Chapter 1: The Course

Last summer, as I was self-auditing my degree credits, I realized that I needed two extra classes. This meant that I would have to take summer classes and that is where the UA at Oxford program entered the picture. While in Oxford I will be taking two classes: The Arts of Oxford and Placing Jane Austen. The Arts of Oxford class will count as a University Honors credit and Placing Jane Austen will count as an English credit for my Creative Writing minor.

The Arts of Oxford, like its main campus counter-part The Arts of Tuscaloosa, consists of a series of group and individual outings to experience the city of Oxford. For the class I will be going to 22 sites or events in Oxford.

After every event, I must submit a response expressing my impressions of what I saw, heard, smelled, thought, and felt. Usually, this response will consist of a creative 150 word paragraph, but a response may also be a poem, drawing, or series of photographs.

The second class is Placing Jane Austen, in which I will be studying four novels by one of my favorite authors: Northanger Abby, Emma, Sense and Sensibility, and Pride and Prejudice. We will also be visiting Chawton to see the Jane Austen House Museum and Bath to take a Jane Austen City Tour.

"I cannot fix on the hour, or the look, or the words, which laid the foundation. It is too long ago. I was in the middle before I knew that I had begun."

~ Pride and Prejudice, ch 60, Jane Austen

course - noun - a direction or intended path, education imparted in a series of lessons or meetings