A220
Email: SNyberg@Hamden.org
Office hours: Monday 2:00 p.m.

Our goals are to read accurately; writing clearly; listen attentively; and speak thoughtfully. We also want to gain a working knowledge of American Literature.

In a course that seeks to be comprehensive, the question of what to read and who to read must necessarily arise. What works should a junior American high school class cover? What should be left out? What will students want to explore as they advance further in the field?

This year we will hear the voices of Nathaniel Hawthorne and Arthur Miller; Edith Wharton and Zora Neale Hurston; Walt Whitman and Emily Dickinson; and Mark Twain and F. Scott Fitzgerald.

There are other voices we will want to listen to as well. Here, perhaps, is a sampling.

Poetry:

Anne Bradstreet (1612-72)
(www.annebradstreet.com)

Michael Wigglesworth (1631-1705)

Edward Taylor (1642-1729)

Phillis Wheatley (1753?-1784)

Francis Scott Key (1778-1843)
The Star Spangled Banner

John Greenleaf Whittier (1807-92)

The fall semester of this class will focus on writing the college essay; hence, much of the reading and writing will be autobiographical.

Hamden High School
Suzanna Nyberg