JOUR-GA 1050.002Topics in Literary Journalism:
A Dangerous Mix: How writers, poets, musicians, photographers are remaking journalism.
Contact:
Office hours: Thursday 1 to 3 PM or by appt.
Ezra Pound called literature “news that stays news.” In this course, we will learn how to turn the news into literature by exploring advanced nonfiction techniques. Each week, we will examine hybrid genres: poetry and literary reportage; music and photojournalism; journalism and memoir and try our hand at hybrids of our own. This course is ideal for graduates with a strong literary background and a keen interest in journalism. Through reading the work of Maggie Nelson, Teju Cole, James Fenton, among others, we will examine the very latest in the field of unconventional storytelling.
For this course, you will be expected to complete all assignments in a timely manner. Participation makes up 50% of your grade, and preparation is essential to this. You will also be asked to choose a work that employs hybrid genres in non-fiction storytelling and to present that work and its author/authors to the class as part of your class assignment.
Each of you will work on a semester-long individual project to be discussed in class that uses unconventional narrative techniques to tell a reported story. To be discussed in class, and developed individually in office hours.
Participation: 50%
Final Project: 30%
Class Assignments: 20%
Texts
James Fenton The Fall of Saigonand Dead Soldiers
Joan Didion Slouching Toward Bethlehem
Maggie Nelson Jane A Murder
Teju Cole Blind Spot
James Agee and Walker Evans Let Us Now Praise Famous Men
Dale Maharidge and Michael Williamson And Their Children After Them
Kevin Young Bunk
Seamus Murphy and P.J. Harvey Selected Short Films and Songs
Eliza Griswold and Seamus Murphy I am the Beggar of the World
Fady Joudah Textu
Azmat Khan and Anand Gopal “The Uncounted” from theNew York Times Magazine November 16, 2017
Week One: Introduction, In-Class Writing and Expectations: January 25, 2018
We will spend our first class setting personal and collective goals and going through syllabus to prepare to meet them.
Week Two: The Sixties: Foreign Reportage and Poetry of War: Feb. 1, 2018
In this class, we will explore how poet and journalist James Fenton used the genres of literary reportage and poetry to chronicle the Vietnam War.
Reading: Please come to class having readJames Fenton The Fall of Saigon (to be handed out Week One) and the poem Dead Soldiers (also to be handed out Week One)
Week Three: The Sixties: Domestic Reportage and the Essay: Feb. 8, 2018
In this class, we will explore how Joan Didion supported her stark look at the hippie generation through reporting.
Reading: Please come to class having readJoan Didion’s Slouching Towards Bethlehem and having watched film:“The Center Will Not Hold,” documentary by Griffin Dunne.
Week Four: Murder and Memoir: February 15, 2018
In this class, we will explore the role of the first person in non-fiction writing—how to use reporting and personal narrative to tell a story.
Reading: Please come to class having read Maggie Nelson’s Jane A Murder
Week Five: Photography and the Essay: February 22, 2018
In this class we will explore how a writer can use photography—or a photographer can use writing—to cross genres and tell a story.
Reading: Please come to class having read Teju Cole’s Blind Spot.
Week Six: Using Photography and Reportage to Chronicle Poverty in America: March 1, 2018
In this class, we will explore collaboration between writers and photographers to chronicle poverty in the United States.
Reading: Please come to class having read the first 150 pages ofJames Agee and Walker Evans Let Us Now Praise Famous Men
Week Seven: Contemporary Rural Poverty—A Response and Collaboration: March 8, 2018
In this class, we will read the Pulitzer-prize winning sequel to Let Us Now Praise Famous Men, in which journalist Dale Maharidge and writer Michael Williamson returned to the landscape and characters of Agee and Evans.
Reading: Please come to class having studied the photographs and read the first 150 pages of And Their Children After Them.
March 15: NO CLASS
Week Eight: News That Stays News: The Odes of Pablo Neruda: March 22, 2018
In this class, we will read the Odes of Pablo Neruda, the Nobel-prize winning poet and diplomat who published these poems in the newspaper—and insisted they appear alongside news rather than arts.
Reading: Please come to class having read the Odes handed out in Week Seven.
Week Nine: Unconventional Correspondence: March 29, 2018
In this class, we will explore the collaboration between the Irish photojournalist Seamus Murphy and the musician P.J. Harvey, as well as Murphy’s collaboration with your professor for a project collecting women’s poetry in Afghanistan.
Reading:Seamus Murphy and P.J. Harvey Selected Short Films and Songs
Eliza Griswold and Seamus Murphy I am the Beggar of the World
To Bring to Class: An article, book excerpt, short film, podcast, etc to share with class that either mixes genres or uses other unconventional modes of non-fiction storytelling. This week, we will set a schedule for the reading of the next two weeks.
Week Ten: Student-Led-Readings: April 5, 2018
Both this week and next, each student will be asked to prepare a 15-minute presentation on the work the student has chosen to present—including historical and biographic context of the authors for the class. This will represent the majority of your 20% class assignment grade.
Week Eleven: Student-Led-Readings Week Two: April 12, 2018
Presentations continue
Week Twelve:The Literature of Fake News: April 19, 2018
In this class, we will read Young’s new history of falsehood and fake news, along with several of his poems, which take on related themes to explore how writers use different genres to explore similar themes.
Reading: Please come to class having read Bunkand Poems; the latter to be handed out in Week Eleven
Week Thirteen: The Poetry of Fact: April 26, 2018
In this class, we will explore the extremely short form of poetry that Joudah, a poet and emergency room doctor, recounts in this popular new collection of poems.
Reading: Fady Joudah Textu
Week Fourteen: Reconstructing Fact: May 3, 2018
In this class, we will deconstruct the recent New York Times Magazine Cover Story related to the uncounted casualties of the war against ISIS in order to discuss reconstructed scene, the use of data, and the role of collaboration in reporting.
Reading:Azmat Khan and Anand Gopal “The Uncounted” from theNew York Times Magazineon November 16, 2017
Due: Your Final Projects will be due on May 3 in class. To be discussed in class.