Activity: Analyzing a Literary Blog

http://www.litkicks.com/

1.     What were your first impressions when you clicked on the blog? Were you drawn in? Were you pushed away? Explain your answers.

2.     What is the ratio of text to images and multimedia content on the blog’s front page? Do you think the blog has too much of one or the other? Why or why not?

3.     What kind of audience is this blog for? Give me a quick character sketch of the blog’s prototypical reader… what are his or her other interests? What kind of background, etc.? Would you be friends with this person? How do you know this blog is for that person?

4.     What do you think of the blog’s layout? Does it look up-to-date or does it look old? What do you think the web designer’s goals were? Do you think the site achieves these goals?

5.     How would you characterize the tone of the writing on the site? Is it easy or difficult to understand? What age group or education level does the author seem to be writing for?

In-class Assignment: Find a Blog Post

Post your answers to these questions as a comment on this blog post.

1.     What did you search for to find this post?

2.     What made you choose this post rather than others you looked at?

3.     What kind of introduction does the post have? How does the writer try to hook his or her reader?

4.     What do you think of the blog’s layout? Is it inviting or intimidating?

5.     How does the blogger conceive of his or her audience? Is it for insiders or outsiders? What kinds of knowledge does the author assume of his or her reader? Are these assumptions true of you?

Diagnostic Writing Assignment

I will use this document to form you into groups. Things you might write about / questions you might answer:

·      What role does writing play in your life? Do you write daily? Just for school?

·      Do you consider yourself a strong writer? What are your personal strengths and weaknesses?

·      How do you think writing is important to your long-term academic goals?

·      What writing courses have you taken? What did they teach you? What do you wish they taught you?

Introductory Post Assignment

(DUE DATE: Friday, September 2)

For your first writing assignment this semester, your group will collaborate on an introductory post for your blog. Your post should accomplish 3 main goals:

1. Introduce each group member (including a photo of each person).

2. Establish the subject of your blog, i.e. give your readers a sense of what you will be writing about this semester.

3. Establish the tone and rhetorical style of your blog.

We will spend the first few days of class discussing a number of different blogs and what does and does not work about each. You will also engage in discussions amongst your group members, during which you will negotiate a coherent and appropriate rhetorical approach for your blog based on a target audience that you work together to identify. You should take into account each group member's interests as well as their strengths as writers, since you will be expected to adhere to this plan throughout the semester.

A successful post will (in order of importance):

1. Establish a rhetorical tone that is appropriate to the blog's subject matter and target audience. Not only will the post address this topic explicitly (i.e. a section of the post that will explain the authors' rhetorical approach), but also implicitly through the tone and style of the post itself.

2. Identify a subject for the blog that will serve to link all of the semester's posts. An outstanding post will also give a sense of the authors' unique approach to this theme.

3. Introduce each of the blog's authors in a manner that emphasizes their credibility as authors as well as the common ground they share with their audience.

4. Be free of errors in spelling and grammar.

5. Be formatted in an appealing and consistent manner.

Length: at least 3-4 paragraphs

Unit 1: Literature

Since you are thinking about a major in the humanities, most of you are probably already readers. The ways in which literature is read, analyzed, and interpreted in the academy, however, are very different than how you might read for pleasure. In this unit, we will begin our study of the academy by examining its approach to a familiar form: the short story. Both in class and in your assignments, we will pay particular attention to how arguments are constructed, to whom they are directed, and what constitutes evidence. 

Feeder 1.1 (DUE DATE: Wednesday, September 14)

For your first feeder assignment, you will compose a persuasive essay about a famous short story. Begin by choosing a short story from americanliterature.com’s web site:

http://www.americanliterature.com/sstitleindex.html

There are over 2,000 short stories on the site, so there are a number of ways you can choose one. You might find a short story by an author you’ve always wanted to learn more about, you might scan the titles and find one that jumps out at you, or you might even pick one at random. Be sure to pick one that you don’t loathe, though, because you will also be working with this story for the rest of the unit. You can choose any of the short stories on the site, but I ask that you please not choose a story that you have read before.

After you have read the story closely, compose a persuasive essay in which you argue that the story either is or is not relevant to current, young adult readers like yourselves. You may be tempted to research more information about your story or its author, but I ask that you refrain from doing so right now (we’ll do that in the next assignment!). If you have chosen a story that you can’t understand well enough to write this essay, you may want to try a different story. Similarly, your essay should not include any biographical details about your author: the evidence for your argument should come strictly from the story itself: its setting, characters, plot, themes, language, etc. Your essay should be 4-6 substantial paragraphs, or the equivalent of 2-3 typed, double-spaced pages.

Feeder 1.2 (DUE DATE: Wednesday, September 21)

Now that you have thought about how your story relates to your life and background, it’s time to examine how other authors and critics have responded to it. Using the Library’s e-research tools for literature (http://eresources.lib.unc.edu/eid/subject.php?subjectName=Literature), locate an academic journal article or scholarly book chapter that analyzes your story. We will talk more about this in class, but the article or chapter you find must be scholarly or you will not receive credit for the assignment. Also, please note that your article might not focus exclusively on your story; it is rare to find a journal article that is simply a sustained analysis of one short story, so try to find an article or chapter that devotes at least a few paragraphs to your story. Read the article closely and try to determine its thesis statement and the key evidence the author uses to prove that thesis. You will almost certainly need to look up unfamiliar terms, so be prepared to do a lot of googling as you attempt to understand the article.

After you have fully digested your article, compose an essay in which you summarize the article’s main argument for your blog’s audience. Remember that your article was written for a very particular audience—mostly professors and graduate students—and your blog has a very different readership. Do your best to explain how the material from the article relates to your audience and what they can learn from it. Your essay should be 4-6 substantial paragraphs, or the equivalent of 2-3 typed, double-spaced pages.

Unit 1 Project (DUE DATE: Monday, October 3)

For your Feeder assignments you mostly looked at your story in isolation, trying to understand how it works as an individual piece of literature. For your Unit Project, however, you will begin to understand how this work is part of a wider context. Begin by choosing another short story that is related in some way—either by the same author, from the same time period, set in the same time or place, deals with similar themes, etc.—to the one you already wrote about. Read this story closely, using the critical skills and methods that you have learned in class and in your first two Feeder assignments.

Next, compose a longer essay (equivalent to 3-5 typed pages) in which you pose an argument about how your pieces relate both to one another and to a wider cultural context. Your context can be most anything, but it will probably relate in some way to the aspect of your stories that is related. For instance, if you chose two stories by the same author, you might explain how each of these fit into the author’s larger career trajectory. If you chose two stories set during World War II, you might explain how the war influenced these stories and how literature changed in response to the war. In addition to reading and re-reading your stories carefully, your essay will require some outside research in order to prove your thesis.

A successful essay will:

·      Present an original and surprising thesis that helps the reader to understand the context of the stories you examine.

·      Use scholarly research to support the author’s claims about the works’ cultural contexts.

·      Include thoughtful, sustained analysis of both of the stories.

·      Cite all sources in a manner appropriate for the blog and its audience.

·      Be written in a lively, engaging and authoritative style.

·      Be free of errors in spelling and grammar as well as visual formatting.

Unit 2: History

One of the most important tenets of the modern academy’s approach to history is the idea that we should not limit ourselves to writing about famous people who did important things. In this unit, your own life and history will be the focus of your study. Rather than mere self-reflection, however, we will use the tools of the modern historian to understand and appreciate the value of both our lives and the lives of the people close to us.

Feeder 2.1

As we begin Unit 2, we will spend much of our class time looking at modern historical research and asking many of the same questions of it that we asked of literary research in Unit 1. What kinds of arguments do historians pose? What kinds of evidence serve to prove these arguments? As we formulate answers to these questions, each of you will compose a historical biography of one of your group members. Most of you are young, so these biographies will be short—4-6 substantial paragraphs, or the equivalent of 2-3 typed pages—but in them you will use the tools and methods of the modern historian. Also like a modern historian, your biography must contain a substantial argument in which you will explain why this person’s life should matter to your readers. You must support this argument with the use of primary evidence such as documents, photographs, interviews, and other materials. A successful essay will not simply be a “puff piece” that relates facts about the subject; instead, it will make the reader feel as though learning about this person was a valuable use of their time.

Feeder 2.2

For your second Feeder assignment you will begin gathering information for the family history you will compose for your Unit 2 Project. For this assignment, choose the city or town that was most important to your family’s development; it may be the city your family has lived in all your life, it might be where your parents met, or if you moved around a lot it might be somewhere an important life event happened. Once you have chosen your city, find an academic journal article, book chapter, or other scholarly resource about your town and summarize it for your blog’s audience. Like your Feeder 1.2 assignment, you will need to explain to your readers how this research relates to them and why it matters to them. For those of you who come from larger or better documented cities, you may want to narrow your research to one historical moment or period. For those of you who come from smaller towns, don’t worry; it might take a little work, but you will be able to find a scholar who has studied your town. Your finished essay should be 4-6 substantial paragraphs, or the equivalent of 2-3 typed pages.

Unit 2 Project (DUE DATE: Friday, November 4)

For your Unit 2 Project, each of you will compose a family history that poses an argument about your family’s relationship to the place you studied in your Feeder 2.2 assignment. Like your Feeder 2.2 assignment, a successful essay will not simply be of interest to your family members. Rather, the argument you pose will be of interest and valuable to your blog’s wider audience. Remember, you are not simply collecting your family history, you are critiquing that history and explaining why it matters. You can choose how far back you want to go; some of you may only talk about your immediate family, while others may go back a few generations. However, your essay should 1. explain how the current generation of your family relates to the place in question, and 2. support your argument(s) with the kinds of primary (photographs, documents, interviews, etc.) and secondary (academic resources like the ones you looked at for Feeder 2.2) resources used by modern historians.

A successful essay will:

·      Present an original and surprising thesis that shows the influence of place on the author’s family history.

·      Use both scholarly research and primary evidence to support the author’s claims about the history of both the author’s family and the place associated with them.

·      Include thoughtful, sustained analysis of the primary sources.

·      Cite all sources in a manner appropriate for the blog and its audience.

·      Be written in a lively, engaging and authoritative style.

·      Be free of errors in spelling and grammar as well as visual formatting.

Unit 3: Art History

In Unit 3, our focus will move to the study of visual art. Using the same strategies we applied to literature and history in units 1 and 2, we will work together to determine what counts as evidence and proof in the academic discourse of art history. We will then use this knowledge both to understand your favorite artists’ work and to understand and appreciate the work of artists with whom you are unfamiliar. You will present many of these arguments using software called VoiceThread, which will allow you to easily create mini-documentaries about your chosen artist’s work.  

Feeder 3.1

Do you have a favorite visual artist? If so, search for his or her work on the internet and check out some images. If not, try searching sites like the-artists.org for an artist that you would like to write about.

Much like earlier feeder assignments, for this post you will identify and summarize a scholarly article about the artist you chose. There are numerous electronic databases of academic art history articles listed on the library's web site, but you may want to start with Art Full Text, the first database on the list.

Once you find an article about your artist (make sure it's from a scholarly art history journal!), you can begin by determining the author's thesis statement. What is the controversy or debate into which s/he is entering? What is his or her position? How do other art historians differ in their opinions?

Once you have determined the author's thesis statement, compose a post (length: equivalent to 2-3 typed pages) summarizing the article's argument for your blog's audience, noting the main theses of each article and what kinds of evidence and arguments the author employs. Is any piece of evidence particularly convincing or unconvincing? Why or why not? Feel free to express your own opinion if you deem it appropriate.

Feeder 3.2

Now that you've gotten your feet wet in art history, it's time to do a little criticism of your own. Choose a different image by the artist you wrote about for Feeder 3.1 and compose a VoiceThread that contextualizes that image within a specific historical, artistic, or cultural context. Think about what supplemental information could help your audience understand and appreciate the piece more fully. For example, you might explore the connections between your piece and works of art from similar movements and/or time periods or you might give your audience information about the historical or political circumstances in which the piece was created. Though your VoiceThread will probably include other images, sounds, etc., your focus should be the formal qualities of the work you are attempting to explain. In other words, try to make clear, specific, and detailed connections between the formal choices the artist makes (colors, framing, medium, etc.) and the contextual material that you present. The audio track for your VoiceThread should total 3-5 minutes.

Unit Project (DUE DATE: December 7)

For your Unit Project I would like each of you to visit the Ackland Museum on campus and compose a VoiceThread (length of audio track: 4-7 minutes) that contextualizes one of the pieces of 20th or 21st-century art currently on display in the museum. (Note: the museum has strange hours and is closed on Mondays and Tuesdays, so don't wait until the last minute! You can see their hours here). You will want to include a digital image of the piece from the Ackland's web page in your VoiceThread.

As for the content of your VoiceThread, I would like you to argue that, through the piece you selected, the artist has attempted to achieve a particular social or aesthetic goal (examples: documenting the plight of slaves across the Middle Passage; illustrating how our perceptive faculties impact the way we see the world; exploring how 3-dimensional objects are represented in 2-dimensional space) and assess whether the artist achieves that goal. While you might include some historical, biographical, or other contextual information, your VoiceThread should consist mostly of a sustained analysis of the piece's formal qualities.

A successful VoiceThread will (in order of importance):

1. Be focused around a sophisticated, surprising thesis about the author's political, social or aesthetic motivations.

2. Include thoughtful, sustained analysis of the chosen piece of art.

3. Include and address potential counter-claims to the author's argument.

4. Cite all sources in a manner appropriate for the blog and its audience.

5. Be delivered in a lively, engaging and authoritative style.

6. Be free of errors in spelling and grammar as well as visual formatting.

Syllabus

English102i	Instructor: Daniel Lupton
Fall 2011	Office: Greenlaw Hall 307
Office Hours	Monday / Wednesday / Friday 10:00AM-10:50AM
Email	dlupton@email.unc.edu

Course Description

The goal of English 102 is to introduce students to the conventions of specific types of written academic discourse. Typically, UNC students participate in one unit each in the natural sciences, social sciences, and humanities. This course, however, is targeted at students who anticipate pursuing a major in the humanities, so instead we will explore three different humanities units: one each in art history, history, and literature. Rather than traditional papers, in this course students will create blogs that explore how the conventions of academic discourse interact with the conventions of more popular media.

Draft Workshops

In English 102i you will work closely with your peers, reading, evaluating, and collaborating on work with one another in group-centered draft workshops. Your participation in these workshops is MANDATORY, and poor performance in them (i.e. failing to give helpful comments to your peers, consistently pulling the discussion off-topic) will adversely affect your grade for that unit.

Required Texts (Available in Student Stores)

Student Guide to English 100, 101, and 102
The St. Martin’s Handbook

In addition to the above texts, it is required that you bring your fully-charged laptop to every class meeting.

Attendance

More than one absence over the course of any given unit will adversely affect your grade for that unit and any student who accumulates more than five absences over the course of the semester will receive a failing grade. If you have extreme circumstances which require you to miss several classes (i.e. mononucleosis, the death of a close relative, etc.) please let me know as soon as possible so that there may be as little disruption to the operation of your group as possible. Please note that there is no distinction between excused and unexcused absences.

Assignments

Your first assignment of the semester will be the first post to your group's blog, which will be an introductory post that introduces the members of your group and establishes the subject and rhetorical style of your blog that you will follow all semester. We will devote a great deal of class time to this post and I encourage you to take it very seriously, since the first post to a blog often establishes the tone that a blog will follow for some time.

You will produce three finished products for each of our 3 units: two feeder assignments, which will either develop skills you will need or help you put together preliminary research for your unit assignment, and a more extensive unit project that will encompass all of the things we’ve studied in class. At the end of each unit each student's work for their blog will be evaluated based on criteria we have developed in class. Blogs will be evaluated along with your participation in class to determine your grade for the unit.

All blog posts should be formatted properly according to the conventions of published blogging.

Late posts are not only unprofessional, they are unfair to your fellow students who worked hard and turned their papers in on time. Posts are considered due by the end of class on the due date unless another time is specified by me. Late posts may or may not be accepted, but they will be strictly and severely penalized.

Even more unacceptable than late work is plagiarism. All instances of plagiarism will be prosecuted in the honor court to the fullest extent allowable by university policy. If you are thinking of plagiarizing, remember that it’s not difficult to tell your writing from a professional’s and I can probably find the original source as easily as you did. You will get far more from the course if you do the work yourself, and your grade will always be better if you work hard on a mediocre assignment than if you plagiarize an excellent one.

Grading

Four grades will be assigned in this course, three letter grades for your cumulative work in each of the three units (including you blog, drafting, pre-writing, class participation, etc.) and one letter grade for your group's presentation.

Obsession with grades is a severe impediment to the writing process, and the perception that one must write to the teacher’s desires rather than one’s own artistic and academic ambition is a key cause of bad writing. No one wants to read the kind of lifeless prose most people think will earn them an A, thus no piece of writing in this class will receive a grade. Grades will only be assigned for your cumulative work in the unit, including final drafts, preliminary drafts and participation in draft workshops and in-class assignments.

The Writing Center (http://www.unc.edu/depts/wcweb/)

Students are encouraged to visit the UNC Writing Center (located on the lower level of Phillips Annex). The tutors at the writing center will work with you one-on-one through problems or concerns about any stage of the writing process and can provide useful feedback between in-class draft workshops. Please note that the writing center tutors will not edit or proofread your papers.

Course Web Site and Blackboard Site

As a computer-intensive course, the internet will be an integral means of communication between yourself, your teacher and your group members. You are expected to check the course web site (http://lupton102ifall2011.blogspot.com/) regularly. You can log in to our Blackboard site with your ONYEN at http://blackboard.unc.edu. If you have trouble accessing the site please alert me as soon as possible, as many of our assignments will depend upon this technology.

Email Correspondence

If office hours are inconvenient students are encouraged to communicate with me via email with the caveat that I will respond at my convenience. I will not review drafts via email; if you are grappling with specific issues you may send a section of your post, but no more than two paragraphs at a time.

Plagiarism

Plagiarism is defined as the unattributed or unacknowledged use of another’s words or ideas and is a breach of the honor code. If I suspect you of a willful violation of the honor code, I will report you to the honor court. See your Student Guide for further information on plagiarism.

Course Calendar