in class?
4. How would you assess this novel in terms of
its treatment of sensitive material,
its balance
of competing viewpoints, and its literary merit?
It is up to you whether you divide the paper into four distinct segments,
one for each topic, or blend the whole thing together. Either approach
is fine as long as you include these elements somewhere in your response.
Religion (do not use the same book you signed up for as a class reading):
John Gregory Dunne, True Confessions
Sinclair Lewis, Elmer Gantry
Margaret Atwood, The Handmaid’s Tale
Timothy LaHaye, Left Behind
Azar Nafisi, Reading Lolita in Teheran
Chaim Potok, The Chosen
Race:
Maya Angelou, Gather Together in My Name (sequel to Caged Bird)
Ralph Ellison, The Invisible Man
Toni Morrison, Beloved
Margaret Walker, Jubilee
Richard Wright, Native Son
Sex:
D.H. Lawrence, Lady Chatterley’s Lover
Henry Miller, Tropic of Cancer
Vladimir Nabokov, Lolita
Philip Roth, Portnoy’s Complaint
Option 2: Using at least five sources (print, online, or a combination
thereof), write five to seven pages describing an historical event relevant
to one of the three themes of this course. Approximately two to three
of those pages should demonstrate how the event you researched fits in with
the relevant material we read in this course. A few examples are provided
below; if there’s something else you’d like to work on, please discuss it
with me in advance.
The
real-life Salem witch trials
The
“Great Awakening” of religious fervor in early America
The
conflicts between the Native American Party (known as “nativists”) and Irish
Catholic
immigrants in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries
The
events leading up to the racial integration of the U.S. armed services under
President Harry S Truman
The
fight over the racial integration of Little Rock High School or the
University of Alabama
The
origin and history of the Ku Klux Klan
Current
controversies over providing/censoring sexual material on the Internet
Controversies
over sexuality in film
Option 3: Choose one of the Supreme Court cases listed below.
Read the decision and find at least five background sources providing additional
information about it. Among other approaches, you could try typing
the name of the case in the Search box in Google, Yahoo!, etc. to see
if any background material turns up. You could also go to the UD library
homepage and click on Databases, then on Lexis/Nexis Academic. Click
on “News” and use keywords to find news articles dealing with the court
case you’ve chosen. Do not use the name of the case as a keyword because
news articles rarely identify cases by name. Instead, use the kinds
of words that a reporter is likely to include in a news article: the
names of key people in the lawsuit, the name of the place where the dispute
arose, etc. Don’t forget to adjust the date range, or Lexis/Nexis
will search only the last six months. To find print sources, you could
go to the UD library website and search both Delcat and the relevant periodicals.
Write five to seven pages summarizing the background material you found
and answering the following questions:
Who sued whom, and why?
When the case reached the Supreme Court, who won? By how many votes?
What were the most important reasons that caused the majority of the Court
to
vote as it did? If there was a dissent,
what were the most important reasons for
it?
How did the background material you read influence your understanding of
the
Supreme Court’s decision?
Supreme Court Cases:
Note: If any case isn’t at the url provided here, just type the title
of the case in the search box on Google or another web browser.
Hazelwood v. Kuhlmeier (1988). Over the objections of student
editors,
a high school principal deleted two stories from the school newspaper:
one on teen pregnancy and the other on the effects of divorce on teenagers
in the family. Students on the newspaper staff sued the school, claiming
that
their rights to free speech and freedom of the press had been violated.
http://www.bc.edu/bc_org/avp/cas/comm/free_speech/hazelwood.html
Board of Education v. Pico (1982). A school board summarily
removed books from the school library on the grounds that the books were
“anti-American, anti-Christian, anti-Semitic, and just plain filthy."
Students asked the courts to restore the books and to vindicate the students’
right to receive information. http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?court=US&vol=457&invol=853
Rosenberger v. Rector (1995) Students challenged a University of Virginia
policy
under which student religious publications were ineligible for financial
support from
student activity fees. http://www.bc.edu/bc_org/avp/cas/comm/free_speech/rosenberger.html
Reno v. American Civil Liberties Union (1997): The ACLU challenged
provisions of the 1996 Communications Decency Act that restricted minors’
access to Internet sites dealing with sexual or excretory material deemed
"’patently offensive’ as measured by contemporary community standards.”
http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?court=us&vol=000&invol=96-511
Playboy Entertainment Group v. United States (2000): Playboy
Entertainment
challenged provisions of the 1996 Communications Decency Act that severely
limited its ability to broadcast the Playboy Channel on television at any
time other
than late at night.
http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/cgi-bin/getcase.pl?court=US&navby-case&vol=000&invol=98-1682
Hustler Magazine v. Falwell: Jerry Falwell, founder of the
Moral Majority, sued Hustler for publishing a comic parody of a liquor ad
in which Falwell ostensibly talks about the first time he had sex.
http://www.law.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/conlaw/hustler.html
At http://www.hfac.uh.edu/comm/media_libel/cases-conflicts/print/hustler.html,
click on “Jerry Falwell Talks About His First Time” to see the parody that
sparked the lawsuit.
Hurley v. Irish-American Gay Group of Boston: Irish homosexuals
and bisexuals wanted to march as a group in the St. Patrick’s Day parade,
carrying a banner announcing their homosexual orientation. The
parade’s organizing committee refused permission, and the Supreme Court
was asked to decide whether that refusal violated the gay group’s right
to free expression.
http://www.mit.edu/afs/athena/course/17/17.245/www/Hurley.htm
Board of Regents v. Southworth (2000). The University of Wisconsin
used a
mandatory student activity fee to support various student organizations.
Students
sued the university, claiming that they should not be forced to support
extracurricular student activities (such as a gay and lesbian club) with
which they disagreed.
http://supct.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/98-1189.ZS.html
Virginia v. Black (2003): The Ku Klux Klan challenged a Virginia
statute that not only forbade the burning of crosses for the purpose of
intimidation, but also stated that cross-burning was in and of itself evidence
of the intent to intimidate. http://supct.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/01-1107.ZS.html
Loving v. Virginia (1967): A mixed racial couple arrested
for violating Virginia’s ban on interracial marriages challenged the law
as unconstitutional. http://www.law.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/conlaw/loving.html
Heart of Atlanta Motel v. U.S. (1964): A motel owner challenged
a provision in the federal Civil Rights Act of 1964 that required places
of public accommodation to be open to all races. http://www.oyez.org/oyez/resource/case/159/
General Specifications for All Options:
1. The paper must be typed, double-spaced, in
12-point font. It should be approximately five to seven pages in length.
2. There should be no footnotes; just indicate in the
text where you found the information you are summarizing. As an example,
you might say, “According to [source], the first meeting of the Ku Klux
Klan was in . . . .“ If you use direct quotes, cite the reference
in parentheses following the quote. It does not matter what style
sheet you use as long as you are consistent throughout the paper.
When citing online sources, give the url.
3. Attach a Works Cited page listing all the sources
you used for the paper.
Paper Grading:
1. The paper must address one of the options listed here
unless you had advance approval to write about something else.
2. The paper must include all the elements listed in
the topic. For example, if you are asked to address four questions,
be sure that all of them are clearly represented in the paper.
3. All factual statements must be accurate.
4. All assertions, arguments, and interpretations must
be clearly based on the material you read for this paper. Be sure
to include examples, quotations, and other references to the source material.
Do not use the overall topic of the paper as a springboard for a lengthy
statement of personal views that are only tangentially or generically related
to the material you are supposed to be analyzing.
5. It does not matter whether your viewpoints coincide
with mine. I have given As to papers with which I disagreed and Ds
to papers with which I agreed; the relevant question is how well the paper
meets the standards listed here.
6. The paper should be written in correct English – spelling,
punctuation, subject/verb agreement, etc. If this has been a problem
for you in the past, I strongly recommend setting up an appointment to have
someone in the Writing Center review your final draft.
7. I hope this won’t happen, but by way of fair warning -- if you
plagiarize all or part
of the paper from either online or print sources, there is a reasonable
possibility
that I’ll recognize it (or suspect it and go looking) because I’m familiar
with
this material. If that happens, the grade for the paper will be 0,
which will result
in an F for the course. In that event, you would have the right to
appeal to the
Office of Judicial Affairs; see http://www.udel.edu/judicialaffairs/ for
the
procedure.