Literary Analysis Assignments
- Imagery and Symbolism in Short Stories
- Symbolism: "My Oedipus Complex" (O'Connor), "Boys and Girls" (Munro), "The Red Convertible" (Erdrich), and "The Things They Carried" (O'Brien)
- Religious Symbolism in Shirley Jackson's "The Lottery" and Nathaniel Hawthorne's "Young Goodman Brown"
- Southern Culture: William Faulkner's "A Rose for Emily" and Flannery O'Connor's "A Good Man is Hard to Find"
- Gender Issues: John Stenibeck's "The Chrysanthemums" and Charlotte Perkins Gilman's "The Yellow Wallpaper"
- Understanding Literary Conventions in Fiction
- Approaches to "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?" by Joyce Carol Oates
- Approaches to "The Secret Lion" by Alberto Alvaro Rios
- The Hero's Quest: "A Worn Path" by Eudora Welty and "1.7 to Tennessee" by Jamie Quatro
- Psychological Conflict: The Tilted World by Tom Franklin and Beth Ann Fennelly
- Flood Mythology: The Tilted World by Tom Franklin and Beth Ann Fennelly
- Freudian View of Parental Indulgence: "The Veldt" by Ray Bradbury
- Tall Tales: Big Fish by Daniel Wallace
- Telling Lies: Isaac Asimov's "Liar" and Karen Russell's "The Prospectors"
- Theme: Sense of Identity
- Theme: Conflicts of War
- The Trickster Motif: To Dance with the White Dog by Terry Kay
- The Danse Macabre: To Dance with the White Dog by Terry Kay
- "Little Red Riging Hood" and "The Company of Wolves" by Angela Carter
- Use of Irony in Half Mammals of Dixie by George Singleton
- Provincial Stories: Half Mammals of Dixie by George Singleton
- Tall Tales: Half Mammals of Dixie by George Singleton
- Significance and Role of Hair in Tayari Jones' Silver Sparrow
- Self-Esteem and Material Possessions: "The Lesson" by Toni Cade Bambara and Silver Sparrow by Tayari Jones
- Flawed Sense of Value
- Knowledge as Power: Silver Sparrow by Tayari Jones
- Being Special: Silver Sparrow by Tayari Jones
- Guilt and Gifts: Silver Sparrow by Tayari Jones
- Gender Conflicts
- Mental Illness in Jill McCorkle and William Faulkner
- Dealing with Death: Jill McCorkle's Creatures of Habit
- Marital Infidelity: Jill McCorkle's "Cats" and "Dogs," Creatures of Habit
- Need for Acceptance: Jill McCorkle's "Snipe" and Ralph Ellison's "Battle Royal"
- Altered Realities: "The Bad Graft" and "Bog Girl: A Romance" in Orange World by Karen Russell
- Magic Realsim: Orange World by Karen Russell
- The Wise Fool: Snipes as Fool in Serena by Ron Rash
- How to Understand Short Fiction
