English 111, Section 002 -- Dislocations: Introduction to Prose Non-Fiction

Lectures: MW 10:00-10:50 in Hennings 202.

Prof. Kevin McNeilly
Office: Buchanan Tower 401, phone 604.822.4466 E-mail: mcneilly@mail.ubc.ca
Twitter: @theRealMcNeilly
Office Hours, September to November 2013: Wednesdays 1:00 to 2:30

Discussion Groups, F 10:00-10:50
L05 -- Math 225
TA: Matt Owen
L06 -- Angus 354
TA: Dallas Hunt
L07 -- Pone 123
TA: Damon Barta
L08 -- Scrf 205
TA: Tiffany Percival
L30 -- Geog 214
TA: Carol Lai

Course Description


In our heavily mediated world, senses of self and of place are becoming increasingly uncertain. In this course, we will examine the basic concepts behind and writing practices of literary non-fiction, focusing in particular on autobiography as a writing form. How do we try to write ourselves into place? How do we identify and document ourselves through writing? What are the demands of placing ourselves in particular discourses and locations? We will deal with ideas of the human subject and of the depiction of and address to others (and the creation of various kinds of community), with the complex relationships between art and fact, and with the interconnections of the graphic and spoken or written language. Questions of representation and self-fashioning will form a crucial part of our investigation of how non-fiction becomes literary work.

Required Texts

Recommended Texts

Assignments

Lecture Schedule
Lectures are Mondays and Wednesdays at 10:00 in Hennings 202.
Please note that I cannot affirm the accuracy or viability of the external material linked to this webpage; these links are provided solely as supplemental information for our class discussions.
Wednesday September 4
Video Introduction. I am away at a conference during the first week of classes. I will return on Monday, September 9. Today, you'll view a video introduction to the course. (This videos will also be made available on line.)
Click here for a YouTube version of this introductory video.
Friday September 6
Discussion Group
Monday September 9
Please read Lavinia Greenlaw, The Importance of Music to Girls.
Click here for Lavinia Greenlaw's homepage.
Click here for audio of Lavinia Greenlaw reading her poetry.
Click here for a list (linked to the texts) of articles by and about Lavinia Greenlaw in The Guardian.
Click here for a review by Greenlaw of Bedsit Disco Queen by Tracey Thorn.
Click here for a video interview with Greenlaw. (There are other YouTube videos with Greenlaw in the right sidebar.)
Click here for Lavinia Greenlaw's faculty homepage at the University of East Anglia, where she teaches creative writing.
Click here for a negative review of Greenlaw's book. (Notice the issues the reviewer raises about surfaces and detachment.)
Click here for a more positive review.
Click here for another positive review of the book.
Click here for another, mixed review.
Wednesday September 11
Please read Lavinia Greenlaw, The Importance of Music to Girls.
Click here for a YouTube version of the opening of Marc Bolan's 1977 tv show Marc, featuring The Jam, performing "All Around the World."
Click here for a 2003 interview with Greenlaw, in which she discusses her writing practice.
Click here for the Poetry Foundation's page on Greenlaw.
Click here for a page on a version of Greenlaw's Audio Obscura project
Friday September 13
Discussion Group
Monday September 16
Please read "Findings" and "Cetacean Disco" from Kathleen Jamie, Findings (41, 145)
Click here for the British Council page on Kathleen Jamie.
Click here for a set of readings by Jamie, from the website The Poetry Archive.
Click here for an interview (from 2005?) with Jamie in Books from Scotland.
Click here for a tourist website for Fife, Scotland.
Click here for a wikipedia page on Ceann Iar.
Click here for a wikipedia page on Ceann Ear.
Click here for a list of Kathleen Jamie's publications in The Guardian.
Click here for Kathleen Jamie's page at the University of Stirling.
Click here for a review, by Jamie, of The Sea Inside.
Wednesday September 18
Classes suspended, so that students can participate in the Truth and Reconciliation Commission's final events.
Friday September 20
Discussion Group
Click here for a YouTube video featuring the Slovenian philosopher Slavoj Zizek discussing the concept of nature, in close relation to the idea of plastic and to other issues raised by Kathleen Jamie in her essays.
Monday September 23
Please read Satrapi, Persepolis
Click here for "Marjane Satrapi: On Artistic Freedom, Fame & Finishing No Matter What" by Ariston Anderson.
Click here for an October 2004 interview with Marjane Satrapi.
Click here for "Marjane Satrapi: Princess of darkness" from .
Click here for a list of articles from The Guardian concerning Marjane Satrapi and her work.
Click here for a 2008 interview with Satrapi.
Click here for a graphic interview (by Mike Russell) with Satrapi.
Wednesday September 25
Please read Satrapi, Persepolis
Click here for Scott McLeod's webpage, with material from Understanding Comics and other texts on graphic media.
Click here for "I Will Always Be Iranian," an interview with Satrapi.
Click here for an article on Marjane Satrapi (in French).
Friday September 27
Discussion Group
Monday September 30
Please read Satrapi, Persepolis
Click here for a brief video, "Beginnings: Marjane Satrapi," in which Satrapi talks about her life and her work.
Wednesday October 2
Please read "Sabbath" from Kathleen Jamie, Findings (129)
An audio podcast of me discussing "Sabbath," as a supplement to today's lecture (which was a bit foreshortened, because I continued talking about Satrapi for the first half of the class) can be found on my audio page, here.
Click here for a Facebook page on the Stornoway Library on the Isle of Lewis.
Click here or here for information on Tolsta's Bridge to Nowhere on the Isle of Lewis.
Click here for a wikipedia page defining metaphor. (Note the etymology, and the idea of tenor and vehicle.)
Friday October 4
First In-Class Essay
Click here to download the essay topic sheet.
Monday October 7
Please Joan Didion, The Year of Magical Thinking.
Click here for an interview with Joan Didion from The Paris Review on how she writes non-fiction.
Click here for another interview with Didion from The Paris Review, this time on writing fiction.
Click here for an overview of Didion's journalistic writing, by Prof. Sandra Braman.
Click here for links to "15 Great Essays by Joan Didion."
Click here for a list of articles about Joan Didion from The New York Times.
Click here for "Staring Clear-Eyed at the Culture: Joan Didion and the Postwar Deluge" by Matthew Brandon Wolfson
Click here for writing by and about Joan Didion in The New York Review of Books.
Click here for "Why I Write" by Joan Didion.
Wednesday October 9
Please Joan Didion, The Year of Magical Thinking.
Click here for a YouTube video of Joan Didion interviewed by Al Filreis about The Year of Magical Thinking.
Click here for "Joan Didion: life after death" (from The Guardian), by Emma Brockes.
Click here for "Notes on a Voice: Joan Didion" by Robert Butler.
Click here for a passage from her 1979 collection of essays, The White Album, about how "We tell ourselves stories in order to live . . . ."
Click here for John Gregory Dunne's obituary from The Guardian.
Click here for an article from the Los Angeles Times for 15 October 2013, describing an event honouring Didion, including remarks made by the actor Harrison Ford.
Friday October 11
Discussion Group
Monday October 14
THANKSGIVING -- UNIVERSITY CLOSED
Wednesday October 16
Please read "Surgeon's Hall" and "Fever" from Kathleen Jamie, Findings (81, 103)
Click here for the homepage for the Surgeons' Hall Museum in Edinburgh.
Click here for a set of images from the Surgeons' Hall Museum.
Click here for a wikipedia page on Sir Charles Bell.
Click here for the abstract of a recent paper in the medical journal Surgeon on John Barclay.
Click here for "'Yo lo vi'. Goya witnessing the disasters of war: an appeal to the sentiment of humanity" by Paul Bouvier.
Friday October 18
Discussion Group
Monday October 21
Please read Blixen, Out of Africa
Click here for the "Karen Blixen - Isak Dinesen Information Site."
Click here for an overview of Karen Blixen's writing career.
Click here for a *.pdf version of Isak Dinesen's interview with The Paris Review in 1956.
Click here for "Isak Dinesen in America" by Sara Stambaugh.
Wednesday October 23
Please read Blixen, Out of Africa
Click here for another biography of Karen Blixen.
Click here for a web page on the Karen Blixen Museum. (The site is in Danish.)
Click here for a review of a book about Blixen in Africa.
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Friday October 25
Discussion Group
Monday October 28
Please read Blixen, Out of Africa and Ngugi, Dreams in a Time of War
Click here for
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Wednesday October 30
Please read "Darkness and Light" and "Peregrines, Ospreys, Cranes" from Kathleen Jamie, Findings (3, 25)
Friday November 1
Discussion Group
Monday November 4
Please read Ngugi, Dreams in a Time of War
Clickhere for Ngugi wa Thiong'o's homepage.
Wednesday November 6
Please read Ngugi, Dreams in a Time of War
Clickhere for "After 50 years, unity is still an African dream" by Ngugi.
Friday November 8
Second In-Class Essay
Click here for the essay topic sheet.
Monday November 11
REMEMBRANCE DAY -- UNIVERSITY CLOSED
Wednesday November 13
Please read "Crex-Crex" and "Markings" from Kathleen Jamie, Findings (69, 93)
Friday November 15
Discussion Group
Monday, November 18
Please read Wah, Diamond Grill
Wednesday November 20
Please read Wah, Diamond Grill
Friday November 22
Discussion Group
Term Paper due in class.
Click here for the essay topic sheet.
Monday November 25
Please read "The Braan Salmon" and "Skylines" from Kathleen Jamie, Findings (59, 117)
Wednesday November 27
Review and Overview
Friday November 29
Discussion Group
Click here for the outline for the final exam.