LoP 11/30

Finish reading Like Water for Chocolate and the essay on pies by Sue Hubbell. We will discuss these at the pot luck next Tuesday.

The pot luck will be held at my house, starting at 2:30. I'l send you all an email with my address, so look for it.

Everyone needs to bring a place-related dish, and know from where each of the ingredients come. Be prepared to tell us how the dish relates to place. I'll start a list of dishes that people are bringing on this blog so that we won't duplicate dishes.

MEC 11/30

Tutorial will continue this week, and also take place next Monday and Wednesday. Only the Thursday group will be exempt from tutorials.

The prompt that is due this week is the oral interview/story with an elder. Next week we will discuss the drafts handed in this week. The Thursday group will not workshop these drafts, so they only need to bring one draft, for me. I will edit these and return them to the Thursday group.

The final papers that are due next week are the drafts we edit this week, the prompt on a challene you have faced and overcome.

LoP 11/21

Hi everyone--no tutorials this week, but we will be meeting to discuss the chapters from Seeing in the Dark.

Let's meet in the classroom this week. If it is pretty, we can always go outside.

MEC 11/21

Hi everyone! Remember that there will be no tutorials this week, but that will will be having class on Tuesday and discussing our reading assignment (through "Spring" in the book).

Also, don't forget that the first long paper is due at the start of class.

LoP 11/8

It looks like everything is going to work out for the vans on Friday. We will plan to leave at 8AM, and hope to return around 7 or 8 PM. Please bring snacks for the vans.

MEC 11/8

Read the foreword and the first three chapters of A Country Year, by Sue Hubbell.

Prompt: Do an oral interview with an elder about his or her childhood. You get to decide how to structure it into an essay.

Long paper/midterm: Choose one of your earlier works and expand on it.  Due the Tuesday before Thanksgiving break.

MEC 10/31

Prompt from last week (due this week): What did Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings mean when she said the Corss Creek and the landscape were part of her? How was that different, and why, from her relationship to New York?

LoP 10/24

Hi everyone--

There is another cold front moving in on Wednesday, so it will be windy tomorrow (people who have taken the intro fieldcraft course will know why...). So we'll meet in the classroom tomorrow. We will be discussing Sarah Vowell's essay and plans for the star party.

MEC 10/24

I am getting behind in my blog updates, for which I apologize!

Remember that we are meeting to finish the movie tomorrow. The prompt draft that is due this week is a comparison of your home landscape to the of the movie, "Cross Creek." (the Monday tutorial group is, as always, one week behind).

The finished draft due this week will be your backstory to the short story.
The edited draft will be the short story.

Cheers!

LoP

Please read the next five chapters of Goodbye to a River. 


Anyone have suggestions for where to meet? I have an idea for an experiment. Let's meet again at the Ranching Heritage Center. Bring something comfortable for sitting on the grass, and any water you might need. I will be leaving from the Honors College at 2:05 if anyone wants to ride bikes over there with me.

MEC 10/2

Prompt: Dream up a short story and provide a short, one paragraph synopsis, then create a backstory for the main character. The backstory is the main focus of this prompt.

Reading: "For Bo," and "A Blizzard Under Blue Sky," in Cowboys Are My Weakness.

MEC 9/26

Questions to ponder for this week's reading:

"How to Talk to a Hunter"

• How did Houston choose to "narrate" the story, and why did she choose to do it this way? What effect does it have?
• How does Houston develop other characters (besides the narrator)? How does she develop the narrator's character? What do you know about the narrator? About the hunter? How do you know these things?
• What is the conflict in this narrative? The plot?
• Why does the narrator do the things she does?
• What is this short story about?
• How did Houston end the story? What do you think has happened or will happen? What has been resolved?

"Selway"

• What do we know abotu the narrator and Jack? What kind of people are they? What do they like? Dislike?How do we know these things?
• Does the narrator love Jack? Does he love her?
• What do they learn about themselves and each other while going down the Sleway?
• How does the Rier play a part in the story? Is it a "character" as well? If so, is it a major or minor one?
• How did Houston end the story and what effect did it have on you?
• What has been resolved?

"Highwater"

• In the two previous stories, there were primarily two main characters, a man and a woman. In this story, there are two main female characters, and two minor characters. How are the minor characters important to the story?
• What do we know about each of the characters and how does Houston tell us these things?
• What is the conflict in this story?
• Why did Houston choose to tell the story of this conflict through the story of the two female characters? Why not a male and female?
• What is or is not resolved in this story?

These questions are simply starting points for discussion of the stories. As you read, think of your own questions. Use them to make note of Houston's technique for telling a story.

LoP 9/26

Some questions to ponder for the reading:

Chapter One:

• What is the difference, if any, between "landscape" and "geography?"
• Why is Graves motivated to canoe the Brazos? Have you ever been motivated in the same way to do something similar?
• What does Graves mean when he says that you can comphrehend a piece of a river? What are some elements of that piece that you can comprehend?
• How many ways does Graves know this river? What does that tell us about the many ways we know a landscape (i.e., how many ways can you know a landscape)?

Chapter Two:

• How is the year/time in which Graves traveling similar/not similar to this year?
• What is Graves's mood as he is starting out? Is he excited? Mournful? Complacent?
• How old is Graves, and how do you know this? That is, what things gives you a sense of his age?
• What does Graves say about "aloneness?" Do you agree?

Chapter Three:

• The Brazos River's full Spanish name is "El Rio de los Brazos de Dios." Who named it, what does this mean, and why do you suppose it got that name?
• According to Graves, what changed the Commanche and gave them power?
• What cultures collide along the Brazos, how, and why?
• How does Graves weave the history of the Brazos into his own story?

Chapter Four:

• River people talk about "river time." Based on what Graves says about impatience and cities, what do you think this might be?
• Graves spends a lot of time describin the people who used and settled the river throughout its history. Do you see influences of these in the cultures and attitudes of contemporary Texans?
• How does Graves describe the river?
• What details does he give us to set the mood of this chapter, and what is that mood?
• Who is the "passenger," and why is he along on this trip? What role does he play in Graves's telling of the story. Does he "stand in" for Graves in some way?
• How does Graves's war experience color his experience on the river?
•  

Chapter Five:

• What does Graves mean, and to what was he referring when he wote "you do not, for instance, conquer and Aztec empire with 400 men and a set of developed humanistic impulses"?
• What Graves have to say about hunting?

Use these questions as a guide to your reading. Think aobut them and the story as you go along, and come up with questions and musing of your own to discuss when we get together.

MEC 9/21

lease read the frist three short stories in Pam Houston's Cowboys Are My Weakness.

Writing assignment: Wrtie a poem about transformation imitating Mary Oliver's poem, "In Blackwater Woods" Five stanzas.

LoP 9/21

Read Chapters 1-7 in Goodby to A River for class next week.

Remember that class will be meeting at The Ranching Heritage Center next week. If you want to ride over with me, meet me in front of the Honors College. Be sure to let me know you are coming, so that we can wait on you if you are going to be a little bit late.

MEC 9/13

Today's writing prompt: Develop an extended metaphor, using nture, and tell us any story about your life.

Literature of Place (LoP) 9/6

Please read Chapters 1 and 3 in A Field Guide to Getting Lost and prepare to discuss them in class. As you read (particularly the first chapter), consider how it relates to our dual task of field research and writing about place. Also keep in mind the essay I read in class today and how it relates to the new chapters.

Also, Dr. Fritz has approved paying the majority of the cost for the canoe trip we are taking in association with Goodbye to a River. If there is additional cost to you, it will be on the order of $20-$25 dollars. I'll keep you posted on that. The cost of the field trip is paid for with grant money.

MEC 9/6

Please read the next three chapters in the novel (7-9).

Here is the prompt from the end of class; Find something about which you do not already know and "go there" to describe it. Try to create a scene with verisimillitude. The first draft of this prompt will be due at the start of next week's tutorial.