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Syllabus forEnglish 320
Writing in an Electronic World
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Week 1
January 15 and 17
Topic: What is Public Reasoning?
Readings: AlterNet Discussion: "Are
There Alternative Media?"
Daily Lobo: Read Jan. 14's column
and letters-to-editor on Professor Berthold--click on back issues
Bring an example of your own writing to class on Thursday.
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Week 2
January 22 and 24
Topic: What is the critique of public discourse? What should public discourse
look like?
Readings: George Lakoff, Judith Rodin, Edward
Said (all on line), and Reynolds (handout)
Assignment 1
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Week 3
January 29 and 31
Topic: What do the different forums for public on -line discourse look
like?
Readings: Sontag, Talbot, Ehrenreich, Responses
to Ehrenreich, Schoch, Responses to Schoch.
Class Activities: Tuesday we'll work on classification. Thursday
we'll work on evaluation.
DRAFT of Paper One due for review and exchange
February 7.
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Week 4
February 5 and 7
Topic: Closed Form Writing.
Readings: Allyn & Bacon Guide to Writing (on reserve), pp. 437-482
on closed forms
For Tuesday read pp. 450 (Lesson 4)-462. For Thursday read pp. 462-482.
You may certainly browse the beginning parts of the packet if you wish,
but we'll probably not discuss these in class until you've turned in a
draft.
Peer Review Instructions
DRAFT DUE THURSDAY FEBRUARY 7
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Week 5
February 12 and 14
Topic: Peer Review and Assembly of Sources and Documents
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Week 6
February 19 and 21
WRITING ASSIGNMENT ONE
DUE FEB 19.
Topic: Open Form Writing
Readings for Thursday Feb. 21:
Julian Dibbell, "The Writer a la Modem or Death of the Author on
the Installment Plan."
http://www.levity.com/julian/alamodem.html
Browse the handout from Allyn & Bacon Guide to Writing "Open
Forms."
Read the NYT Forum ("spot-ox") and come prepared to discuss
credibility. Who is the most credible and why? Runner up? Least credible?
Figure out which web sites you are going to visit in your search for a
place to contribute to public discourse.
In class we'll talk about spot-ox for a bit and then you'll get started
with your own conversation projects.
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Week 7
February 26 and 28
Topic: Participating in Web-based Public Discourse
In-class activities: Presentations of your experiments. Developing categories
of analysis.
Assignment 2
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Week 8
March 5 and 7
The list below is the "third site" list--my picks for your "stretched"
discussion. I've tried to give you some alternatives. I've had to look around
in each for discussions that look interesting--and you'll probably have
to do the same. I recommend browsing quite a bit before selecting your point
of entry.
http://islamicity.com/communications/Discussion/--lots
of posts on islam by practioners. Log in a guess first. When you join,
your password is selected for you and emailed to you.
http://www.answerterrorism.com/forums.html
-- try military.com and looksmart.com
http://www.afghansite.com/forums/
-- for promising discussion go to http://www.afghansite.com/forums/forum.asp?FORUM_ID=2
(best bet?)
http://www.sojo.net/index.cfm/action/home.html
- Christian onine journal geared to spiritual renewal and social justice--pacifist
orientation.
Scroll down left for forums; discussion follows articles.
Visuals as Public Discourse: Long list of political cartoon sites. No
assignment--just for fun.
http://dmoz.org/Society/Politics/Humor/Cartoons/
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Week 9
SPRING BREAK
Work on Assignment 2.
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Week 10
March 19 and 21
Topics: Assembly of Sources and Documents. Discussion of Analysis
DOCUMENTATION FOR WRITING ASSIGNMENT TWO
DUE MARCH 19
NO CLASS MARCH 21
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Week 11
March 26 and 28
ANALYSIS FOR WRITING ASSIGNMENT TWO
DUE
Exploring Open Form writing. Read handout. Read Dibbell's "A
Rape in Cyberspace" noting the encoded tensions, descriptive
language, persona(e), and topics under exploration.
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Week 12
April 2 and 4
Lotsa pages of your open form draft due April 2--2 copies. Bring disks.
Your review of your peer's writing is due April 4--2 copies. Bring disks.
The drafting you do will raise questions about what you should be doing.
Welcome these questions and address them by re-examining the handout on
open form and examining other open form essays. "Berkeley Blues"
(in your open form packet) is a very short student essay that enables
you to examine some of the typical "moves" of open form writing.
"You Won't C-Me"
gives you another crack at reading essays to understand open form features.
You'll examine these in class in groups. "Modern
Boys and Mobile Girls" is a much longer open form essay by William
Gibson--a well-known writer of cyberfiction, and I recommend "Feminism
for the Incurably Informed" only for the intrepid, as Ann Balsamo
is a dense writer who combines closed form and open form features. You
might peek at these latter two to look for the features we're placing
under scrutiny.
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Week 13
April 9 and 11
Assignment 3
Here you'll find a despcription of the assignment and links to possible
publication venues.
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Week 14
April 16 and 18
Class Publication Sites and Guidelines
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Week 15
April 23 and 25
Peer Review Guidelines for Web-Publishable
Essay
Final Words on Open-Form and Web-Publishable
Essays
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Week 16
April 30 and May 2
OPEN-FORM ESSAY DUE AND WRITING ASSIGNMENT THREE
DUE
(assignment 3 is the web-publishable essay)
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