Masterpieces of World Literature
ENGLI 2226 Section NET40
Spring 2019
Dr. Melina Martin, Associate Professor of English
Class Location and Time :
16-Week ONLINE Course: 1/19 to 5/17
Professor’s Contact Information:
E-mail: probstm@cod.edu
Phone: (630) 942-2288
Office: Berg Instructional Center (BIC), Room 2C06M
Virtual Office Hours
(I will return messages left Monday through Thursday within 24 hours. Communication over the
weekend will be limited.)
Required Course Materials:
· The Norton Anthology of World Literature : Volume 1 , Shorter 3rd Edition.
· The Norton Anthology of World Literature : Volume 2: 1650 to the Present , Shorter 3rd Edition.
· The Story of an African Farm , by Olive Schreiner.
· MyCOD username and password
· Flash drive for saving and transferring electronic documents or cloud space (such as Google
Drive)
· A private computer or tablet that has technology to record audio/video, use video to
communicate (with Skype, Google Hangouts, Video.me), download PDFs, etc.
Catalog Course Description :
ENGLI 2226 (IAI H3 907)
Masterpieces of World Literature
3 credit hours
Reading of novels, drama and short stories from different cultural backgrounds and from
different historical periods. Emphasis is on fictional literary masterpieces important to a liberal
education. Prerequisite: Course requires Reading Placement Test Score-Category One. (3
lecture hours)
General Course Objectives in the Catalog :
Upon successful completion of the course the student should be able to do the
following:
1. Identify writers of cultures and time periods other than the student’s own.
2. Analyze some masterpieces of literature to determine how and why those works
transcend their particular place and time.
What online learning looks like:
This is a fully online course, which means you will be required to interact only online. As an
online student, you should be competent using and troubleshooting a computer. A successful
online student is one who manages his/her time efficiently, is organized, can follow a schedule,
and is technologically adept and curious. You must be mindful of the language you use and
how you present yourself. Precise, concise language becomes even more important in an online
setting where tone can be ambiguous and attentions spans short. Remain respectful towards
one another and find ways to trust one another. You will become valuable resources to one
another. I have created groups for you to become closer acquainted to a select few of your
classmates. Developing online relationships with those you are required to communicate with
can make you more candid and feeling less vulnerable. Therefore, let’s start the class by getting
to know one another (you will find the discussion board where you will introduce yourself in our
Week 1 folder under Units). You will maintain ejournals, respond to one another in discussion
board posts, and create digital projects. I will introduce this work and in class and you will
practice them and implement them online.
Because it can be difficult to read long texts online, you have a physical textbook to purchase.
As this is a literature course, you should practice annotating the stories and get in the habit early
in the semester. Also, for the same reason, you should respond on Blackboard using a variety
of texts (e.g. written language, audio, video, image, etc.)
Evaluation:
Here is a list of the assignments you must complete to pass the course, along with the
percentage values for each that will be used in calculating your final grade:
Project 1 25%
Project 2 25%
Class Participation* 50%
*Class participation includes discussion board/journal responses, involvement in class
discussion, and small projects. These may include quizzes as deemed necessary.
Academic Etiquette:
An educational environment is one that must foster open expression and exchange of ideas. We
benefit from learning from and with others whose ideas appear to be different. As candid
participants and as respectful listeners, students with open minds have the most to gain from an
education. Furthermore, we do not want to deprive others of their right to be heard; therefore,
we must encourage one another, engage others meaningfully in discussion, and never belittle
another person’s ideas. You are expected to abide by these educational principles.
Because we are interacting online, we need to agree upon online etiquette. Practice the same
caution and delicateness online as you would in-person. Anonymity can encourage us to be
more candid, and that’s great. But remember you are interacting with other people , not
computers or “users.” Treat your classmates respectfully, regardless of the medium of
interaction.
Academic Dishonesty
College of DuPage believes that all members of the community have a responsibility to
participate in learning with honesty and integrity. Fundamentally, this principle asserts that all of
us – teachers, students, staff, and administrators – must fulfill the commitments we make as we
enter our academic endeavors, and we must respect the learning process. This respect includes
but is not limited to the following:
· a commitment to working hard at learning, both in class and out of class;
· a sense of the value that all members of the learning community can bring;
· an honest undertaking of all tasks related to the college community.
If you cheat or attempt to cheat on an assignment, you may fail that assignment and may fail the
course. Cases of plagiarism and cheating will be reported to the Dean of Student Affairs and
resolved according to guidelines for incidents of academic misconduct. This policy is available
online at: https://inside.cod.edu . Plagiarism is a serious violation of academic and professional
integrity. If you have any questions about plagiarism, or about how to appropriately paraphrase
and cite other writers’ work, come and see me at office hours.
Text Annotation:
You should annotate thoroughly and thoughtfully all texts read for this class. This means
reading with a writing instrument in hand, and it means writing glosses for important ideas,
imagery, plot events, and narrator commentary, writing questions about passages that are
difficult, and recording insights and observations as they occur to you. This annotation should
yield direct benefits in your ability to contribute to class discussion and to write essays with
specific textual supporting evidence.
Late work/make-up policy:
There is a grade-reduction by one letter for each day past an essay/project’s deadline.
Essays/projects must be submitted by the designated deadline in order to avoid a late
penalty. Late informal assignments (those that comprise your participation grade) are not
accepted for late credit. These include discussion board posts and journals.
Access and Accommodation Statement
If you need course adaptations or accommodations because of a disability, if you have medical
emergency information to share with me, or if you need special arrangements in case the
building must be evacuated, let me know as soon as possible. In compliance with the
Americans with Disabilities Act, all qualified students enrolled in this course are entitled to
reasonable accommodations. It is the student’s responsibility to inform me of any special needs.
If you have a blue card and you think you may need accommodations for this class, please
discuss your needs with me during the first two weeks of the semester. Also inform the College
of DuPage Center for Access and Accommodations at access@cod.edu if you need any special
accommodations in the curriculum, instruction, or assessments of this course to enable you to
fully participate.
Technical Support:
– COD email
– Forwarding COD email to a personal account and using email on a mobile device
Writing Center:
You can use the Reading and Writing Center located in the Learning Commons in SRC 2102. If,
at any time during the term, you find yourself having difficulty with the reading or writing
assignments, please feel free to discuss this with me in person or via email. The website has
online handbooks and other sources that will help you revise, edit, and document. There will be
extra credit opportunities (5 points per essay project) for your two essay/project assignments if
you turn in proof of attending a writing tutoring session over the specified assignment before the
assignment is due.
Withdrawal:
The last day to withdraw from this class is April 12th . After that date, students may file a
Petition for Late Withdrawal through the Registration Office. Petitions for Late Withdrawal will
be granted for extenuating circumstances only , including student (severe) illness, death in the
immediate family, family emergencies, call to active duty, or other appropriate extenuating
circumstances. The student will be required to provide appropriate documentation for all
requests for Late Withdrawal. Prior to withdrawing from this class, students are encouraged to
speak with the instructor. If students have an illness or condition that makes it unlikely that they
can complete the course, they can get a medical withdrawal; please contact Registration for this
procedure.
Schedule of Readings:
*The following readings are subject to change to suit the pace of the course. Readings
may be added as well as dropped or rearranged.
Assignments are indicated in our Blackboard shell.
Origins and Age of Revolution
Week 1 (Starting 1/19) – Intros and Introduction to the Anthology; get a head start on Faust
Week 2 (Starting 1/28) – Goethe’s Faust (401-511) and Keats’s poetry (608-14)
Goethe and World Lit Origins DB due 2/1 and a reply to a classmate due 2/3
Early World Literature:
Do These Challenge or Support What World Literature Is?
Week 3 (Starting 2/4) – Ovid’s Metamorphoses (649-75)
Early Masterpiece DB due 2/8 and a reply to a classmate due 2/10
Week 4 (Starting 2/1 1) – Homer’s The Iliad
Mastery of Form and Subject Matter DB due 2/15 and a reply to a classmate due 2/17
Week 5 (Starting 2/18) – Zhen’s “The Story of Yingying” (1331-39) and Qingzhao’s song lyrics
(1340-43)
Eastern Masterpieces DB due 2/22 and a reply to a classmate due 2/24
Week 6 (Starting 2/25) – Dante’s Inferno (1049-1172)
Literature’s Religious Significance DB due 3/1 and a reply to a classmate due 3/3
Week 7 (Starting 3/4) – The Thousand and One Nights (1173-1196)
World Masterpiece with Multiple Origins DB due 3/8 and a reply to a classmate due 3/10
Week 8 (Starting 3/11) – Read a work from the “Europe and the New World” section of our first
anthology.
The Turning Point in World Literature DB due 3/15 and a reply to a classmate due 3/17
Project 1 Due 3/15
Realism across the Globe Part 1
Week 9 (Starting 3/18) – Schreiner’s The Story of an African Farm
Schreiner and Cultural Intersections DB due 3/22 and a reply to a classmate due 3/24
Spring Break (Starting 3/25)
Final project assigned
Realism across the Globe Part 2
Week 10 (Starting 4/1) – Tolstoy’s Death of Ivan Ilyich
A Masterpiece in its Spiritual Significance DB due 4/5 and a reply to a classmate due 4/7
Week 11 (Starting 4/8) – Chekhov’s The Cherry Orchard (917-60)
Gradual Change vs. Revolutionary Change DB due 4/12 and a reply to a classmate due 4/14
Modernism and Cultural Movement via the Past
Week 12 (Starting 4/15) – selections from Undset’s Catherine of Siena ; (Access Catherine of
Siena on BB in our Learning Materials folder for this unit folder.)
Sigrid Undset’s Proclivity to Medievalism DB due 4/19 and a reply to a classmate due 4/21
Week 13 (Starting 4/22) – John Ruskin’s Stones of Venice (the selections accessed via the
hyperlink to Project Gutenberg); Xun’s Diary of a Madman (1236-46); and excerpts from George
Eliot’s Middlemarch (“Prelude” and Chapter 1 accessed via the hyperlink to Project Gutenberg)
Ruskin’s and Eliot’s Medieval Interest DB and Xun’s Unique Role DB due 4/26 and a reply to a
classmate due 4/28
Post-War Mindset
Week 14 (Starting 4/29) – Borges’s “The Garden of Forking Paths” (1335-44)
Creating a New Movement in Literature DB due 5/3 and a reply to a classmate due 5/5
Week 15 (Starting 5/6) – Achebe’s “Chike’s School Days” (1561-66); and Camus’s “The Guest”
(1509-20)
Post-WWII Literature DB due 5/10 and a reply to a classmate due 5/12
Wrapping up the Course
Week 16 (Starting 5/13) – Final project due 5/14
