Syllabus

 

The Travel Habit: On the Road in the Thirties

Gallatin School, NYU

Fall 2011

 

K20.1558

TR 11 - 12:15 (September 6–October 20)

715 Broadway, room 601

Steve Hutkins

 

REQUIRED TEXTS

  1. John Steinbeck, The Grapes of Wrath (Penguin Non-Classics) 

  2. Nathanael West, A Cool Million (Farrar, Straus)

  3. Tom Kromer, Waiting for Nothing (University of Georgia)

  4. Various articles and excerpts, online


ASSIGNMENTS

(for details, see the Assignment page)

 

DATE READING POST TAG
Week 1: On the Road in the 30s
Tues., Sept. 6 Introduction  
Tues., Sept. 8 Setting off: In search of America: Selections from Rorty, Asch, Pyle, and others 1. Setting Off
Week 2: Migrants
Tues., Sept. 13

Grapes of Wrath, chapters 1 - 16

 2. Grapes of Wrath (1)
Thurs., Sept. 15

Grapes of Wrath, chapters 17 - 20

 3. Grapes of Wrath (2)
Week 3: Writers
Tues., Sept. 20

Grapes of Wrath, chapters 21 - end

 4. Grapes of Wrath (3)
Thurs., Sept. 22

Writers on the Road: Selections from Adamic, Asch, Anderson, Pyle, and Caldwell

 5. Writers on the Road
Week 4: Writers, Photographers, and Novelists
Tues., Sept. 27

Writers & Photographers on the road: Selections from Lange & Taylor, Agee & Evans, Caldwell & Bourke-White

 6. Words & Images
Thurs., Sept. 29

Down & Out in Fiction: Selections from Conroy, The Disinherited; Algren, Somebody in Boots; Boxcar Bertha; Guthrie, Bound for Glory

 7. Travel novels
Week 5: Vagrants
Tues., Oct. 4

Waiting for Nothing

 8. Waiting for Nothing
Thurs., Oct. 6

Waiting for Nothing

 9. Open topic
Week 6: Innocents & Tourists
Tues., Oct. 11 A Cool Million No class  
Thurs., Oct. 13 Tourism in the 30s  A Cool Million 10. Cool Million
Week 7: America discovers itself
Tues., Oct. 18 The WPA Guides Tourism in the 30s 11. Tourism
Thurs., Oct. 20 Conclusion WPA Guides 12. WPA Guides
 

 

 

 

REQUIREMENTS

1. In class: attendance, participation, quizzes, etc. (20% of final grade)

2. Twelve blog posts, approx. 400 words each (60%)

3. Twelve comments on other posts, approx. 100 words each (20%)

 

 

CONTACT

Office: 715 Broadway, room 608

Phone: 998-7361

E-mail: ssh1@nyu.edu

Course website: travel-studies.com

Office Hours: Tues. and Thurs., 9:30 – 11, 3:30 – 5:00; also, 12:30 - 2 and 5 - 6, by appointment only.

 

POLICIES

 

Deadlines

The blog posts are due the night before a class day (i.e., on Monday and Wednesday night), so there's time to read them over before class.  The comments on other people's posts should be done with a day or two of the original post.  (These are important deadlines, and the website makes it easy to track them.)

Plagiarism

In writing your posts, you are encouraged to copy and paste quotations from scholarly articles and other websites, but it is extremely important that you cite your source (author's name or title of the piece) and provide a link to it.  The blog posts are a form of academic writing, and plagiarism is a serious violation of the rules of academic integrity.

Attendance

The class is a discussion seminar, so attendance is very important.  One or two absences are fine, but more than that will affect the final grade (with the exception of illnesses). It is not necessary to notify the instructor about your absences, unless you are having issues that you'd like to discuss.