Course Description
Summary
“We all wear masks, and the time comes when we cannot remove them without removing some of our own skin.”
― André Berthiaume
The Scriptorium, a “place for writing,” is a class for writers interested in improving their critical essay-writing skills. We will read to write and write to read. Much of our time will be occupied with writing and revising—essai means “trial” or “attempt”—as we work to create new habits and productive strategies for analytical writing. As we write in various essay structures with the aim of developing a persuasive, well-supported thesis statement, we will also revise collaboratively, improve our research and citation skills, and study grammar and style. We will strive for clarity, concision, and expressiveness as we read and respond to a variety of historical and contemporary texts.
This Scriptorium is about the complex relationship between who we are and who we present to the world, and how this relationship changes over time. We will think about this topic in a variety of contexts ranging from racial passing to gender and sexual covering to forms of becoming in contemporary fandom and transgender literature. When is masking necessary to survive or thrive? To what degree does masking involve concealing or revealing one’s identity? We will think about masks and metamorphoses in novels, short stories, poetry, drama, autobiographical prose, films and graphic novels. Our readings may include primary works by Langston Hughes, Nella Larsen, Oscar Wilde, Eliza Haywood, Charlotte Charke, Shakespeare, Ovid, James Baldwin, Liana Finck, Casey Plett, Cameron Awkward-Rich, Ash Kreis; and critical texts by Judith Butler, Jack Halberstam, Hortense Spillers, Laura Mulvey, bell hooks, Danzy Senna, Jennifer Nash, Andrea Long Chu, and Caroline Bynum Walker.
