Contents
  YU Homepage

PROGRAMS OF STUDY & COURSE DESCRIPTIONS
English (ENG)

Major: Yeshiva College
ENG 2010; nine additional courses in English (27 additional credits minimum), seven of which must be taken in residence. At least one of these courses must focus on pre-1700 British literature (ENG 2003, 2315, 2316, 2318, 2323, 2331, 2332, 2346, or 3424). Of the nine additional courses, at least seven must be Yeshiva College English literature courses. Two of the nine may be in writing and/or linguistics.

Each student majoring in English is required to maintain and complete a satisfactory portfolio containing selected pieces of writing from the English courses he has taken and reflective statements including self-assessments of the student’s work and comments about interconnections among the student’s various courses and about his overall progress in the major. The student is required to meet with an assigned cluster advisor at least once per semester, for discussion about course selection and his portfolio. Portfolio guidelines are available from the English Faculty.

Students who declared the major in English by February 2004 will ordinarily follow the previous requirements, which are described in the 2002-2004 Undergraduate Catalog for Men. However, with permission from the English faculty, such students may instead choose to fulfill the new requirements.

Minor: Yeshiva College
Literature Track
ENG 2010 and 15 additional ENG literature credits. All courses in the minor must be taken in residence.

Students who declared the minor in English by February 2004 will ordinarily follow the previous requirements, which are described in the 2002–2004 Undergraduate Catalog for Men. However, with permission from the English faculty, such students may instead choose to fulfill the new requirements.

Writing Track
ENG 1101, 1102, and 12 additional credits in more-advanced writing courses. All courses in the minor must be taken in residence.

Note: ENG 1101–1102 is a prerequisite for all higher-numbered ENG courses. At Yeshiva College, one semester of ENG 2003, 2004, 2005, 2010, 2201, 2202, 2611, 2612 is a prerequisite for other ENG literature courses. Any exception must be approved by the instructor.

0001 Developmental English. No credits.

0011, 0012, 0013 English as a Second Language (ESL). Three hours. 1 credit.
Written and spoken English, including examination of the nature of the language. First-semester students who are not native speakers must take a placement examination to enter ENG 1101; otherwise, they are placed into one of the three levels of ESL. Each ESL student advances through these levels until he is ready to begin ENG 1101.

0011 English as a Second Language (ESL)–Intensive. Ten hours. 3 credits.

1101–1102 Composition and Rhetoric. Two hours plus conferences. 2 credits.

1101: Learning how to write a well-developed and coherent essay organized around a clear central idea and exhibiting mastery of sentence and paragraph structure as well as standard grammar, syntax, spelling, and punctuation. A minimum of four to six essays (3,000 words), with revisions, is required.

1102: Developing critical and analytical skills and rhetorical strategies for effectively defending a thesis and persuading an audience. The course requires an analytical research paper (1,500–2,000 words) with formal documentation, as well as a minimum of three or four additional essays (2,500 words), with revisions.

Writing Workshops
Each workshop progresses from formal, technical exercises to original compositions. Criticism of work in progress and completed, group analysis, written recommendations, personal conferences. Students improve their basic writing skills and develop their creative talents.
Prerequisites: ENG 1101–1102.

1311 Technical Writing and Editing. 3 credits.
1324 Business Writing. 3 credits.
1407 Expository Writing. 3 credits.
1601 Print Journalism. 3 credits.
1641 Broadcast Journalism. 3 credits.
1721; 1722; 1723; 1724 Creative Writing. 3 credits.
1743 or 1743H Creative Fiction Writing. 3 credits.
1822 Writing Fiction. 3 credits.
1832 Writing Poetry. 3 credits.

1931H, 1932H Freshman Honors Seminar. 3 credits.
Reading literary and other texts: fiction, nonfiction, poetry, and drama. Writing critical and analytic essays, with emphasis on revision. 1932H requires an analytical research paper with formal documentation. Open only to students admitted to the Jay and Jeanie Schottenstein Honors Program.

2003 or 2003H British Literature: Medieval through Shakespeare. 3 credits.
A survey of British literature from its beginnings through the beginning of the 17th century. This course can be applied to either the literature requirement for graduation or the requirements for the major in English.

2004 or 2004H British Literature: Donne through the Romantics. 3 credits.
A survey of British literature from the early 17th century through the mid-19th century. This course can be applied to either the literature requirement for graduation or the requirements for the major in English.

2005 British Literature: Victorian through Contemporary. 3 credits.
A survey of British and commonwealth literature from the mid-19th century through the present. This course can be applied to either the literature requirement for graduation or the requirements for the major in English.

2010 Interpreting Texts. 3 credits.
Introduction to at least three and as many as five major approaches to literary interpretation. Examples: close reading, reader response criticism, deconstructionism, new historicism, and cultural studies. Students will read literary works in various genres and learn to interpret them by applying literary theory. Each student should develop a complex, multipronged understanding of literature and literary criticism. This course can be applied to the literature requirement for graduation; it is required for both the major and for the minor (literature track) in English. Not open to students who have received credit for ENG 2001.

2201 World Literature: Ancient and Classical. 3 credits.
A survey of works representing the literary, historical, and philosophical imagination of ancient and classical Greece and classical Rome. Emphasis on close reading of texts. This course can be applied to either the literature requirement for graduation or the requirements for the major in English. Not open to students who have received credit for English 4201, which it replaces.

2202 World Literature: Postclassical to Contemporary. 3 credits.
A survey of works representing the literary, historical, and philosophical imagination of the West from postclassical antiquity to modern times. Emphasis on close reading of texts. This course can be applied to either the literature requirement for graduation or the requirements for the major in English. This course is not open to students who have received credit for English 4202, which it replaces.

2315 Chaucer. 3 credits.
Major works, with emphasis on The Canterbury Tales.

2316 Medieval Literature in Modern English. 3 credits.
Medieval English and continental masterpieces in modern English translation. Works in various genres (romance, lyric, allegory, saga, epic) illuminate intellectual, social, and literary conventions, such as courtly love, chivalry, the heroic ideal, Arthurian traditions, and the quest for salvation. Special topics may be chosen each semester.

2318 or 2318H The World of King Arthur. 3 credits.
A broad chronological survey of the Arthurian literary tradition, focusing on the resources of the World Wide Web. The course concentrates largely on medieval texts (Latin, Welsh, and English chronicle materials; English and French romances) but includes some 19th- and 20th-century Arthurian poetry and fiction. All works are read in Modern English translation. Course requirements include midterm and final hypermedia projects.

2323 Elizabethan and Jacobean Poetry and Prose. 3 credits.
More, Sidney, Spenser, Shakespeare, Jonson, and Donne.

2331; 2332 Shakespeare I; II. 3 credits.
First semester: histories and comedies; second semester: tragedies, problem plays, and romances. Consideration of the plays in the contexts of Renaissance and modern theatrical and dramatic conventions.

2346 Milton and 17th-Century Literature. 3 credits.
Studies in the works of Milton and other authors.

2356 English Literature in the 18th Century. 3 credits.
Studies in the works of Pope, Swift, Jonson, Blake, and other authors.

2360 The Enlightenment. 3 credits.
Continental and English masterpieces by writers and thinkers of the 17th and 18th centuries.

2400 The Romantic Vision. 3 credits.
Characteristic, influential, and significant works by British and continental authors, with a view to understanding some of the major interests, concerns, and attitudes prevalent in the Romantic period.

2410 or 2410H The Victorian Web. 3 credits.
Major writers—such as Carlyle, Macaulay, Dickens, Mill, Newman, Browning, Arnold, Tennyson, Huxley, Ruskin, Hopkins, and Pater—in relation to the intellectual, social, and cultural milieu.

2611 American Literature through the Civil War. 3 credits.
The development of American literature from its beginnings through the Civil War. This course can be applied to either the literature requirement for graduation or the requirements for the major in English.

2612 American Literature: 1865 to the Present. 3 credits.
The development of American literature from the period immediately following the Civil War to the present. This course can be applied to either the literature requirement for graduation or the requirements for the major in English.

2861 or 2861H; 2862 or 2862H Major Authors. 3 credits.
Works by a maximum of four major authors, usually English, American, or both. May be repeated, as the subject matter varies from term to term.

2910 American Autobiography. 3 credits.
Diverse forms of personal narratives in the United States from the 16th century to the present; emphasis on the changing needs that writing autobiography has served over this period, and the variety of forms that writers’ life stories have taken.

2911 Literature and Culture of the American City. 3 credits.
How writers have responded to intensifying urbanization in the United States, largely since the end of the 19th century, and the role of literature in defining a distinctly “urban” culture or consciousness during this period. Fulfills the core requirement for the minor in American Studies.

2912 American Literature and Culture 1876–1918. 3 credits.
The dramatic cultural transitions—particularly those accompanying urbanization, industrialization, and immigration—that shaped writing and society in the United States from the decade following the Civil War through the end of World War I. Fulfills the core requirement for the minor in American Studies.

2913 American Literature and Culture 1919–41. 3 credits.
Literature’s response to cultural events between the two world wars, especially the rise of middle-class consumer culture and conservative social values during the 1920s, and the crisis of confidence and effort to restore order during the Depression. Fulfills the core requirement for the minor in American Studies.

2914 Literature and Culture of Rural America. 3 credits.
Examines, in its historical context, literature—as well as film, music, art, and material culture—that deals with life on farms and in small towns across the United States since the 19th century. Probes the conflicts and tensions that surround rural ideals in an increasingly urban United States and the ways in which “rural America” has come to stand for national values.

2915 or 2915H Chicago and New York at the Turn of the 20th Century. 3 credits.
Focuses on Chicago and New York at the pivotal moment when urbanization was profoundly altering U.S. cultural life. Particularly concerned with conflicts over “American” values in U.S. urban life, and with the role of literature in the development of a distinctly “urban” culture and consciousness.

2961; 2962 Contemporary Literature. 3 credits.
Fiction, poetry, drama, or nonfiction prose by contemporary authors, usually English, American, or both. May be repeated, as the subject matter varies from term to term.

3189 Comedy and Satire. 3 credits.
Theories of and studies in comedy and satire, from their classical roots through the present. Authors may include Aristophanes, Terence, Boccaccio, Rabelais, and Moliere.

3208 The Art of Fiction. 3 credits.
How great writers of fiction shape their audiences’ responses through traditional and experimental strategies.

3237 Great Short Fiction. 3 credits.
Survey of outstanding short novels or long short stories by European and American writers.

3315; 3316 The English Novel. 3 credits.
The development of the novel genre through selected English novels. First semester: Defoe, Richardson, the sentimental and gothic novels, Austen, the Brontës, Dickens; second semester: Eliot, Hardy, Conrad, Joyce, Woolf, and others.

3342 Modern American Fiction. 3 credits.
Novels and short stories by American writers since World War I.

3376 Classic Modern Novels. 3 credits.
Intensive study of five landmark novels, some in translation, by authors who have explored new territory in modern fiction.

3408 The Art of Drama. 3 credits.
Theatrical conventions and techniques to clarify how dramatists convey meaning and hold an audience; intensive examination of selected American, English, and Continental plays.

3411 Tragedy. 3 credits.
Selected works from different periods and cultures. Emphasis on understanding the forms of tragic drama and the nature of the tragic vision of life.

3424 Renaissance Drama. 3 credits.
Renaissance plays by authors other than Shakespeare.

3426 Great Drama from Dryden through Ibsen. 3 credits.
Restoration drama through early modern experiments with realism and symbolism.

3461 Modern Drama from Ibsen to the Present. 3 credits.
European, British, and American dramatists such as Ibsen, Strindberg, Chekhov, Shaw, Pirandello, O’Neill, Beckett, Ionesco, Williams, Miller.

3622 or 3622H Jewish New York. 3 credits.
Uses an interdisciplinary approach to explore key arenas of community, tension, and change within developing Jewish cultures in New York City since the end of the 19th century: work and worship on the Lower East Side; political, economic, and ethnic conflict; suburbanization; and the legacy of the Holocaust.

3717 The Art of Poetry. 3 credits.
Poetic techniques and meanings through intensive examination of selected works.

3742 Modern Poetry. 3 credits.
Nineteenth-century roots of modern masterpieces (Eliot, Pound, Frost, Yeats); contemporary poets.

4051, 4052 Introduction to Linguistics. 3 credits.
How scientific procedures are applied to discover the structure of languages. Provides a body of factual knowledge about the languages of the world, their diversity, what features they have in common, and the relationships among them.

4061, 4062 History of the English Language. 3 credits.

4081 Classic Literary Criticism and Theory. 3 credits.
Plato through the 19th century. Exploration of fundamental questions: What is literary art? What value does it have? How does it work? How is it understood and judged? Analysis of works selected for relevance.

4086 Modern Criticism and Theory. 3 credits.
How particular modern and contemporary theories can help readers understand particular works, the nature of literature, and the process of interpretation.

4411 Literature and Social Change. 3 credits.
Literary explorations with an historical or sociological slant. May focus on one of the following topics: literature and war, literature and revolution, literature of the underclass, or the immigrant experience in America.

4421 Literature and Psychology. 3 credits.
Relations between systems of psychology and literary works, from the Greeks through the dominant modern systems of Freud, Jung, and Laing.

4519 American Jewish Literature. 3 credits.
Literature written by Jews in the United States since 1900. Focuses on how these texts deal with the experiences of immigration and suburbanization, conflicts between tradition and modernity, and the legacy of the Holocaust. Authors include Cahan, Yezierska, Gold, Singer, Roth, Malamud, Bellow, Ozick, Olsen, and Paley.

4551 or 4551H; 4552 or 4552H Topics in Literature. 3 credits.
Special topics courses. Courses offered recently under these numbers include “Constructions of Otherness,” “From Gutenberg to Ben Franklin: The Impact of the Hand Press,” “Contemporary World Fiction,” “Gothic Traditions.” May be repeated, as the subject matter varies from term to term.

4571 Parents and Children. 3 credits.
The portrayal in literature of the splendors and miseries of having children; generational conflict; people’s changing attitudes, first as young children, then as parents of children and as middle-aged children of aging parents.

4901 Independent Study.

4911 Guided Project
Meet with the Yeshiva College academic dean.