278 Greensboro College Undergraduate Academic Catalog 2022-2023
its joint ancestry in fine arts and literature; examine its historical development up to the twenty-first century;
and analyze some of the broader cultural and aesthetic factors that have accounted for its growth and
sophistication as a genre. We will also attend to the broad variety of artistic and storytelling approaches that
graphic novels have employed to reflect themes of politics, sexuality, censorship, cultural and ethnic
diversity, and more. Readings will include classic and contemporary works by writers and artists such as
Lynda Barry, Alison Bechdel, R. Crumb, Neil Gaiman, Joe Sacco, Marjane Satrapi, Riad Sattouf, Art
Spiegelman, Yoshihiro Tatsumi, Chris Ware, and others.
ECM 3450 Advanced Creative Writing (2)
Prerequisite: ECM 2450
Offered: Periodically based on student need
Building on skills developed in Introduction to Creative Writing, this course moves beyond creative writing
exercises and techniques. In a workshop setting, students learn to critique one another’s work and accept
constructive criticism in a professional manner, while also learning to incorporate a variety of revision
strategies. Students will advance their study and understanding of writing as a craft by analyzing the work
of contemporary writers. May be repeated for a maximum of four credits.
3500 Series: Literature of Diversity and Difference
ECM 3519 African-American Writers (H) (4)
General Education: Artistic/Literary course, Humanities course
Prerequisite: ECM 1120 or equivalent
Offered: Periodically based on student need
We will explore the connections between race and literary expression by examining the social, cultural, and
literary patterns linking the lives of African-American writers with their works, especially those of the 20th
and 21st centuries. Students will examine the writers, texts, themes, and literary and historical contexts that
have shaped the African-American literary canon. Authors studied in this course may include, among others,
Phillis Wheatley, Frederick Douglass, Langston Hughes, Zora Neale Hurston, Richard Wright, Ralph Ellison,
Gwendolyn Brooks, James Baldwin, Alice Walker, and Toni Morrison.
ECM 3529 Women Writers (H) (4)
General Education: Artistic/Literary course, Humanities course
Prerequisite: ECM 1120 or equivalent
Offered: Periodically based on student need
In this course students will explore the connections between gender and literary expression by examining the
social, cultural, and literary patterns linking the lives of women writers with their works. Although the writers
studied will vary from offering to offering, the course will explore concerns central to feminist criticism,
such as the role of women as writers, readers and literary characters; the relations between gender and genre;
and feminist revisions of the literary canon. Authors studied in this course may include Aphra Behn, Jane
Austen, the Brontës, Emily Dickinson, Virginia Woolf, Gertrude Stein, Elizabeth Bishop, Sylvia Plath, and
Alice Walker. !
ECM 3539 Writers of the American South (H) (4)
General Education: Artistic/Literary course, Humanities course
Prerequisite: ECM 1120 or equivalent
Offered: Periodically based on student need
In this course students will explore the connections between place and literature by examining the social,
cultural, and historical significance of the Southern literary tradition. The South has produced many of
America’s greatest writers such as Mark Twain, Edgar Allen Poe, William Faulkner, Flannery O’Connor,
Tennessee Williams, and Alice Walker; however, southern literature has also grappled (perhaps more than
literature from any other region) with the problems gripping the country. The course will explore and question
the concerns addressed by southern writers, including slavery, equality, poverty, family, the oral tradition,
memory, and the multiple ways in which history continues to impact us today.
ECM 3540 Migration Literatures (H) (4)
General Education: Artistic/Literary course, Humanities course
Prerequisite: ECM 1120 or equivalent
Offered: Periodically based on student need
This course focuses on what one might call—and, likewise, call into question—the literature of cultural
identity. Provocatively, it examines the historical forces and narrative influences that shaped the work of
writers emerging from the former European colonies as well as those residing in immigrant communities
abroad. Topics such as hybridity, political struggle, the conflicts of assimilation, postcolonialism, and the
difficulties of self-representation will be explored. Authors studied in this course may include V.S. Naipaul,
Isabel Allende, Jamaica Kincaid, Sandra Cisneros, Chinua Achebe, Sherman Alexie, or Amy Tan.