Sample course syllabi for

• Medieval British Literature

• Chaucer: The Canterbury Tales

• British Literature Survey

• Shakespeare's Plays

• Restoration to 18th Century British Literature

• Introduction to Poetry (for nonmajors)

• Introduction to Old English

• History of the English Language

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My teaching and my research center on the literate practices of communities—how we share words crafted into expressions of poetry, song, debate, drama, and narrative. In order to help my literature students find their own connections with those communities, my pedagogy prioritizes students’ positive first encounters with texts. I recognize that reading medieval and early modern literatures requires students to grasp disparate interwoven strands of language, form, theme, and culture. In my classroom, I remain keenly aware how daunting students may find that first encounter, and so I carefully plan rich multi-layered first experiences that help them find their way through a text’s layers of linguistic, literary, and cultural contexts.