Writing and Reading the Essay

Readings

Session 1: Introduction to the Class as a Writing Community; The Essay as a Genre; Why Write?

• No readings assigned

Session 2: Treasured Objects and the Self / Writing and Creativity

• Sacks, Oliver. “The Creative Self.” In The River of Consciousness. Vintage Books, 2018, pp. 129–32. ISBN: ‎9780804171007. [Preview with Google Books]

Session 3: Self, Family, Memory, and Culture 

• Obama, Barack. “Introduction.” In Dreams from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance. Broadway Paperbacks, 2007. ISBN: ‎9781400082773. 
• Baldwin, James.  “Notes of a Native Son.” In The Art of the Personal Essay: An Anthology from the Classical Era to the Present. Selected and with an introduction by Phillip Lopate. Vintage Books, 1995. ISBN: ‎9780385423397. [Preview with Google Books]

Session 4: Family Memories, Food, and Culture; The Danger of a “Single Story” 

Read

• Bruni, Frank. Chapter 1 in Born Round: The Secret History of a Full-Time Eater. Penguin Books, 2010. ISBN: 9780143117674. [Preview with Google Books]
• Musni, Lauren. “How Birthday Pancit Helped Me Learn to Love My Filipino Heritage.” Food & Wine, June 28, 2022.

View

• Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. “The Danger of a Single Story.” TED Talk. July 2009.

Session 5: Peer Review Workshop: Essay 1 Version 1

• No readings assigned

Session 6: Self, Family, Memory, and Culture: Sibling Relationships

• Baldwin, James. “Sonny’s Blues.” Parisian Review 24, no. 3 (1957): 327–58.

Session 7: Self, Family, Memory, and Culture: Parents’ Perspectives

• Olsen, Tillie. “I Stand Here Ironing.” The Short Story Project.
• Dubus, Andre. “A Father’s Story.” Narrative Magazine. Spring 2006.

Session 8: Friendships / Chosen Families

• Caldwell, Gail. Excerpt from Let’s Take the Long Way Home. Random House Trade Paperbacks, 2011. ISBN: ‎9780812979114. 
• Morrison, Toni. Excerpt from Recitatif: A Story. Alfred A. Knopf, 2024. ISBN: ‎9780593315033. [Preview with Google Books]

Session 9: The World of Work

• Land, Stephanie. Excerpt from Maid: Hard Work, Low Pay, and a Mother’s Will to Survive. Legacy Lit, 2020, pp. 58–71. ISBN: ‎9780316505093.
• Jahren, Hope. “Prologue.” Excerpt from Lab Girl: A Memoir. Vintage Books, 2017. ISBN: ‎9781101873724. [Preview with Google Books]
• McCourt, Frank. Excerpts from Chapter 1 in Teacher Man: A Memoir. Scribner, 2006. ISBN: ‎9780743243780. [Preview with Google Books]

Session 10: The World of Medicine: Patients and Healers

• Jamison, Leslie. “The Empathy Exams.” In The Empathy Exams: Essays. Graywolf Press, 2014, pp. 1–26. ISBN: ‎9781555976712. [Preview with Google Books]
• Sacks, Oliver. “Witty Ticcy Ray.” Chapter 10 in The Man Who Mistook His Wife For a Hat and Other Clinical Tales. Vintage Books, 2021. ISBN: ‎9780593466674. [Preview with Google Books]
• Gawande, Atul. “The Case of the Red Leg.” In Complications: A Surgeon’s Notes on an Imperfect Science. Picador, 2003. ISBN:‎ 9780312421700. [Preview with Google Books]

Session 11: Peer Review Workshop: Essay 2, Version 1

• No readings assigned

Session 12: Peer Review Workshop: Revision Essay 1

• No readings assigned

Session 13: The Experience of Mental Illness / Mental Anguish 

• Jamison, Kay Redfield. Excerpts from An Unquiet Mind: A Memoir of Moods and Madness. Vintage Books, 1996. ISBN: ‎9780679763307. [Preview with Google Books]
• Kaysen, Susanna. “Toward a Topography of the Parallel Universe.” Excerpt from Girl, Interrupted: A Memoir. Vintage Books, 1994. ISBN: ‎9780679746041.

Session 14: Crossing Cultures: The Writer as Cultural Translator

• Fadiman, Anne. “Birth.” Chapter 1 in The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down: A Hmong Child, Her American Doctors, and the Collision of Two Cultures. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2012. ISBN: ‎9780374533403. [Preview with Google Books]
• ———. “Fish Soup.” Chapter 2 in The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down: A Hmong Child, Her American Doctors, and the Collision of Two Cultures. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2012. ISBN: ‎9780374533403. [Preview with Google Books]
• ———. “The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down.” Chapter 3 in The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down: A Hmong Child, Her American Doctors, and the Collision of Two Cultures. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2012. ISBN: ‎9780374533403. [Preview with Google Books]

Session 15: Peer Review Workshop: Revision Essay 2

• No readings assigned

Session 16: Understanding History Through Individual Lives: Portraiture / Case Study as a Writing Strategy

• Wilkerson, Isabel. Excerpt from “Leaving.” Chapter 1 in The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America’s Great Migration. Vintage Books, 2011. ISBN: ‎9780679763888. [Preview with Google Books]
• ———. Excerpt from “The Great Migration, 1915–1970.” Chapter 2 in The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America’s Great Migration. Vintage Books, 2011. ISBN: ‎9780679763888. [Preview with Google Books]

Session 17: Peer Review Workshop: Essay 3, Version 1

• No readings assigned

Session 18: Making the Case for Social Change: Experimenting with Form—The Epistolary or Letter Form

• King, Jr., Martin Luther. “Letter from a Birmingham Jail.” April 16, 1963. African Studies Center, University of Pennsylvania.

Session 19: Making the Case for Social Change: Sexism in Contemporary U.S. Society

• Bates, Laura. “Introduction.” In The New Age of Sexism: How AI and Emerging Technologies Are Reinventing Misogyny. Sourcebooks, 2025. ISBN: ‎9781464234361. 
• ———. “The New Age of Domestic Abuse: AI Girlfriends.” Chapter 6 in The New Age of Sexism: How AI and Emerging Technologies Are Reinventing Misogyny. Sourcebooks, 2025. ISBN: ‎9781464234361. 
• ———. “The New Age of Discrimination: Designing AI.” Chapter 7 in The New Age of Sexism: How AI and Emerging Technologies Are Reinventing Misogyny. Sourcebooks, 2025. ISBN: ‎9781464234361. 

Session 20: Making the Case for Social Change: Investigative Essay Contextualizing Social Problems: Racial Inequality in Contemporary U.S. Society

• Coates, Ta-Nehisi. “The Black Family in the Age of Mass Incarceration.” The Atlantic 316, no. 3 (2015): 60–84.

Session 21: Revision Essay 3 Workshop

• No readings assigned

Session 22: Writing Day

• No readings assigned

Session 23: Making the Case for Environmental Action: Awareness / Experimenting with Form

• Carson, Rachel. “A Fable for Tomorrow.” Chapter 1 in Silent Spring. Mariner Books, 2002. ISBN: ‎9780618249060. [Preview with Google Books]
• Lopez, Barry. “Into the Earth.” Notre Dame Magazine. May 1981. 
• Pollan, Michael. “Why Mow? The Case Against Lawns,” New York Times Magazine, May 28, 1989.

Session 24: Debating a Moral Issue: Is It Ethical to Kill Animals to Eat Meat?

• Singer, Peter. “All Animals Are Equal.” In Animal Rights and Human Obligations. 2^nd ed. Edited by Tom Regan and Peter Singer. Prentice Hall, 1989. ISBN: 9780130368645.
• Pollan, Michael. “An Animal’s Place.” MichaelPollan.com. November 10, 2002. 

Session 25: Essay 4 Workshop: In-Class Reading

• Final in-class readings of student essays

Session 26

• Final in-class readings of student essays