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Approaches to Teaching Emily Brontë's Wuthering Heights
Editor(s): Sue Lonoff, Terri A. Hasseler
Pages: vii & 195 pp.
Published: 2006
ISBN: 9780873529938 (paperback)
ISBN: 9780873529921 (hardcover)
"Wuthering Heights is a major literary text taught in a wide variety of courses, from freshman writing courses to graduate seminars. This excellent addition to the MLA Approaches to Teaching series is not only needed and useful but mandatory."
Anne Humpherys, Graduate Center, CUNY
"Stimulates the reader who is also a teacher to ponder fundamental questions again."
Archiv
Emily Brontë's Wuthering Heights has long held a high position in the academy and in popular culture. It is taught at levels from high school English to doctoral studies and has been adapted in enough film and television versions that many students who know nothing about the book know who Heathcliff is. Nevertheless it is not an easy novel to teach. Thus in addition to surveying experienced teachers of Wuthering Heights, the editors sought to learn directly from students what in the novel was difficult for them and what worked best in engaging their interest. As a result, the approaches suggested in this volume reflect practices that have proved successful for both students and teachers.
Part 1 of this Approaches volume, "Materials," surveys and assesses the available editions of Wuthering Heights, identifies editions of other works by Emily Brontë, reviews biographies and other background materials, notes the critical studies most frequently mentioned as useful by instructors, and provides an annotated list of resources on the Internet.
Among the classroom strategies described in part 2, "Approaches," are the following:
- Uncovering the hidden elements of race, gender, and class through close analysis of the narrative
- Teaching the novel from the vantage point of gothic conventions, biographies of Brontë family members, the debates about the place of the novel in the canon
- Helping students engage with theory after identifying and critiquing their "perspective-free" positions
- Considering the circularity of the novel, the reliability of the narrators, the complexity of character development
- Familiarizing students with historical and legal documents to reveal social and economic issues of the period like child custody and women's property rights
- Comparing film and TV adaptations with one another and with the novel itself
- Using recordings to consider how hearing the speech of characters brings to light issues of social class, age, and gender
Contributors
Suzy Anger
Frances Beer
Dean de la Motte
Kamilla Elliott
Laraine Fergenson
Catherine R. Hancock
Tamar Heller
Diane Long Hoeveler
Paula M. Krebs
Tricia Lootens
Carine M. Mardorossian
Beth Newman
Barry V. Qualls
Maureen T. Reddy
Leilani D. Riehle
Patsy Stoneman
Lisa Surridge
Paul Vita
Table of Contents
Preface to the Series
Preface to the Volume
PART 1: MATERIALS Sue Lonoff
- Courses and Course Designs
- Editions
- The Instructor's Library
- Other Works by Emily Brontë
- Biographies and Background Studies
- Critical and Theoretical Studies
- Additional Contextual Materials
- Wuthering Heights: A Family Tree
- What Students Say about Approaching Wuthering Heights
PART 2: APPROACHES
- Introduction
- Terri A. Hasseler
Historical and Social Contexts
- Wuthering Heights in Its Context(s)
- Beth Newman
- Geometries of Race, Class, and Gender: Identity Crossing in Wuthering Heights
- Carine M. Mardorossian
- Victorian Border Crossings: Thinking about Gender in Wuthering Heights
- Barry V. Qualls
- Teaching the Language of Domestic Violence in Wuthering Heights
Catherine R. Hancock
Literary and Disciplinary Contexts
- Haunted Bodies: The Female Gothic of Wuthering Heights
- Tamar Heller
- Biographical Keys to the Heights
- Frances Beer
- Wuthering Heights in the Culture of the English Department
- Paula M. Krebs
Theories of Interpretation
- "The Writing on the Wall": Interpreting Wuthering Heights in a Class on Theories of Interpretations
- Suzy Anger
- Teaching Wuthering Heights as Fantasy, Trauma, and Dream Work
- Diane Long Hoeveler
- The Narrative Design of Wuthering Heights: Interpreting the Telling of the Tale
- Leilani D. Riehle
- Wuthering Heights, Women, and the Law: A Historical Approach
- Lisa Surridge
- Evading "the Secret Truth" in Wuthering Heights: Film and Visual Illustration in Teaching Critical Theory
- Patsy Stoneman
Imagining and Reimagining Wuthering Heights
- Teaching Wuthering Heights through Its Film and Television Adaptations
- Kamilla Elliott
- Hearing Class in Class: Using Audio Excerpts to Teach Wuthering Heights
- Dean de la Motte
- Teaching Wuthering Heights Intertextually: The Example of Alice Hoffman's Here on Earth
- Maureen T. Reddy
Building Skills through Teaching Wuthering Heights
Teaching Emily Brontë's Poetry and Wuthering Heights in a First-Year Composition Course
- Tricia Lootens
- Teaching Wuthering Heights through Close Reading / Teaching Close Reading through Wuthering Heights
- Paul Vita
- Using Collaborative Learning to Teach the Themes of Education, Ignorance, and Dispossession in Wuthering Heights
- Laraine Fergenson
Notes on Contributors
Survey Participants
Works Cited
- Editions of Wuthering Heights
- Audio, Film, and Video Resources
- General Works
Index
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