Presents an exchange between two English professors who offer opposing perspectives on the profession of English. Covers arguments on the understanding of theory, literary history, reading, curricular design, and pedagogy through the examination of Nathaniel Hawthorne's "The Minister's Black Veil." (MM)

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)

Ruminates on and analyzes the author's experiences in teaching the first course in women's literature and feminist criticism at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education. Asserts that the course brought to consciousness the author's femininity, feminism, and a new understanding of feminist criticism. (MM)

Introduces a student-composed diagram as a means of discussing obstacles and resistances to teaching literature, such as assumptions about what a text is and whether it should be analyzed at all. Discusses a possible structure for the introductory literature course. (TB)

Considers the tension between deterministic social construction and individual autonomy of the subject in the act of reading literary texts. Develops a critical reading pedagogy that takes into account the balance between those two extremes of the dialectic of reading praxis. Illustrates the pedagogy with two concrete examples. (HB)

Describes the focus of a freshman literature course: understanding literary meaning, analyzing literary form, and exploring literary value with each of the three one-quarter classes drawing on the resources of a major area within current literary studies, such as hermeneutics (meaning), poetics (form), and criticism (evaluation). (EL)