soliciting readings

[swan_tower]

Here's the deal: course proposals to teach at Collins have to be turned in stupidly early. As in, by October 19th, I need a complete syllabus, including readings broken down by week, assignments, grading system, and everything else. And since I have a variety of other things between me an October 19th, I'm going to bootstrap myself through this process a bit by soliciting help; otherwise this hunt would take way too long.

I need suggestions for small (i.e. article- or chapter-sized), reasonably scholarly nonfiction readings on certain topics, as follows:

• hard/soft primitivism
  
• the place of women in republic-era Rome
  
• western views of Far Eastern/Japanese history and culture
  (would Said's Orientalism work for that? I know he's more writing about the Middle East)
  
• the American frontier, esp. the interaction of diversity there
  
• current theories on how we perceive and use history
  
• the performance of gender/sexuality in Elizabethan England
  
• the intersection of religious, political, and secular life in the Renaissance
  
• eighteenth-century piracy in the Caribbean
  
• events leading up to the O.K. Corral gunfight (not the events of the day itself)
  

Bonus points if you can figure out what my course topic is, based on this eclectic set of needs. <g>

Comments

[gollumgollum.livejournal.com]

I can help on the frontier stuff. You should come over and dig through books with me; that might be the best way, really. I'll try to find the ones i'm thinking of.

And no idea on the course topic.


BTW...guess what came in the mail yesterday?

[swan-tower.livejournal.com]

Maybe I can look through your books while we watch "Tall Tales" and the other episode we missed. ^_^

[gollumgollum.livejournal.com]

Indeed. (:

[tltrent.livejournal.com]

OMG. And I thought Virginia Tech was insane for insisting we have course descriptions ready by Sept. 24. Sheesh. I am *extremely* curious about what this course might be; I'm completely stumped.

[swan-tower.livejournal.com]

Stay tuned for further developments . . . .

[anima-mecanique.livejournal.com]

I may be able to come up with something on women in the Republic. I did a lot of reading on the subject for my Roman family class; I may still have some of it.
Is the class on historical fiction?

[swan-tower.livejournal.com]

I thought you might be a good source for the Roman question.

And you're close . . . .

[unforth.livejournal.com]

Okay, I don't have access to my books, and can't really help with chapter length things, but I can point you towards a few books that might help on a few of those, and you might be able to dig chapters out of them. I'm gonna send you links to the books on Amazon, cause I can't think how else to be sure to point you at the right ones.

Western views of the far east: John Dower, War Without Mercy. Not a perfect fit, but if memory serves it spends a lot of time talking about propaganda and racism and the like, in view of WWII. This means that it incorporates a lot on that sort of thing. By necessity, such discussion includes some about this topic, though from a relatively modern perspective.
I took a class on east asian cinema that had some articles related to that too...I hated that class, so I didn't save anything related to it, but maybe I can find one of the books...here's one of them: Peter X. Feng, Screening Asian American's. All articles, various authors, about how Asian's have been portrayed in American cinema. Neither of these is probably quite what you had in mind, but they might help. :)

Current Theories on how we Perceive History: Roy Rosensweig and David Thelen, The Presence of the Past, which is about how we use history in our day to day lives in America. Don't know if it's quite what you mean, but it's interesting. John Bodnar, Remaking America, on the same topic. Who is apparently a member of our faculty. It's about the symbols of history and how they are used. I took a class on this subject. :)

I also took a course on the intersection of religious, political and secular life in the Renaissance (okay, my course was pre Renaissance, but close enough) but sadly there were no readings what so ever, it was a class based entirely on class notes (which, let me tell you, was terrifying, since the only graded item the entire semester was the final exam!). So I'm afraid I can't really help there. If I had the syllabus, I could, it had a HUGE bibliography. Sorry. :( If you can't find anything, the name of the professor was Oggins, and he taught at Binghamton University, he might be willing to help - the course was "Knights, Peasants and the Church." Don't know if you are to the point of e-mailing random people, though. ;)

Sorry these aren't better, but they might get you started. :)

[swan-tower.livejournal.com]

Mmmm. Not quite what I'm after, but it's my fault, for not stating more clearly what exactly I'm looking for. (Clarification will be forthcoming in a while.)

[intertext.livejournal.com]

Can't help with readings, alas, but it looks like a great course. My guess - pop culture use of history? (Rome, Deadwood, Bull's latest novel or one of the movies, Shakespeare in Love, Pirates of the Caribbean, not sure about the Asian stuff...)

[swan-tower.livejournal.com]

Not exactly, but you're in the right ballpark.

[kendokamel.livejournal.com]

I shall abstain from the bonus points, since you already told me the answer... but I shall take a look around to see if any of my research articles might be helpful in this context. (:

[buzzermccain.livejournal.com]

Under the Black Flag by David Cordingly is an entertaining introduction to piracy. It might also be fun to do a chapter from A General History of the Pyrates by Defoe (or Johnson-he wrote under a pseudonym)- perhaps the chapter on Anne Bonney and Mary Read might make a good lead-in to some of your other topics. There is a Dover Thrift edition of this, and it is also available online at many digital library projects like this one.

Nightwork by Anne Allison is an interesting ethnography about working in a hostess club in Japan. There is some interesting stuff in there about Western expectations of the Mizo Shobai.

There is also The Asian Mystique: Dragon Ladies, Geisha Girls, and our Fantasies of the Exotic Orient by Sheridan Prasso, which is a title I meant to read and never got around to a few years back. It sounds right on topic, but, as mentioned, I can't give a first hand recommendation.