Course Title: American EcoFeminism
Professor: Dr. Patrick Murphy
Graduate Students: Blake V. & Jay Jay S.
When: Summer Session C, 2011 (May 16 through August 5)
Credits: 3 hours
Structure:
Blake and Jay Jay will post weekly reading responses and discuss the texts assigned to their collaborative blog, Two EcoFeminists (http://twoecofeminists.blogspot.com). Dr. Patrick D. Murphy will be added as an author for the blog as well. The first weekly post is due by midnight on Tuesday, with a response due Wednesday by midnight. Posts will be due from week 1 through week 10; week 1’s post will be a “Personal Goal Statement” for our expectations for the course.
The blog creates an online resource space for students, scholars, and independent scholars interested in ecofeminist theory. Therefore, in addition to posting our weekly reading responses and discussions, we will post our abstracts, our short papers, and conference papers. In the spirit of encouraging scholarly collaboration, articles, books, images, websites, archives, or multi-media files of interest found during our research process will be posted to the blog.
Another goal is that of networking with other ecofeminist scholars and academics through our blog. Ultimately, we want to enculturate ourselves into the ecofeminist academic discourse community. We hope to communicate with at least two scholars through our blog, in addition to Dr. Murphy.
Writing Requirements:
A 1,500 word essay (5-6 pages) essay due during week six, on Friday, June 24, 2011. The paper will be emailed to Dr. Murphy as a .doc file as well as posted to our blog. We will have the option to significantly expand this paper for the conference paper; to do so however, the final conference paper must be 15-18 pages instead of 10-12 pages.
Five abstracts, due weeks two through eleven on scholarly articles or book chapters (one page, single spaced). Due dates to be determined; abstracts will be emailed to Dr. Murphy as .doc files and posted to our blog.
A preliminary bibliography is due week eight on Wednesday, July 6, 2011. A conference proposal is due week nine on Wednesday, July 13, 2011.
One conference paper, ten to twelve pages, designed for submission to an upcoming conference, following the guidelines for an actual call for papers. The paper will have a minimum of four scholarly sources in addition the primary text. A rough draft is due Monday, July 25, 2011 to Dr. Murphy, with feedback given at the Wednesday face-to-face meeting on July 27, 2011. Blake and Jay Jay will exchange papers for revision as well.
The conference paper is due Wednesday, August 3, 2011. Blake and Jay Jay will give an informal mock-conference presentation to Dr. Murphy on that date. The papers will be emailed to Dr. Murphy as a .doc files and posted to our blog.
Face to Face Meetings:
If agreeable to Dr. Murphy’s schedule, at least six weekly meetings will occur on Wednesdays in the afternoon, in his office.
Reading Schedule:
Articles: To be assigned or discovered through research by Blake and Jay Jay.
Selected Chapters & Possible Primary Texts: To be read concurrently with book assignments.
American Women of Letters and the Nineteenth-Century Sciences: Styles of Affiliation (Nina Baym)
Reading the Roots: American Nature Writing before Walden (Michael P. Branch)
Essays on Nature and Landscape (Susan Fenimore Cooper)
The Feminine Sublime: Gender and Excess in Women's Fiction (Barbara Claire Freeman)
Florida’s Frontiers: A History of the Trans-Appalachian Frontier (Paul E. Hoffman)
Week One: The Environmental Imagination: Thoreau, Nature Writing, and the Formation of American Culture (Lawrence Buell)
Week Two: Woman's Fiction: A Guide to Novels by and about Women in America, 1820-70 (Nina Baym)
Week Three: The Lay of the Land: Metaphor As Experience and History in American Life and Letters (Annette Kolodny)
Week Four: Mary Wollstonecraft's Journey to Scandinavia: Essays (Anka Ryall)
Week Five: Ecofeminist Literary Criticism: Theory, Interpretation, Pedagogy (Environment Human Condition) (Greta Gaard and Patrick D. Murphy)
Week Six: Literature, Nature, and Other: Ecofeminist Critiques (Patrick D. Murphy). Short Paper due Friday, June 24, 2011.
Week Seven: When Species Meet (Posthumanities) (Donna J. Haraway)
Week Eight: Research Week; Preliminary Bibliography due.
Week Nine: Research Week; Conference Proposal due.
Week Ten: Research Week
Week Eleven: Research Week
Week Twelve: Conference papers are due, accompanied by our mock-conference presentation in Dr. Murphy’s office.
