The Graphic Novel Syllabus

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STUDENT EXPECTATIONS

Throughout the session, students will learn strategies for visual and textual analysis, as well as various academic writing techniques. Students will also learn how to write about comics and how to tell stories through sequential art by reading Scott McCloud’s Understanding Comics, along with several primary texts: Maus, Watchmen, One Hundred Demons, and Persepolis. Most daytime sections will be spent reading, writing and discussing concepts and readings, while many of the evening sessions will be spent practicing various writing and drawing techniques and different styles of both. Overall, students will draft two critical academic, college-level essays (3-5 typed pages) and several short creative pieces individually and in groups. One academic essay must be revised and one comic will be expanded to a final project.

DAY-TO-DAY SCHEDULE

DAY SESSION TOPIC COVERED/WORK DONE

1 Morning • Discuss honor code and how it relates to our class. Go over and sign computer use agreement.

• Define “graphic novel.”

• Generate a list of rules, guidelines, and philosophies for our class. Combine and narrow them down to 5 rules, then break into small groups to make a poster for each.

• Complete questionnaire about writing experience.

Afternoon ● Complete pre-assessment: essay analysis of p. 6-7 from Persepolis.

● Further discuss course goals.

Evening ● Lecture on reading actively and annotating.

● Begin with McCloud’s Understanding Comics 1-2.

2 Morning ● Quick review of critical reading strategies.

● Creative exercise: Draw a 1-panel self portrait. Volunteers may share their portraits with the class.

● Introduction to historical context in Persepolis.

● Begin Persepolis.

● Lecture and discussion on memoir, truth, and unreliable narrators.

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DAY SESSION TOPIC COVERED/WORK DONE

Afternoon ● Continue reading Persepolis and discuss.

Evening

(TA Off)

● Practice annotation and close reading techniques and identify key themes from ‘The Veil’ in Persepolis.

● In small groups, share your annotations and responses with each other.

● Continue reading Persepolis.

3 Morning ● Continue discussion on memoir, truth, and unreliable narrators.

● Creative exercise: 10-minute free-write on a childhood memory.

● Discuss allusions and themes in Persepolis.

● Read Understanding Comics chapter 2 out loud around the room. Discuss and debate McCloud’s main points.

Afternoon ● Discuss and analyze stylistic elements of Persepolis.

● Review active reading strategies (how to hone in on particular themes, recurring motifs, and anomalies).

● Come up with preliminary questions for analytical essay on Persepolis: write down at least 3 themes or visual motifs that interest you.

Evening

(TA Only)

● Refine preliminary questions from afternoon session, working on how to make them complex and argumentative. Work in groups of 3 to strengthen questions.

● Read and annotate Persepolis with your particular question in mind.

4 Morning ● Creative exercise: As a class, read through “Dancing” from Lynda Barry’s One Hundred Demons. Then sketch out a 4-panel sequence of a memory from your childhood. You can use your free-write exercise and adapt it for comics or tell a new story. In groups of 3, share your panels and offer constructive comments. Volunteers share their piece with the class.

● In small groups, brainstorm and list the elements of an academic essay.

● Pre-writing and drafting time for the first essay.

● Workshopping at various stages.

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DAY SESSION TOPIC COVERED/WORK DONE

Afternoon ● As a class, brainstorm strategies for prewriting and planning an analytical essay.

● Students share essay topic ideas in small groups and provide commentary (cover strategies for effective peer review, provide peer review prompt, cover revision strategies).

Evening ● Continue with peer review of analytical essays.

● Students draft and get help from instructors.

5 Morning

LAB

● First day in the lab, drafting first critical essays on Persepolis.

● Students submit a printed copy of what they have, along with their notes, at the end of the session.

Afternoon

PROJECTOR

● Write down answers to lab follow-up questions: 1. What do you think you did well? What do you still need to work on? What do you need a lesson on/What do you need help with? What’s the most interesting/helpful thing you’ve learned all week?

● Watch the documentary Comic Book Confidential (1988). Free-write: opinion of censorship, especially of comics.

● Discussion Questions: Where would Persepolis fit into this film? Are there any new trends since 1988? Where would YOU fit in (what story would you write, what style?)? What is the role of underground comics in changing mainstream comics?

● Students tidy their workspace and then reflect on what they’ve learned so far and what they would like to learn/do in the following week. Instructors give an overview of the plan and goals.

6) Evening ● Individually read Understanding Comics chapter 3.

● Creative exercise: students continue to expand their memoir project.

7 Morning ● Creative exercise: Students continue working on their memoir piece. They may share their work-in-progress with the class.

● Revisit concepts from Understanding Comics chapter 3 (closure, gutters, and sequencing).

● Introduction to Maus.

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DAY SESSION TOPIC COVERED/WORK DONE

● Begin to read Maus 1-10.

Afternoon ● Students read excerpts from scholarly articles individually (“The Shadow of a Past Time: History and Graphic Representation in Maus 1-10 and “History and Talking Animals” from Comic Books as History).

Evening ● Instructor hands back analytical drafts with feedback.

● Class discussion on how to revise and edit.

● Students revise their Persepolis papers for the remainder of class.

8 Morning

LAB

● Second day in the lab, revising critical essays on Persepolis. Students will revise according to comments provided by the instructor.

Afternoon ● Class reflection and sharing of critical essays.

● As a class, read through chapter 5 of Understanding Comics and discuss McCloud’s key themes.

● Creative exercise: Students develop their memoir piece.

Evening ● Continue reading Maus.

● Read and discuss Understanding Comics chapter 5.

9 Morning ● MAUS

● Graphic Memoir

Afternoon ● MAUS

● Graphic Memoir

Evening ● MAUS

● Graphic Memoir

10 Morning ● Drafting / Revision

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DAY SESSION TOPIC COVERED/WORK DONE

● Workshop

Afternoon ● Drafting / Revision

● Workshop

Evening ● Sharing Final Drafts

● Documentary on Super Heroes in American Popular Culture

11 Morning ● 4th of July Special Segment: Reinventing Captain America. Students learn about the origins and changes in Captain America through lecture and reading and discussing the scholarly article, “Captain America’s Empire: Reflections on Identity, Popular Culture, and Post-9/11 Geopolitics,” by Jason Dittmer, published in the Annals of the Association of American Geographers.

● Students analyze the covers of several significant Captain America comic book covers from the 1941 to 2002 (a few from each decade) to see the ways the character was represented in different eras and what he symbolized for each generation.

Evening ● Creative practice: Characterization.

● First students provide descriptors of some of the major characters from Watchmen that the instructor lists on the board (adjectives and details that support those adjectives).

● Creative exercise: Students come up with their own interesting character (brainstorm traits, background, description, etc. and fill out the character questionnaire handout.

● Randomly exchange drawings. A student must draw the character based on the other student’s description. Then students meet back up to discuss the sketches and make revision notes (this is tied into discussion of Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons’ collaborative process.

Afternoon ● ”Reinventing Captain America” creative exercise: Students first free-write for a few minutes about what their own version of Captain America would look like and symbolize, what s/he would stand for and against whom s/he would fight. Then, in groups of 3, they create a comic book cover of the new version of CAP. The plot needs to be implied and the symbolism apparent.

12 Evening ● Individually begin to read and annotate Watchmen.

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DAY SESSION TOPIC COVERED/WORK DONE

13 Morning ● Handout: “AP Literature and Composition: List of Literary Terms and Definitions.”

● Instructors discuss major literary devices and themes to look for in Watchmen and provide a general introduction to the book’s authors, conception, and cultural context.

● Students read chapter 1 to themselves, but wait to read the “Under the Hood” section aloud together in a “popcorn” reading.

● Notice and focus discussion of chapter 1.

● After break: students have time to read chapter 2 and take more notes and write down responses (Each chapter takes about an hour for all students to finish. They need to stay in the same chapter for now and not read ahead but instead reread and take more notes about imagery, motifs, etc.).

Afternoon ● Continue reading and discussing Watchmen chapters 3 and 4.

● Class brainstorms a list of emerging questions that might lead to a debate or an essay topic.

14 Morning ● Share reflections on the collaborative character creation from last night (what worked, revision notes, etc.)

● Students continue reading, annotating, and journaling in response to Watchmen (through chapter 4).

● Reading journal focus to prepare for afternoon discussion: write down allusions / references (known and unknown); pause for a few minutes after each chapter to respond – what was most interesting or perplexing, what might happen next, and further discuss the characterization of the various characters and what they symbolize.

Afternoon ● Discussion: Allusions (what they might mean); Imagery; Theme; Motifs; Big Questions that are emerging.

Evening ● Creative exercise: storytelling techniques: plot and setting (storytelling challenge: excerpts from Matt Madden’s 99 Ways to Tell a Story (Students pull a “style” from a hat, and each has to tell the same narrative using that style).

15 Morning

LAB

● Students finish reading Watchmen and continue journaling.

● Handout: prompt for second analytical essay.

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DAY SESSION TOPIC COVERED/WORK DONE

Afternoon ● Selected bibliography (so students can see what scholars have written about).

● Discussion of how to develop an essay on Watchmen.

● Prewriting / Drafting time.

Evening ● Complete an initial draft.

● Peer review workshop.

16 Morning ● Creative exercise: sketch out the final draft of graphic project and move on to inking and coloring.

Afternoon ● Creative exercise: Finalize graphic project.

● Students receive instructor feedback on the final paper.

● Early finishers may finish other sketches or read from the Graphic Novel Lending library.

● Share work (Comics Art Gallery).

● Provide content for digital anthology.

● Complete Student-Program Evaluations.

Evening ● Post-Assessment

● Clean up the classroom.

17 Morning ● Read together: Understanding Comics Chapter 9.

● Share goals with the class (where to next?).