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English

The English program is designed to enable the student to understand the communications of others and to employ the English language in creative and expository composition and speech. Courses prepare the student in grammar, composition, vocabulary, and literary analysis so that he develops competence in the use of his native language, not only in college, but throughout life.

In the Lower School, courses prepare the student in understanding and employing grammar, in developing a keen interest in the use and meaning of words, in writing and speaking, and in reading and understanding types of literature.

In the Upper School, English courses continue to emphasize a sound understanding of and facility in English through the study of literature according to type, theme, aspects, history, and great masterworks; through frequent writing of essays and research papers reflecting both personal expression and interpretation of literary studies; through the continued study of word origins, connotative and denotative meanings, analogies, and the constant employment of vocabulary of recognition; and finally through the continued study of grammar, usage, and syntax, not in isolation from literature and composition, but in relationship with those aspects of English study.

After students have completed the required Junior English Review course or AP English during the first semester of the eleventh grade, they enroll in British Literature I or AP English during the second semester of the junior year. As first-semester seniors, students complete British Literature II or continue with AP English. Second-semester seniors enroll in seminars offered in several areas, such as genres, historical periods, themes, or great authors.

English 7
Full Year, Grade 7
This course not only lays a foundation for the study of grammar, composition, and literature, but also encourages a habitual precision of thought and word. Sentence analysis fosters higher-level thinking and builds a vocabulary of language study. Frequent paragraph writing and some supervised research emphasize organized, substantive, detailed, and concise prose. Reading and discussing short stories, a novella, and other texts instill an appreciation for the writer’s technique. The study of mythology uncovers the roots of religion, folklore, and literature to which so much of Western culture is indebted.

Vocabulary, Computer, and Research Studies
One Semester, Grade 7

Approximately half of the class meetings in this course involve a systematic study of English vocabulary. The other half focus on computer keyboarding, networking, and use of specific software, along with an introduction to the resources available to students in the MUS library and a variety of research methods.

English 8
Full Year, Grade 8
An intensive study of the grammar and mechanics of standard English, this course emphasizes clear, effective writing and the analysis and appreciation of the short story, the novel, the folk
epic, and Greek tragedy.

Honors English 9
Full Year, Grade 9
This course familiarizes the student with various genres of literature and critical vocabularies associated with each; it reviews grammar — punctuation, syntax, and diction — and stresses vocabulary building. Effective writing is emphasized through examinations of the mechanics of the paragraph, the five-paragraph composition, and the literature-based critical analysis.

Honors English 10: American Literature
Full Year, Grade 10
Students are introduced to the major writers and works of American literature in a historical analysis with continued emphasis on traditional genres. In addition to writing compositions of literary analysis, students learn the fundamental procedures of research as they complete a formal term paper. Continued vocabulary study accompanies the review of English grammar through writing and practice in advanced usage and structure.

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Honors English 11: Junior English Review
First Semester, Grade 11
Taken during the fall semester of the student’s junior year, this course offers intensive vocabulary study and concise but thorough review of grammar with emphasis on usage problems. Required of all juniors unless they are enrolled in AP English.

AP English 11: English Language
Full Year, Grade 11
In this course, selected juniors are allowed to review grammar, to increase vocabulary, and to polish their skills in writing and in analyzing prose in preparation for the AP English Language and Composition examination. Entrance subject to approval of the instructor and the English Department.

Honors English 11: British Literature I
Second Semester, Grade 11
Juniors begin a historical survey of British literature that continues in the first semester of the students’ senior year. A research paper is required of all students in addition to essays of literary analysis that exhibit standard grammar, usage, expression, and organization. The course examines major authors and stylistic periods through the eighteenth century, including Chaucer, Shakespeare, Donne, Milton, Swift, Pope, and Goldsmith.

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AP English 12: English Literature
First Semester, Grade 12

In this course, seniors advance their ability in analysis of poetry, drama, essays, short stories, and novels in preparation for the AP English Literature and Composition examination. Entrance subject to approval of the instructors and the English Department.

English 12: British Literature II
First Semester, Grade 12
Seniors continue the survey of British literature begun in the second semester of the junior year with attention to relevant literary terms and styles as well as historical background. Authors include major romantic and Victorian poets as well as Conrad, Yeats, Joyce, Lawrence, and Eliot from the twentieth century. Compositions emphasize essays of literary analysis.

Honors English 12: Senior Seminar
Second Semester, Grade 12
In the spring, each senior enrolls in one of several one-semester courses. The following electives have been offered in the recent past:

Literature and the Monomyth
This survey explores powerful ideas and myths surrounding the "wrake and wonder" of the hero's journey, the meta-narrative of the fairy tale, and the preternatural legends that were staple entertainment. Students will examine how literature responds in particular, complex ways to individual and social problems of great urgency. The objective will be to situate these pieces in a rich textual environment that shares and contests discourses about self-fashioning, the relationship between the individual and society, official and unofficial practices of justice, and adventure.

 
Literature and War
In this seminar, students will explore the nature of war and its effect on man through a study of modern war literature.  In his forward to Men at War, Hemingway deemed war as a "part of the intercourse of the human race."  Students will examine varying attitudes of authors toward war and what these attitudes reveal about society.  In addition, students will examine various literary movements — romanticism, realism, naturalism, absurdism — and explore how the literature reflects the characteristics of these movements.
 
Modern American Fiction and the Search for Meaning

In this course, students will consider twentieth- and twenty-first century American writers' quests to understand the meaning of life. Students will take to the highway with Jack Kerouac, wander the western wasteland with Cormac McCarthy, tour the galaxy with Kurt Vonnegut, and explore the notion of Fate in the form of a foul ball with John Irving.

Shakespeare
With an overview of Shakespeare's life and times, this course emphasizes the study of Hamlet, The Merchant of Venice, Romeo and Juliet, Henry IV, Part One, The Tempest, and King Lear.
 
Short Story Composition
In this course, students will be introduced to the disciplined craft of writing the contemporary short story.  After a brief historical introduction to the development of the modern short story in America , the course will focus on reading and discussing exemplary modern and contemporary American short stories for the benefit of the student’s own work.  The class will use a collaborative workshop/critique model of evaluation and revision to commend and correct student stories in the hopes that by semester’s end each student will have crafted at least one story worthy of submission to the MUSe (the literary review of MUS) or to a regionally or nationally circulated literary publication.

Southern Renaissance Literature
This seminar explores and attempts to explain the sudden flowering of Southern literature of all genres beginning in the late twenties and continuing to the present. The novels studied are Faulkner's Light in August, Walker Percy's The Moviegoer, and Ernest Gaine's A Lesson Before Dying. In addition, the short story (Eudora Welty, Flannery O'Connor, and others), poetry ("The Fugitives" and others), and the essay are considered.

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