First Year Writing Course Descriptions
UCOR 101-Thinking & Writing Across the Curriculum
3 credits
An introduction to the expectations and practices of academic writing; UCOR 101 introduces students to the principles of rhetoric. Students learn how to identify audiences and create arguments that rely on logic, a credible voice, and that take into consideration an audience’s values. Through reading nonfiction prose students engage in critical thinking and analysis and write between three and six papers (totaling between 16–25 pages of final-draft writing) with careful attention to the process of invention, drafting, and feedback. Students will also learn how to incorporate other voices into their own writing and how to properly document their use of those outside sources.
Required texts:
Quick Access Compact by Lynn Q. Troyka and Doug Hesse
Everything's an Argument by Andrea Lunsford and John Ruszkiewicz/Everything's an Argument with Readings by Andrea Lunsford, John Ruszkiewicz, and Keith Walters
UCOR 102-Imaginative Literature & Critical Writing
3 credits
An introduction to imaginative literature and to critical techniques for interpreting imaginative literature; in this course students apply the academic-writing and critical- thinking skills they developed in UCOR 101 to the analysis of literature. Reading and analyzing texts from the three primary genres of literature (poetry, fiction, and drama) and perhaps other genres such as film, students will write 16–25 pages of literary analysis resulting from a serious engagement with the writing process as initially introduced in 101. In 102, moreover, students will be asked to use scholarly sources in a research paper on literature and to continue to sharpen their documentation skills.
Many of the sections deal with a certain theme or subject matter and are listed according to this theme, or “cluster.” Listed below are the descriptions of the clusters. Please see the First-Year Writing page for sections affiliated with these clusters.
UNDESIGNATED SECTIONS (NOT AFFILIATED W/A CLUSTER)
Courses in these undesignated sections deal with a wide range of thematic concerns, from the spiritual quest to the epic hero, from contemporary literature to the classics.
LITERATURE, CLASS, AND CULTURE
The “Literature, Class, and Culture” cluster will examine literature that focuses on themes of work, the family, the individual in relationship to the community, social class, and protest.
GODS AND MONSTERS
This cluster deals with “frontiers” in literature—the places where we move a step beyond reality and into the terrifying unknown. By looking at the supernatural, the freakish, the grotesque, the readings question what it means to be human, thereby forcing students to learn about issues that often go unexamined in society, and by extension, themselves.
LITERATURE AND THE IMMIGRANT EXPERIENCE
How have writers depicted the experience of being an immigrant, or of having immigrant come to their lands? How does one balance maintaining a cultural identity and assimilating to a new culture?
FANTASY AND REALITY
This cluster also investigates border territories between the "fantastic" and the "real," with a primary focus on myths, fairy tales, and fantasy works. By understanding strategies authors use in constructing these stories, students are able to develop their own understandings and critiques of these issues in their writing and during class meetings.
GENDER AND LITERATURE
How is sex different from gender? What does it mean to be male or female? How are gender stereotypes created? How does society affect masculine and feminine roles? Do male authors write differently than female authors? Do men and women read differently? These are just some of the questions this class will examine as we study images of men and women in literature (fiction, short story, drama, poetry) and film.
LITERATURE AND POPULAR CULTURE
How does literature inspire, react to, and interact with today’s popular culture? How do image-based forms of culture like films, television, and video games affect our understanding of literature? These and other questions will be the basis of this cluster.
SEPT. 11 AND/IN LITERATURE
How have the traumatic events of 9/11/2001 been depicted in literature? How has literature helped Americans process the meaning of the terrorist attacks?