1). Attendance, Preparation, Participation (15%):
Active and engaged participation is essential to your success and enjoyment of this course. I expect promptness as well as daily attendance and I keep track. This is a seminar, so I expect you all to be engaged interlocutors. This means:
- More than one unexcused absence will lower your course grade. Illness or injury are suitable excuses for absence. Wanting to extend Thanksgiving break or to pick up a friend from the airport are not.
2. You will not get full attendance credit if you come to class without the assigned texts.
3. We will start class ON TIME. You will not get full attendance credit if you are late or leave early.
4. More than three unexcused absences may result in failure for the course.
What is Class Participation? Coming to class prepared to participate, having read and thought about any assigned readings, will make it a more rewarding experience for you, your classmates, and your professor. You are all expected to be active, critical thinkers; to participate in class activities, particularly the seminar discussions; to do the reading in a timely fashion and to bring your texts to class. You may augment your participation by tweeting thoughts, or questions for the class or snippets from Ntozake Shange’s work using the hashtag #Zake. You can follow the class @ShangeWorlds. Your tweets are not a substitute for class participation because I also want you to be engaged with people in the room with you!
PLEASE NO USE OF SOCIAL MEDIA DURING CLASS EXCEPT AT DESIGNATED TIMES (archive visits, Shange visits, etc.)
2). Weekly Blogposts (20%)
3). Blog Audit & Short Paper (15%)
4). Class Presentation (20%)
Each of you will give a 10-15 minute researched oral presentation that will include at least one piece of supplemental material (preferably audio-visual)—a piece of music, a production photo, a piece of art, a video clip, a short piece of source material, etc.
After you give a well-organized presentation (focusing on one of the following: historical background, cultural context and /or critical scholarship), start the class discussion with four questions that cite passages in the text and invite close analysis. Give the questions and passages on the handout. Also include any bibliography for source materials.
PLEASE NOTE: If you plan to use the class’ AV equipment, please come to class early and have everything set up (i.e. tested) by the time I’ve finished announcements.
5). Music contribution, Movement contribution (5%)
I am hoping that each class will contain some sound or movement. Therefore 1x during the semester you will either pick a piece of music to play during class or if you have dance/movement/theater /PE interests, lead us in a SHORT movement exercise.
Music: This can be something that you write on for your music blogpost, something that you listened to while reading Shange or a piece of sound that inspired in you a thought about the class. Briefly tell us what the music is and why you wanted us to hear it.
Movement: I want you to help us move at some point during class! You can use exercises you know or drawn from reputable internet sources. It has to be something we can do during a class break.
“this is an experiment”
6). Final Digital Project (25%)
Four your final project, you will pair one item from The Ntozake Shange Collection and one item from another archive in a way that teaches something about feminism during the 1970s-80s. Imagine this as your contribution to a class exhibit on Shange and feminist influences. What story does your item tell? How will you contextualize your items and explain the pairing? The class includes training in handling of archival documents, metadata and the platform that will display your exhibits. Along with the exhibit itself, you should give me a short paper on your research and creative process (I will give out a prompt later in the semester.)