Lesson Plan: Matching Quotations from Theory to Evidence
Comparative Literature and Culture
Objective
To give students practice matching quotations from a theoretical text to evidence culled from literary texts; to model the process of critical thinking required to produce an essay in the discipline of comparative literature; to get students started on their next assignment by selecting quotations that they may use in their essays
Estimated Time
30 minutes
Work Completed Before Class
For the previous class, students were assigned to post on our online course manager two quotations from a theoretical article (of their choice) that they plan to use for an upcoming essay assignment that asks them to use a work of literary theory to compare two literary texts. In preparation for this class, students have been asked to expand their previous posts by matching quotations from the two literary texts they have chosen to use in their upcoming essays to each of the theoretical quotations they posted for last class. I (the instructor) have done the same using assigned readings.
In Class
- Discuss how students matched quotations from literary texts with the quotations from the theoretical text they chose for the previous class (i.e., what makes a good match). Discuss how the quotations they chose from their literary texts fit next to one another. (5 minutes)
- Ask individual students to read aloud the quotations you (the instructor) have chosen from the assigned readings. Discuss the relation of each literary quotation to the theoretical quotation and then compare the theoretical readings of each literary quotation to one another. (5-10 minutes)
- Repeat step two for the second collection of quotations. It is possible to skip or summarize this step to save time. (5-10 minutes)
- Discuss the commonalities between the first and second collections of quotations that might allow one to propose a thesis for a comparative essay that uses these texts.
- Discuss how such an essay might be structured. I typically emphasize that students’ essays should not catalogue a series of connections between theory and literature, but that they should develop an argument.
- Following from the previous step, ask each student to arrange the two theoretical quotations they have chosen thus far into their most logical order. Have several students share their quotations and the order they chose, and explain why that order constitutes a progression of ideas that they might use to order an essay.
Ryan Wepler
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