Upcoming Courses

Instructor: Halley Cotton

Come explore what it means to be a Birminghamian. We’ll be using writing and research as tools of discovery alongside creativity and self-expression. Students will experience the culturally vibrant layers of Birmingham including why the city is a food destination, how it birthed civil rights, its industrial founding, stunning outdoors, and more.

Instructor: Lauren Slaughter

This course is an introduction to the practice of creative writing, with a focus on flash fiction and flash creative nonfiction. "Flash" refers to writing in short forms, usually between 250 and 2,000 words. (This class will not cover poetry.) By the completion of the course students will:

• Understand the various elements of a successful work of flash fiction/flash creative nonfiction
• Practice and apply a range of techniques to write original, energetic, image-driven and voice-driven flash fiction and flash creative nonfiction
• Revise their writing and recognize that successful creative writing is always the result of a lot of hard work. To this end, expect to devote considerable attention to strategies for observation and focus, modeling, accurate language choice, achieving a precise image, and the elements of structure

Instructor: Melba Major

This course introduces students to the fundamentals of creative writing. In this class, we’ll explore the genres of flash nonfiction and poetry. Students will develop their unique voices while experimenting with brevity, imagery, and lyricism. A basic premise of this course is that powerful writing often emerges from attentive reading, fearless writing, and rigorous revision. Through close reading of contemporary works, in-class exercises, discussions, and peer feedback sessions, students will learn to craft compelling prose and evocative verse. By the end of the course, students will have a portfolio of original work and a deeper understanding of the creative process. No prior experience is necessary—just a willingness to explore, create, and engage with language in new ways. This course meets Blazer Core Creative Arts with a Flag in Post-Freshman Writing.

Instructor: Anamaria Santiago

We’ve come a long way from the moral panic induced by comics in the 1930s, when literary gatekeepers denigrated comics as a lesser form, dangerous for literacy and intellectual development. Now, of course, we know that the graphic narrative medium—less pretentiously, comics—is sophisticated storytelling that is not only worthy of study but also especially adept at tackling the kinds of critical questions we so value in the humanities. In this discussion and analysis-heavy course, we’ll examine how a variety of graphic narratives use visual language (signs) and the comics form (sequencing) to generate textual meaning (sense). We’ll review the history, evolution, and cultural significance of the form and read celebrated classics as well as contemporary texts spanning from fantasy and sci-fi to historical fiction and autobiography. We’ll see how diverse authors have used the form to explore a multitude of topics, from war and violence to identity and relationships. Students should bring to this course the expectations they have of any other 200-level literature course, as we will rely on close reading, analysis, and theory to better understand and appreciate the basics of the genre.

Instructor: Amy Cates

Our preoccupation with imagining alternate timelines and revisiting the past is evident in many forms of storytelling and throughout pop culture. But it is within imaginative literature that we will dig in and explore how time travel is a portal into some of humanity’s most universal questions. What if time is not linear but something we can bend or even escape? Are other possible parallel versions of our lives obtainable? If we could revisit the past, would it change anything other than our own understanding?

This course travels its own timeline, as it examines a variety of fictional works and poetry selections as we seek to understand how time travel reflects changing cultural anxieties and wide-reaching philosophical questions. Students will also be exposed to academic research that offers accessible explanations of scientific ideas that frequently appear in speculative fiction. Through in-class discussions and a mix of reflective and analytical writing, students will explore how literature and science work together to shape our understanding of time travel. As with many works of serious literature, some assigned texts may include difficult subject matter. Students should expect to encounter political and social perspectives that may differ from their own, as well as scenes that include violence or sexual content.

Instructor: Ronald Guthrie

Over the course of the semester, we will discuss what it means to be human in the 21st century by analyzing science fiction short stories and films from both past and contemporary authors and directors. We will also read several nonfiction pieces, including news stories, to give context to the fictional readings and movies. During the first half of the semester, we will look at works focused on robotics and artificial intelligence with an eye toward the possible ramifications of giving machines “human” rights or imposing laws to control them, especially if they become self-aware. During the second half of the semester, we will focus on cyborgs by examining how society has already adapted and will have to adapt even more to people who are both human and machine in light of the predictions made by speculative fiction and film.

This course will require considerable reading, writing, and classroom discussion. Students should be aware that some of the texts and films include uncomfortable and controversial subject matter, such as prejudice and discrimination, religion, sex, drug use, and violence.

Instructor: Aparna Dwivedi

“People think that stories are shaped by people. In fact, it is the other way around” (Pratchett). Witches have long been trapped in such narrative contraption, which held them captive as broomstick-borne bearers of misfortune and practitioners of magic. In this class, our purpose is to study folklore/fairy tales and literary narratives to understand the transformation in the representation of witches. After starting out with the context of folklore and fairy tales, we will go on to read several short works (available on Canvas) and two novels (I, Tituba and Circe) to see how authors have resisted the established discourse on witches and appropriated the witch narrative in their own writing. Except for the two novels, all materials will be made available on Canvas. For instance, we will situate Maryse Conde’s I, Tituba within the context of the Salem witch trials and Arthur Miller’s representation of Tituba in The Crucible and gather other narratives, to consider the many appropriations of Tituba’s voice in present times. In tracing such parallel narratives, our purpose is to understand the complex ways in which stories exist and operate. The semester will be divided into three segments, each culminating with a major assignment: an essay, exam, and a multimodal group project.

Instructor: Jill Clements

This course provides students with the essential elements of literary research, including approaches to textual interpretation, the conventions of literary analysis essays for structure and content, and research methods and tools. We’ll focus on how to make claims that are rooted in close-reading and situate those claims in the broader scholarly conversation about a primary text. To that end, we will work through research strategies using specialized library databases, examine various models of literary analysis, and developing techniques for writing convincing and compelling arguments about literature. (Our topic and base texts for EH 301 this fall will be tales of medieval knights' quests and Arthurian lore, and this course can count toward the minor in Ancient, Medieval, and Renaissance Studies.)

Instructor: Jill Clements

The corpus of texts from medieval Scandinavia tells the stories of the Norse gods, legendary heroes, and colorful families of the Viking Age. Focusing particularly on sagas, this course introduces Old Norse-Icelandic literature in translation and fosters skills in close reading and interpretation. We will also discuss the historical milieu in which these texts were composed and transmitted, and how the literature represents various aspects of medieval culture, including such topics as travel abroad and raiding, settlement, love and marriage, feasting, law, warrior ethics, blood feud, cosmology, and religious rituals. This course counts toward the minor in Ancient, Medieval, and Renaissance Studies.

Instructor: Jaclyn Wells

Students will study the complex process of learning to write. Students will also learn practical strategies for teaching writing one-on-one. The course will balance reading and discussion with hands-on experience and observation in the University Writing Center. Course readings will include articles about writing pedagogy, practical tutoring guides, and real tutors’ published reflections about their work. Course projects will include observation write-ups, tutoring reflections and philosophies, and research about a topic of the student's choice. Undergraduate students must take this course to qualify for employment in the University Writing Center; however, due to a limited number of available positions, taking EH 401 does not guarantee employment in the UWC.

Instructor: James Braziel

Our goal for the semester will be to explore and create different types of characters. We will look at the basic ingredients that go into inventing every character (motives, history, reputation, habits, preferences, choices, etc.), and we will look at different types of characters from flat to dynamic, comical to serious in model stories. We will write brief character sketches from the photographs in the book American Photobooth. Then we will create scenes for these characters and ultimately create full-length short stories with these characters for the workshop and portfolio.

Instructor: Margaret Jay Jessee

This course explores American literature and culture from the end of the Civil War through World War I, a period often referred to as the Gilded Age. The term is borrowed from Mark Twain and Charles Dudley Warner’s 1873 satire, which captures the glittering surface and deep structural inequality of the period: rapid industrial growth, staggering concentrations of wealth, political corruption, labor exploitation, anti-immigrant backlash, racial violence, and the consolidation of corporate power. Many of these issues remain strikingly familiar today, from widening wealth gaps and labor struggles to debates over immigration, media influence, corporate accountability, voting rights, and whose histories get remembered or erased.

We will examine how literature and popular culture responded to the pressures of modernization, urbanization, mass media, and social upheaval. Along the way, we will consider questions that still resonate now: What can writing do in times of political crisis? How do stories shape public opinion? What is the relationship between art, journalism, entertainment, and activism? And how do writers imagine both the problems and the possibilities of American life?

Authors may include Henry James, Mark Twain, Edith Wharton, Charles Chesnutt, Zitkala-Ša, Jacob Riis, and William Dean Howells.

Instructor: Kerry Madden-Lunsford

This workshop will focus specifically on writing stories for young people. Students will be presented with a range of children's authors from picture books to early readers to middle-grade novels to young adult novels. From Maurice Sendak to Ann Whitford Paul to Jane Yolen to James Marshall to Kwame Alexander to Judy Blume to Sophie Blackall to Jerry Craft to Nikki Giovanni to Jaqueline Woodson to Linda Sue Park to Rainbow Rowell to Laurie Halse Anderson to Irene Latham to Pam Muñoz Ryan and many others, students will read a range of diverse stories and styles and learn about writing for children. Students will write three picture books, including a draft of a fractured fairy tale and/or a nonfiction picture book, one chapter of a middle-grade novel, and one chapter of a young adult novel. They will also be expected to revise their work based on feedback in the workshop. A visiting author will come to the workshop in person or via Zoom during the semester to discuss writing and children's literature.

The class will culminate in a visit to Epic Magnet or Glen Iris School near campus for UAB students to read their stories developed in the workshop to the children in grades K-5 at Epic or Glen Iris and submit their work to a children’s publisher. They will also be introduced to SCBWI.ORG – the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators, and the local chapter “Southern Breeze,” with local and online networking opportunities for internships, contests, and meetings with professionals working in the industry today.

Instructor: Gale Temple

This class will survey selected writings of Marxist theory, which (broadly speaking) seeks to connect the ways people think to the economic conditions in which they live. We will focus on the concept of “ideology,” which the French Marxist Louis Althusser defined as “the imaginary relationship of individuals to their real conditions of existence.” Ideology, in Marxist thought, is the meshwork of assumptions and beliefs that enable a given way of life to seem “natural” or “normal,” and as such it functions both to reproduce existing economic and cultural systems, and to maintain the power and influence of those who benefit most from them. Ideology conditions the way we see the world – our goals and aspirations in life, our views of proper sex/gender roles, our tastes in art and literature, our beliefs about animals and other nonhumans – and one of the goals of Marxist theory is to help us step out of our limiting ideological frames in order to better understand the pictures we’re in. By studying writers such as Karl Marx, Walter Benjamin, Hannah Arendt, Eve Sedgwick, Judith Butler, and Michel Foucault (among others), we will think in this class about how ideology has conditioned us to accept the norms that structure our lives, and about how Marxist theory helps us to rethink (and potentially resist) them.

Instructor: Margaret Jay Jessee

Mean Girls in Lit is a graduate seminar devoted to the pleasures and provocations of the “bad woman” in literature: the sharp-tongued heroine, the social climber, the manipulator, the narcissist, the woman whose selfishness, cruelty, ambition, or refusal of feminine virtue makes her difficult to admire and impossible to ignore. Moving from Emma and Vanity Fair to Wuthering Heights, The Custom of the Country, and Sula, the course examines how literary texts construct female unlikability and why such figures so often become central to questions of desire, power, class, race, sexuality, morality, and social performance.

Rather than treating these characters as merely “toxic” personalities or psychological case studies, we will approach them through sustained literary analysis, attending closely to form, narration, irony, genre, historical context, and critical scholarship in order to ask what these women do within their texts and what cultural anxieties they expose. Across the semester, students will investigate how literature makes room for women who are disruptive, transgressive, glamorous, cruel, or defiantly unreadable, and how reading them critically can illuminate the gendered stakes of judgment itself.