Professor Marie McAllister's Literature of Death and Purpose was recently recognized by UMW Voice as a course providing insight into life, the pandemic, future careers, and more: Shelley Nguyen hasn’t landed on a career choice yet, but she’s already contemplating what kind of legacy she wants to leave. “It’s important to think about how I want to live my life,” said Nguyen, a University of Mary Washington sophomore and international affairs major who spends a few minutes each morning jotting down notes in a gratitude journal. “I’m glad I’m already figuring these things out.” She began to think along those lines during one of her first courses at Mary Washington: Literature of Death and Purpose. Introduced right before COVID hit in spring of 2020, the timely class covers two millennia of prose and poetry grappling with grief, loss and life’s meaning. In addition to literary analysis, students write letters to their 80-year-old selves, practice connecting with strangers, visit … [Read more...]
Lorentzen Presents at Dickens Symposium, Develops New Course
Professor Eric Lorentzen presented over the summer a paper as part of the “Dickens and Education” panel of the annual Dickens Society Symposium. His talk, “Happy Shepherd-Boys and Closing Prison-Houses: The Importance of Connection in Wordsworth, Dickens, and Tolstoy,” originated in a UMW Faculty Development Summer Grant and detailed, in part, the creation of a new course that he is planning to offer at UMW during the 2022-2023 academic year. The course will examine a philosophical genealogy of the “continuity of the self” that begins with Wordsworth and other Romantic poets, continues through Dickens and other Victorian novelists, later spreads globally to writers like Tolstoy, extends to contemporary short stories of the late 20th and early 21st century, and finally permeates many forms of popular American culture, from Disney films to teen dramas. The course will also include aspects of popular culture in the form of literary tourism, a component about which Lorentzen plans to … [Read more...]
Course Info for Registration
Look above under Courses: New and Upcoming Special Topics Courses for information on offerings in Spring 2014 that are not listed in the Undergraduate Catalogue. … [Read more...]
Course Information for Registration
A new page under the Courses tab above, called "Upcoming New and Special Topics Courses," provides information for Summer and Fall 2013 sessions about courses that are not in the current catalogue. Please continue checking for updates. … [Read more...]