Teaching and Learning

This college-preparatory course begins with the belief that students must become acquainted with the literature and culture of America.  Students explore a variety of genres in order to become exposed to the major writers, periods, and themes of American literature.  Of especial importance is seating the works of literature in their historical time periods, reinforcing the relationship between works of art and the cultural milieu that produces them; thus, students not only read major works such as Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, the poetry of Walt Whitman and Emily Dickinson, Death of a Salesman or The Crucible, The Great Gatsby, Song of Solomon or Beloved, and excerpts from the works of Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau, but also they appreciate the events and cultural practices that inspire and provoke those works.  Major works are supplemented by varying choices, such as The Scarlet Letter, The Awakening, Their Eyes Were Watching God, The Grapes of Wrath, The Tortilla Curtain, and other selections.  Students are required to write, conference, and revise a minimum of five compositions each semester.