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English Courses

American Literature

American Literature is an exciting class where we examine American Literature from an historical perspective. Students will supplement their study of literature with primary historical documents and texts. Through this approach, students will begin to see history as subjective, open to interpretation by writers, historians, and the general population. It is the goal of this course to provide students with the skills to analyze these interpretations and formulate educated theories and opinions for themselves.

The reading list includes but is not limited to the following:

Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass by Frederick Douglass
Of Mice & Men by John Steinbeck
Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston
The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger
The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien
The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros

British Literature

12th Grade English is a comprehensive course in British Literature ranging from the Anglo-Saxon Period to the present. This survey course has the following general objectives:

To familiarize students with the major writers and works from Beowulf in the Anglo-Saxon period to the Theater of the Absurd in the modern period
To generate enthusiasm for and interest in England’s Literature, culture, and history
To appreciate the debt current language, culture, and literature owe to earlier ages in English history
To develop an awareness of interrelationships among literature, art, history, scientific development, and philosophy
To challenge students to relate their own experience and thoughts to English literature
To encourage integration of reading, thinking, writing, and speaking skills
To facilitate diverse classroom activities in teaching/learning literature including integration of technology into the class and curriculum
To lead students to cross-relate recurring themes and movements in English literature

The reading list includes but is not limited to the following:

“Beowulf”
The Canterbury Tales, Chaucer
Othello, Macbeth, Shakespeare
Frankenstein, Mary Shelley
Tess of the d’Urbervilles, Thomas Hardy
Waiting for Godot, Samuel Beckett