No Place Like Home Syllabus — December 14-16 2010

Syllabus: December 2010

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Tuesday 12/14 – Unit 1; Introduction: Images of War and the Return

CLASS:            Introduction to course, goals, expectations, procedures. Introduce essential questions of the course. Images/stories of war, the soldier, and homecomings. What image/stories are told, immortalized, kept veiled, or forgotten.

HOMEWORK:            Read and annotate Vanity Fair article (“Medal of Honor Winner…” and Yusef Komunyakaa’s poems “Camouflaging the Chimera,” “Losses,” and “Tunnels”.

Wednesday 12/15

CLASS                        Check materials. Discuss article and poems: The experience of war and the return.

HOMEWORK:            Complete a 2-3 page typed response (Response # 1) to the

following questions: Part I: What are your personal experiences of home, leaving home, and homecomings. What departures and homecomings have been a part of your life? (1.5 pages) Part II: What images/ stories of war or the soldier’s return from war do you carry with you into this course? These might be family experiences, experiences you’ve witnessed, or images, books, films, news items, etc that have affected you in some way and helped to inform your understanding of war (1.5 pages). Please bring to class on Thursday an artifact (an object, image, article, quote, etc) that represents some aspect of this image/story that you carry into the course.  Be prepared to explain your artifact briefly to the class.

Thursday 12/16

CLASS:            Response # 1 due (with artifact). Share images.

NO HOMEWORK — Enjoy the break!