English 461 - American Literature to 1800         Winter 2008

CRN 25407     4 credits                                                                                                   

MWF 1:00-1:50 pm in Pacific Hall room 16                                                                                    

 

Prof. Gordon Sayre 

521 PLC   ph. 346-1313   gsayre@uoregon.edu

Office Hours 2-4 pm Mondays, 9-10 am Fridays

 

This course is the first part of a three-term upper-division sequence in American literature (the following courses are ENG 462 and 467).  I have designed it not so much as a survey, but as a series of case studies in the literature of exploration and colonization in North America by Spanish, Dutch, German, French, African, and English peoples of various religions.  This course will not be like other upper-division English courses that concentrate on major authors or familiar literary genres.  Many of the authors are little-known and some of the selections are in translation, indeed I have done a couple of the translations myself. Students should be prepared to learn a lot of history and geography, and to quickly absorb a wide range of readings by a large number of authors.  The reward will be a rich knowledge about the formation of our society in North America.

This course satisfies the 1500-1789 distribution requirement within the English major. It does not satisfy the Arts and Letters group requirement.

 

Books: at the University Bookstore

Mulford, ed., Early American Writings (Oxford UP)

 

Blackboard On-line Course Materials

This course has an on-line component on the UOÕs Blackboard coursesite. I plan to use the discusssion board, and post updated discussion questions, paper assignments, and short reading assignments as follows.

 

These reading assignments will be available on-line through blackboard, either as pdf files or as links to e-texts. I provide the URLs here just in case.

 

Norton, John. "Iroquois origin myth" [pdf uploaded]

Cusick, David. Ancient history of the Six Nations               http://olivercowdery.com/texts/1827cusk.htm

Sayre, ÒThe Surprise Attack BetrayedÓ [pdf uploaded]

Isaac Jogues' captivity narrative and Jean de BrŽbeufÕs martyrdom [pdf uploaded]

Dane, John. John Dane's spiritual autobiography

               http://historymatters.gmu.edu/d/6214/

Le Page du Pratz, Histoire de la Louisiane

               Volume I, chapters 16-19; Volume II, chapter 23

               http://darkwing.uoregon.edu/~gsayre/LPDP.html

Gronniosaw, James. Gronniosaw's narrative.

               http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/readex/13311.html

Gates, Henry Louis. "James Gronniosaw and the trope of the talking book" [pdf upload]

Royall Tyler, ÒThe ContrastÓ

               http://www.mith2.umd.edu/eada/html/display.php?docs=tyler_contrast.xml

 

Assignments

There will be two papers, of at least 6 pages each, due on January 30th and February 29th.  I will post a list of topics for each of these papers.

The third major writing assignment is a review of colonial historical sites and memorials. This will be due March 18th, although you will need to notify me of the place you have chosen by March 10th.  The research may be done mostly on the internet, but the analysis should incorporate some of our class readings.  IÕll circulate details later in the term.

There will also be a midterm exam and a final exam.

The major papers will each count for 20% of the final grade, the historical site analysis for 10%, the final for 20%, and the midterm for 20%.  The remaining 10% will reflect your contributions to discussion, both in class and on the blackboard site, and the results of in-class quizzes and assignments.

 

 

Schedule of Assignments (all page references are to Early American Writings)

 

Jan. 7th              Why did people come to America?

James Revel and Wheatley (handouts)

 

Jan. 9th             Sixteenth century Spanish/Italian narratives of encounter:

Columbus and Vespucci 28-52

 

Jan. 11th          La Leyenda Negra:

Las Casas, Cabeza de Vaca and Castaneda 52-73

 

Jan. 14th          Iroquois stories of creation, tribal origins, and encounter:

                              Early American Writings 9-13; John Norton (blackboard link):

                              David Cusick, "Ancient History of the Six Nations" (blackboard link)

 

Jan. 16th          Other Native American stories:

Inca Garcilaso de la Vega, 103-109

                              Stories of encounter with Europeans 152-158

 

Jan. 18th          Exploration and Ethnography:

                              Samuel de Champlain, 114-123; Adriaen Van der Donck, 708-715; Jean de                                            Lery, 74-86; Roger Williams, 257-263; Robert Beverley, 513-522;                                                      Cadwallader Colden, 628-632

 

Jan. 21st           No class - Martin Luther King Jr.  holiday

 

Jan. 23rd         Captivity Narratives I: Initiation Rites

                              Pierre-Esprit Radisson, 123-139

                              Juan Ortiz story from the Inca Garcilaso's La Florida, 93-103

 

Jan. 25th          The Pocahontas Myth

John Smith, 177-188, John Rolfe 195-197

 

Feb. 1st             Captivity Narratives II: Jesuit Martyrs

Jan. 28th          Isaac Jogues' narrative and Jean de Brebeuf's martyrdom (blackboard)

                              Marie de l'Incarnation, 440-446

 

Jan. 30th          Missionaries

               John Eliot, 265-276; Delgado, Kino and Palou, 394-411; Brebeuf, 429-440

 

                                                            FIRST PAPER DUE Jan. 30th

 

Jan. 28th          The Pueblo Revolt and the "Surprise attack betrayed":

Feb. 1st             Otermin and Vargas, 384-394; Hopi account of the Revolt, 150-152;                                                            Acoma Origin story, 18-22; Gaspar Perez de Villagr‡, 372-384;

                              Prof. Sayre's essay on the "Surprise Attack Betrayed" (blackboard)

 

Feb. 4th            Captivity Narratives III: the New England Puritans

                              Mary Rowlandson and John Williams 305-349

 

Feb. 6th            Calvinism and Poetry

                              Anne Bradstreet poems  280-284; Edward Taylor poems 302-305,                                                  349-357; John Dane's spiritual autobiography (blackboard link)

 

Feb. 8th            Midterm exam

 

Feb. 11th          The Promotional Tract I: A Question of Labor

                              John Smith, "A Description of New England" 171-177

                              Gottlieb Mittelberger, 744-757

                              George Alsop, 553-562

 

Feb. 13th          The Promotional Tract II: The Pastoral and Georgic

                              James Grainger, 501-513

                              Francis Daniel Pastorius and Christophe Saur 725-744

                              John Lawson 490-498

 

Feb. 15th          Promotional Tract III: The Parodies

                              Ned Ward, 481-490; Ebeneezer Cook 563-572

                              Le Page Du Pratz's fabulous journey [link from blackboard]

 

Feb. 18th          The Trope of the Loupe

                              Le Page Du Pratz, 470-478, which continues in

                              Prof. Sayre's translation of vol. II, chapter  23 of Histoire de la Louisiane                                      

Feb. 20th          Quaker Spiritual Autobiography

                              Wm. Penn, George Keith, Elizabeth Ashbridge, John Woolman 590-628

 

Feb. 22nd        The Great Awakening

                              Jonathan Edwards and Charles Chauncy 668-694

 

Feb. 25th          The Black Atlantic: Autobiographies by Africans in the 18th century                                           Briton Hammon 864-867; John Marrant 928-941

 

Feb. 27th          The Trope of the Talking Book

                              Olaudah Equiano 912-927

                              Henry Louis Gates "The Trope of the Talking Book"; and

                              James Albert Ukawsaw Gronniosaw's narrative (blackboard links)

 

Feb. 29th         Phyllis Wheatley and Prince Hall 888-912

                                                            SECOND PAPER DUE

 

March 3rd      The American Revolution

                              Declaration of Independence 965-967;

                              British Loyalists, 967-975; Thomas Paine, 836-848

 

March 5th       J. Hector St. John de Crevecoeur 975-998

 

March 7th       NO CLASS

 

March 10th    Thomas Jefferson 945-965

 

March 12th    Royal Tyler, ÒThe ContrastÓ (on-line, link from Blackboard)  

 

March 14th    The Politics of Seduction

                              William Hill Brown, Hannah Webster Foster and Susannah Haswell                                            Rowson, 1084-1094, Judith Sargent Murray 1039-1051

 

TBA for March 17th: Review for Final Exam

 

March 18th    15:15 pm  Final Exam

                                                            HISTORICAL SITE ANALYSIS DUE