Laughter and tears are not always straightforward. A tale of pride going before a fall can be reassuring to us as well as sad, and a Hollywood romantic comedy can encode a scathing social critique. Offering insight into our ongoing fascination with the extremes of human emotion, this course traces how the twin poles of the comic and tragic have developed through literary history, and how they vary across diverse cultural traditions.Weekly Contact:Lecture 3 hrs.GPA Weight:1.00Billing Units:1Count:1.00Liberal Studies:LLCustom Requisites:Not available to ACS English Option, BA English, English-Philosophy and English-History double major program students.ENG 104 - The Short StoryCourse DescriptionAs a relatively new genre that burst on the literary scene with the emergence of magazine culture, the short story is a truly modern form. Its excitement has to do with the concision of its form and the startling turns its narratives can offer. This course explores the history and conventions of the genre, examining stories from a variety of cultural contexts representing a range of styles, themes, and social issues.Weekly Contact:Lecture 3 hrs.GPA Weight:1.00Billing Units:1Count:1.00Liberal Studies:LLCustom Requisites:Not available to ACS English Option, BA English, English-Philosophy and English-History double major program students.ENG 110 - Literatures Across BordersCourse DescriptionLiterature shapes and is shaped by the world we live in. It straddles the borders between nations, personal and collective histories, and narrative forms. In this course, students engage with diverse literary forms, themes, locations, and historical contexts; and develop skills for critical analysis and the creation of sustained, organized, and well-reasoned arguments.Weekly Contact:Lecture 2 hrs. Tutorial 1 hr.GPA Weight:1.00Billing Units:1Count:1.00Antirequisites:ENG 108ENG 112 - Zap, Pow, Bang: Pop LitCourse DescriptionHorror stories, pop songs, love poetry, comics-this course introduces students to various types of writing that were popular at different times and in different cultures. Students will learn central concepts and terminology in the study of popular writing and culture, and they will analyze the impact that cultural and political issues have had not only on what works became popular but also on the very notion of "the popular" itself.Weekly Contact:Lecture 3 hrs.GPA Weight:1.00Billing Units:1Count:1.00Liberal Studies:LLAntirequisites:ENG 703Custom Requisites:Not available to ACS English Option, BA English, English-Philosophy and English-History double major program students.ENG 142 - Black Arts, Black PowerCourse DescriptionBlack textual and cultural productions reveal the material conditions of Black experience. Students are introduced to Black Studies by exploring cultural production throughout the Black diaspora in its historical and social contexts, including the Middle Passage, slavery, emancipation, segregation, civil rights activism, immigration, and post-colonial revolution. Students analyze literary texts and intellectual traditions in the Black experience of North America. Specific attention is paid to the Black Canadian context.Weekly Contact:Lecture 3 hrs.GPA Weight:1.00Billing Units:1Count:1.00ENG 200 - Writing as a Cultural ActCourse DescriptionWe live our lives through networks of texts, both printed and digital. This course takes a rhetorical perspective to explore how written texts provide more than just information: they perform important cultural actions in contemporary civic life. Students examine the relationship of writing to knowledge, belief, and social organization in contexts such as popular and social media, politics and activism, literature and art, and professional, technical, and academic cultures.Weekly Contact:Lecture 3 hrs.GPA Weight:1.00Billing Units:1Count:1.00ENG 201 - Myth and LiteratureCourse DescriptionFrom classical poetry to video games, stories follow recognizable patterns that tell us much about our values, fears, and desires. Offering a fertile source for plots and themes, myth systems present a set of limits to be investigated, challenged, and rewritten. This course examines how plays, poems, novels, and/or other texts engage with myth. Topics may include such diverse ideas as masculinity, initiation, fellowship, betrayal, rebirth, exile and homecoming.Weekly Contact:Lecture 3 hrs.GPA Weight:1.00Billing Units:1Count:1.00Liberal Studies:LLCustom Requisites:Not available to ACS English Option, BA English, English-Philosophy and English-History double major program students.ENG 203 - The Literature of Indigenous PeoplesCourse DescriptionHow has colonialism impacted Indigenous cultures, and how have Indigenous people used texts to pose challenges to colonialism and to preserve and retell traditional stories? Reading contemporary literature by Aboriginal Australian, Maori, First Nations and other Indigenous writers, students address these and other important socio-political questions, examine wider literary and theoretical issues, and consider questions regarding cultural identity raised in the writings of Indigenous peoples.Weekly Contact:Lecture 3 hrs.GPA Weight:1.00Billing Units:1Count:1.00Liberal Studies:LLCustom Requisites:Not available to students in ACS English Option, BA English, English-Philosophy and English-History double major programsENG 208 - Introduction to Non-FictionCourse DescriptionStories come to us in many forms including life writing, travel writing, documentaries, historical testimony, political speeches, journalistic texts and scientific and legal discourse. In this course, students read and write about non-fiction in a variety of forms across diverse historical periods and media.Weekly Contact:Lecture 2 hrs. Tutorial 1 hr.GPA Weight:1.00Billing Units:1Count:1.00Prerequisites:ENG 108 or ENG 110ENG 212 - Cultures in CrisisCourse DescriptionUsing novels, short stories, films and other media, this course focuses on significant challenges faced by, and changes initiated in, a wide range of cultures. From the perspectives of gender, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, ability, mobility, and ongoing negotiations of identity within multicultural and im/migrant communities, course materials illuminate the complex nature of modern experience and draw attention to the important questions and concerns cultures have faced and continue to face.Weekly Contact:Lecture 3 hrs.GPA Weight:1.00Billing Units:1Count:1.00Liberal Studies:LLCustom Requisites:Not available to students in ACS English Option, BA English, English-Philosophy and English-History double major programsENG 222 - Fairy Tales and FantasiesCourse DescriptionStarting with the powerful images of folk tale, fairy tale, and legend, and following them through fantasies and animal tales, this course explores their evolution from oral stories for adults to literary versions for children. It will also examine the intellectual and historical influences of the periods. The material to be studied includes modern versions of the tales in print and visual media.Weekly Contact:Lecture 3 hrs.GPA Weight:1.00Billing Units:1Count:1.00ENG 223 - Literatures of Exile and MigrationCourse DescriptionRecent years have seen the largest movement of people from their homeland since WWII. We live in an era of increased mobility with national borders alternately porous and reinforced as nations welcome new refugees and immigrants or strive to keep them out. In this course, students read both fiction and nonfiction narratives about the experiences of exile and migration, and the possibilities and anxieties brought by the global movement of populations.Weekly Contact:Lecture 3 hrs.GPA Weight:1.00Billing Units:1Count:1.00Prerequisites:ENG 108 or ENG 110Antirequisites:ENG 204ENG 224 - Children's LiteratureCourse DescriptionThis course examines children's literature as a cultural category that shapes and is shaped by changing notions of "the child" and childhood. Students explore the ways in which texts directed at children's instruction and entertainment relate to their time, place, and generic form. Topics may include fiction; picture books; comics; film; and poetry.Weekly Contact:Lecture 3 hrs.GPA Weight:1.00Billing Units:1Count:1.00ENG 230 - Creativity, Writing, and Everyday LifeCourse DescriptionCreativity as a distinct practice of expression and investigation is a key function of art and learning. Students analyze the role of creativity in the making and criticism of literary objects, including poetry, short stories, novels, and more. Accounting for historical models of literary invention and other associated terms (such as genius and taste), students examine the role of creativity and its value in writing, scholarship, and the everyday circumstances of our lives.Weekly Contact:Lecture 3 hrs.GPA Weight:1.00Billing Units:1Count:1.00ENG 240 - Contours of CreativityCourse DescriptionCreativity is a process requiring everyday cultivation and practice. How, for example, do we tap the imagination or overcome writer’s block? This course involves a combination of theory and practice, intertwining critical analysis and creative expression. It involves creative practitioners and research creators who share insights into how diverse themes—such as food, sports, and fashion; illness, healing, and cultural identity—can be shaped as potent sources of creativity.Weekly
Laughter and tears are not always straightforward. A tale of pride going before a fall can be reassuring to us as well as sad, and a Hollywood romantic comedy can encode a scathing social critique. Offering insight into our ongoing fascination with the extremes of human emotion, this course traces how the twin poles of the comic and tragic have developed through literary history, and how they vary across diverse cultural traditions.Weekly Contact:Lecture 3 hrs.GPA Weight:1.00Billing Units:1Count:1.00Liberal Studies:LLCustom Requisites:Not available to ACS English Option, BA English, English-Philosophy and English-History double major program students.ENG 104 - The Short StoryCourse DescriptionAs a relatively new genre that burst on the literary scene with the emergence of magazine culture, the short story is a truly modern form. Its excitement has to do with the concision of its form and the startling turns its narratives can offer. This course explores the history and conventions of the genre, examining stories from a variety of cultural contexts representing a range of styles, themes, and social issues.Weekly Contact:Lecture 3 hrs.GPA Weight:1.00Billing Units:1Count:1.00Liberal Studies:LLCustom Requisites:Not available to ACS English Option, BA English, English-Philosophy and English-History double major program students.ENG 110 - Literatures Across BordersCourse DescriptionLiterature shapes and is shaped by the world we live in. It straddles the borders between nations, personal and collective histories, and narrative forms. In this course, students engage with diverse literary forms, themes, locations, and historical contexts; and develop skills for critical analysis and the creation of sustained, organized, and well-reasoned arguments.Weekly Contact:Lecture 2 hrs. Tutorial 1 hr.GPA Weight:1.00Billing Units:1Count:1.00Antirequisites:ENG 108ENG 112 - Zap, Pow, Bang: Pop LitCourse DescriptionHorror stories, pop songs, love poetry, comics-this course introduces students to various types of writing that were popular at different times and in different cultures. Students will learn central concepts and terminology in the study of popular writing and culture, and they will analyze the impact that cultural and political issues have had not only on what works became popular but also on the very notion of "the popular" itself.Weekly Contact:Lecture 3 hrs.GPA Weight:1.00Billing Units:1Count:1.00Liberal Studies:LLAntirequisites:ENG 703Custom Requisites:Not available to ACS English Option, BA English, English-Philosophy and English-History double major program students.ENG 142 - Black Arts, Black PowerCourse DescriptionBlack textual and cultural productions reveal the material conditions of Black experience. Students are introduced to Black Studies by exploring cultural production throughout the Black diaspora in its historical and social contexts, including the Middle Passage, slavery, emancipation, segregation, civil rights activism, immigration, and post-colonial revolution. Students analyze literary texts and intellectual traditions in the Black experience of North America. Specific attention is paid to the Black Canadian context.Weekly Contact:Lecture 3 hrs.GPA Weight:1.00Billing Units:1Count:1.00ENG 200 - Writing as a Cultural ActCourse DescriptionWe live our lives through networks of texts, both printed and digital. This course takes a rhetorical perspective to explore how written texts provide more than just information: they perform important cultural actions in contemporary civic life. Students examine the relationship of writing to knowledge, belief, and social organization in contexts such as popular and social media, politics and activism, literature and art, and professional, technical, and academic cultures.Weekly Contact:Lecture 3 hrs.GPA Weight:1.00Billing Units:1Count:1.00ENG 201 - Myth and LiteratureCourse DescriptionFrom classical poetry to video games, stories follow recognizable patterns that tell us much about our values, fears, and desires. Offering a fertile source for plots and themes, myth systems present a set of limits to be investigated, challenged, and rewritten. This course examines how plays, poems, novels, and/or other texts engage with myth. Topics may include such diverse ideas as masculinity, initiation, fellowship, betrayal, rebirth, exile and homecoming.Weekly Contact:Lecture 3 hrs.GPA Weight:1.00Billing Units:1Count:1.00Liberal Studies:LLCustom Requisites:Not available to ACS English Option, BA English, English-Philosophy and English-History double major program students.ENG 203 - The Literature of Indigenous PeoplesCourse DescriptionHow has colonialism impacted Indigenous cultures, and how have Indigenous people used texts to pose challenges to colonialism and to preserve and retell traditional stories? Reading contemporary literature by Aboriginal Australian, Maori, First Nations and other Indigenous writers, students address these and other important socio-political questions, examine wider literary and theoretical issues, and consider questions regarding cultural identity raised in the writings of Indigenous peoples.Weekly Contact:Lecture 3 hrs.GPA Weight:1.00Billing Units:1Count:1.00Liberal Studies:LLCustom Requisites:Not available to students in ACS English Option, BA English, English-Philosophy and English-History double major programsENG 208 - Introduction to Non-FictionCourse DescriptionStories come to us in many forms including life writing, travel writing, documentaries, historical testimony, political speeches, journalistic texts and scientific and legal discourse. In this course, students read and write about non-fiction in a variety of forms across diverse historical periods and media.Weekly Contact:Lecture 2 hrs. Tutorial 1 hr.GPA Weight:1.00Billing Units:1Count:1.00Prerequisites:ENG 108 or ENG 110ENG 212 - Cultures in CrisisCourse DescriptionUsing novels, short stories, films and other media, this course focuses on significant challenges faced by, and changes initiated in, a wide range of cultures. From the perspectives of gender, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, ability, mobility, and ongoing negotiations of identity within multicultural and im/migrant communities, course materials illuminate the complex nature of modern experience and draw attention to the important questions and concerns cultures have faced and continue to face.Weekly Contact:Lecture 3 hrs.GPA Weight:1.00Billing Units:1Count:1.00Liberal Studies:LLCustom Requisites:Not available to students in ACS English Option, BA English, English-Philosophy and English-History double major programsENG 222 - Fairy Tales and FantasiesCourse DescriptionStarting with the powerful images of folk tale, fairy tale, and legend, and following them through fantasies and animal tales, this course explores their evolution from oral stories for adults to literary versions for children. It will also examine the intellectual and historical influences of the periods. The material to be studied includes modern versions of the tales in print and visual media.Weekly Contact:Lecture 3 hrs.GPA Weight:1.00Billing Units:1Count:1.00ENG 223 - Literatures of Exile and MigrationCourse DescriptionRecent years have seen the largest movement of people from their homeland since WWII. We live in an era of increased mobility with national borders alternately porous and reinforced as nations welcome new refugees and immigrants or strive to keep them out. In this course, students read both fiction and nonfiction narratives about the experiences of exile and migration, and the possibilities and anxieties brought by the global movement of populations.Weekly Contact:Lecture 3 hrs.GPA Weight:1.00Billing Units:1Count:1.00Prerequisites:ENG 108 or ENG 110Antirequisites:ENG 204ENG 224 - Children's LiteratureCourse DescriptionThis course examines children's literature as a cultural category that shapes and is shaped by changing notions of "the child" and childhood. Students explore the ways in which texts directed at children's instruction and entertainment relate to their time, place, and generic form. Topics may include fiction; picture books; comics; film; and poetry.Weekly Contact:Lecture 3 hrs.GPA Weight:1.00Billing Units:1Count:1.00ENG 230 - Creativity, Writing, and Everyday LifeCourse DescriptionCreativity as a distinct practice of expression and investigation is a key function of art and learning. Students analyze the role of creativity in the making and criticism of literary objects, including poetry, short stories, novels, and more. Accounting for historical models of literary invention and other associated terms (such as genius and taste), students examine the role of creativity and its value in writing, scholarship, and the everyday circumstances of our lives.Weekly Contact:Lecture 3 hrs.GPA Weight:1.00Billing Units:1Count:1.00ENG 240 - Contours of CreativityCourse DescriptionCreativity is a process requiring everyday cultivation and practice. How, for example, do we tap the imagination or overcome writer’s block? This course involves a combination of theory and practice, intertwining critical analysis and creative expression. It involves creative practitioners and research creators who share insights into how diverse themes—such as food, sports, and fashion; illness, healing, and cultural identity—can be shaped as potent sources of creativity.Weekly
