English
223 Elizabeth
Chiseri-Strater
M/W
2-3:15 and conferences McIver
114, Office
Room 308 Graham 334-5263
PAYING
ATTENTION: Reading and Writing Essays
“The importance of a writer...is that he is
here to describe things which other people are too busy to describe.”
James
Baldwin
Texts:
King, Stephen. On Writing: A Memoir of the
Craft, Scribners: New York, 2000.
Sunstein, Bonnie and Chiseri-Strater, Elizabeth. Fieldworking:
Reading and Writing Research, Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2002.
Observation is the heart of all good nonfiction
writing. Paying close attention to the
details around you and to how you perceive them requires well honed looking and
listening skills as well as imagination, insight and reflective thought. We all pay attention in different ways and
that is what shapes the writer’s individual voice: your singular textual
vantage point will be encouraged and developed in this course (English will be
discouraged). This course will require you to dig deeply into your previous
experiences, forage widely in the greater world and reflect on the meaning of
some of your private and public experiences..
English 223 is a course
devoted to essay writing, to crafting clear, engaging language to capture your
perceptions of the world(s) around you and to share those with an audience. In this pursuit you will read the work of
other well known essayists, compose essays of your own, workshop writing with
your peers and revise it thoroughly to submit in a portfolio at the end of the
semester. You will be expected to attend
this class regularly, turn in your work in a timely manner, read and respond to
the assigned essays and come to class prepared to hold an intelligent
conversation with others about the art and craft of essay writing. You should leave English 223
with a greater appreciation of the craft of essay writing, the kind of thought
and research it involves, and with an increased ability to read within a wide range of nonfiction prose genres.
LEARNING GOALS OF THE COURSE:
By the end of this course you should be able to:
Write
clearly, coherently and effectively within a variety of essay genres.
Understand
different audiences and adapt writing accordingly.
Incorporate
feedback from your peers and instructor into your writing.
Edit
your work so that it conforms to standard usage.
Organize
your text so that it reads fluently.
Read
and respond widely within the nonfiction prose genre.
“Let
me say it again: do not come lightly to the blank page.” Stephen King
Course
Rituals and Requirements:
The course will be conducted as a writing
workshop where participants share, respond to and support each other’s writing
in progress. The course is organized so
that every writer’s work will receive written and oral feedback in a workshop
format wherein every participant writes weekly critiques to the drafts of her
peers. You’ll write three essays, revise one completely and turn in from twenty
to twenty five pages of polished prose for your final reading/writing. Specific requirements about each essay will
be handed out as we go along but the overall arc of the assignments will move
from writing about your own family and then to interviewing someone whose life
you are invested or interested in (oral history, interview) to writing an essay
about yourself (Observation of Self) to researching a subculture you are
fascinated with (Fieldwork/mini-ethnography).
READING:
As Toni Morrison says, “Writing and reading are
not all that distinct for a writer. Both
exercises require being alert and ready for the unaccountable beauty, for all
the intricateness of the simple elegance of the writer’s imagination, for the
world that that imagination evokes.”
Reading responses to the essays will be required and a selection of
these responses will go in your final portfolio. I will check these occasionally but assume
that you are doing them in order to be prepared for smart class discussions. These one pagers should not be summaries of the essays but
should focus rather on a few lines of the text, an interesting image, metaphor
or writing technique that engaged you as a writer.
PARTICIPATION:
I expect to learn from you and for you to learn
from each other as well as from me. In order to do that you need to come to
class on time, awake and alert and prepared to participate. It seems a waste of time to occupy classroom
space without bringing your full energies to the course. Poor attendance, lack
of participation, or failure to meet the deadlines will result in a
substantially lower grade or even from being dropped from the course.
COMMUNICATION:
Every student should submit a current email
address and be part of the university’s email system so that I can post class
messages about any changes in our schedule.
If an emergency arises, you may email me at any time (e_chiser@uncg.edu). You may also leave a message on my answering
machine (334-5263). If for any reason
you miss class, you are responsible for keeping up to date, particularly when
peer reviews are due.
EVALUATION:
You will turn in your writing portfolio at
midterm and the end of this course for an evaluation. The midterm portfolio
grade will be folded into (will be a percentage of) your final grade. You may ask for a tentative grade on any
paper you submit and you will always have the option of revising any essay up
to the final portfolio. In addition to
your writing portfolio, you will be evaluated on (an easy guess) your class
participation, your reading responses, your peer critiques and your writing
exercises. If you complete all your assigned work in a timely manner and are a
contributing member of this writing community you should do reasonably well in
this course.
“For me the initial delight is in the
surprise of remembering something I didn’t know I knew.” Robert Frost
Reading
and Writing Schedule
1/13
Monday Introduction
Introduction to the course and one another
through an artifact exchange
1/15
Wednesday Artifacts as another Type
of Fact
Reading: Fieldworking,
Chapter 7, Box 27 (Model for artifact exchange 370-373).
Writing:
Write up your description of partner’s artifact (two copies, one for me and one
for partner).
1/20
Holiday Martin Luther King Day No
Classes
1/22
Wednesday Family Stories
Reading: Fieldworking, Chapter 7, Kingston, “No Name
Woman” and poem by Lisa Mueller, Why We Tell Stories” (413-4).
Writing: Reading response to Kingston essay and
Mueller poem (one page each). What function do stories serve in this poem and
essay?
1/27
Monday Listening and Asking
Reading: Fieldworking,
finish Chapter 7, Focus on Sacks’ essay, “An Anthropologist on Mars” and Cindie Marshall’s “Ralph’s Sports Bar”
Writing: Reading response to both essays. Pose questions about the interviewing
process.
1/29 Wednesday Writing Workshop: Family Stories
Reading: Excerpt from Elizabeth Stone’s Black
Sheep and Kissing Cousins (handout).
Writing: 1-2 page family story and analysis (two
copies, one for me and one for group).
2/3 Monday Self as Reader
Reading: Fieldworking, Chapter 3
Writing: Complete Box 9, Respond to Mama Day,
Box 10 (explore ethics statements online),
Name of person you plan to interview
2/5
Wednesday Self as Writer
Reading: King, On Writing (50) Student
Papers
Writing:
Response to student papers (2 copies, one to me) and respond
to first fifty pages of King.
2/10
Monday What Is Fieldwork?
Reading: Fieldworking,
Chapter 1, focus on “Friday Night at Iowa 80"
Writing: Complete Box 3 in Chapter 1 (use any
newspaper)
2/12 Writing Workshop
Reading: Student papers
Writing:
Response to student papers, Two copies of your
interview, oral history paper
*****Indicates Writing is due that day.
“An experience isn’t finished until it’s
written.” Anne Morrow Lindbergh
2/17
Monday Paying Attention to Self
Reading: Lucy Grealy, “Mirrorings”; Kunsz, “Ring Leader”
Writing: Respond to both essays
CONFERENCE
WITH INSTRUCTOR THIS WEEK (2/17-2/22)
2/20
Wednesday Writing Workshop
Reading: Student papers and King (101)
Writing: Responses to student papers and King
2/24 Paying Attention
to Self
Reading: Lopate,
“Portrait of My Body”; Lott, “Brothers”
Writing: Respond to both essays
2/26
Wednesday Writing Workshop
Reading: Student Papers (King, 162)
Writing: Respond to student papers and to King
3/3
Monday Paying Attention to Place
Reading: Fieldworking,
Chapter 2, focus on Didion essay, “On Keeping a
Notebook”
Writing: Take an hour’s worth of fieldnotes on a shop or subculture on Tate Street
3/5 Mid-term Portfolio, Observation of Self
paper plus interview or family story
In-class
writing about portfolios
3/10-3/14-
SPRING BREAK
3/17
Monday Researching Place
Reading: Fieldworking,
Chapter 5, focus on Mapping Space and poem, “Scouting” by Philip Levine
(290-291)
Writing: Fieldnotes on
your selected subculture, Box 8 (96-98)
3/19-CCCC New York No Class (Use this time
productively to gather fieldnotes on subculture)
3/24
Monday Researching Place
Reading: Fieldworking, Chapter 5 to end, focus on Kinkaid,”On Seeing England for the First Time” and Photo Phantasy by Karen Downing.
Writing: Data sharing: Bring in your most
interesting data to date.
3/26
Wednesday Writing Workshop
Reading: Student papers
Writing: Response to papers
3/31
Monday Researching Language
Reading: Fieldworking,
Chapter 6 to page 310 and poem by Wendy Rose.
Writing: Share language from subculture, Box 21
302-303.
4/2
Wednesday Writing Workshop
Reading: Student papers.
Writing: Response to papers
4/7
Monday Researching
Subcultures
Fieldworking,
Chapter 4
Writing: Summarize archival or web work related
to your subculture.
4/9
Wednesday Writing Workshop
Reading: Student Papers, King (finish)
Writing: Response to student papers
CONFERENCES THIS WEEK ON FIELDWORK PROJECTS
4/14
Monday Writing It Up
Reading: Fieldworking,
Chapter 8
Writing: Draft of fieldwork projects
4/16
Wednesday Writing Workshop
Writing: Draft of fieldwork projects
4/21
Monday Presentations on Fieldwork
4/23 Wednesday Presentations
on Fieldwork
4/28
Monday Writing Workshop: Final
Drafts of Fieldwork
Reading: Student papers
Writing: Response to student papers
4/30
Wednesday Writing Workshop:
Revisions for Portfolios
Reading: Student Papers
Writing: Response to student papers
5/5 LAST DAY OF CLASS Porfolios Due Returned during Exam Time
“The last act of writing must be to become
one’s own reader. It is, I suppose, a
schizophrenic process, to begin passionately and to end critically, to begin
hot and end cold: and more important to be passion hot and critic cold at the
same time.” John Ciardi