Discusses the problem of criticizing students' interpretations of poetry. Argues that faulty interpretations should only be ignored for artistic reasons, but should be called mistakes for factual and experiential reasons. (MM)

Urges teachers of literature to respect and honor the simplicity of the common reader, marginalized among the experts. Advocates a kind of reading that includes them and does not undermine their confidence in themselves as readers and in the text as readable. Urges teachers to render simplicity more complex and to rejoin the common reader. (SR)

Discusses three strands in the general area of the "crisis in English studies": the notion of generic "man" and the study of humanities, the idea of literature as a tradition, and the sacredness of text. (AEA)

Takes a new look at the importance and the oddity of John Donne's "The Exstasie" through a feminist critical perspective. Discusses certain major elements in the poem: the situation, the the persons, and the images that carry key meanings. (EL)

Considers the importance of textual studies to literature study, the expanded canon of contemporary criticism, and the anti-intuitive bias of contemporary literary theory. (CRH)

Warns that English departments' emphasis on literary criticism and "explications de texte" introduced too early in undergraduate English majors' careers can crush students' enthusiasm and interest. (AEA)

Sketches a picture of recent scholarship in English studies that features moral earnestness, enthusiasm, and the desire for change. Describes literature as a social fact. Considers the effect of treating literature as something other than social fact--as an unsocial construction. (HB)

Proposes that English studies is not a privileged route to addressing and redressing social ills. Questions whether literary studies is now or has ever been a "serious" enterprise or whether those who engage in it are overly self-serious. (HB)

Shows how teaching "The Bluest Eye" not only helps students learn about the time period of the novel and its relevant issues and techniques, but also helps them to understand themselves. Shows how it can fit into contemporary literature classes, introductory courses to fiction or literature, or into women's literature classes. (EL)

Suggests that feminism is at the heart of a profound revolution in both the intellectual as well as the political sphere and that feminist criticism reveals the literary classics as newly vital. (AEA)

Addresses the problems in discussing nineteenth-century British literature in the classroom and advocates encouraging students to take and support various interpretations of text. (DF)

Identifies the ideas of the good that organize the professional lives of English college faculty. Discusses how these ideas should help faculty to constitute their departments, colleagues, and students. Applies insights from Aristotle's "Rhetoric" to departmental discussions. (HB)

Considers how students are represented in institutional discourse and how students are viewed by their teachers. Outlines historical and current examples of the way students are represented. Calls for a closer examination of the relationship between rhetorical representations of students and reality. (HB)

Responds to Richard Ekman's criticism of poststructuralism and discusses three strands of a poststructuralist English curriculum. (EL)

Discusses the teaching of literature in an instrumentalist or bureaucratic culture. Gives examples of instrumentalist influence in the English department at the University of Iowa: changes in department offerings, the emergence of a new departmental coherence, and the concentration of literary theory in the program of comparative literature. (EL)