FALL 2019

ENGL202: ENGAGING ENGLISH

PROFESSOR BOYLE
3 CREDITS

COURSE DESCRIPTION + OBJECTIVES

This course introduces students to the study of English through reading and discussing various
literary genres and producing various
types of writing, including creative
writing, personal narratives, and
analytical essays, among others. Our
class, which is organized around the
theme of “narrating journeys within and
without,” will examine what narratives
about traveling beyond our comfortable
boundaries have to say (and teach us)
about what it means to be and become
human.

Class discussions will consider a few key

questions: what does it mean to travel
within and without—to explore ourselves
inwardly while journeying outside of
familiar spaces? what lessons do we
learn (about ourselves, about others)
when we journey to new places? what
role does place play in shaping our
identities and interactions with others?
how, why, and to what ends do we tell
stories about our travels? By
investigating these questions through
our readings, assignments, and co-
curricular activities, students will practice
and hone skills that will prove essential
to their future personal, academic, and
professional success.

At the end of the course, students will be

able to:
1. Explain the methods, objects of study, and applications of English Studies.
2. Apply multiple critical approaches to define cultural complexities. 
3. Apply knowledge of written and visual literacies for working with diverse media.
4. Explain and apply different methods of reading.
5. Explain and apply foundational skills of English Studies, such as close reading, written
persuasion and argument through evidence.
REQUIRED TEXTS
For this course, you are required to have the following texts:
✈ Lucy Knisley, Displacement: A Travelogue (Fantagraphics, 2015; 9781606998106);
✈ Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, The Little Prince (Mariner, 2000; 9780156012195);
✈ Alex Garland, The Beach (Riverhead, 1997; 9781573226523).
Additional course texts are available on Blackboard (indicated in calendar as “Bb”); please
make sure to always print and bring these with you to class.

GRADES + ASSIGNMENTS


✈ attendance (100 pts.): You have four free absences in this class. I don’t need to know
why you aren’t in class, what you’re doing while you’re absent, or anything else
about your missed days. Your attendance grade decreases by one full letter grade
(from an A to a B or a B to a C) for each additional meeting you miss. If there are
unusual circumstances related to your attendance, please communicate with me so
we can develop a plan that works for you. 


✈ participation (100 pts.): This course best operates in an atmosphere in which each and
every participant feels comfortable expressing his or her ideas, opinions, and
questions. For this reason, I ask that you respect one another as individuals with
potentially differing backgrounds and perspectives. I will not tolerate rudeness or
disruption and reserve the right to ask you to leave if I feel your presence is
preventing other students from engaging with the material (this will count as an
absence). If you are not comfortable speaking up in class, you may email me your
thoughts before class (at least 30 minutes prior to our meeting) so that I may bring
them up (without naming the person who emailed them) as topics for discussion.

✈ activity responses (3 x 75 pts. = 225 pts.):

• As college students, you’re lucky enough to spend the majority of your days in a
community that offers a host of social, academic, and professional events for
you to expand your mind beyond the boundaries of a conventional classroom.
For this assignment, you’ll select three activities/events to attend and reflect
on in a 2-page response. These can be Big Read events, events at the Co-Rec
(a cooking class, perhaps?), events sponsored by academic departments,
activities you experience with friends or family, or anything else that falls under
the category of an “event” or “activity” (we can talk more if you’re unsure
about if your activity is appropriate or applicable). And, yes, you can absolutely
write about the class trips to Chicago and to see The Odyssey.
• Your subject? Journeys. That’s right—journeys. Feel free to take liberties with how
you define “journeys” for your final report, just make sure that definition is
clear to your readers. You’ll also want to make sure to ground your reflection in
the literature we’re reading, perhaps by using one of our literary journeys as a
springboard for your reflection or comparing the journey you experienced
through your chosen event to that of one of our literary characters.
 • Think of this assignment as an event review in a local magazine’s arts and culture
section. You’ll begin by briefly (we’re talking 1 paragraph) describing the event
from your perspective, including details about what you saw, experienced,
learned, heard, etc.; then, analyze the event (what content was relayed
through the event, how was it relayed, and how did the form of the event
influence its content?); conclude by giving your opinion on the event (did the
content interest you, do you think the event was effective, and how did the
event influence the way you think?). I’ll leave it up to you to decide where the
literary journeys will come in and how your definition of “journeys” was
shaped by this activity.
• Your 2-page responses are due on Blackboard one week after you attend each
event. Make sure to bring a writing utensil and paper to record details about
the events.

✈ larger assignments:


1. personal travelogue (100 pts.):

• Important Dates:
• Rough draft due: Tuesday, 9/3 in class (hard copy);
• Final draft due: Thursday, 9/5 at 5pm on Blackboard.
• Our first assignment this semester will be a personal travelogue written in
a style resembling that of Knisley’s Displacement, which we will read
in class. Your personal travelogue should not only recount a journey
you have taken but also reflect on what that journey taught you about
life, your identity, or your relationships with others. Since we aren’t all
talented illustrators like Knisley, drawings aren’t necessary for your
travelogue; but you should employ the basic principles of Knisley’s
graphic novel (images, document design, and showing, not telling)
when crafting your narrative. What this means is that you don’t need
to—indeed, you shouldn’t—format this essay using standard MLA
formatting but rather have fun with design. Include images, thought
bubbles, drawings, physical artifacts, irregular text boxes, call-outs, or
whatever else strikes your fancy to compose a personal travelogue
that effectively recounts a literal and figurative journey you’ve taken.
• Your finished personal travelogue should be 500-750 words.


2. passage interrogation (125 pts.):

• Important Dates:
• Rough draft due: Thursday, 9/19 in class (hard copy);
• Final draft due: Thursday, 9/26 at 5pm on Blackboard.
• For this assignment, select a brief passage from one of our assigned
poems (100-250). Type this passage in a word-processing (Microsoft
Word or Pages) document and use the “Footnote” feature of your
word processing software and the Oxford English Dictionary to
interrogate the text. To do so, annotate the words, phrases,
references, and sentences in that passage. Your goal in this
assignment is to observe interactions between the passage’s overall
 meaning (and its relationship to the broader work) and its individual
parts (words, phrases, and references).
• Your grade for this assignment will be based on two parts: 1.) your
annotated passage and 2.) a 3-page reflective synthesis essay where
you make explicit connections between the individual items you’ve
identified/annotated in your selected passage and the broader work.
Make sure to use MLA style, formatting, and citations.


3. adaptation showcase (125 pts.):

• Important Dates:
• Rough draft due: Thursday, 10/10 in class (hard copy);
• Final draft due: Tuesday, 10/15 in class.
• Our third project will be an adaptation showcase in which, working in small
groups, you will select one of the two plays we read and “pitch” an
adaptation of that text. You’re free to select whichever play your group
would like to adapt as well as the form that adaptation takes, be it a
film, television series (plan for one season), a video game, an escape
room, a board game, or whatever else you and your group can
imagine. Then, you’ll pitch that adaptation to potential
“investors” (your classmates) at our adaptation showcase using a trifold
poster display and multimedia components. In addition to crafting
some multimedia element of that adaptation (such as the game board
or promotional materials), you will also use the poster to detail your
adaptation’s various components, including its target audience,
advertising campaigns, actors (if relevant), and more.
• Each group will also have 5 minutes at the beginning of the Showcase to
share their project with the class; in these brief presentations, your
group should share how you came up with this project, who its target
audience is, and what choices you had to make while designing it.


4. strangers in another world essay (100 pts.):

• Important Dates:
• Rough draft due: Tuesday, 11/5 in class (hard copy);
• Final draft due: Thursday, 11/7 at 5pm on Blackboard.
• This assignment is comprised of two parts: a creative essay and an
explanation of that creative essay. Make sure to use MLA style,
formatting, and citations when writing this essay.
• The first part is a (3-page) creative work in which you rewrite a scene in one
of our works of short fiction by incorporating a character from one story
into the setting of another and exploring how that character responds
to the particular challenges, concerns, and environments of that new
world.
• The second part is a brief (2-page) “Letter to the Reader” in which explain
why you selected this text, what choices you made while crafting your
revised scene, and how you believe your changes influence the story’s
tone, meaning, and function. 


5. page-to-screen analysis (125 pts.):

 • Important Date: Final draft due on Tuesday, 12/10 at 5pm on Blackboard.
• Films, like books, are cultural texts that attempt to define, enforce, or
challenge particular social beliefs through the narratives they share. In
this way, we may read both films and books for the particular ways they
deploy certain literary devices to craft narratives about not only the
world in which we presently live, but also the future world we may or
may not hope to inhabit.
• In this essay, you will analyze how, why, and to what ends Danny Boyle’s
2000 adaptation of Alex Garland’s The Beach uses the medium of film
to grapple with similar and different cultural preoccupations as
Garland’s novel.
• Your final page-to-screen analysis should be 3-4 pages. Make sure to use
MLA style, formatting, and citations.

All major assignments will be graded on the standard plus-minus letter grade scale. The
breakdown for all major assignments is as follows:
✈ 90-93 (A-), 94-96 (A), 97-100 (A+) —The submitted project fulfilled the assignments at
a high-quality level, and the submitted work shows originality and creativity. Work in
this range shows all the qualities listed above for a B; but it also demonstrates an
extra effort to be original or creative in developing content, solving a problem, or
developing a verbal or visual style.
✈ 80-83 (B-), 84-86 (B), 87-89 (B+) —The submitted project fulfilled the assignment at a
high-quality level. Work in this range needs little-to-some revision, is relatively
complete in content, is organized fairly well, and shows special attention to style
and visual design.
✈ 70-73 (C-), 74-76 (C), 77-79 (C+) —The submitted project did what the assignment
asked. Work in this range tends to need a bit of revision, but it is complete in
content and the organization is logical. The style, verbal and visual, is
straightforward but unremarkable or somewhat problematic.
✈ 60-63 (D-), 64-66 (D), 67-69 (D+)—The submitted project did what the assignment
asked at a low level of quality. Work in this range tends to need significant revision.
The content is often incomplete and the organization is difficult to discern. Verbal
and visual style is often non- existent or chaotic.
✈ Below 59 (F)—Don’t go here. I usually reserve the F for people who don’t show up or
don’t do the work. If the submitted project evidences an honest try, I doubt it would
receive an F.

POLICIES
access and accommodations
I want our class to be a welcoming and accessible space for all students regardless of learning
style or disability. If you have any requests for adjustments that would make our class more
accessible for you, please let me know so we can discuss options. You are also encouraged to
contact the Disability Resource Center (DRC), which is located in Young Hall, room 830, by
phone at 765.494.1247 or [email protected].

academic integrity
Purdue University takes academic integrity seriously, and so should you. As a writer and student
at Purdue, you are cautioned against the following:
✈ submitting someone else's work as your own, even if you have paid for it or obtained
the author's permission;
✈ using, without acknowledgment, someone else’s ideas or word-for-word phrases,
sentences, or paragraphs without quotation marks, signal language, and citations;
✈ using the materials of another after making only slight changes or using a rewritten form
of someone else's materials.
Plagiarism will not be tolerated. Any student who is found to plagiarize all or part of an
assignment will fail the course.

nondiscrimination
Purdue University is committed to maintaining a community which recognizes and values the
inherent worth and dignity of every person; fosters tolerance, sensitivity, understanding, and
mutual respect among its members; and encourages each individual to strive to reach his or
her own potential. In pursuit of its goal of academic excellence, the University seeks to develop
and nurture diversity. The University believes that diversity among its many members
strengthens the institution, stimulates creativity, promotes the exchange of ideas, and enriches
campus life. Purdue’s nondiscrimination policy can be found at http://www.purdue.edu/purdue/
ea_eou_statement.html.

late work and extensions

All projects—unless otherwise noted—should be uploaded to Blackboard by the day and time
they are due. Do not email projects to me. If for whatever reason you are unable to turn in a
project on time (or ahead of time if you plan to miss class), your grade will be docked 10% for
every day it is late. I will not accept any work that is more than 2 days late unless arrangements
have been made prior to the assignment’s due date. I will consider extension requests on a
case-by-base basis, so come talk to me in office hours if you need more time completing an
assignment.

SCHEDULE OF READINGS
* N.B. This schedule of readings and due dates is subject to change with adequate notice.

WEEK 1 TUESDAY, 8/20 THURSDAY, 8/22

TOPIC Introductions to the Class What is travel and why do
journeys matter?
READINGS Adler, “How to Mark a Knisley, Displacement, pp.
Book” (Bb) 1-10
ASSIGNMENTS

WEEK 2 TUESDAY, 8/27 THURSDAY, 8/29

TOPIC Memoirs Memoirs
 READINGS Knisley, Displacement, Days Knisley, Displacement, Days
1-5 6-end
ASSIGNMENTS

WEEK 3 TUESDAY, 9/3 THURSDAY, 9/5

TOPIC Memoirs – Workshop Poetry: Departures
READINGS Wheatley, “A Farewell to
America” (Bb)
Millay, “Departure” (Bb)
Parker, “Hearthside” (Bb)
Lennard, The Poetry
Handbook, (Purdue Libraries
Online)
•“Metre” (stop at
“Exemplary Poems”)
•“Form” (stop at “General
Forms”)
ASSIGNMENTS Bring a draft of assignment #1 Assignment #1 due @ 5pm on
to class. Blackboard

WEEK 4 TUESDAY, 9/10 THURSDAY, 9/12

TOPIC Poetry: In Transit Poetry: Arrivals
READINGS Frost, “Stopping by Woods Bishop, “Questions of
on a Snowy Evening” (Bb) Travel” (Bb)
Stevenson, “From a Railway Wharton, “Terminus” (Bb)
Carriage” (Bb) Mao, “Riding Alone for
Blanco, “Looking for the Gulf Thousands of Miles” (Bb)
Motel” (Bb) Lennard, The Poetry
Lennard, The Poetry Handbook, (Purdue Libraries
Handbook, (Purdue Libraries Online), “Syntax” (stop at
Online), “Exemplary Poems”)
“Punctuation” (sections on
“Stops” [~p. 156] and “Family
of Rules” [~p. 180])
ASSIGNMENTS

WEEK 5 TUESDAY, 9/17 THURSDAY, 9/19

TOPIC Poetry: Lessons Poetry – Workshop
 READINGS Shakespeare, “Sonnet
50” (Bb)
Holmes, “The Chambered
Nautilus” (Bb)
Dickinson, “LXII” (Bb)
Lennard, The Poetry
Handbook, (Purdue Libraries
Online), “Rhyme” (stop at
“Exemplary Poems”)
ASSIGNMENTS Bring a draft of assignment #2
to class.

WEEK 6 TUESDAY, 9/24 THURSDAY, 9/26

TOPIC Drama and Adaptation Drama
READINGS Glaspell, Trifles (Bb)
ASSIGNMENTS Assignment #2 due @ 5pm on
Blackboard

WEEK 7 TUESDAY, 10/1 THURSDAY, 10/3

TOPIC Drama Drama
READINGS Williams, Will Mr. Merriwether Christie, Afternoon at the
Return from Memphis? (Bb) Seaside (Bb)
ASSIGNMENTS

WEEK 8 TUESDAY, 10/8 THURSDAY, 10/10

TOPIC No Class Drama
–
READINGS Drama – Workshop
October Break
ASSIGNMENTS Bring a draft of assignment #3
to class.

WEEK 9 TUESDAY, 10/15 THURSDAY, 10/17

TOPIC Adaptation Showcase Short(er) Fiction
(Going Places)
READINGS Bradbury, “A Sound of
Thunder” (Bb)
Poe, “Man of the Crowd” (Bb)
ASSIGNMENTS Assignment #3 due in class
WEEK 10 TUESDAY, 10/22 THURSDAY, 10/24
TOPIC Short(er) Fiction Short(er) Fiction:
(Getting There) YA Literature
READINGS Zitkala-Ša, “The School Days Saint-Exupéry, The Little
of an Indian Girl” (Bb) Prince (pp. 1-51)
Heuler, “Egg Island” (Bb)
ASSIGNMENTS

WEEK 11 TUESDAY, 10/29 THURSDAY, 10/31

TOPIC Short(er) Fiction: Film Screening:
YA Literature The Little Prince (2015)
READINGS Saint-Exupéry, The Little
Prince (pp. 51-83)
ASSIGNMENTS

WEEK 12 TUESDAY, 11/5 THURSDAY, 11/7
TOPIC Short(er) Fiction – Workshop Novels
READINGS Garland, The Beach (1-94)
ASSIGNMENTS Bring a draft of assignment #4 Assignment #4 due @ 5pm on
to class. Blackboard

WEEK 13 TUESDAY, 11/12 THURSDAY, 11/14
TOPIC No Class Meeting Novels
–
Go to
Marathon Reading
(9:30 - 4:15 pm
in Rigel Gallery,
Stewart Center)
READINGS Garland, The Beach (94-196)
ASSIGNMENTS

WEEK 14 TUESDAY, 11/19 THURSDAY, 11/21

TOPIC Novels Novels
READINGS Garland, The Beach (197-316) Garland, The Beach (316-436)
ASSIGNMENTS
WEEK 15 TUESDAY, 11/26 THURSDAY, 11/28
TOPIC
No Class
–
Thanksgiving Break

WEEK 16 TUESDAY, 12/3 THURSDAY, 12/5

TOPIC Film Screening: Film Screening:
The Beach (2000) The Beach (2000)
READINGS
ASSIGNMENTS

FINALS WEEK TUESDAY,

12/10
ASSIGNMENTS Assignment #5 due @ 5pm on Blackboard