English/Professional Writing Program

Sexual attraction is often represented as chemical, magnetic, or electric: think of cartoon characters with eyes that jump out of their sockets and ears that hiss with steam. This course will explore the history of eyes that spark desirous electric bolts and bodies that bubble when aroused. Importantly, we will think about how science might play a role in "naturalizing" or "biologizing" sexual attraction between men and women at the expense of other kinds of desire, as well as how raced and gendered practices have been relatedly excluded from mainstream science. We will discuss what scientific objectivism is, if it even exists, and we will see how language and metaphor inflect scientific method. Major questions of the course include: How do movements against gay marriage invoke the sciences to support their claims? In turn, how has the gay liberation movement internalized scientific definitions of desire by making homosexuality something that one is born with? In the words of Lady Gaga: baby, were we really born this way?

a history that is informed by enslavement, forced land removal, and immigration--that makes it such a rife space for the appearance of all sorts of ghosts. We'll ask then a series of questions that look something like this: why is American literature haunted in the way that it is? How does haunting disrupt our notion of traditional historical progression? What does it mean when the past refuses to stay put, bubbles up, and careens into the present? What kind of historical possibilities does the novelistic form provide that the history textbook simply can't.

With the invention of photography in 1839, the question of how artistic production would evolve in a technological era became the subject of much debate. What would art look like in the wake of photography, a medium that replicated the world better than any human talent ever could? This course specifically explores how literature reacted to shockwaves of this new technological medium.

The past decade has witnessed the renaissance of the witch, which last had its height amidst the "goth weirdos" of the 1990's. Currently, patches, t-shirts, and pins pepper Etsy with statements like "Hex the Patriarchy" and "'We Are the Granddaughters of the Witches You

Within the terrain of Narrative Theory an approach that focuses on narrative worldmaking can illuminate how the stories we encounter are not only colored by complex cultural situations but also function to shape the culture we live in, especially when engaging texts situated in racially diverse worlds. Not enough attention has been given to the role that narrative has played in structuring – and also in resisting – the social hierarchies of Jim Crow America. In his essay “Faulkner and Desegregation,” James Baldwin asserts that “any real change implies the breakup of the world as one has always known it, the loss of all that gave one an identity, the end of safety. And at such a moment, unable to see and not daring to imagine what the future will now bring forth, one clings to what one knew, or thought one knew; to what one possessed or dreamed that one possessed” (209).  To say it another way, when faced with the uncertainty of the future we look for the characters and the plots that fit the stories and the world we already recognize. Situating an exploration of narrative worldmaking in the racially divided culture of Jim Crow illuminates both how narratives might be assembled and interpreted differently depending on the author’s or audience’s relation to hegemonic storylines and how the material conditions of racially oppressive societies can be created, supported, or resisted through narrative form. Using Baldwin’s 1965 short story “Going to Meet the Man” as a primary example, this essay will develop a narrative worldmaking approach that is situated within larger conversations about narrative theory, suggests that socially constructed identities exert considerable pressure on what stories can be told or understood, and points to the potential narrative form might offer for social change.

In a recent article in To Improve the Academy, Lindsay Bernhagen and Emily Gravit highlight how the work of educational development is often coded as “pink labor” because of the field’s emphasis on the skills of caring and emotional work. In this essay, I draw on personal experiences from three years of work as a graduate instructional consultant to consider the particular challenges and affordances of undertaking the work of educational development as a man. Beginning with a focus on the emotional intelligence and active listening skills that are not culturally encouraged in boys, I reflect on how I developed these skills through personal experience. Both researching race and masculinity in American literature and attending a weekly men’s group for graduate students helped me to develop the skills of asking reflective questions and empathizing with others that enabled me to succeed as an instructional consultant. Drawing on examples from my personal consulting journal, I highlight vulnerability as a key aspect of interpersonal relationships, which is essential to the process of consulting but which is also actively distanced from hegemonic conceptions of masculinity. Using examples from individual journal entries to show my affective response to moments of vulnerability and to my own gestures of care, I illustrate how a self-awareness of culturally masculine habits of thinking plays into the process of successful consultations for male practitioners of educational development. In addition to the discussion of internal thought processes, I draw on other consulting examples to highlight how the gender of both consultant and teacher can create a range of initial starting points for a consultation.

The name Webster is known in every American household; however despite several biographies and the somewhat recent publication of a collection of his letters, essays, and diaries, the life and work of the man who produced the American Dictionary of the English Language is not widely known ...

Injection of the specific N-methyl-a-aspartate (NMDA) antagonist, 3(2-carboxypiperazin-4-yl)-propyl-l-phosphonic acid (CPP), into the frontal cortex of rats~ induced hyperactivity characterized by unique episodic darting behavior. This behavioral profile contrasts sharply with the ataxia and hyperactivity seen after intracerebroventricular CPP and other NMDA antagonists.

Two experiments were conducted to investigate (1) whether 'behavioral despair' was related to inescapability of the warm swim and (2) whether 'behavioral despair' would generalize to a shock escape task. Results indicated that rats exhibited 'behavioral despair' independent of the escapability of the warm swim and that the phenomenon did not generalize to a shock escape task. Implications for the validity of the behavioral despair model are discussed. Depression Behavioral model Behavioral despair Learned helplessness Animal model

To test the hypothesis that the motor hyperactivity associated with intra-accumbens injections of N-methyld-aspartate (NMDA) results from stimulation (direct or indirect) of nucleus accumbens dopaminergic mechanisms, the behavioral effects of intra-accumbens and intraventricular NMDA were compared to those of the prototypic dopaminergic releasing agent, amphetamine, and the competitive NMDA receptor antagonist, 3-(2-carboxypiperazin-4-yl)propyl-l-phosphonic acid (CPP). Drugs were injected into the right lateral ventricle, or bilaterally into the nucleus accumbens of rats. Locomotor activity was monitored electronically and by direct observation for 40 rain prior to, and 1 hour after, drug treatment. Intra-accumbens injections of NMDA (0.4, 1.2 and 2.0 iJ, g/side) produced dose-related increases in distance traveled, but had no significant effect on movement time or vertical movements. The NMDA-induced increase in distance traveled was temporally correlated with convulsive wild running, but not with exploratory behavior, suggesting that this increase may have been secondary to seizure-like activity. Intra-accumbens injections of amphetamine (10, 20 and 40 I~g) or CPP (0.1 p,g) produced dose-related increases in all three measures. By the intraventricular route, the effects of NMDA were similar to those of intra-accumbens administration, whereas intraventricularly administered d-amphetamine had no effect. The behavioral effects of intra-accumbens NMDA cannot be explained by an NMDA receptor-mediated facilitation of dopaminergic neurotransmission; rather, this type of facilitation may be associated with competitive NMDA receptor antagonism. NMDA Amphetamine Locomotion Nucleus accumbens NMDA receptor antagonist CPP

Recently, an animal model of depression, which appeared to be sensitive to clinically effective antidepressant treatments, was described by Porsolt et al (1978b). The model was derived from the observation that rats forced to swim in inescapable warm 0 (25 C) water for fifteen minutes become immobile after some time.