LIBA 101 Z The “I” in Family Fall 2022
Instructor: Carol B. Wilson Telephone: 864.597.4577 (O); 864. 430.0438 (C)
E-Mail: wilsoncb@wofford.edu Office: Main 323
Office Hours: MWF 9.30—11 AM. Since previously scheduled meetings may fill these office hours times, please email Dr. Wilson to set a meeting time best for your schedule.
Credit Hours: 03 Location: Main 322 Meeting Times: TR 8 AM – 9.30 AM
Course Description:
Wofford's LIBA 101 course is designed to engage students in small-group seminars in humanistic inquiry, with special attention given to value questions and issues and to critical thinking and writing skills. The course includes substantial reading and group discussion, considerable work on English composition skills, and the writing of short essays and other papers.
Class Description
Family. It’s a word of signifying that we are part of a biological, legal, or claimed relationship with others. Often, people see that group as connected and loving, a network of support. At times however, family can also become a limiting net of expectations or requirements that constrain the individual. Students in this class will read about family relationships in novels, short stories, and plays written between 1955 and the present: works such as A Streetcar Named Desire by Tennessee Williams, Fences by August Wilson, and Mama Day by Gloria Naylor. In class discussion and papers, we will think about ways that the individual—the “I”—interacts with their family or families. We’ll consider how family connects and separates, includes and distinguishes, and claims and defamiliarizes. We’ll wonder a bit: about how people identify family, about how individuals can exist within and outside family lines, and about how people identify themselves inside or outside family relationships. In all those complications, we will explore our own definitions, mindsets, and values as we consider identity within family relationships.
- Teacher: Carol Wilson