TR 12:30-1:45
Instructor: David Bowen
Email: ddbowen2000@yahoo.com
Office: 126 McIver
Hours: TR 1:50-2:20 (and by appointment)
This course is designed to sharpen the kinds of writing, reading, and thinking skills you will need to be successful in college and beyond. By the end of the course you should be able to choose effective strategies for overcoming problems in your own writing process, write and evaluate arguments, locate and evaluate textual evidence and incorporate it into your own writing, and analyze your writing and the writing of others, critically evaluating the effectiveness of content and presentation.
Since the process of writing is so important to the final product, you will be asked to do a great deal of inventing, drafting, and revising. You will write for yourselves, but also for your peers and for me. Through writing, reading, and collaborating with your fellow students, you will critically examine yourself and the world around you.
Required Texts (in addition to Writing Matters)
Bloom, Lynn Z., Shane Borrowman, and Edward M. White. Inquiry. Second
Edition. Upper Saddle, NJ:
Pearson Prentice Hall, 2004.
Kushner, Tony. Angels in America (Part One and Part Two). New York: TCG, 2003.
Lunsford, Andrea. EasyWriter: A Pocket Guide. New York: St. Martin’s
Press, 2002.
Nordan, Lewis. Wolf Whistle. Chapel Hill: Algonquin Books, 2003.
Course Requirements and Grading
Your final grade will be determined by two things: “class participation” and four essays you’ll complete throughout the semester. Class participation includes everything from speaking during discussions to weekly journal assignments and daily quizzes. Though I won’t assign any numbers to daily discussion—because everyone will talk—most other aspects of class participation will be quantified in points.
Quizzes and journals range between five and 20 points, which over the course of the semester could easily equal or surpass the weight of one essay. The essays will be worth 200 points each, for a total of 800 points. If you don’t get the grade you want the first time around, you will have the option of revising for additional points.
As you can see, the essays will make up the bulk of your grade, but poor performance on quizzes and/or a handful of missed journals can easily make the difference between a final grade you’d like and one you won’t. Attendance on workshop days is also important, since active participation in each workshop is worth 20 points.
Essays and Workshops: For each paper you’ll form a group with two others.
On days when a paper is due, you’ll bring two copies to class for the
members of your group. They’ll take these copies home and read them,
make notes, offer feedback, and then a few days later you’ll form groups
and workshop them in class. The revision will be due in the following class,
which I will collect and return to you with a grade. (You have the option of
revising again to raise this grade.) In each group, there will be an A-Wave,
B-Wave, and C-Wave. Study the attached schedule and be sure to plan ahead for
your due dates. Your group will depend on your participation, so deadlines
will be crucial, and work really can’t be late at all. If you are afraid
of missing a deadline, you might be able to switch due dates with someone in
your group. Otherwise, plan to plan ahead.
Attendance: For every formal paper that you write, you will move through drafts
and revisions, working with your peers to rethink, revise, and edit your work,
in addition to helping them with theirs. Consequently, prompt attendance at
each class is mandatory. Attendance on workshop days will be worth 25 points,
and daily quizzes can’t be made up, so absences can lower your grade
by missing these things.
Writing Well: Workshop days will begin with sessions that focus on the craft
of writing. We will probably do some in-class exercises on such days, and quizzes
that follow will incorporate elements that we touch on in these sessions.
Academic Misconduct: In a writing course, this means using other people’s
words and passing them off as your own—plagiarism. Depending on the severity
of the infraction, students might receive a failing grade or even be expelled.
Check your student handbook for all the grisly details. If you’re not
sure you’re citing a source correctly, ask. Most plagiarism is probably
unintentional, but it can still get folks in trouble.
Course Schedule: Please read assigned material before class and be prepared
to discuss it. Readings are subject to alteration, in which case you’ll
receive ample notice.
WEEK DATE READINGS ASSIGNMENTS /
WRITING WELL TOPICS WRITING ASSIGNMENT DUE DATES
A-Wave B-Wave C-Wave
1 17-Aug Meet and greet / introduce syllabus
19-Aug “How Do I Know Who I Am?” (INQ 1-5)
Rodriguez, “Memoir of a Bilingual Childhood” (INQ 108)
2 24-Aug Wright, “The Power of Books” (INQ 99)
26-Aug LeGuin, “Where Do You Get Your Ideas?” (INQ 318)
Writing Well: “The Writing Processes” (INQ 122) Intro Paper 1 Intro
Paper 1 Intro Paper 1
3 31-Aug “How Do We Know What We Know?” (INQ 117-123)
Plato, “Allegory of the Cave” (INQ 138) and Weston, “Thinking
for Yourself” (handout) Paper 1
2-Sept Hawking, “Our Picture of the Universe” (INQ 572)
Writing Well: “Focus”—introductions, conclusions,
paragraphs, and topic sentences [Workshop 1] Paper 1
4 7-Sept Whorf, “An American Indian Model of the Universe”
(INQ 209)
Writing Well: “Argument and Evidence” (INQ 347) [Workshop 1]
9-Sept Silko, “Landscape, History, and the Pueblo Imagination” (INQ
532) and Hogan, “Hearing Voices” (INQ 314) Paper 1
5 14-Sept Bronowski, “The Reach of the Imagination” (INQ 306-13)
Writing Well: “Writing for an Audience” (INQ 5) [Workshop 1]
16-Sept “What Are…Rights and Responsibilities?” (INQ 340-347)
King, “Letter from Birmingham Jail” (INQ 388) and “Public
Statement by…Alabama Clergymen” (handout) Intro Paper 2 Intro Paper
2 Intro Paper 2
6 21-Sept Baldwin, “Stranger in the Village” (handout)
FILM: Eddie Murphy, “White Like Me” Paper 2
23-Sept Steele, “The Age of White Guilt” (INQ 35-47)
Writing Well: “Where’s the Action?” (handout);
gerunds, appositives, and participles [Workshop 2] Paper 2
7 28-Sept Liu, “Notes from a Native Speaker” (INQ 66-76)
Writing Well: Phrases, clauses, restrictive and
nonrestrictive elements [Workshop 2] Paper 2
30-Sept Writing Well: “Sources” (INQ 483); MLA citations
and the Works Cited page (EW 166-187) [Workshop 2]
8 5-Oct Nordan, Wolf Whistle (1-90)
7-Oct Nordan, Wolf Whistle (90-161) Intro Paper 3 Intro Paper 3 Intro Paper
3
WEEK DATE READINGS ASSIGNMENTS /
WRITING WELL TOPICS WRITING ASSIGNMENT DUE DATES
A-Wave B-Wave C-Wave
9 12-Oct Fall Break—No Classes
14-Oct Nordan, Wolf Whistle (162-290)
10 19-Oct “What Will the Future Be Like?” (INQ 604-611)
Juergenmeyer, “Terror in the Mind of God” (INQ 665) Paper 3
21-Oct Milosz, “American Ignorance of War” (INQ 661)
Writing Well: Revising, editing, and proofreading [Workshop 3] Paper 3
11 26-Oct Annan, “The UN in the 21st Century” (INQ 698)
Writing Well: Commas, semicolons, and conjunctions
(EW 102-111) [Workshop 3] Paper 3
28-Oct Berry, “Thoughts on the Presence of Fear” (INQ 678)
Writing Well: Comma splices, fused sentences, and
sentence fragments (EW 50-55) [Workshop 3]
12 2-Nov Kushner, Angels in America (9-75)
4-Nov Kushner, Angels in America (75-125) Intro Paper 4 Intro Paper 4 Intro
Paper 4
13 9-Nov FILM: Angels in America, Part 2
11-Nov FILM: Angels in America, Part 2
14 16-Nov Kushner, 138th Commencement Address at Vassar College Paper 4
18-Nov TBA [Workshop 4] Paper 4
15 23-Nov TBA [Workshop 4] Paper 4
25-Dec Thanksgiving Break—No Classes
16 30-Nov TBA [Workshop 4]
2-Dec Work on revisions—No Classes