<미국학 입문>수업 사례연구

A Case Study of Class "Introduction to American Studies"

I have taught the class of "Introduction to American Studies" in English since fall semester in 2005. The objectives I've wanted to achieve in the class are like the following: to help students understand the whole sphere of American Studies so that they can apply it to any fields relevant to America in general; to let students read the text of A New Introduction to American Studies from critical perspectives rather than regarding it as a book portraying absolute truth; to improve students' writing capacities in English based on class discussion and critical thinking. I've grouped the whole sixteen chapters into four sub-categories according to thematic similarities. That's why we've at started to read chapters one, five, and six together because they are supposed to be closely related in their subjects like American nature, Native Americans, and American west. In order to stimulate students' curiosity and interest, we've also watched two films Dances with Wolves and Unforgiven, which greatly influenced on students' expanding their sphere in the above topics. The films also helped students not only approach the written text from diverse perspective but enrich their imagination about the abstract ideas in the text. Even though the class has been a big challenge to both students and myself, we've had a wonderful opportunity of de-constructing the text and re-evaluating the seminal topics in American studies.