11 AP Syllabus

AP English 11 Honors:

“Meaning is not determinate:  it is made by binary oppositions.”

September activity:  Coming to terms with Opposing Viewpoints

Activities will ask students to produce a close reading of Executive Order 9066, Okita’s poem, and Takei’s TED talk to discuss the Japanese Internment.

Primary texts: 

Executive Order 9066

Dwight Okita’s “In Response to Executive Order 9066:  All American of Japanese Descent Must Report to Relocation Centers”

George Takei’s TED talk:  “Why I love a country that once betrayed me” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LeBKBFAPwNc

Primary assignments:

Close reading of texts using Notice and Focus, the Multiple Perspectives Note-catcher, and the Claim Development Tool

Argument paper

Secondary assignment:

Class discussion

Unit 1:  Binary Opposition

A binary opposition (also binary system) is a pair of related terms or concepts that are opposite in meaning. Binary opposition is the system by which, in language and thought, two theoretical opposites are strictly defined and set off against one another.

Essential Questions:

Where is the tension in the text?  What binary opposite best catch the importance of the text? What content most dramatically embodies the binary opposites in order to provide access to the topic?

Primary texts:
Plato’s “The Allegory of the Cave” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1RWOpQXTltA

The Wizard of Oz (film)

Nathaniel Hawthorne’s “Young Goodman Brown” and “Rappaccini’s Daughter”

Charlotte Perkins Gillman’s “The Yellow Wallpaper”

Arthur Miller’s The Crucible

Frederick Douglass’ Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass

Secondary texts:

Excerpts from Writing Analytically

Chapters 1 and 2 from Understanding Rhetoric:  A Graphic Guide to Writing

Primary Writing Assignments:

Binary Opposition journals for Hawthorne, Gilman, Miller, and Douglass

Argument paper, using the Toulmin Method of Argumentation

• Prompt:  Discuss the established structure of Salem and its Puritan society – its binary oppositions/social divisions into rich and poor, powerful and powerless, town insiders and outsiders, male and female, educated and illiterate, old and young, religious conservatives and religious liberals, etc.
• Discuss how the events of the play constitute an attempt of some segments of society to overturn the traditional ways of society, while other segments fight to maintain /strengthen the old/traditional social order.
• Discuss Miller’s larger message as it relates to these struggles—who, here, is the moral high ground?  

TRANSITION UNITS:  Poetry Out Loud / The Great Thanksgiving Listen

Unit 2:  LANGUAGE, TRUTH, AND IDENTITY:  THE UNRELIABLE NARRATOR, THE ESSAY OF DEFINITION, and Classical Argument

Essential questions: 

·         Is Truth absolute or relative? What is the relationship between truth and language?

·         How willingly does an individual embrace truth?

·         Do texts present truths or undermine them?

·         How do we form and shape our identities?

Primary texts:

Edgar Allen Poe’s “The Tell-tale Heart,” and “The Cask of the Amontillado”

Dave Eggers’ Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius

J. D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye

Secondary text:

The Toulmin Method:  https://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/588/03/

Plato’s “The Allegory of the Cave” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1RWOpQXTltA

Primary writing assignments:

Essay of definition:  Truth

Argument essay:  Choose two authors from this unit.  Which author gets to Truth most effectively?

Unit 3:  Elements of Argument / Panel Presentations

Essential questions:

·         What is an argument?

·         Where do we see arguments in our daily lives?

·         What makes an argument effective?

·         How can arguments affect change?

·         What role can we personally play in using arguments to affect change?

This unit will ask students to use skills from units 1 and 2 to craft informed (researched) arguments regarding a particular perspective on the topic of (TBD).

Primary texts:

Plato’s “The Allegory of the Cave” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1RWOpQXTltA

Research from approved databases

Secondary texts:

Popular articles, TED talks, documentaries, etc.

Primary writing assignments:

Close reading of texts using The Method

Summaries

Précis

Annotated Bibliography

Claim statement / Counter claim

Formal outline for panel presentation

Real-world writing (for example, an editorial for The Warrior or a letter to the BOE)

Unit 4:  On Reading for Literary Theory

Literary perspectives help us explain why people might interpret the same text in a variety of ways.  Perspectives help us understand what is important to individual readers, and they show us why those readers end up “seeing” what they see.  This unit will introduce students to two literary theories and perspectives that are studied in depth in 12 AP and SUPA; we will apply those theories to new texts and re-visit core course texts looking at the perspectives that inform literary criticism. 

Essential questions:  use these to guide your research (an annotated bibliography is required) and your reading of the text.  DO NOT merely answer them in your journal.

Social class:

Gender / Feminist:

What is the social class of the author?            Which class does the work claim to represent?           What conflict can be seen between the values the work champions and those it portrays?          What social classes do the characters represent?          How do characters from different classes interact or conflict?

How is the relationship between men and women portrayed?           What are the power relationships between men and women (or characters assuming male/female roles)?           What constitutes masculinity and femininity?           How do characters embody these traits?           What does the work reveal about the operations (economically, politically, socially, or psychologically) of patriarchy?          What does the work imply about the possibilities of sisterhood as a mode of resisting patriarchy?

Primary texts:

Gilman’s “The Yellow Wallpaper” (for context)

F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby

OR

Virginia Woolf’s A Room of One’s Own

Primary tool:  "It's Not So Simple" graphic organizer in the Toolbox

Primary writing assignment:

Literary Criticism paper (using lessons from argumentation)