December 21-22, 2024: Spring Semester Previews

[I thinkwe could all use some reminders these days of the best of our communities andconversations. So for this year’s Fall Semester reflections series, I wanted toshare one moment from each of my classes that embodied those collective goals.Leading up to this special post on what I’m looking forward to in the Spring!]

ThreeSpring courses that make me (somewhat) excited to come back from the holidaybreak.

1)     Graduate English Research: I’ve been teaching coursesin our MA program since the end of my first year at FSU (Summer 2006!), andhave been the Chair of the program as well for the last 3+ years. But somehow,in all that time and across all these courses, I’ve never had the chance toteach our one required class, Graduate English Research. This Spring I’llfinally have that chance, and am so excited for two specific units: one wherewe’ll read a ton of LangstonHughes’s Collected Poems and think about different research and analyticallenses on them; and one where we’ll read a number of short stories from the BestAmerican Short Stories 2018 anthologyand do the same with more contemporary texts. One key to teaching at a placefor 20 years is keeping things fresh, and this course promises to do that forme in Spring 2025 for sure.

2)     Honors First-Year Writing II: This is anotherclass I’ve never had the chance to teach—it won’t be quite as new for me as theGraduate one, as I’ve taught First-YearWriting II every year and have also taught our HonorsLiterature Seminar many times; but this will still be a variation on thosemore familiar themes, and a chance to work with our phenomenal Honors studentswhich is always a profound pleasure. And maybe I’ll have a chance to recruitone or two or all of them to add a Minor in English Studies (if they’re notalready English Studies Majors, which most of them won’t be)…

3)     MajorAmerican Authors of the 20C: This upper-level literature course willinclude a lot of such Majors and Minors already, although I also always get anumber of students from across the university in my lit courses which makes fora great balance. Some authors/texts have been present every time I’ve taughtthis class and will remain so this Spring, including opening with Dreiser’sSister Carrie (1900) and working with multiple poems from both theaforementioned Langston Hughes and SylviaPlath in two mid-semester units. But I’m especially excited to concludethis class with a favorite novel that I’ve taught many times but never on thissyllabus: JhumpaLahiri’s The Namesake (2003). Every time I come back to this novel Isee different things, and I’m sure this setting will open it up in new waysstill. Not rushing the break, but also, I can’t wait!

Year inReview posts start Monday,

Ben

PS. Whatare you looking forward to?