Individual study and writing projects
provide opportunities for advanced work with a professor on a topic of
special interest (see below for a representative listing of topics I have
supervised). I strongly recommend that students who are considering graduate
school in the humanities write the equivalent of a "junior" or "senior
thesis"--a sustained research project of 25-50+ pages written over one
or two semesters. Most competitive graduate schools expect matriculants
to have this kind of research and writing experience, and applications
to these schools almost always call for the kind of writing samples (20+
pages, original, professionally researched and documented, potentially
publishable) that are not often produced in regular undergraduate course
offerings. If you are interested in an independent study, please come
and talk with me (or the professor of your choice) during
office hours. For more information and an application form, see Independent
Studies in English.
Hope College (2001-)
Abigail Rockwood, Independent Study in English. Academic Journalism. Spring 2006.
Abigail Rockwood, Independent Study in English. A Survey of American Environmental Literature. Fall 2005.
Peter Derby, Independent Study in English. The
Raiders: Creating Identity Within the Nation (A Study of Irish Literary
Nationalism in the 20th Century). Fall 2003. 30 pages.
Charles White, Independent Study in English.Searching for the Spiritual Artist: The
Epics of a Fallen World. Spring 2001. 60 pages.
Harvard University (1997-2000)
Christopher Amar, Senior Thesis in American
History and Literature. Sadakichi Hartmann: The Last Bohemian.
1999-2000.88 pages.
Nadia Berenstein, Junior Thesis in American
History and Literature. Remembering the Civil War in the Civil
Rights Movement . 1999-2000.32 pages.
Kyle Hawkins, Junior Thesis in American History
and Literature.The Politics
of 19th-Century Presidential Biography .1999-2000. 35 pages.
Elizabeth Mahler, Junior Thesis in American
History and Literature.African-American
Composers and the New Deal.1999-2000.36 pages.
Caroline Perkins, Senior Thesis in American
History and Literature.Walt
Whitman and Latin American Poetry.1999-2000.71 pages.
Jordanna Brodsky, Senior Thesis in American
History and Literature.The
Auto-Erotic Muse: Walt Whitman and Emily Dickinson.1997-1998. 91 pages.
Brendan Gibbon, Junior Thesis in American History
and Literature. Representing Theodore Roosevelt: Visual Images
and the Hero of San Juan Hill. 1997-1998. 44 pages.
Gonzalo Martinez, Senior Thesis in American
History and Literature.Questioning
a Canonical Chicano Experience: Writing Against Chicanismo in Acosta,
Rodriguez, and Moraga.1997-1998.97 pages.
Sarah Landreth, Junior Thesis in American and
English History and Literature.Bram
Stoker, Walt Whitman, and Dracula: Changing Male Identities in England
and America in the Late 19th Century.1996-1997.34 pages.
Rebecca Edwards, Junior Thesis in American History
and Literature.The Cult
of Motherhood in Civil War Hospitals.1996-1997. 26 pages.
Jenna Webster, Junior Thesis in English.Women Writers and the American Revolution.1995. 37 pages.
