Week 4: American Born Chinese, Intertextuality, and Marxist Theory

On Tuesday we'll continue our discussion of American Born Chinese. We'll have time for you to share what you discover as you write your critical reflection papers, but we'll also use the text as an opportunity to talk about "intertextuality".

Here's a recommendation for your paper:

• Introduce:  Begin with a question or aspect of American Born Chinese that interests you. Provide the reader with a little context related to that idea.
• Insert:  Describe the panel or series of panels you intend to analyze to the reader. Focus on the elements most related to the idea you plan to develop.
• Interpret: "Read" the text for us--tell us what we can discover by reading the text in this way!

While I don't want people to think about the above suggestion as a "formula", you may find value in recognizing and being able to draw on conventional forms.

On Thursday the Marxist Theory group will introduce us to the theory and provide us with some practice generating questions and/or using Marxist theory to help us reading texts. If you like, you might want to look at the chapter on Marxism in the Tyson text.