UW-Milwaukee: L&S Freshman Scholars Seminars - Fall 2008


Humanities Africology Celtic Studies Communication Comparative Literature English Ethnic Studies German History Italian Philosophy Women's Studies Natural Science Atmospheric Sciences Biological Sciences Physics Social Science Africology Anthropology Economics Political Science Psychology Sociology Cultural Diversity English		Fall 2008 Seminars English The Memoir: Writing Your Life Aspects of Hell Satire, from Jon Swift to Jon Stewart Wiki Nation: Producing the Internet Multicultural America Going Green: Literature and Film Representations of the American Dream Hmong American Life Stories Baseball Reading and Culture The Beat Writers Freshman Workshop in Creative Writing: Riding the Waves of Change The Translation Game: Examining Hidden Meanings in Language Contemporary Western stories of Zen/Buddhism Writing for the Social Good Wild Justice: Revenge Terror and the State The Memoir: Writing Your Life Sandra Brusin, Senior Lecturer Memoir differs from autobiography by focusing on a significant moment in a life as opposed to the collective moments from birth to the present that compose a life. It also relies on emotional truth, not just factual truth. Thus how you remember an event, your perceptions and feelings shape what's "true." In this class, we will study the genre of memoir writing by reading a selection of memoirs, analyzing what makes them successful, and applying what we learn by writing a memoir about a particular person or event of significance. Sandy Brusin is a Senior Lecturer at UWM, English 102 Coordinator, and teaches other first year composition courses and English 201. She developed her interest in memoir writing and began publishing memoirs while completing her MA in English at UWM. Sandy loves her family, teaching, traveling, biking, hiking, cooking, music, eating chocolate, the color purple, and her Soft Coated Wheaten Terrier dog, Teddy Bear. All of her "loves" have been subjects for her memoir writing. Number: ENGLISH 192, SEM 001 Credits: 3HU Time: MW 9:30-10:45 Place: CRT 286 Class Number: 46068 Check current enrollment information. Return to Top of Page Aspects of Hell Brian Marks, Senior Lecturer Where is hell? Does map quest offer directions? How did this idea of hell come about? Why does Satan have horns and cloven hooves? Who goes there and why? Does the existence of hell make us better people? Do the practitioners of Eastern religions believe in hell? Do we still believe in hell, and, if so, what is it like? Has it changed? What is it about hell that we find so fascinating and repelling? In this class, we will discuss how the renderings of hell in different periods of time reflect social, economic conditions and philosophical beliefs. We will read a variety of texts such as Dante's Inferno and Alan Moore's graphic novel From Hell as well as view paintings and films about the subject to help us begin to answer some of the above questions. You should expect to write about, discuss, present interpretations of readings/viewings and perhaps even offer your own depiction of what hell is. We won't be donning black cloaks and pentagrams and participating in freaky chants, but we will check out what goes down "down there" and who has been said to be sent "down there" throughout the ages. Brian Marks is a senior lecturer in the English department. He has a strong interest in American fiction in the nineteen twenties and fifties, mythology (both ancient and contemporary), magical realism, and wishes he had more time to read fun stuff, like graphic novels and David Sedaris. He is currently working on his first novel. In the class, he figures himself to be Virgil (who leads Dante through hell in the Inferno), but he will also let you tell him where you want to explore once you get your bearings in Land O' Lucifer. Number: ENGLISH 192, SEM 002 Credits: 3HU Time: MW 11:00am-12:15pm Place: CRT 286 Class Number: 50678 Check current enrollment information. Return to Top of Page Satire, from Jon Swift to Jon Stewart Kyla Moore, Lecturer Many of us have laughed at South Park, Family Guy or Chapelle Show, but what is the purpose of satire, and can it be an effective political strategy? This seminar will explore the literary tradition of satire, what makes it "work," and its levels of political effectiveness. In addition to looking at modern popular satires such as The Daily Show and The Colbert Report, students will read seminal satirists including Juvenal, Jonathan Swift, and Mark Twain. In doing so, students will develop critical reading skills, discussion skills, and an understanding of genre conventions associated with satire. During the course of the semester, students will also have the opportunity to select their own satire to add to the syllabus and analyze, as well as develop their college-level writing skills and ideas about political participation by composing a short satire on a topic of their choice. Kyla Moore is an Instructional Specialist for the UROP Program and a Lecturer in the English Department at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. She received her Master's degree in English from the University of Notre Dame and undergraduate degrees in English and Psychology from Hope College in Holland, MI. Her primary field of research is the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning, and she has been named a Center Scholar at UWM by the Center for Instructional and Professional Development for the '06-'07 and '07-'08 academic years. She is currently working on researching student learning within a paired-course learning community environment. Number: ENGLISH 192, SEM 003 Credits: 3HU Time: MW 12:30pm-1:45pm Place: BOL B80 Class Number: 50146 Check current enrollment information. Return to Top of Page Wiki Nation: Producing the Internet Mary Brehm, Senior Lecturer YouTube, Facebook, Wikipedia, Linux: Digital technologies are changing our relationship with media, allowing us to be producers, not just consumers, of all kinds of texts. Open-source, open-content sites are transforming the way we work and play. This class is for anyone who is interested in how digital texts are produced and accessed today, and what's in store for our wired society. Learning outcomes: Demonstrate awareness of current issues in information literacy, technological literacy and trends in media and society. Apply your own experiences with digital texts to these issues, and reflect on your relationship to digital technologies Participate in open-source, open-content projects and evaluate your experiences doing so Mary Brehm is a lecturer with the English Department who loves Wikipedia. She loves it because she can read about black holes, polyandry and Pee Wee Herman all within few keystrokes, but she especially loves the fact that it represents democratization of knowledge. Mary is the course coordinator for English 102, a research writing course that many first-year students take. You may have seen her riding her bike south on Maryland, wearing a nerdy blue and while bike helmet. She has to wear it to model safe bike behavior for her kids, Max and Zoe. Fun fact: Max and Wikipedia were born in the same year: 2001 Number: ENGLISH 192, SEM 004 Credits: 3HU Time: MW 3:30pm-4:45pm Place: MER 315 Class Number: 50938 Check current enrollment information. Return to Top of Page Multicultural America Greg Jay, Professional Note: Students who complete this course will satisfy both their Cultural Diversity and Humanities General Education Requirements How are our identities shaped by the cultures and communities from which we come? Arriving at UWM, many students experience a diversity of people they have not encountered before, leading to unexpected friendships as well as tensions and confusions. Success in today's multicultural America requires thinking critically about one's own story as well as learning to listen to the tales told by others. This seminar will invite students to explore the importance of "cultural identity," both in the stories and poems we read and in our own personal lives. Whether our ancestors were Germans or Mexicans, Ojibwe or Jewish, from West Africa or Laos or Ireland (or any combination of these and any others), the histories of our families and the stories we have inherited shape who we are, what we know, what we value, and how we act. Through a combination of literary readings, film and video screenings, and experiences in the Milwaukee community, students will have opportunities to reflect on their own identities as they also learn to appreciate other people's stories. Work for the course will culminate in an "Identities" project, in which students will investigate their own histories and identities through the lens of their growing multicultural awareness. Gregory Jay is a professor of English and the Director of UWM's Cultures and Communities Program. He grew up in Los Angeles during the turbulent 1960s, when the Civil Rights movement and anti-war protests shook-up the Woodstock generation. Looking for answers, he went to an experimental college (UC Santa Cruz), hitchhiked through Europe, and fell in love with American literature (he remembers reading Moby-Dick during his breaks cooking bad food at a drive-in restaurant). After earning his doctorate, he took a job at the University of Alabama, which had only recently been de-segregated. That's where his commitment to a more multicultural curriculum began. He listens to blues and jazz, goes to indie flicks, loves New Mexico, and spoils his two spaniels. Number: ENGLISH 192, SEM 005 Credits: 3HU Time: MW 3:30pm-4:45pm Place: LUB S233 Class Number: 50940 Check current enrollment information. Return to Top of Page Going Green: Literature and Film Kristin Terwelp, Senior Lecturer The "Green" movement in the United States has not only become very visible in recent years, but it has also become big business. So what is all the "Going Green" hype about? What do terms like global warming, eco-lifestyle, and global sustainability really mean? Can Americans be both high tech consumers and ecologically conscientious? In this course, we will trace the history of the "Green" movement beginning with texts by Henry David Thoreau, Walt Whitman, and several Native American writers and ending with films and texts by Wendell Berry, Annie Dillard, and Al Gore. We will also examine "green" advertising and do some virtual window shopping at a "green" Wal-Mart. That's right, even Wal-Mart had joined the "Green" movement. This course is designed to help students find and use the many resources available at the university. With this in mind, students will be required to write a 7-8 page research paper which will be due during the second half of the semester. The class will be visiting the library at least once early in the semester to help students in this endeavor. We will also visit the Peer Mentoring Center and the Writing Center. Because this is a student-centered course, once the research papers are completed, students will have the opportunity to share their work with the class. In other words, the students' work will become an integral part of the course material. Kristin Terwelp received her Ph.D. in English from UWM where she has taught creative writing, literature, and introductory composition for the English Department for the past 9 years. She is a poet and has published her poetry in a number of literary journals throughout the country. Her scholarly interests include women's literature, gender studies, nineteenth-century American literature, and Native American literature. As a first-generation college student and a woman from a working-class family, she is particularly interested in the roles working women have played in American literature. Number: ENGLISH 192, SEM 006 Credits: 3HU Time: TR 9:30am -10:45am Place: CRT 466 Class Number: 53298 Check current enrollment information. Return to Top of Page Representations of the American Dream Liana Odrcic, Senior Lecturer One of our nation's most enduring cultural ideas about itself is that of "the American Dream." In this seminar we will look at representations of the American Dream in nineteenth and twentieth-century American literature, contemporary film, and non-fiction texts to explore the meaning of this idea in American life. Questions guiding out explorations throughout the semester will be: What is the American Dream, anyway? How is it defined and portrayed in literary works, film, non-fiction? To whom does the American dream apply? Is the American Dream a myth? A reality only for some? How so? Course texts will include literary works by American authors such as F. Scott Fitzgerald, Stephen Crane, Anzia Yezierska, Willa Cather, and Toni Cade Bambara, and works of non-fiction by Martin Luther King, Jr., historian Jim Cullen, and cultural historian Studs Terkel. Film viewings will include "American Splendor" and "Real Women Have Curves." Dr. Liana Odrcic is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of English at UWM. Her doctoral research has focused on nineteenth and twentienth-century American literature and theories of popular reading practice. As a first-generation American herself, she is interested in exploring "the American Dream" that brought her maternal grandfather across the Atlantic in 1914 and her father in 1963. Number: ENGLISH 192, SEM 007 Credits: 3HU Time: TR 11:00am-12:15pm Place: CRT 466 Class Number: 53300 Check current enrollment information. Return to Top of Page Hmong American Life Stories Mary Louise Buley-Meissner, Associate Professor Extraordinary stories often are told by ordinary people - stories of courage, fear, sacrifice, strength, and hope. If we want to understand people, we need to listen carefully as they tell us about their families, histories, and dreams of the future. This seminar will focus on such narratives by Hmong Americans, who have become an increasingly important part of this country since the Vietnam War. Students will read a history of the war (Hmong in America: Journey from a Secret War by Tim Pfaff); the first collection of poetry and essays by young Hmong Americans (Bamboo Among the Oaks: Contemporary Writing by Hmong Americans,edited by Mai Neng Moua); a book of cross-cultural investigative reporting (The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down by Anne Fadiman); and two issues of the literary journal Paj Ntaub Voice (Loss and Separation and Becoming America). These texts illuminate not only individual lives, but also the historical and cultural circumstances shaping people's identities, communities, and sustaining values. Through reading, writing and informed discussion, we will address many challenging questions. For example, how differently do first-, second- and third-generation Hmong Americans view the opportunities offered by this country for success and happiness? When Hmong traditions clash with modern American values, to what extent can opposing world views be reconciled? What are the choices and consequences faced by young people who attempt to live "between worlds"- as Hmong and American? For young women in particular, how can family and community obligations be balanced with personal ambitions that challenge tradition? To investigate such questions, we will delve into historical, social and educational studies of Hmong American life. Guest speakers and videos will provide additional background information. Our seminar will emphasize active learning through discussion informed by extensive reading, individual research projects, and class inquiry into the dynamic development of Hmong American identity from the 1970s until now. A Seattle native, Mary Louise Buley-Meissner has traveled to China, Japan, Hong Kong, New Zealand, Europe and across the U.S. as a teacher and life-long learner. She enjoys meeting new students, crossing cultures, and searching for the perfect cup of coffee. An associate professor of English, she also works with the Cultures and Communities Program to promote cultural diversity in the UWM undergraduate curriculum. Her main project is developing the Hmong American Studies Initiative, which includes connecting course work with community engagement. Number: ENGLISH 192, SEM 008 Credits: 3HU Time: TR 12:30pm-1:45pm Place: CRT 468 Class Number: 53320 Number: ENGLISH 192, SEM 011 Credits: 3HU Time: TR 3:30pm-4:45pm Place: CRT 468 Class Number: 59122 Check current enrollment information. Return to Top of Page Baseball Reading and Culture Mariann Maris, Senior Lecturer Baseball is life! Read, write, think critically, and talk about baseball's influence on American literature and culture in this seminar. Learn more about the place baseball occupies in our imaginations and in our lives. Day-to-day class activities will vary. Plan to read about and discuss the recent steriod issue, baseball in Milwaukee in the 50's, baseball and racism, and other baseball-related literature. During final exam week, we'll tour Miller Park. Also, if you're interested in purchasing opening day tickets for spring 2007, we can go to opening day together (invite family and friends) even though the class meets during the fall semester. Mariann Maris, Senior Lecturer in the Department of English, loves baseball. A Brewers season ticket holder, she follows the team closely. During the winter, Ms. Maris looks forward to the day pitchers report for spring training. Just as sighting the first robin, for some, represents the return of spring, for her, spring training signals that another wonderful season of baseball has begun and baseball will return to Milwaukee once again. Number: ENGLISH 192, SEM 009 Credits: 3HU Time: TR 2:00pm-3:15pm Place: CRT 466 Class Number: 53402 Check current enrollment information. Return to Top of Page The Beat Writers Jeffrey Perso, Lecturer This seminar will investigate the writers known collectively as the Beat Generation. Students will read major Beat writers, such as Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg, as well as their critics. Students will also examine how jazz and religion influenced the style and content of Beat writing. Through their reading, writing and research, seminar participants, will experience the literary and cultural phenomenon which was the Beat writers. Journalist, fiction writer and educator, seminar instructor Jeffrey Perso has written extensively on the Beat writers and the '60's counterculture. His work has appeared in The Alternative Press Review, Milwaukee Weekly, Porcupine Literary Arts Magazine, San Francisco Phoenix, and elsewhere, and he received the English Department's Teaching Excellence Award for 2005. An avid, though lumbering runner, most days he can be seen panting through Milwaukee lake shore parks. Number: ENGLISH 192, SEM 010 Credits: 3HU Time: TR 3:30pm-4:45am Place: HLT G84 Class Number: 53650 Check current enrollment information. Return to Top of Page Freshman Workshop in Creative Writing: Riding the Waves of Change Oody Petty, Lecturer Change happens in everyone's life. Sometimes, in the midst of change, it can be difficult to find solid ground. For many of us, the first year of college is one of those times. Although a time of transition can be exhilarating, it can be fraught with anxiety and uncertainty. Nonetheless, transitional periods also have the potential for tremendous discovery and growth. This creative writing workshop will be an open, supportive, collaborative and interactive environment for any level of freshman writer-from beginner to more advanced. We'll engage in an array of writing exercises that help us to notice, examine, and ultimately express the experiences of change you encounter in your first year of college. We'll learn how the basic elements of poetry, fiction, and personal essay can help us craft the articulations of personal experience into satisfying and moving pieces of writing. By reading, examining and discussing the works of a variety of published authors, as well as your own and your classmates' writings, we'll gain perspective on how "writing to learn" can be successfully applied to help us navigate the important challenges, emotions, and triumphs that change presents. This course offers methods of utilizing the forces present in times of transition to inspire writing that can be beneficial and gratifying to both the writer and his or her readers. Oody Petty is a lecturer at UWM where she received her doctorate in English. Oody teaches courses in literature, creative writing, and composition, and has served as Creative Non-Fiction and Poetry Editor for The Cream City Review, UWM's literary magazine. Her academic interests include women's literature, Romanticism, and the influence of culture on knowledge, particularly in its effect on race and gender. Oody is a poet and enjoys mentoring her writing students, many of whom continue to send her poems and stories years after they're done with classes. Number: ENGLISH 192, SEM 012 Credits: 3HU Time: MW 2:00pm-3:15pm Place: CRT 468 Class Number: 60081 Check current enrollment information. Return to Top of Page The Translation Game: Examining Hidden Meanings in Language Jennifer Mattson, Senior Lecturer Does "I feel trapped" mean the same in male-speak as it does in female-speak? You are somewhat of an expert translator already, perhaps without even realizing it. When a girlfriend says, "Are you hungry?" you know it means SHE is hungry. When a friend says, "Why are you hating on me?" you know you need to apologize for something. What does it mean when a professor says, "I don't formally take attendance, but..."? Why does an international student misinterpret your friendly suggestion to "help yourself"? Does "Where do you live?" mean the same as "Where you stay at?"? What exactly does the word "change" mean when spoken by a political candidate? What is "the heart to never surrender"? How do we translate "defend our national security"? We will explore hidden and (mis)understood meanings between males and females, between advertisers and consumers, between politicians and voters, between whites and blacks, between internationals who speak English as a second language and native speakers, between mainstream speakers of American English and non-mainstream speakers. We will also examine the language of political correctness, propaganda, text messaging, cell phone novels, and more. You will have the opportunity to interact with someone who speaks English as a second language, and will learn to recognize and observe various dialects, genderlects, sociolects, and idiolects. This will in turn make you more aware of the ways you and those around you use language. Your metalinguistic awareness will increase. And you will learn what all these things mean! I spent 11 years at 11 colleges before I finished my degrees in Linguistics (Bachelor's) and English (Master's). Don't worry, though, taking that long is not contagious! I got all the restlessness out of my system and have been happily teaching here at UWM since. I have the best job in the world. I am a Senior Lecturer and have taught many intro-level sociolinguistics courses to UWM undergrads, as well as English as a second language courses to international students. I know how to say "Are you cheating?" in many languages. Number: ENGLISH 192, SEM 013 Credits: 3HU Time: MW 2:00pm-3:15pm Place: MER 316 Class Number: 60082 Check current enrollment information. Return to Top of Page Contemporary Western stories of Zen/Buddhism Steve Nelson, Senior Lecturer My plan for this course is to introduce students to the history and ideas of Zen/Buddhism through a close examination of accessible Western stories (fiction, nonfiction, and movies). By focusing on stories, as opposed to strictly the philosophy/ideas of Zen/Buddhism, students will be able to see the ideas in action and better understand the practical applications and challenges of the Zen/Buddhism system of beliefs. The class will be directed to enjoy, interpret, and analyze the chosen texts and movies. To do so, they must utilize and develop their critical thinking skills, asking questions and moving beyond the material given to them in order to make sense of it and relate what they've learned to their own lives. Books I am considering using for the class include Siddhartha, Zen in the Art of Archery, The Dharma Bums, and The Razor's Edge. Movie possibilities include Little Buddha, Kundun, The Matrix, and Seven Samurai. After each work, we will have classroom discussions, students will write responses, and over the course of the semester students will work a research paper on a topic of their choice. By the end of the semester students will have improved their writing and critical thinking skills, be more comfortable and confident engaging in classroom discussions, see their college years as an opportunity to learn more about the world and themselves, and have a developing knowledge of (and hopefully growing interest in) Zen/Buddhism. Number: ENGLISH 192, SEM 014 Credits: 3HU Time: TR 2:00pm-3:15pm Place: CRT 468 Class Number: 60083 Check current enrollment information. Return to Top of Page Writing for the Social Good Rachel Spilka, Associate Professor Do you like to write? Do you also have a strong "social conscience" and care passionately about problems in our society? Maybe you know about social, civic, school, or organizational problems like some of the following and have the urge to write about them: A student formerly diagnosed as mentally ill having too-easy access to guns preceding the massacre at Virginia Tech Single working women discovering at the last minute that they are unqualified for paid or unpaid leave when they adopt children internationally Children continuing to attend a daycare center where lead paint has been detected but not yet reported to families A service learning coordinator at a non-profit agency assigning serious writing tasks to male students but only menial labor tasks to female students Unequal treatment by police officers of citizens of different races In this seminar, we will discover how writers can have enormous power and how writing, if done well, has huge potential to help individuals or even entire organizations understand complex problems better and sometimes resolve them. Together, we will work on altruistic writing tasks, all aimed at improving people's lives or work conditions. This will be a highly interactive, "hands-on," projects-based course held in a computer lab. We'll do some brainstorming and planning, and then some writing, peer reviewing, and revising, as we consider how best to use writing as a "social tool" to improve people's lives. What we'll write (or rewrite) will depend on problems that concern us the most, but might include letters to newspaper editors, emails to aldermen, memos to company CEOs, policies for company employees, short proposals to schools or religious institutions, brief reports to non-profits or civic organizations, and flyers or brochures for consumers. Rachel Spilka used to be a full-time professional writer and editor. She has held such job titles as "Senior Writer," "Editorial Assistant," "Neurosurgical Editor," "Technical Editor," "Communications Analyst," and one of her favorites, "Senior Information Design Specialist." She has also taught business, medical, technical, and professional writing over the past few decades. She has been at UWM over the past nine years and especially enjoys teaching students who care about social issues-and who also like to write. Number: ENGLISH 192, SEM 015 Credits: 3HU Time: TR 3:30pm-4:45pm Place: CRT 127 Class Number: 60218 Check current enrollment information. Return to Top of Page Wild Justice: Revenge Terror and the State Peter Blewett, Lecturer This course explores the spectacle of terror as expressive of the idea of revenge in popular culture from the Renaissance play, The Revenger's Tragedy, to the contemporary graphic novel and film, "V" for Vendetta. The required texts investigate artistically the problem of realizing justice in a corrupt or bureaucratic state. The texts typically locate the problem in the relation between the individual and the state. Number: ENGLISH 192, SEM 016 Credits: 3HU Time: MW 12:30pm-1:45pm Place: ENG B38 Class Number: 60219 Check current enrollment information. Return to Top of Page
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