2021-2022 Academic Catalog 
    
    Apr 25, 2024  
2021-2022 Academic Catalog [ARCHIVED CATALOG]

Course Descriptions


Courses at Furman are typically identified by codes separated into three distinct parts. The first segment designates the academic subject of the course, the second component relates to the level of instruction, and the final element (when displayed) assists with the identification of the meeting times and location for individual course sections.

Credit bearing undergraduate courses typically are numbered between 100 and 599, graduate instruction is typically numbered between 600 and 999, while zero credit experiences frequently have numbers between 001 and 099. Undergraduates can further expect courses numbers to reflect:

100-299 introductory courses, geared to freshmen and sophomores
300-499 advanced courses, designed for majors and other students with appropriate background and/or prerequisites
500-599 individualized instruction, including internships, research, independent study, and music performance studies
 

Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages

  
  • EDOL-621 Sociolinguistics for English Language Learners


    Focus of course is on an in-depth study of the English language as a system. Emphasis is placed on applying concepts, theories, and research in classroom practices to facilitate the acquisition of English. 3 credits.
  
  • EDOL-640 Principles and Strategies for Teaching English Language Learners


    Course focuses on the history, theories, and teaching strategies, including the use of technology, of teaching English to speakers of other languages. As the first course in the TESOL sequence, this course is designed as an introduction to the field. 3 credits.
  
  • EDOL-641 Teaching Reading and Writing to PK-12 English Language Learners


    Course examines curriculum, instructional strategies, and support materials used for teaching reading and writing to English language learners. Planning, implementation, and evaluation of instruction are emphasized, including the modifications and accommodations necessary to meet English language arts standards. 3 credits.
  
  • EDOL-720 Linguistic and Cultural Diversity in Education


    Course offers a framework for understanding diversity in the schools and for conceptualizing the educator?s role in promoting an inclusive educational environment. Recent research and critical issues in education related to diversity are presented. 3 credits.
  
  • EDOL-723 Bilingual Special Education


    3 credits.
  
  • EDOL-742 Testing & Assessment of English Language Learners


    In this course, the theoretical and practical issues associated with testing and assessment of language minority learners will be provided. Instruction and practice in the administration, scoring, and interpretation of norm-referenced, criterion-referenced, and alternative assessment measures of language proficiency and academic achievement are provided. 3 credits.
  
  • EDOL-743 Content Modification for English Language Learners


    Course focuses on issues, programs, and strategies for modifying content instruction for English language learners. Emphasis is placed on the content-based learning approach that helps learners to acquire a new language through the study of academic disciplines such as mathematics, science, and social studies. 3 credits.
  
  • EDOL-961 Practicum: Principles and Strategies for Teaching English Language Learners


    The field-based practicum is designed to provide candidates with opportunities to demonstrate their knowledge, skills, and dispositions for teaching English language learners (ELLs). 3 credits

English

  
  • ENG-111 Texts and Meaning


    GER: TA (Critical, Analytical Interpretation of Texts)
    An introduction to the study of the structures and methods by which texts create and convey meaning. Texts and approaches will be determined by individual instructors, but all emphasize reflective, critical reading, as well as text-centered discussions and written assignments. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-150 Interpretive Strategies


    GER: TA (Critical, Analytical Interpretation of Texts)
    Addressing issues and questions specific to literary and cultural analysis and in the process exploring various interpretive strategies through which ideas of the literary and of literary study are engaged. The content and perspective of this course will vary according to instructor. Students will read primary theoretical texts, and will write about how theories of literature might inform ways of reading prose, poetry, drama, and/or film. By the end of the term, students should have a sense of how over the years critical debate has shaped the many practices of reading literature. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-152 History of English Language


    HB (Human Behavior)
    Any FYW.
    Survey of the internal history of English,
    reviewing Indo-European and Germanic background
    and studying the development of phonology,
    morphology, and syntax from Old English to Modern
    English. 4
  
  • ENG-153 English Language: How It Works


    HB (Human Behavior)
    Introduction to basic English linguistics. The
    difference between prescriptive grammar (the rules
    we learn in school) and descriptive grammar (the
    linguistic rules that native speakers of a
    language have learned). Discussion of the main
    divisions of linguistics, focusing on the
    phonology, morphology, and syntax of Edited
    American English. Study of the ways other
    dialects, in particular, Southern American English
    and African American Vernacular English, differ
    from the standard and exploration of the
    implications of linguistics on social and
    educational policy 4
  
  • ENG-172 Gothic Creatures


    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    The Gothic genre is populated by unnatural creatures: phantoms, human-animal hybrids, and vampires that stalk the seemingly innocent. But such beings may also give voice to cultural guilt or anxiety. This course locates the Gothic creature in its historical and political context. May Experience ONLY. 2 credits.
  
  • ENG-200 Introduction to Creative Writing


    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    Develop student proficiency in the craft of creative writing. Typically focuses on three genres of creative writing – fiction, nonfiction and poetry. Students should be eager to write frequently, to read carefully and to comment thoughtfully upon the work of other writers – including their classmates. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-211 Professional Communication


    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    Development of effective written and oral communication skills, critical thinking, research strategies, collaboration, and professional and ethical behavior in workplace environments. Job search and interviewing strategies will also be covered. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-212 Journalism Principles and Practice


    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    Addresses the role of newspapers in society, the strategies for reporting and writing news, and the ethical and legal ramifications of newspaper reporting. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-214 Immersion Journalism: Reading as Writers


    GER: TA (Critical, Analytical Interpretation of Texts)
    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    Study of a fascinating branch of nonfiction writing. Texts may include works by Tom Wolfe, Barbara Ehrenreich, Edward Abbey, Karsten Heur and Susan Orlean. Students will read as writers, scour the texts for craft and style tactics and critique class members’ essays. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-220 Writing Poems


    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    Emphasizes awareness and proficiency in the craft of poetry. Students should be prepared to write frequently, to duplicate their work for discussion, and to comment upon their classmates’ work. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-221 Writing Fiction


    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    Emphasizes awareness and proficiency in the craft of prose fiction. Students should be prepared to write frequently, to duplicate their work for discussion, and to comment upon their classmates146 work. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-223 Writing Nonfiction


    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    This course will develop students’ proficiency in the craft of nonfiction. Students will do writing exercises, discuss published work, explore prose techniques, and critique their classmates’ work. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-224 Writing Biography


    Analysis of Texts (TA) Writing/Research Intensive (WR)
    Any FYW
    Biographers write histories of lives. Their storytelling is often novelistic but their standards of evidence are those of the historian. They confront distinctive questions: What lives are worth writing? What is the relationship between the individual and society? What rules govern the relationship between biographers and their subjects? How has the art of biography changed over the centuries, and what forces have driven those changes? 

    In this course, we’ll read both notable biographies and the critical literature on biography. We will apprentice ourselves to leading biographers to understand the craft, and we will develop the research tools necessary for uncovering and narrating lives that illuminate our world. The course will be workshop-based with students sharing their creative work, exploring prose techniques, and offering peer critique. 4
  
  • ENG-225 Writing with Writers


    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    Supervised by a prominent writer, students will work on their own creative projects. The genre (prose fiction, creative nonfiction, poetry) will change from year to year. May Experience ONLY. 2 credits.
  
  • ENG-226 Business Communication


    4 credits
  
  • ENG-240 Art of Travel Writing


    Introduction to history, society and culture of specific travel destination. Exploration of art of travel writing including reading and analyzing travel essays as models for their own writing. Required for students participating in travel
    writing May Experience in a given year. 2 credits.
  
  • ENG-241 Medieval Arthurian Literature


    GER: TA (Critical, Analytical Interpretation of Texts)
    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    Study of the earliest tales of King Arthur and his knights. Course focuses on medieval European literature but may include one contemporary version. Authors include Chrien de Troyes, the Gawain poet, Malory, and others. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-252 Shakespeare


    GER: TA - Textual Analysis
    Prerequisite:  Any FYW course.
    The plays of William Shakespeare studied primarily in their historical and theatrical contexts. Attention also paid to Shakespeare’s role in producing modern cultural awareness in the English speaking world and beyond. Appropriate for majors and non-majors. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-261 Revolution and Reaction


    TA (Textual Analysis)
    Any FYW.
    Focuses on appreciating the diversity of thought
    collected under the term conservatism. The
    courses will celebrate the diversity,
    inconsistencies, and variable unity of the
    divergent ideas sometimes considered synonymous
    with conservatism.  4
  
  • ENG-273 Altered States in Victorian Literature


    TA (Textual Analysis)
    Any FYW.
    Taking a broad interpretation of the phrase
    “altered states,” this course examines Victorian
    literary works depicting states of mind that
    defy, transcend, or exceed notions of “normal”
    psychic functioning as defined by
    nineteenth-century culture and particularly
    science.  4
  
  • ENG-291 Studies in Short Fiction


    GER: TA (Critical, Analytical Interpretation of Texts) and WR (Writing-Research Intensive)
    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    Stories to be discussed are selected from a variety of historical periods and cultural perspectives. Writers might include Hawthorne, Scott, James, Lawrence, Joyce, Trevor, and Munro. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-292 African-American Drama


    GER: TA (Critical, Analytical Interpretation of Texts)
    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    Three-part history and development of African American drama in the United States from its origins to the present moment. Part one explores the roots of African American drama and examines early stage images of black subjects, 19th century stage stereotypes of minstrelsy, and the initial achievements of the African Grove Theatre and early black playwrights. Part Two focuses on the Harlem Renaissance and the Harlem Unit of the Federal Theatre Project. Part Three examines major plays and playwrights from Lorraine Hansberry’s A Raisin in the Sun (1959) to the 2001 Pulitzer Prize-winning production of Suzan Lori-Park’s Topdog-Underdog. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-293 Literature of the South


    GER: TA (Critical, Analytical Interpretation of Texts)
    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    The dialogue about race, class, and gender that takes place between writers such as Faulkner, Warren, Gaines, Welty, O’Connor, Walker, and Allison. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-294 Modern and Contemporary Poetry


    GER: TA (Critical, Analytical Interpretation of Texts)
    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    Works by at least a half-dozen prominent poets will be read, analyzed, and evaluated. Although prosody, poetic theory, and the development of modernism will be covered, major emphasis will be on the aesthetic qualities of individual poems and the distinctive sensibilities of individual poets. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-297 Autobiography


    GER: UQ (Ultimate Questions)
    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    Topics include formal/theoretical discussions that stress spiritual and moral concerns, exploring contrast with other forms such as biography and memoir, and the study of specific sub-genres. Film adaptation or autobiographical film may also be considered. Alternating versions will include either an American emphasis or a global emphasis. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-298 Literature and the Environment


    NE ((Humans and the Natural Environment) and TA (Critical, Analytical Interpretation of Texts)
    Any FYW.
    Focus on works commonly considered major examples
    of environmental writing and examine the
    theoretical/critical considerations involved in
    reading these works. Writers include: James
    Fenimore Cooper, Henry David Thoreau, John Muir,
    Mary Austin, Aldo Leopold, Rachel Carson, and
    Barry Lopez will be read and discussed.
    Theoretical problems such as the relation of
    writing to lived experience and the justice of
    emphasizing all life over human life will help
    focus discussions. Class participation
    demonstrating considered familiarity with assigned
    reading will be required, as will written work
    demonstrating thoughtful command of issues raised
    by the course. 4
  
  • ENG-300 Literature Before Print


    GER: TA (Critical, Analytical Interpretation of Texts)
    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    Medieval English literature. Exploring the differences between the way medieval people read–their experience of reading and their training as interpreters of texts–and the way we read today. The complexity and variance of texts created in a pre-print world. Introducrion to canonical and non-canonical texts of the medieval English period, with a focus on the question of what it meant to read in the Middle Ages. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-304 English Literature of Restoration and 18th Century


    GER: TA (Critical, Analytical Interpretation of Texts)
    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    Survey of English literature and culture from the Restoration of Charles II in 1660 to the creation of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland in 1801. Covers a range of literary genres, such as drama, satiric poetry, travel narratives, periodical essays, and novels. Students will examine the historical, social, political, and intellectual backgrounds for these texts, including the declining influence of court culture, the construction of a colonial market economy, discourses of slavery and abolition, and considerations of gender and marriage. Authors studied include: Rochester, Behn, Pope, Equiano, and others. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-314 Studies in Chaucer


    GER: TA (Critical, Analytical Interpretation of Texts)
    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    The poetry of Chaucer, in Middle English, including some early poems, Troilus and Criseyde, and substantial selections from The Canterbury Tales. Special attention to the development of Chaucer146s narrative art, his invention of the Chaucerian persona, and his relevance to postmodern thought, conceived as his self-consciousness about the use of language and his ambivalence about the value of literary art. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-315 Animals in Medieval Literature and Culture


    GER: TA (Critical, Analytical Interpretation of Texts)
    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    Explores medieval literature about animals, humans’ historical relationships with other animals, philosophical discussions of the idea of “the animal,” and connections between medieval views of animals and modern ecological issues. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-316 Late 14th Century English Literature


    GER: TA (Critical, Analytical Interpretation of Texts)
    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    Study of literature by poets and mystics of Ricardian England, with an emphasis on interpreting these texts in light of their medieval social and philosophical context. A substantial part of this course is devoted to Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-317 Literature of Early Modern Britain


    GER: TA (Critical, Analytical Interpretation of Texts)
    Prerequisite: Any first year writing seminar
    A study of literature written during the reigns of the Tudors and the early Stuart monarchs when England began to develop a distinct cultural identity. Emphasis is on poetry and prose. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-318 Early Modern Drama


    GER: TA (Critical, Analytical Interpretation of Texts)
    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    Major works from the golden age of English drama. Work by Marlowe, Jonson, Webster, Middleton, Ford, and others of Shakespeare’s contemporaries. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-319 Major Figures in Early Modern British Literature


    GER: TA (Critical, Analytical Interpretation of Texts)
    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    Study of works written by major authors in the reigns of the Tudors and the Stuarts. Authors include: Sidney, Spenser, Wroth, Marlowe, Jonson, Milton, or the major lyric poets. Focus on major works in their entirety written by single authors except in the case of the lyric poets. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-328 Interpretive Issues in Early Modern Literature


    GER: WR (Writing-Research Intensive) and TA (Critical, Analytical Interpretation of Texts)
    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    Study of key issues for understanding early modern British literature and its place in a history of ideas in the West. Topics include early modern literature in relation to the histories of science, individualism, gender and sexuality, privacy, literary criticism, authorship and/or the place of period texts in emerging theories of literature and history. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-329 Harry Potter and the Secrets of Popular Culture


    GER: WR (Writing-Research Intensive) and TA (Critical, Analytical Interpretation of Texts)
    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar 
    This course will examine the relationship between the Harry Potter film and book franchise and the 18th century novel. Like the blockbuster series, many 18th century novels relied on an earlier literary tradition, which they both sensationalized and updated. Not only does the Harry Potter series borrow tropes and plots from a variety of literary works, but it also relies on a rich literary tradition of borrowing and adaptation. This course will explore how literary traditions have always grown through copying, imitation, and outright theft.  4 credits.
  
  • ENG-336 British Romantic Literature


    GER: WR (Writing-Research Intensive) and TA (Critical, Analytical Interpretation of Texts)
    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    The major writers and some less well-known figures from the period 1790-1830: the poets Blake Wordsworth, Coleridge, Byron, P. B. Shelley, and Keats; the novelists Austen and Scott; the essayists Hazlitt, Lamb, and De Quincey; and others like Mary Shelley, Godwin, and Clare. Introduction to both literary and critical writing of the period as well as to the current critical and theoretical issues, mainly rhetorical and historical, that engagement with these writers entails. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-337 Victorian Literature and Culture


    GER: TA (Critical, Analytical Interpretation of Texts)
    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    Study of Victorian fiction, poetry, and prose with an emphasis on major social, cultural, and political concerns and debates in nineteenth-century Britain: industrialization and modernization, ideologies of class and gender, evolutionary theory and religious ambivalence, new developments in aesthetic theory and literary form. Authors studied include: Carlyle, Ruskin, Dickens, Eliot, Browning, Tennyson, Pater, Morris, and Wilde. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-338 Victorian Novel


    GER: TA (Critical, Analytical Interpretation of Texts)
    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    The Victorian novel viewed through the lens of both nineteenth-century and modern theories of the novel. Works by Charles Dickens, George Eliot, Charlotte Bronte, Thomas Hardy and others will be examined from the perspective of Victorian literary culture and the work of critics such as Mikhail Bakhtin, Georg Lukas, Walter Benjamin, Ian Watt, Fredric Jameson, and Franco Moretti. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-339 Emerson to Dickinson


    GER: UQ (Ultimate Questions)
    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    Study of Emerson, Thoreau, Douglass, Stowe, Whitman, Fuller, Poe, Hawthorne, Melville and Dickinson. Through exploring poems, essays, novels, and personal narratives, this course examines living well,  considering relationships to nature, to God, and to one’s self. In addition, the course examines concepts of good and evil and the political realities of slavery and the disenfranchisement of women.  4 credits.
  
  • ENG-344 Gothic Literature


    GER: TA (Critical, Analytical Interpretation of Texts)
    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    Study of literature that evokes terror and horror, explores the possibility of supernatural forces, depicts psychological disorders, critiques patriarchal constructs, and exposes cultural anxieties and oppression. Strong focus will be upon the scholarly division of Gothic Literature into Male and Female Gothic traditions, and upon examining how the literature explores gender and sexual norms and transgressions during various cultural periods.  Topics and texts may vary. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-346 Slave Narrative to Slave Novel


    GER: TA (Critical, Analytical Interpretation of Texts)
    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    Consideration of the traditional Black Atlantic 18th, 19th, and 20th century slave narratives and novels, including authors such as Douglass, Equiano, and Butler, among others. Texts critique historiographies, ideologies, and models of interpretation that subjected African American cultural production and black identity to second-class citizenship. Examine the relationship between memory, writing, and historical representation and the production of hierarchical categories in the construction of racial, sexual, and gender differences. Texts engage the challenges of formal genre presented by the slave novel’s reinvention of the traditional slave narrative. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-350A American Novel to World War I


    TA (Analysis of Texts)
    Any First Year Writing seminar
    Examination of literary romanticism, realism, and naturalism as reflected in a selection of American novels  and study of their cultural contexts, including war, gender roles, slavery, expatriation, and immigration. Authors might include Cooper, Hawthorne, Stowe, James, Twain, Norris, Chopin, and Cather.  4 credits
  
  • ENG-350B American Novel Since World War I


    TA (Analysis of Texts)
    Any First Year Writing seminar
    Examination of modern and post-modern novels, emphasizing how these works reflect cultural assumptions about social class, race, ethnicity, gender roles, politics, technology, religion, art
    and entertainment. Authors might include Fitzgerald, Hemingway, Faulkner, Hurston, Kesey, Walker, and Tan. 4 credits
  
  • ENG-352 Experimental Poetries


    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    Introduction to different kinds of British and American poetries and poetics of the 20th century: some that reaffirm the well-known persona-centered lyric in various guises, and others that question the notions of expressivity and authenticity to redefine the lyric through a relatively more pronounced linguistic experimentation. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-354 Global Issues in Literature


    GER: TA (Critical, Analytical Interpretation of Texts) and WC (World Cultures)
    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    Study of postcolonial responses to and re-authoring of different Western literary canons, including examples from drama, fiction and poetry. Study of literary practices from diverse postcolonial locations (Africa and the Caribbean) to enable understanding of how through literary adaptations and oppositional writings third world writers respond to writings from Europe and America. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-356 Faulkner


    GER: TA (Critical, Analytical Interpretation of Texts)
    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    Chronological study of the development of Faulkner’s art from FLAGS IN THE DUST to GO DOWN, MOSES. Attention paid to the concept of Yoknapatawpa County and to the various innovative narrative techniques Faulkner employed. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-357 Irish Renaissance Literature


    GER: TA (Critical, Analytical Interpretation of Texts)
    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    The remarkable literary flowering contemporary with the late nineteenth-century movements in Ireland that led to the creation of the Irish Free State in 1921, and with the difficult historical circumstances faced by the new nation in the first years of its existence. The major figures studied include Yeats, Joyce, Synge, and O’Casey. Normally taught in conjunction with study away experience conducted in the British Isles.  4 credits.
  
  • ENG-358 Film and Visual Culture in South Asia


    GER: VP (Visual and Performing Arts) and WC (World Cultures)
    South Asian cinemas and visual culture through analyzing films, film studios, film archives, library and other visual and performative art forms such as architecture, painting, cinema billboards, advertising, public spaces, design, fashion, photography, dance and theatre. 4 credits
  
  • ENG-359 Studies in the Essay


    GER: TA (Critical, Analytical Interpretation of Texts) and WR (Writing-Research Intensive)
    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    The essay as a genre, beginning with work from early practitioners such as Montaigne, Hazlitt, Lamb, and Shonagon, and tracing its development to the dynamic form we see in contemporary work. Students will read both American and international writers and discuss works on the basis of both thematic and formal qualities. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-360 Studies in Contemporary American Literature


    GER: TA (Critical, Analytical Interpretation of Texts)
    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    Readings in American literature from 1950 to the present, with emphasis on what might make this recent writing different from what came before, or 147postmodern148 in terms of aesthetics and cultural context. May address fiction, drama and poetry or concentrate on a single genre. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-363 Mystery and Detective Fiction


    GER: WR (Writing-Research Intensive) and TA (Critical, Analytical Interpretation of Texts)
    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    Study of mystery fiction and its offshoots (detective, suspense, spy) in English and translation. Possible writers: Shakespeare, Walpole, Poe, Hammett, Mankell. Critical perspectives may include narrative studies, gender criticism, Marxist criticism. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-364 Drama in London


    GER: TA (Critical, Analytical Interpretation of Texts)
    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    Study of drama from the West and elsewhere in performance primarily on stage in London but also in other locations around the British Isles. Attention paid to the conditions of theatre in the present and at the time the drama was first produced. Offered only in conjunction with study away experience conducted in the British Isles. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-365 Revolution and Reaction


    GER: WR (Writing-Research Intensive) and TA (Critical, Analytical Interpretation of Texts)
    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    Focuses on appreciating the diversity of thought collected under the term conservatism. The courses will celebrate the diversity, inconsistencies, and variable unity of the divergent ideas sometimes considered synonymous
    with conservatism. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-366 Drama at Stratford-upon-Avon


    GER: VP (Visual and Performing Arts)
    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    Offered only as part of the fall term in the British Isles program. Study of the drama being performed in London and Stratford-upon-Avon by the Royal Shakespeare Company, the National Theatre and others. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-378 Travel Study in the British Isles


    Texts and culture in the United Kingdom and Ireland. Specific topics will change from year to year. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-379 Studies in Fictional Histories


    GER: TA (Critical, Analytical Interpretation of Texts)
    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    How does literature shape the ways in which one imagines historical figures, national events, or remote geographies? How do partially fictionalized reconstructions of experience influence historical understanding? This course theorizes the often porous borders between history and fiction. Students will examine archival material, historical documents, and theoretical studies alongside fictional works that do not simply reimagine the past but profoundly recast national histories. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-390 Gender in South Asian Literature and Film


    GER: TA (Critical, Analytical Interpretation of Texts) and WC (World Cultures)
    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    Introduction to the various debates over the representations of masculinity and femininity as these categories intersect with other forms of identity and belonging such as caste/class, nation, race, and sexuality through the reading of literary and filmic texts. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-391 Global Postcolonial Issues


    GER: TA (Critical, Analytical Interpretation of Texts) and WC (World Cultures)
    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    Introduction to the field of Global Postcolonial Studies through the study of literary, filmic, and theoretical texts focusing on the historical and ongoing interactions of European and non-European cultures from the perspective of domination, resistance, and the search for alternatives. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-392 Film Analysis


    GER: TA (Critical, Analytical Interpretation of Texts)
    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    Exploration of the fundamentals of film form151narrative construction in the Hollywood system as well as non-narrative formal systems (documentary, abstract and avant-garde film). Includes examination of the fundamentals of film style (mise-en-sc232ne, cinematography, editing, sound) and attention to the relationships between the literary and filmic texts. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-393 Literary Feminisms


    GER: TA (Critical, Analytical Interpretation of Texts) and WR (Writing-Research Intensive)
    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    Women’s literature in English as a distinct tradition, from the perspective of feminist literary theory and criticism. Structured as a historical and thematic survey of issues in the field; the writers and theorists studied will vary. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-399 Upper Level Pathways


    Any FYW.
    A required set of experiences to help majors understand how the study of the English language and literature align with vocational exploration and preparation. Three zero credit and one one-credit course. Variable
  
  • ENG-461 Critical and Cultural Theory


    GER: TA (Critical, Analytical Interpretation of Texts)
    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    Introduction to theoretical approaches to literature such as psychoanalysis, deconstruction, feminism, and postcolonial studies. Consideration of the ethics and politics of interpretation, the assumptions and practices informing theoretical work, and the relation between literature and theory. Readings include works of fiction, film, and texts by theorists such as Freud, Lacan, Kristeva, Zizek, Derrida, de Man, Butler, Cixous, Spivak, Bhabha. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-475 Senior Seminar in English


    Writing/Research Intensive (WR)
    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    Course topic changes with each offering. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-476 Senior Seminar in Writing


    WR (Writing/Research Intensive )
    Prerequisite: any first year writing seminar
    Capstone experience for students pursuing the writing track within the English major. Students engage in reading, writing, commenting, and revising to create a portfolio of polished writing. 4 credits.
  
  • ENG-501 Independent Study


    Variable credit.
  
  • ENG-503 Individualized Internship


    Prerequisite: instructor permission
    Student will develop an internship to work at a business, agency or media site for up to 210 hours over the term and will meet the objectives of a learning agreement completed with the employer and approved by a faculty sponsor. Requirements include a work journal, portfolios, and assigned academic papers relating to their internship. Open primarily to seniors and juniors. A student must have the permission of the instructor and an internship position secured to be enrolled. May be taken only once. May not be taken for major credit. No pass/fail. May not contribute to the major. Cannot be completed through the pass-no pass grading option. Not repeatable. Variable credit.
  
  • ENG-505 Structured Internship


    Prerequisite: instructor permission
    Students will develop internships at businesses, agencies, or media sites for up to 210 hours over the term and will meet the objectives of a learning agreement completed with the employer and approved by a faculty sponsor. The internship site must permit the student a significant degree of professional writing. A weekly seminar class focuses on the objectives and issues of students? experiences as they develop their verbal and written communication skills. Course requirements include a work journal, portfolios, and academic papers relating to their internship. The course is open primarily to seniors and juniors. The course may contribute to the major. No pass/fail. Not repeatable. The course is open primarily to seniors and juniors. The course may contribute to the major. Cannot be completed through the pass-no pass grading option. Not repeatable. Variable credit.

Environmental Studies

  
  • EST-001 Biodiesel Production


    Provides students with a working knowledge of biodiesel production, including basic organic chemistry, safety considerations, logistics, and economics, through the weekly processing of high grade biodiesel from waste vegetable oil. Course will include weekly discussions concerning alternative fuels and environmental issues. 0 credits.
  
  • EST-1 Biodiesel Production


    Provides students with a working knowledge of biodiesel production, including basic organic chemistry, safety considerations, logistics, and economics, through the weekly processing of high grade biodiesel from waste vegetable oil. Course will include weekly discussions concerning alternative fuels and environmental issues. 0 credits.
  
  • EST-301 Environment and Society


    GER: NE (Humans and the Natural Environment)
    Interdisciplinary examination of the causes, potential solutions and ethical dilemmas associated with environmental problems on various spatial, temporal, political and social scales (individual to global). 4 credits.

Film Studies

  
  • FST-202 Introduction to Reading Film


    GER: Dependent on version; consult term-specific course listings
    Distinctive ways that film conveys and generates meaning. Tools to critically analyze films by examining the basics of film form, style (mise-en-scene, camera angle and movement, editing, and sound), and genre. The course also will explore the characteristic features of – as well as alternatives to – the “classical Hollywood style,” a series of formal and narrative conventions present in films as distinct as Steven Spielberg’s War of the Worlds (2005) and John Ford’s 1939 western, Stagecoach. 4 credits.
  
  • FST-365 Great Film Directors


    GER: VP (Visual and Performing Arts)
    An examination of the concept of auteur (author) film production that focus on the unique stylistic elements of films based on the film director’s aesthetics and worldview. The course looks at the films of many of the main individuals, both inside and outside of Hollywood, who are considered auteur directors such as John Ford, Billy Wilder, Igmar Bergman, Alfred Hitchcock, Akira Kurosawa, Federico Fellini, Jean-Luc Godard, Stanley Kubrick, Woody Allen, Pedro Almadovor, Spike Lee, Zhang Yimou, and Wong Kar Wai. 4 credits.

First Year Writing

  
  • FYW-1101 Abortion: Issues and Controversies


    Abortion touches core beliefs about the nature of the human person, human freedom and rights, human relationships, and the right ordering of society. This seminar will consider abortion through various disciplines in order to arrive at a deeper understanding of the issues and the controversies around this phenomenon. 4 credits.
  
  • FYW-1106 Doing History in the 1950s


    The purpose of this seminar is, first, to explore changing tastes in the field of history by comparing what was written in the previous generation to what is being written today, and second, to examine the Landmark Series, published in 185 volumes by Random House in New York City in the 1950s and early ‘60s. Students will read on topics, mostly of their choice, comparing books written in the U.S. in mid-century to the best of current scholarship on those same topics. 4 credits.
  
  • FYW-1108 Evaluating Scientific Claims in the Media


    Students will learn the skills necessary to read scientific claims carefully, find relevant information in a variety of sources, and develop an informed opinion in writing about the veracity of the original claim. 4 credits.
  
  • FYW-1109 Global Climate Change


    This course provides an insight into the scientific theory and data of global climate change. Students will analyze real data and compare their results to those cited in the novel “A State of Fear” by Michael Crichton. Ultimately, we will assess the roles of humans and natural variation in current climate change. We will also consider how knowledge and uncertainty influence climate policy. 4 credits.
  
  • FYW-1110 Global Water Issues


    The course is intended to introduce students to and foster discussion on the many scientific and political facets of the world’s leading global water issues. The course covers a wide range of water resource and water policy topics. 4 credits.
  
  • FYW-1111 Haunted Mansions


    This course explores how the interior and exterior settings of a selection of Gothic novels, short stories, and films reflect the lives and complex psyches of the characters. Students will learn about such psychological disorders as dissociative identity disorder, post-partum depression, and schizophrenia and will discuss how family relationships and cultural pressures adversely affect the characters studied. 4 credits.
  
  • FYW-1112 History of Liberal Arts


    Why are you at Furman? The course will explore the history and practice of the liberal arts from the classical period to the present. Specific focus will be on the development of “Humanism” and the “Humanities” in higher education from early modern European universities to liberal arts education on American campuses. Students will explore arguments and create their own through a series of guided writing assignments that will introduce them to college-level writing. 4 credits.
  
  • FYW-1116 Language, Argument and Culture


    A study of classical and modern principles of rhetoric and argument applied to contemporary linguistic issues such as information technology, multilingualism, language and gender, language and national identities, and the globalization of English. 4 credits.
  
  • FYW-1117 Magic and Religion


    FYW (First Year Writing)
    This course focuses on how people from cultures around the world conceptualize the spiritual realm and how such conceptualizations are shaped by the values and social relations of the cultures in which they occur. Of particular concern is the relationship between magic and religion. We will examine the diverse ways in which humans attempt to communicate and intervene with the divine as well as ritually mark crucial moments such as birth death illness and change. 4
  
  • FYW-1118 Man vs. Machine


    Popular culture has depicted the prospect of intelligent machines as a threat to the humans that serve as their models. This course examines the enterprise of creating an intelligent machine and what it might imply about our own species. 4 credits.
  
  • FYW-1120 Medicine, Morality and Culture


    This course will examine the ways in which our moral and cultural conceptions shape medicine and medical research as well as the ways that medicine and medical research shape our cultural understandings of health, wellness, and normal human functioning. Special attention will be given to historically controversial cases, for example: the Tuskegee Syphilis Study, Nazi human experimentation, the Terri Schiavo case. 4 credits.
  
  • FYW-1122 Popular Culture, Crime and Justice


    Examine images of crime and justice in popular culture and compares them to scientific data; consider the source of these popular culture accounts of crime and justice; and evaluates the influence popular culture has on understands of crime and criminal justice policy. Discuss the ways that mass media reflects and reinforces underlying issues and concerns about crime and justice, and how these images changes over time. Use a socio-historical perspective to examine crime and justice in American popular culture and connect those images to broader social issues. 4 credits.
  
  • FYW-1125 Sex and the New Testament


    Sex and the NT is a writing seminar that will investigate through research and writing what the New Testament has to say about sex, why it says what it does, and what that might mean for contemporary society. 4 credits.
  
  • FYW-1126 The Ethics of Sex


    Introduction to understanding human sexuality and thinking about sexual ethics through consideration of pressing issues, such as the moral status of pornography, prostitution, masturbation, polygamy, and abortion; the rationale and value of marriage; intersexed and transgendered individuals; and debates over whether there is a rational basis for privileging heterosexuality over homosexuality. Three broad approaches, an evolutionary, a social constructionist, and a Christian theological, will be used to examine ethical questions in dialogue with a number of philosophical and theological scholars. 4 credits.
  
  • FYW-1127 To Walk the Land


    Through weekly hikes, the goal of this seminar is that you would come to know and enjoy the land, your local upstate environment, in a deeper way; to appreciate its natural and cultural history; to better understand our connection to and dependence on the land; and to communicate this new understanding effectively. Students will explore arguments and create their own through a series of guided writing assignments that will introduce them to college-level writing. This seminar is physically demanding and time consuming because of one six-hour afternoon hike and one two-hour discussion meeting per week. 4 credits.
  
  • FYW-1128 Turing: Thinking Machines, Codes and Other Enigmas


    Explores the enigmatic life and prodigious work of Alan Turing (1912-1954), including his pioneering work in the fields of artificial intelligence, the limitations of computing power, and code-breaking during World War II. Consideration of works offering biographical or fictionalized treatments of Turing. Uses a biographical study of his life and writings to examine the fundamental nature of human thought, the existence of a soul, and the ethical role of a citizen in wartime, as well as society’s response to otherness. 4 credits.
  
  • FYW-1129 Pristine Nature: Myth Or Reality?


    An examination of the concepts of wilderness and “pristine” nature from scientific, historical, and cultural perspectives. Both the present influence of humanity on nature and evidence for human influences on landscapes in the past will be considered. 4 credits.
  
  • FYW-1133 Can We Make Sense of the 60s?


    An introduction to college writing that focuses on American history in the 1960’s and early 1970’s.  Through writing and revision, students will critically analyze conflicting forces that shaped American life. With careful staging of assignments, they will complete a research project on a topic of choice, such as on a key individual or international crisis of the era, the civil rights movement, the emergence of the environmental crusade, or on the protest tradition. 4 credits.
  
  • FYW-1136 Exploring Politics through Literature


    This course seeks to stimulate intellectual curiosity about the philosophic underpinnings of politics through thoughtful readings of literature. Drawing upon the vivid power of literature taken from a variety of different historical and cultural contexts, students will have an opportunity to begin an exploration of the influence of politics on human development. More specifically, how the competing views of nature, religion or the human good embedded in politics influence the possibility of self-knowledge. Literary works will be supplemented with short readings from the tradition of political philosophy. 4 credits.
 

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