ENGL 254: Writing and Communities
Fall Semester 2010
Section 010
MWF: 8:30AM – 9:20AM, Andrews Hall 030
Fall Semester 2010
Section 010
MWF: 8:30AM – 9:20AM, Andrews Hall 030
____________________________________________________
Instructor: Joshua Ware
Email: unlengl@gmail.com
Office: 302 Andrews Hall
Hours: 9:30AM – 10:30AM, WF (336 Andrews Hall)
Email: unlengl@gmail.com
Office: 302 Andrews Hall
Hours: 9:30AM – 10:30AM, WF (336 Andrews Hall)
____________________________________________________
Course Description:
In his book Spinoza: Practical Philosophy, French philosopher Gilles Deleuze wrote: that, with regard to relationships: "It is no longer a matter of utilizations and captures, but of socialibilities and communities. How do individuals enter into composition with one another in order to form a higher individual, ad infinitum? How can a being take another being into its world, but while preserving or respecting the other's own relations and the world? And in this regard, what are the different types of socialibilities for example?"
In many ways, this course will explore the manner in which individuals form "socialibilities and communities" in an attempt to, literally, "enter into composition." To this extent, if we trace the etymological origin of the word “community,” we find that it derives from the Latin word communitas, which can be parsed out further into the roots cum, meaning "with” or “together," and munus, meaning “service, duty, or work performed.” As such, a “community” is a cohesion predicated upon specific actions to be performed via, and in benefit of, “togetherness”; in the specific case of this course, our "work" will be writing.
Of course, what constitutes writing in contemporary society is rather expansive, and often in dispute. As far as anthropologists and linguists can tell, writing began as fragmentary inscriptions and engravings; or stated more specifically, humans constructed the word at a physical site wherein a body etched glyphs into a surface that tended to be localized and earthen. Writing, then, or inscription (from the Greek work skripat, which means "scratch”) was a material process that necessitated bodies act upon and alter tactile objects in a very immediate manner so as to produce a tangible text. Nowadays, common writing practices, such as an individual scribbling thoughts and feelings into a journal or typing an essay for a college course on a computer, retain but a trace of writing’s former physicality. Moreover, while the proliferation of today’s digital technologies (e.g. blogging, tweets, photographic essays, and streaming video, just to name a few) offer us new, exciting, relevant, and powerful means for re-conceptualizing the term “writing,” it also has a disembodying effect. While writing by its very nature leaves an irreparable divide between the writer and the written, New Media, it would appear, leads to a furthering of that distance.
As such, our goal for this course will be two-fold. First, we will explore the implications of communal writing. For example, what communities, in the broadest sense of the word, do we have available to us? Moreover, what are the similarities and differences between communities based upon discipline, university affiliation, family or friends, and online associations? Likewise, how do communities and individuals within communities use writing for multiple purposes? Does a particular community employ writing to set the terms of membership, forge an identity, deliberate over important matters, research and make informed decisions, argue, communicate, or create new knowledge? Secondly, through a series of performative projects, we will attempt to re-introduce the physical into our writing through radical embodiment. and performative utterances. Of course, conceptualizing embodied writing should not be an effort to negate more disembodied forms of writing (i.e.digital), but, instead, serve to complicate and expand our notions of what writing can be in our contemporary moment. For example, how do such multi-valent, performative utterances both move us closer to and further away from the process of writing? With any luck, we will come to well-thoughout, but necessarily contingent understanding of these questions, as well as contextually-based answers.
Course Goals (as provided in the English Department’s Aims & Scopes Guide):
1) Students will build on prior experiences with composing and with the rhetorical concepts of audience, purpose, and context by undertaking a minimum of 3 projects in various forms and producing the equivalent of 30 pages of polished prose. These formal projects should be informed directly or indirectly by students’ developing understanding of writing as a social practice and students’ study of writing in communities.
2) Students will learn to analyze the social dynamics of actual contexts for writing, and interpret published texts through an understanding of writing as a social practice.
3) Students will learn strategies for researching the uses of writing in a community. While the emphasis of this course is on conducting primary research, students may also gain additional experience with secondary research as well.
4) Students will have opportunities to learn new revision strategies and gain insights about revision by developing a more finely tuned understanding of how writers conceptualize their work and possible communities of readers for their work.
5) Students will continue to refine their skills at providing constructive response to peers’ writing by producing at least 3 substantive, written responses to peers’ or community members’ texts-in-process.
6) Students will have guided opportunities to inquire into and reflect on the development of their writing and learning in terms of the concepts taken up in the course.
Course Texts:
There will be no textbook for this class. Instead, I will post a series of PDF documents on Blackboard. You will be expected to have assigned documents read before our class period begins, your own hard-copy when we discuss the material, as well as any relevant notes, annotations, or questions you might have. This means that you will need to a) know how to properly access and navigate Blackboard, b) print the necessary documents, and c) engage the readings in a thoughtful and critical manner. If anyone has issues using Blackboard or accessing a printer, let me know at the beginning of the semester (i.e. now) so that I can assist you with technology concerns or direct you to public computer labs.
Assignment Descriptions:
I will provide detailed Performance/Project guidelines for each major assignment a few weeks before specified due dates. But, all performances will contain documentation that may or may not include: a collaboratively-written statement of purpose, a collaboratively-written script, individually-written research notes/narrative, and an individually-written reflection on the performance’s process/performance. The below project dates are tentative and, thus, subject to change:
Sculpture Garden Presentation
(15 points, DUE DATE: 09/22/10)
Dramatic Dialogue
(25 points, DUE DATE: 10/20/10)
Community: Materiality, Process, and Space
(25 points, DUE DATE: 11/19/10)
Dada Burlesque
(35 points, DUE DATE: 12/10/10)
As is standard practice, all documentation must be turned in at the beginning of class in hard-copy form, printed in 12pt Times New Roman font, double-spaced, and using 1-inch margins. If expectations or mediums alter, this will be addressed and documented in an appropriate, public fashion.
Grading Scale:
A = 100-93 A- = 92-90 B+ = 89-87 B = 86-84 B- = 83-80 C+ = 79-77
C = 76-74 C- = 73-70 D+ = 69-67 D = 66-64 D- = 63-60 F = 59-0
Attendance:
The Department of English expects students registered for English classes to attend all scheduled class meetings. Moreover, to perform effectively in class and to provide quality input on your peers’ writing necessitates regular attendance and active participation. Therefore, you can miss up to six class periods with no affect on your final grade; you will have withdrawn from (i.e. failed) the course once you accrue six absences. I will take attendance daily. Furthermore, it is your responsibility to find out what you missed and be prepared for the next class. Regular tardiness will also affect your class performance and distract the class in progress; as such, chronic tardiness will affect your grade.
Code of Conduct:
All members of the course must commit to creating a place of study where everyone is treated with respect and courtesy. Everyone must share in the commitment to protect the integrity, rights, and personal safety of each member of the classroom community. This includes helpful, yet courteous, discussion of individual and group writing projects. Additionally, make sure cell phones, pagers, and any other similar electronic instruments are turned off when in class. These devices are not conducive to a learning environment and will be treated as such.
General Education “ACE Statement”:
By passing this course, you will fulfill ACE Learning Outcome 1: “Write texts, in various forms, with an identified purpose, that respond to particular audience needs, incorporate research or existing knowledge, and use applicable documentation and appropriate conventions of format and structure.” Your written work will be evaluated by the instructor according to the specifications described in this syllabus. At the end of the term, you may be asked top provide sample of your work for ACE assessment as well.
In his book Spinoza: Practical Philosophy, French philosopher Gilles Deleuze wrote: that, with regard to relationships: "It is no longer a matter of utilizations and captures, but of socialibilities and communities. How do individuals enter into composition with one another in order to form a higher individual, ad infinitum? How can a being take another being into its world, but while preserving or respecting the other's own relations and the world? And in this regard, what are the different types of socialibilities for example?"
In many ways, this course will explore the manner in which individuals form "socialibilities and communities" in an attempt to, literally, "enter into composition." To this extent, if we trace the etymological origin of the word “community,” we find that it derives from the Latin word communitas, which can be parsed out further into the roots cum, meaning "with” or “together," and munus, meaning “service, duty, or work performed.” As such, a “community” is a cohesion predicated upon specific actions to be performed via, and in benefit of, “togetherness”; in the specific case of this course, our "work" will be writing.
Of course, what constitutes writing in contemporary society is rather expansive, and often in dispute. As far as anthropologists and linguists can tell, writing began as fragmentary inscriptions and engravings; or stated more specifically, humans constructed the word at a physical site wherein a body etched glyphs into a surface that tended to be localized and earthen. Writing, then, or inscription (from the Greek work skripat, which means "scratch”) was a material process that necessitated bodies act upon and alter tactile objects in a very immediate manner so as to produce a tangible text. Nowadays, common writing practices, such as an individual scribbling thoughts and feelings into a journal or typing an essay for a college course on a computer, retain but a trace of writing’s former physicality. Moreover, while the proliferation of today’s digital technologies (e.g. blogging, tweets, photographic essays, and streaming video, just to name a few) offer us new, exciting, relevant, and powerful means for re-conceptualizing the term “writing,” it also has a disembodying effect. While writing by its very nature leaves an irreparable divide between the writer and the written, New Media, it would appear, leads to a furthering of that distance.
As such, our goal for this course will be two-fold. First, we will explore the implications of communal writing. For example, what communities, in the broadest sense of the word, do we have available to us? Moreover, what are the similarities and differences between communities based upon discipline, university affiliation, family or friends, and online associations? Likewise, how do communities and individuals within communities use writing for multiple purposes? Does a particular community employ writing to set the terms of membership, forge an identity, deliberate over important matters, research and make informed decisions, argue, communicate, or create new knowledge? Secondly, through a series of performative projects, we will attempt to re-introduce the physical into our writing through radical embodiment. and performative utterances. Of course, conceptualizing embodied writing should not be an effort to negate more disembodied forms of writing (i.e.digital), but, instead, serve to complicate and expand our notions of what writing can be in our contemporary moment. For example, how do such multi-valent, performative utterances both move us closer to and further away from the process of writing? With any luck, we will come to well-thoughout, but necessarily contingent understanding of these questions, as well as contextually-based answers.
Course Goals (as provided in the English Department’s Aims & Scopes Guide):
1) Students will build on prior experiences with composing and with the rhetorical concepts of audience, purpose, and context by undertaking a minimum of 3 projects in various forms and producing the equivalent of 30 pages of polished prose. These formal projects should be informed directly or indirectly by students’ developing understanding of writing as a social practice and students’ study of writing in communities.
2) Students will learn to analyze the social dynamics of actual contexts for writing, and interpret published texts through an understanding of writing as a social practice.
3) Students will learn strategies for researching the uses of writing in a community. While the emphasis of this course is on conducting primary research, students may also gain additional experience with secondary research as well.
4) Students will have opportunities to learn new revision strategies and gain insights about revision by developing a more finely tuned understanding of how writers conceptualize their work and possible communities of readers for their work.
5) Students will continue to refine their skills at providing constructive response to peers’ writing by producing at least 3 substantive, written responses to peers’ or community members’ texts-in-process.
6) Students will have guided opportunities to inquire into and reflect on the development of their writing and learning in terms of the concepts taken up in the course.
Course Texts:
There will be no textbook for this class. Instead, I will post a series of PDF documents on Blackboard. You will be expected to have assigned documents read before our class period begins, your own hard-copy when we discuss the material, as well as any relevant notes, annotations, or questions you might have. This means that you will need to a) know how to properly access and navigate Blackboard, b) print the necessary documents, and c) engage the readings in a thoughtful and critical manner. If anyone has issues using Blackboard or accessing a printer, let me know at the beginning of the semester (i.e. now) so that I can assist you with technology concerns or direct you to public computer labs.
Assignment Descriptions:
I will provide detailed Performance/Project guidelines for each major assignment a few weeks before specified due dates. But, all performances will contain documentation that may or may not include: a collaboratively-written statement of purpose, a collaboratively-written script, individually-written research notes/narrative, and an individually-written reflection on the performance’s process/performance. The below project dates are tentative and, thus, subject to change:
Sculpture Garden Presentation
(15 points, DUE DATE: 09/22/10)
Dramatic Dialogue
(25 points, DUE DATE: 10/20/10)
Community: Materiality, Process, and Space
(25 points, DUE DATE: 11/19/10)
Dada Burlesque
(35 points, DUE DATE: 12/10/10)
As is standard practice, all documentation must be turned in at the beginning of class in hard-copy form, printed in 12pt Times New Roman font, double-spaced, and using 1-inch margins. If expectations or mediums alter, this will be addressed and documented in an appropriate, public fashion.
Grading Scale:
A = 100-93 A- = 92-90 B+ = 89-87 B = 86-84 B- = 83-80 C+ = 79-77
C = 76-74 C- = 73-70 D+ = 69-67 D = 66-64 D- = 63-60 F = 59-0
Attendance:
The Department of English expects students registered for English classes to attend all scheduled class meetings. Moreover, to perform effectively in class and to provide quality input on your peers’ writing necessitates regular attendance and active participation. Therefore, you can miss up to six class periods with no affect on your final grade; you will have withdrawn from (i.e. failed) the course once you accrue six absences. I will take attendance daily. Furthermore, it is your responsibility to find out what you missed and be prepared for the next class. Regular tardiness will also affect your class performance and distract the class in progress; as such, chronic tardiness will affect your grade.
Code of Conduct:
All members of the course must commit to creating a place of study where everyone is treated with respect and courtesy. Everyone must share in the commitment to protect the integrity, rights, and personal safety of each member of the classroom community. This includes helpful, yet courteous, discussion of individual and group writing projects. Additionally, make sure cell phones, pagers, and any other similar electronic instruments are turned off when in class. These devices are not conducive to a learning environment and will be treated as such.
General Education “ACE Statement”:
By passing this course, you will fulfill ACE Learning Outcome 1: “Write texts, in various forms, with an identified purpose, that respond to particular audience needs, incorporate research or existing knowledge, and use applicable documentation and appropriate conventions of format and structure.” Your written work will be evaluated by the instructor according to the specifications described in this syllabus. At the end of the term, you may be asked top provide sample of your work for ACE assessment as well.
