Course Requirements:
Required Texts:
Apuleius. The
Golden Ass (tr. P.G. Walsh). Oxford WorldÕs Classics, 1994
Aristophanes.
The Complete Plays. (tr. P. Roche). New American
Library, 2005
Freudenberg,
K. ed. The Cambridge Companion to
Roman Satire. Cambridge, 2005
Hooley, D. Roman Satire. Blackwell, 2007
Horace.
Satires and Epistles (tr. J. Davie & R. Cowan) Oxford WorldÕs Classics 2011
Lucian.
Chattering Courtesans and Other Sardonic Sketches (Tr. K. Sidwell).
Penguin, 2004
Juvenal.
The Satires (tr. N. Rudd). Oxford WorldÕs Classics, 1991
Ogborn, J. and P. Buckroyd.
Satire. Cambridge Contexts in Literature. 2001
Petronius.
The Satyricon, Seneca. Apocolocyntosis (tr. J.P.
Sullivan). Penguin, 1986
Grading Categories:
Attendance, Discussion, and Reading:
ATTENDANCE IS REQUIRED. Most of the
work of the class can only be completed by regular attendance and disciplined,
consistent adherence to the syllabus. In this course meeting twice a week, you
will average 40 pages of reading per session, with some sessions requiring a
bit more reading time than average and some a bit less. Be prepared to spend 2-3
hours outside class for every hour in class to complete the assignments for
this course. You are reminded that your IN-CLASS time per week is nearly three
hours, but you receive 4 credit hours for the work you do in this course. The
additional credit hours awarded recognize the rigor of your coursework OUTSIDE
the classroom, your reading, writing, and critical thinking which should amount
to at least double the amount of time you spend INSIDE the classroom. That
means you are expected to fulfill a minimum average of 12-13 hours of work per
course, per week.
Please look ahead on your syllabus. Some of the readings are
very dense, and you will need to take notes as you read. Do NOT wait till
the last minute to do all readings. Many of the readings lend themselves to
note taking as outlines or highlighting of significant passages. Use outlining
to your advantage for understanding and later studying.
If you are confused by foreign names and phrases, make an
alphabetical list of names that reappear so you can see similar looking names
right next to each other.
In-class activities will include lecture, web resources, Daily
Show and Colbert Report clip analysis, student oral presentations, group work, and
LOTS OF DISCUSSION of readings. Your class participation grade will rest on
your contribution to class through questions and discussion. You will receive a
daily grade for this work which will reflect my
general assessment of your performance in class: A, B, C, D or 0. An absence
for any reason must be counted as a 0 for discussion since you cannot
participate if you are absent. For sickness or other personal reasons, I will
excuse two absences (1 week of class time) at the end of the term when computing
your grade. In general, I do not distinguish between excused and unexcused
absences for purposes of daily participation grades, but PLEASE always contact
me by email or phone before class if you MUST be absent on a given day. I want
to know when and why you need to miss class, and make sure that you don't get
too far behind. After you have totaled 4 absences from class, I reserve the
right to drop you from the class or leave you on the rolls and allow your grade
to be affected by your failure to attend.
It is important to understand that participation can include
informed questions, requests for further explanation, offering to answer
specific questions, or any contributions that foster learning in the classroom
environment.
GROUP WORK PROVISO: I will utilize different
groupings of students from time to time in class to facilitate peer learning
and review. Be prepared any given day to form groups quickly and efficiently as
instructed. I encourage those of
you who benefit from group study to create a working study group for
out-of-class work.
TEXT BOOK PROVISO - VERY
IMPORTANT!! – failure to bring the textbook to
class when required by the syllabus will result in a grade of 0 for that
day. These will add up quickly.
Yes, purchase of the books is necessary for this course. No other way to have
the material for classroom discussion. Electronic formats, such as Kindle, are
acceptable, so long as I know that is what youÕre doing on your computer, but
recognize that the page references will be cued to the books in print form.
I
ENCOURAGE YOU TO WORK WITH OTHERS, BUT MAKE SURE YOU UNDERSTAND EVERYTHING FOR
YOURSELF BY THE TIME YOU GET TO AN EXAM or PAPER.
Midterm Exam: You will take a major midterm term exam as listed on the syllabus. This will cover all material from Aristophanes to SenecaÕs Apocolocyntosis. It will be in a take-home, short essay and extended essay format with open texts. It is due at the time noted on the syllabus. Failure to submit the midterm at the required time will result in a grade of 0. Content will be discussed more fully as we approach the date on which it is posted for you to begin work. All work on this exam must be your own alone, with only acceptable resources permitted for consultation. Take-home exams are to be pledged just like any other written work as your own and yours alone. Take-home exams are NOT GROUP PROJECTS. This will be a substantial piece of writing – essays will require significant comment to be considered successful.
Writing Assignments: This is a J course that satisfies one of your Composition Requirements. You will be writing throughout the term, including significant analytical writing on the midterm, satire construction for presentation (see Oral Assignments), 3 short satirical pastiches/parodies, and a journal logging the content of The Daily Show and Colbert Report throughout the term. A few details on these assignments:
1) Ancient to Modern Satire Sketches: You will construct 3 separate 3-page satirical sketches—pastiches imitating the style of a particular author we have read—listed as Modern Horace, Modern Lucian, Modern Petronius/Apuleius. The content and focus of your satire can be anything you like, but the format should follow the following expectations – Modern Horace in the form of a satirical essay or if you like a poem, Modern Lucian in the form of a dialogue between multiple characters addressing an idea from different perspectives and backgrounds, Modern Petronius/Apuleius in a form combining narration and commentary typical of a scene in a novel. For all of these papers, you should understand the page limits to be minimums that you must write, 1 ½ spaced in a normal Times New Roman 12 font with 1 1/4 inch margins – donÕt fudge on me. Talk with me or others about ideas, but be original in what you want to write about, what matters to you, what perspectives you bring to an issue, and what would be a good counter-argument to your idea.
2) Daily Show/Colbert Report Journal Entries: On six occasions during the term as listed on the daily assignments, you will ÔlogÕ one episode per week each of Daily Show and Colbert Report to dissect the satire-writersÕ construction of satirical sketches, and the stitching together that makes the show work from joke to joke. Essentially you will try to dissect the serious content being satirized, but also the various methods used to sustain that bit comically. There is no absolute length requirement for these logs, but you should be as thorough as possible to get the most out of the exercise for training your ear and eye to the subtleties behind the comedy. The point of this exercise is to get you thinking about how to model your own satires when you need to construct them on your own. You will follow the chart below to know which dayÕs episodes you are expected to cover. You will do this logging in the online ÔJOURNALÕ feature in Blackboard. Enter in the name line each time you construct a journal entry, your 1) name, 2) group number below, 3) show you are logging, including name, day and date of the show. You will have until midnight the following Monday to enter your entries for credit, and you should keep a copy of your journal in a separate file too, as a backup. The episodes can be watched online any number of times after the date of the show, so you should be able to stop and start the video-clip as often as you need. I want you to include WHO the guest interviewee is, but you do not need to log the interview. You should however log the ÔMoment of ZenÕ at the end of Daily Show, the ÔTossÕ at the beginning of Colbert Report when he generally does 3 ÔTonightÉÕ gags and introduces the guest, all with a quick witty line - this ÔTossÕ will not always be used. If we discover that a chosen week will be an Ôoff-airÕ week for the shows, we will adjust as necessary.
|
Group # |
What and when to log |
What and when to log |
|
1 |
Monday
Daily Show |
Thursday
Colbert Report |
|
2 |
Tuesday Daily Show |
Wednesday Colbert Report |
|
3 |
Monday Colbert Report |
Thursday Daily Show |
|
4 |
Tuesday Colbert Report |
Wednesday Daily Show |
Oral Satire Projects: As a J course, this also satisfies one of your Oral Communication GenEd Requirements – that requires you to present two formal pieces of oral work, but you also are being graded on discussion as an oral component.
1) Group Satire: In groups of 3 (different from your DS/CR Groups above) you will construct and refine a 5-8-minute satire on any topic(s) you like. This will be performed on Group Satire Day along with all other Group Satires. Each group member must have a well-defined speaking part, and I will want a simple statement of who did what on the project to make sure that everyone is pulling his/her weight. The standard rule for oral projects is that a double-spaced page of text in 12 point Times New Roman would take the average reader 2.5 minutes to present. With awareness of those limitations, you will be producing no more than 3 full pages of script, unless you have fast readers. You can of course write more and edit down – all good satire writers do. Gags get dropped, etc. You may use any video or audio support, but be aware with the time limitations you will have to be able to run this material on my Mac or the Desktop PC in the room, so make sure your material works before you come to class and try to use it in a time-limited setting. I prefer that you work on memorizing this very short script – it will make for a much cleaner presentation, but I also realize that neither Jon Stewart nor Stephen Colbert does that, nor any of their correspondents – they use tele-prompters. But they are also professional improv comedians. So IÕm saying that if you clearly know your script well and are not stumbling all over it, if you expand the font big enough that youÕre not fumbling for words in your presentation (that will kill comedy fast), you may use scripts. But make sure everybodyÕs firing on all cylinders, no matter how you decide to present. There is a date also by which you as a group must submit a statement of your idea and a rough draft of your satirical sketch – so get to work in your groups sooner rather than later so you can figure out how you want to proceed on this. A tape/video that you have completed ahead of time is acceptable for submission as your presentation, but not required.
2) Individual Satire to be Delivered on Final Exam Day: you will once again construct a 5 minute satire, but by yourself. Same rules apply as above, just vary the topic and learn from your other satirical projects youÕve worked on over the course of the term. YouÕll actually be more free to do a format of your choosing here, so your creativity is key. If you wish to have an assistant help you with tech support that you have constructed, you may do that, but all work must be your own.
In the case of both these projects, and all projects, please ask questions well in advance so you have time to address issues – there are always issues when you wait too late. Fall back on your own talents, whether writing, delivery, comedy, edgy commentary, to produce the best work you can. Learn from your peers and the models you are reading and watching. Consult instructors and tutors at the Writing Center if necessary – they are very helpful.
A new, stricter policy for final examinations, end of semester tests and quizzes being administered during final exam week ONLY is now mandated for all instructors. The 3 page paper due the final week for this class does not fall into this category, but please, should you have any instructors announce tests during the last week of class in lieu of administering that exam during final exam week, please report that to the department office for that instructor as soon as you can so it can be corrected. This is a serious infringement on proper completion of other coursework and should be reported appropriately.
ACADEMIC HONESTY AND WRITTEN WORK – I cannot stress enough (and you will see more mentioned about this below) that every piece of work you turn in for a grade must be yours and yours alone. Cheating, whether in class or out of class, is a punishable offense at Binghamton University, and will be addressed very seriously in accordance with university policy.
Grading: Your final grade will be determined
roughly as follows:
Midterm Exam 25%
Group Oral Satire Project 17%
Individual Oral Satire Project 18%
Discussion/Class Participation 20%
Daily Show/Colbert Report Journal 5%
3 Ancient to Modern Satire Sketches 15% (average of 3 assignments)
You may need to spend 3-5 hours outside of class for every hour in class (6-10 hours per week), and you receive an hour of credit each week beyond the required class meetings. Foreign languages often require significant preparation time if you want to do well.
Suggestions for Success:
1) ALL written work to be turned in
for a grade must be pledged with an affirmation of your adherence to the
Student Academic Honesty Code as described at
this site.
2) Make sure that you regularly consult your binghamton.edu
email (or link this address to your preferred email) and Blackboard DAILY, as
these are the most efficient ways for me to disseminate information to everyone
enrolled in this class.
3) My only real pet peeves in classroom demeanor are cell
phones and other devices used to access social networking sites (turn them
off), chronic tardiness, sleeping or other insulting inattentiveness in class,
and not informing me and others affected if you have a schedule problem.
4) I guess the next closest thing to a peeve is my
frustration with being unable to read the minds of completely silent
students. Part of the joy of college discussion courses and the satirical
genre itself is sharing what you think about it - whether good or bad. There's
always something that deserves discussion, and the whole class can benefit from
your insights. And (this is the lesson I've had to learn over time), if you're
a natural talker, know when to balance your contribution with that of those
around you. Be sensitive to the silences that sometimes occur - someone may be
thinking deeply. I have toyed with the idea of using other media to help out
those who are more inclined to silence, but I continue to believe that oral
human communication is a most valuable gift and tool for all aspects of modern
life, just as it was for the even more orally oriented cultures of the ancient
world.
5) Keep on your syllabus. This class will allow little time
for catching up if you fall behind. The syllabus daily assignments are a
guide and a goal. If you find yourself unable to get through the assigned
readings and exercises, let's discuss it as a group or individually - work with
others, divide the load and then make sure you teach each other. I prefer to
have a plan, and try to find the best way to get there. CHECK YOUR SYLLABUS
FREQUENTLY FOR ANY CHANGES I MAY NEED TO MAKE ALONG THE WAY.
6) Please organize before
you come to class and bring all the appropriate books or printouts/online texts
each day they are required by the syllabus. For the most part, you will need
1-3 books for any given session – NOTE THE TEXTBOOK PROVISO ABOVE which, if unheeded, will result in serious damage to your
class participation grade. Mark your texts as you like; take
notes while you read, and you can bring that to class with you if necessary. Scanning
over a dayÕs reading after the class the day of the assignment will go a long
way toward helping you at the time you need to review a lot of material
7)
Extra Credit - fuhgedaboutit!! (Someone burned me
long ago abusing extra credit. I'm afraid there is no antidote for my allergic
reaction to requests for extra credit). On the other hand, you get personal
extra credit for every thing you learn above and beyond the call of absolute
duty, so look at the bigger picture.
8) Final Grades are an assessment of your whole performance.
I like to create many components to a grade as an evaluation of a complete
student. I tend not to curve (unless something is clearly wrong with the
grading apparatus) in order to preserve my overall sense of student performance
and aptitude for the assignment of the more important final grade. I do
consider improvements in problem areas as part of what shows your increased
aptitude.
9) Enjoy reading, learning, discussing, and gaining critical
skills using many types of ancient and modern materials and the community of
learners around you. Let's make our time in class productive, but also, as
often as possible, interesting, enjoyable and thought- provoking. We will talk
frequently about the way Greeks, Romans and WE have thought and lived to try to
understand what we are all saying to each other. We will not sit in dull
lecture sessions 2 days per week. We will change exercises and engage in
discussion of ideas often.
Pursuant to this end, please feel free within reason
to bring coffee or other legal stimulants for our evening sessions. This is New
York still, not Washington or Colorado, and I did say, LEGAL and STIMULANTS.
YouÕre mellow and ÔexperiencedÕ enough by this time of evening.
10) One day there may be a suggestion 10, but right now, I
don't have one and there were 9 Muses, so we will leave an ennead of sage
Starks suggestions for student success - maybe suggestion 10 should be to
practice saying that 10 times fast.