Swift's Modest Proposal

My friend Michael just posted on his blog "Collage of Citations" some excellent thoughts about teaching Swift's "Modest Proposal" in freshman composition courses and the problems with providing students with enough background and context so that they can be critical readers without at the same time coloring their reading with our own personal slants. Michael is reading the Sheridan Blau's book The Literature Workshop: Teaching Texts and Their Readers. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann, 2003. You can read his original post from August 2 and our conversation atMichael Faris’ “Collage of Citations” Collage of Citations