>Simple Prose Texts/ Spring Semester 1392-93/ Instructor: Z. Jannessari Ladani<
Simple Prose Texts: Course Syllabus
I. Course Description: In this course, you will work on a number of selected texts or texts to be selected based on the progress of the students in the class. We are going to focus not only on reading comprehension in a higher level compared with the previous reading courses students have passed, but we also intend to go several steps further beyond comprehension. We will be introduced to the types of prose text such as old and modern texts, news, observation and report, expression of ideas, conversation and interview, literature and art, scientific and technological, official and ceremonious, legal and so forth. Here, our main focus will be on the subgenres of prose: narrative, purely informative, instruction, diary, biography and autobiography, report, travel, history, etc. meanwhile, we will cover style and its different types with respect to the notion of rhetoric as we go on with each text.
II. Bibliography: Simple Prose Texts for the spring semester 1392-93 is built around the following materials. Texts will be copied and distributed among students; however, students must purchase numbers 1 and 2.
1. Abbasi, A. and Ouliaeinia, H. Simple Prose Texts. Tehran: SAMT.
2. Abrams, M. H. (2014). A Glossary of Literary Terms. 11th ed. Boston: Cengage Learning.
3. from Benjamin Franklin's Autobiography
4. "Badajos" from Iberia by James Michener
5. from Ann Frank's Diary of a Young Girl
6. Review Sample: the review of Taking Soaps Seriously: World of Guiding Light by Michael J. Intintoli
7. Manual Sample: “Oliso Smart Iron” Manual
III. Assignments & Grades: Students should study the portions and texts that are assigned to them by the instructor for the following session. Each text or extract should be read before students come to class. Students will have a final exam on all of the materials taught and discussed in class. This exam will have forty two (42) points. This will be assigned by the instructor. Students will also have one or two quizzes through the semester. Each quiz will receive up to (2) points. Students are not allowed to be absent from any of the class sessions. They will receive one point (+1) for each presence and a minus (-1) for each absence. More than three (3) sessions of absence will be reported to the Education Office and the absentee will be deprived of the final exam. All these scores will amount to the final grade of 60: quizzes (4) + presence in all sessions (14) + final exam (42) = 60. The student’s final score is one third of this total grade (60/3 = 20).
IV. Week-by-Week Reading Schedule: Please note that this schedule tells students what they need already to have read when they sit down in class in each session. Note also that, once in possession of the Schedule, no one should be in doubt about the assignments.
Week One – Wednesday 16 Bahman 1392:
What is Prose? Sub-genres and Features
Week Two – Wednesday 23 Bahman 1392:
“The Baby Who Came to Stay” by Danny Seifer; in Simple Prose Texts.
Week Three – Wednesday 30 Bahman 1392:
“Disciplining Children” by John Holt; in Simple Prose Texts.
Week Four – Wednesday 7 Esfand 1392:
“The Tables Turned” by Jan Needle; in Simple Prose Texts.
Week Five – Wednesday 14 Esfand 1392:
from Benjamin Franklin's Autobiography
Week Six – Wednesday 21 Esfand 1392:
“Julius Caesar: Hero or Villain” by Jan …; in Simple Prose Texts.
Week Seven – Wednesday 20 Farvardin 1393:
from Ann Frank's Diary of a Young Girl
Week Eight – Wednesday 27 Farvardin 1393:
"Badajos" from Iberia by James Michener
Week Nine – Wednesday 3 Ordibehesht 1393:
Looking up “Critical Essay” in A Glossary of Literary Terms
“Shakespeare’s Sister” by Virginia Woolf; in Simple Prose Texts.
Week Ten – Wednesday 10 Ordibehesht 1393:
Review Sample: the review of Taking Soaps Seriously: World of Guiding Light by Michael J. Intintoli
Week Eleven – Wednesday 17 Ordibehesht 1393:
Looking up “Style” in A Glossary of Literary Terms
Week Twelve – Wednesday 24 Ordibehesht 1393:
Style: The assessment of stylistics in texts covered in class
Week Thirteen – Wednesday 31 Ordibehesht 1393:
[continued] Style: The assessment of stylistics in texts covered in class
Week Fourteen – Wednesday 7 Khordad 1393:
Style: The assessment of stylistics in an unseen text
Week Fifteen – Wednesday 14 Khordad 1393:
Catch-up
GOODLUCK