Instr:                 Sharee Paull
Office:              CRT 533,     229-5041
e-mail:              paul9456@uwm.edu
Office hours:     by appointment.

Course Information:          TR 12:30-1:45     PHY 120

Course Description

Realism, Environment, Work Ethic, Immigration and Cultural Diversity are all aspects of the pursuit for the American Dream whether it is pursued in the north, south, east, or west.  Economic Independence and the luxuries that affords socially and politically are undeniably central to the workings of American Novels.  Capitalism, Individualism, and the Realism of sexism and racism collide in literature, and authors traditionally formulate novels around these central nationally important themes. Authors elaborate on the tensions that emerge when we take these ideals into a specific setting where individuals work, fight, and compete, sometimes to gain victory and sometimes not, in the American Novel.  Both the cost and the cultural impact of the ethic of the individual will be explored by reading a variety of American Novels as we consider male and female roles, work ethics, otherness, and justice.

American Novels
Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter  *
Mark Twain's Huckelberry Finn *
Stephen Crane's Maggie: A Girl of the Street
Kate Chopin's The Awakening
Willa Cather's My Antonia
John Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath *
Upton Sinclair's The Jungle
Richard Wright's Native Son *
N. Scott Momoday's House Made of Dawn
Alice Walker's The Color Purple *
* Indicates texts will be represented by film