Syllabus

Booklist (all texts at Prairie Lights Bookstore)

Agee & Evans	Let Us Now Praise Famous Men
Cha, Theresa	Dictee (recommended)
Caldwell & Bourke-White	You Have Seen Their Faces
Nelson, Cary	Oxford Anthology of Modern American Poetry
Nowak, Mark	Shut Up Shut Down
Rankine, Claudia	Don't Let Me Be Lonely
Spahr, Juliana	The Transformation
Spahr, Juliana	this connection of everyone with lungs
Watten, Barrett	Bad History
Wright, Richard	12 Million Black Voices (recommended)
Wright, C. D.	One Big Self (recommended)

Expectations

Attendance: Because this class will be held as a proseminar, continuous and intense participation is essential to its success. Solid preparation and regular attendance are, therefore, absolutely crucial to your success. You must consistently do the assigned reading and viewing, post responses before class, and come to class ready to engage with the other members of the seminar. Please review the College's policy on attendance, available here; in this class, more than three unexcused absences will torpedo your grade.

Assignments:

In-class presentations: To insure engagement with the texts and the issues they raise, students will be responsible for opening our discussions with two-person in-class presentations. In the course of the semester, all class members will be required to initiate three or four class sessions. The purpose of the presentations is to set up and guide discussion of the day's texts: presenters should, therefore, focus closely on those texts and not digress into unfamiliar material or wander off-topic. The focus of the presentation can be expository (explaining an event, issue, or implication in the texts), critical (evaluating the texts on the basis of factual or ideological problems), and/or quizzical (formulating questions to be addressed in the discussion). So that the work can be judiciously divided and the remarks blended coherently, the team of students participating in each presentation must consult with one another in advance. Each co-operative presentation must take no longer than 12 minutes, but their structure is up to the team of presenters, who can speak serially, engage in dialogue, or otherwise divide responsibility for leading us into the important questions generated by the material. You are welcome to use A/V or computer materials in your presentations, although I'll need to know at least a week ahead in order to arrange for the equipment.

Written assignments:

a. two brief papers: these correspond to divisions in the reading schedule, each addressing an issue raised by our discussions of the join between documentary and poetics. The form of the papers is open: you can offer a critical reading of an assigned text, think through the relationships between several texts, or examine a concept deriving from these texts in a related text not assigned for the class. One of these papers may be a creative imitation of the material at hand accompanied by a two-page meditation on the process of writing the imitation. One of these papers can--indeed, should--become the seed for the final research project. All papers will be posted on our class discussion page.

unit date due

Poetics of Facts & Figures February 5

Three Poetic Traditions & photo-text compilations April 8

b. a prospectus and annotated bibliography: By the end of Week 9, I'll ask for a short (1-2 page) prospectus for the research paper; at the beginning of Week 13, I'll ask you to hand in an annotated bibliography analyzing at least 10 sources for your research paper. The prospectus will be brief; the annotations can also be compact but should indicate why the sources you describe are important to your topic. In Weeks 13 & 14, I'll hold individual conferences to go over the bibliographies and help develop final strategies for writing the research papers. The last three class sessions will be given over to discussions of individual projects, with two people presenting in each period a capsule overview of their research, basic argument, and final questions or concerns about the paper. The annotated bibliography will be developed as a joint project in a class wiki.

c. a final research paper (12-15 pages): The final paper should develop, clearly and cogently, an original argument addressing one or another aspect of the general topic of the course, taking your analysis of documentary poetics beyond class discussion through the use of external resources. Feel free to shape the approach to fit the topic: it can be, that is, critical, sociological, visual- or sound-oriented, philosophical, or experimental. The paper will be due 5:00 pm May 14th in my mailbox in the Zimansky Room (EPB 310).

unit	date due
Poetics of Facts & Figures	February 5
Three Poetic Traditions & photo-text compilations	April 8

Grading

class participation and posts	10%
in-class presentations	15%
short papers	15% each
prospectus & bibliography	not separately graded
final paper	30%

Policy on Academic Fraud

Plagiarism and any other activities that result in a student presenting work that is not his or her own constitute academic fraud. Academic fraud is reported to the departmental DEO and then to the Associate Dean for Academic Programs and Services in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences who deals with academic fraud according to the following guidelines: www.clas.uiowa.edu/students/academic_handbook/ix.shtm

Procedures for student complaints

Students have the right to make suggestions or complaints. Complaints should first be discussed with the instructor, then, if unresolved, with the Director of Undergraduate Studies and, if still unresolved, then with the departmental DEO. All complaints must be made within six months of the incident. www.clas.uiowa.edu/students/academic_handbook/ix.shtml#5

Accommodation for students with disabilities

A student seeking academic accommodations first must register with Student Disability Services and then meet with a SDS counselor who determines eligibility for services. A student approved for accommodations should meet privately with the course instructor to arrange particular accommodations. See www.uiowa.edu/~sds/

Understanding Sexual Harassment

Sexual harassment subverts the mission of the University and threatens the well-being of students, faculty, and staff. Please see www.sexualharassment.uiowa.edu/ for definitions, assistance, and the full policy.

Reacting Safely to Severe Weather

The University of Iowa Operations Manual section 16.14 outlines appropriate responses to a blizzard, ice-storm, tornado, or to similar crisis. If a tornado or other severe weather is indicated by the UI outdoor warning system, members of the class should seek shelter in rooms and corridors in the innermost part of a building at the lowest level, staying clear of windows, corridors with windows, or large free-standing expanses such as auditoriums and cafeterias. The class will resume, if possible, after the UI outdoor warning system announces that the severe weather threat has ended.

The Writing Center

An important--and very useful--campus resource is the Writing Center, run by the Rhetoric Program and open to all students. Check out its website, hotlinked above, and don't hesitate to use its services.