History H 650: Colloquium in
U.S. History Professor
E.B. Monroe
Fall, 2005
Wednesdays 5:45-8:25 Office:
CA 529
Classroom:
CA 537 Email:
emonroe@iupui.edu
Office
hours: by appointment Telephone:
278-2255
GOALS: This course will acquaint students with the
development of biography (and autobiography) over the last three centuries,
although student assignments concentrate on twentieth and twenty-first-century
American materials. Students will gain a
substantive understanding of the scholarly literature of biography, the
techniques and materials of biographical research, and the historiography of
the area of biography most useful to their own research. Guest speakers will provide additional
insights to biography for public audiences, edited collections as a form of
biography, and biographical sources.
Assignments related to researching and writing biography will be an
integral part of weekly activities. The
products of the course itemized below at evaluation identify about 35-40 pages
of written assignments to be completed by each student.
METHOD: Discussion and
intellectual exchange are important components of this course. Each week students will be expected to be
familiar with assigned materials. Most
of the class periods will be devoted to discussion, and students are expected
to engage in class discussions and in dialogues with guest speakers. By that I mean that in addition to discussion
of each week’s assignments, students will indicate their interests in the
presentations of guests and other students by asking well-phrased questions
that will enhance everyone’s understanding of the topic discussed.
ASSIGNMENTS: Each student will
prepare a summary of critical reception, a source summary, an “entry” to the Dictionary
of American Biography, a chapter for a children’s book. a brief review
essay, and an extended historiographical essay.
Further, each student will give an oral presentation of several written
assignments. Each written assignment
will be discussed in class in advance of the due date, and all projects are
described below or in attached handouts.
IN CASE OF BAD WEATHER: If class
is cancelled by the university or the instructor or you have an acceptable
excuse for absence, written assignments are due to the History Department
Office on the day the university reopens or within two days of your absence.
EVALUATION: Students are
expected to participate in every class and complete written assignments on
time.
DUE DATE ASSIGNMENT APPROX. LENGTH VALUE
Class
participation 15%
Aug 31 Statement of Intention 1 2
pages
Sep 7 Summary
of critical reception# 3
pages 10%
Sep 19 Source summary* 2
pages 5%
Oct 12 DAB “entry”* 750
words 15%
Oct 19 COFAS chapter
3-5 pages 10%
Nov 2 Review
essay* 5 pages
15%
Nov 2 List
of ten items for historiographical essay
Dec 12 Historiographical essay 20
pages 30%
# I will provide a copy of the best example to
each member of the class
* Be sure to make enough copies for all class
members and the instructor
Grade scale: A=90-100; B=80-89;
grades below 80 are considered failing in a graduate course.
POLICIES:
All students are expected to
attend and participate in every class.
Absence without the advance consent of the instructor (barring
unforeseen disasters) will result in the loss of two (2) points on the FINAL
course grade.
All projects are due on the date
assigned. Failure to turn in a project
on the date due will result in the loss of two (2) points on the FINAL course
grade for each day the assignment is late.
A grade of zero (0) will be
assigned to any work which has been produced by cheating or plagiarism.
Cheating:
Cheating is dishonesty of any kind with respect to examinations, course
assignments, alteration of records, or illegal possession of examinations. It is the responsibility of the student not
only to abstain from cheating, but, in addition, to avoid the appearance of
cheating and to guard against making it possible for others to cheat. Any student who helps another student to
cheat is as guilty of cheating as the student assisted. The student should also do everything possible
to induce respect for the examining process and for honesty in the performance
of assigned tasks in or out of class.
Plagiarism:
Plagiarism is the offering of the work of someone else as one’s own. Honesty requires that any ideas or materials
taken from another source for either written or oral use must be fully
acknowledged. The language or ideas
taken from another may range from isolated formulas, sentences, or paragraphs
to entire articles copied from books, periodicals, speeches, or the writings of
other students. The offering of
materials assembled or collected by others in the form of projects of
collections without acknowledgment is also considered plagiarism. Any student who fails to give credit for
ideas or materials taken from another source is guilty of plagiarism.
A grade of “incomplete” will not
be assigned except in the event of a catastrophe such as serious personal
illness or death of a family member. All
incompletes must be arranged in advance of the final day of class. Arrangement for an incomplete will require
the instructor’s approval of a signed statement from the student about the
reason for requesting the incomplete and a date when all remaining work will be
submitted.
The Student Advocate is located
in UC002. Phone 278-7594 and email stuadvoc@iupui.edu. See Student Advocate website:
http://www.life.iupui.edu/advocate/
TEXTS:
James Boswell. (Introduction by Christopher Hibbert) Life of Samuel Johnson. (London: Penguin, 1979).
Jerald E. Brown. The Years of
the Life of Samuel Lane, 1718-1806, A New Hampshire Man and His World. (Hanover, NH: University Press of New
England, 2000).
Scott E. Casper. Constructing
American Lives: Biography and Culture in the Nineteenth Century. (Chapel Hill, NC: University of North
Carolina Press, 1999).
Alain Corbin. The Life of an
Unknown. (New York: Columbia
University Press, 2001).
Adam Sisman. Boswell’s
Presumptuous Task: The Making of the Life of Dr. Johnson. (London: Penguin, 2000).
Alfred F. Young. The Shoemaker and the Tea Party. (Boston: Beacon Press, 1999).
WRITTEN ASSIGNMENTS:
General format: All assignments
for this course must be typewritten, one-inch margins, double-spaced, and
composed in excellent grammar and style with no spelling errors. All projects should be proofed. Asking someone to proof your papers does not
constitute cheating. Significant numbers
of errors that should have been caught in proofing will cause a paper to be
returned, so that proofing can be conducted, and a professional paper submitted. Your name should be typed in the upper right
corner of the first page (no need for a title page) and may also be shown on
subsequent pages. Please use a “12” font
in the typeface of your choice, but keep in mind the instructor’s aging eyes. I prefer that you use double-spaced endnotes
for your papers. All pages should be
numbered. Projects should be stapled
together (no folders). BE SURE TO KEEP A
COPY OF YOUR PAPERS.
Statement of Intention (due
August 31). This 2-page paper should
identify your overall biographical topic for the course, your reasoning behind
the choice, and three preferences for Pulitizer Prize winning books.
Summary of Critical Reception:
(due September 7). This 3-page paper
will summarize and analyze the critical reception of your Book #1 choice from
the Pulitzer Prize biography list. At
the top of the first page give the complete and correct citation for the book
(as it appears in the reviews). Your paper will include who reviewed the book,
where, their assessment, and how and why reviewers’ assessments differed. You should also include your own evaluation
of the strengths and weaknesses of the book.
While your brief essay will not allow inclusion of all reviews, you
should append to your paper citations to all known professional reviews of the
work. Be sure to check Book Review
Index, Book Review Digest, American History and Life. J-STOR is not enough! Students will present their papers in class on September 7. Be sure to put copies for all class members
in their mail boxes on September 19.
Source Report: (due by noon,
September 19–note, this is a MONDAY--to each student’s mailbox and the
professor’s mailbox). This 2-page
(please use 2-sided copy on one sheet–you may single-space this assignment)
summary will carefully define a primary source used frequently in
biography. Each student will state what
information a source may (or may not) provide, show examples of sources, and
identify where additional information may be obtained. On October 28 students will orally present
the results of their research to the class in a report of no more than 10
minutes and will answer questions. All
students will have read the source reports before class and will be prepared to
discuss sources in general. Sources
include: military records, cemetery records, probate records, census records,
church records, voting records, city directories, immigration records, and tax
records among others.
DAB entry: (due October
12). This 750 word essay will comply
with the Directions for Contributors for the DAB. Each student will select a subject with the
advice of the instructor and prepare the entry, bibliography and references,
and checklist in accordance with the instructions. Each student will orally present a synopsis
of their findings and will answer questions.
Childhood of Famous Americans
chapter (due October 19). This 3-5 page
“chapter” will comply with the Guidelines for Authors of this series
(handout). You will be presentng a story
about the childhood of a famous American.
The background should be authentic, the incident dramatized will be
accurate to the period and character of the subject, but may not be a matter of
fact. Your chapter should be suitable to
the 7-12 age group.
List of ten items for
historiographical essay: (due November 2).
Provide a list of ten proposed items for the historiographical essay in
complete and correct bibliographical form.
While articles are acceptable, books are preferable. In any event, articles should constitute no
more than one third of the entries included in this list and in the final
paper.
Review Essay: (due November
2). This 5-page essay will review three
or four related pieces of the scholarly literature. At the top of page one provide complete
bibliographical citations for all items reviewed as you would find them in a
published review essay. The purpose of
the review essay is to collectively examine books related to a single
theme. In other words you will evaluate
the character of the books and report on the authors’ contributions. The best reviews will be thematic, generally
relating, for example, how each author uses his/her sources and comparing their
uses, or relating all theses to each other, etc. You should briefly discuss the
authors’ backgrounds and summarize the books.
You should spend most of your energy discussing the theses, sources, and
methodologies used by the authors to address major historical problems. However, this essay will draw comparisons
between the assumptions, research techniques, and conclusions of the related
books in the context of our discussions of the role of biography in American
history, the theoretical framework of the author, and the historiographical
tradition of the work. (For page
references give the author’s name or a short title and page in parentheses in
your text.) Reviews in American
History frequently runs review essays; JAH and AHR
occasionally.
Historiographical Essay: (due by
noon December 12, note this is a Monday).
This 20-page paper will review the sweep of scholarly literature on your
topic, focusing on biographies. Each
student will use approximately 40 books/articles (no more than 13 articles) to
cover the chosen topic. Internal
parenthetical notes of short-form author and page or title and page will be
used with a full bibliography of all items discussed at the end of the essay.
CLASS ASSIGNMENTS:
Aug 24 Introduction to course and broad discussion of objectives,
assignments, and possible topics.
Handout “Food for Thought.”Choose source reports and COFAS books. Schedule appointments for individual
consultations during week.
31 Lecture on history of biography STATEMENT
OF INTENTION DUE
Discussion
of SISMAN
Sep
7 Lecture on history of
biography SUMMARY
OF CRITICAL RECEPTION DUE
Discussion
of BOSWELL PRESENTATIONS
OF CRITICAL RECEPTION
14 Note–this class will meet at 4:15 pm at
the INDIANA STATE LIBRARY, enter off Ohio Street. After Prof. Barrows speaks on sources for
biographies, we will tour the library.
Guest
speakers: Robert Barrows, Assoc. Professor of History, IUPUI and Marcia Caudell,
Reference Librarian, Indiana State Library.
Read the
handout from Albion Fellows Bacon: Indiana’s Municipal Housekeeper and
look at Indiana Biography Indexes (see handout). Bring to class a list of your top three
preferences for DAB subjects.
19(
noon) Note–this is a Monday SOURCE
REPORT DUE
21 NO CLASS [AASLH]
28 Discussion
of CASPER PRESENTATIONS
OF SOURCE REPORTS
Oct 5 Discussion of BROWN and YOUNG
12 Discussion of CORBIN DAB
ENTRY DUE
PRESENTATIONS
OF DAB ENTRIES
19 Guest speaker Cinda May, COFAS CHAPTER DUE
Project
Manager, PRESENTATION
OF COFAS CHAPTER
Wabash
Valley Visions & Voices
Read selected
COFAS volume and prepare chapter according to Guidelines for Authors.
26 NO CLASS [AMM]
Nov 2 Guest
speakers: Marianne Wokeck, Prof. of History REVIEW ESSAY DUE
and
General Editor and Director of the Santayana LIST
OF 10 ITEMS DUE
Edition
and Ray Boomhower, Managing Editor,
Indiana
Historical Society Press
For class look
at the following published collections of papers: William Penn, Benjamin
Franklin, Abigail Adams (part of the Adams Papers), and Thomas Jefferson
(either Presidential or Retirement Series).
Also read John P. Kaminski, “The Editor as Biographer.” Documentary Editing. Vol. 26, No. 4, Winter, 2004 pp. 205-214 and handouts from Traces
and Public History News.
9 NO
CLASS. Individual appointments with
instructor during week.
16 PRESENTATIONS
OF TOPICS
23 THANKSGIVING HOLIDAY–NO CLASS
30 PRESENTATIONS
OF TOPICS
Dec 7 6:00-ish Dinner in Zionsville
Dec 12 (noon)(Note–this is a Monday) HISTORIOGRAPHICAL ESSAY DUE