Today’s Plan:
- ENG 132
- Syllabus Time
- Talk about Discourse Communities
- Share Communities List
- Homework
ENG 132
Some information about the course:
English 132, or Comp Enrichment (Lab), is a course that is designed to supplement the work students will do in ENG 122. ENG 132 is now offered on campus, meets once per week, and carries one credit. The course content ranges from assistance with grammar, punctuation, and documentation style to peer review of ENG 122 papers etc. The workshops align with the common syllabus, but the class is flexible enough that students in any ENG 122 who are not using the common syllabus will benefit equally. ENG 132 is meant to be helpful, fun, and educational for those who just need an extra boost when it comes to their writing.
The course is open to all enrolled in Eng 122. We do send out a few emails over the summer to many students who have been deemed good candidates for the course based on their SAT/ACT cut scores and HSGPA. I am happy, however, to enroll any ENG 122 student who would like the supplemental instruction or any students you find through early writing in your courses may benefit from the course.
With this in mind, would you please let your students know about the course either by announcing it in class or sending an announcement through your Canvas shell? I am happy to visit with any of your students more about what the class entails and how it might fit into their schedules etc.
If you have any students in mind, please give them the registration information at the bottom of this email. If they have any questions, please feel free to give them my email and office number etc.
sonja.scullion@unco.edu
Course Info:
ENG 132-101 CRN 14948 Meets: Mondays 11:15am-12:05pm 1 credit
Thanks, again, for all of your help with enrolling Eng. 132 (formerly Eng. 198.).
Sonja Scullion
Senior Lecturer, English Dept.
University of Northern Colorado
1163 Ross Hall
Campus Box 109
(970) 351-2636
Identifying a Community
As I mentioned in our first class and throughout our discussion of the syllabus, you will spend this semester writing in a particular community. Let me emphasize that I say writing in a particular community and not writing about a particular topic.
Topic signals “generic area.” You can write about topics to a generic audience. For instance, you could write your standard argumentative paper about immunizations, the death penalty, abortion, etc. But this kind of writing isn’t really aimed at a particular audience or group. It just sort of exists as something for you to hand to me. This is precisely the kind of writing I don’t want you to do.
Research shows that writers develop best when they are writing to a specific group of people about something they all care about. This means we need to find (a) space(s) in which people write, comment, share, reflect, and most importantly *theorize* your interests. By theorize, I mean that people aren’t just reporting news about your topic/activity/interest, but analyzing, debating, critiquing, exchanging, the best elements of your community, the best ways to appreciate your community, how to best be an active member of your community. We aren’t looking for flame wars, but we are looking for informed and constructive disagreement (whether that concerns the best way to tank Susano Extreme, the emotional depth of Jar Jar Binks, the likelihood that Trump raises the debt ceiling, the chances Sammy Watkins becomes a tier one quarterback, or whether Jon Snow will make it through the season). We will talk about this more as you develop your projects, but at minimum I am not interested in projects that report *what* happened, or perhaps even *why* it happened, but rather measure the significance or what happened, projects what might happen next, and explain how to (not) make that happen.
Your writing this semester needs to be responsive. That is: some event happens that people in your community care about. They you read 3-4 pieces by people in the community that share different opinions or perspectives. Then you write a piece that compares and contrasts those perspectives, while situating yourself amongst them and, hopefully, offering new insight. So while each individual assignment might be about a topic (a particular event that just occurred or is about to occur), your writing is primarily directed toward a community of folk. The challenge is in making sure you are reading material that will stimulate good writing. Academic writing–the kind of writing you will be expected to do over the next four years–is intricately tied to reading. It is an act, an art, of putting ideas in conversation. Sometimes you agree with another writer, sometimes you disagree. My aim is to help you learn how to structure an academic argument (whether agreement or disagreement) writing about things that you care about. Learning to structure an argument (how to make a claim, objectively summarize and contextualize another person’s idea, supply evidence to support your idea) should, I argue, transfer to writing situations across different contexts.
But it all starts with reading something insightful, inspiring, and/or irritating (thought is the product of disequilibrium–I define intelligence as the ability to face difference without castigation, hostility, or dismissal; we have to learn how to learn and recognize confusion not as a problem to be solved, but a productive state to be negotiated).
That’s a main reason why the proposal project, outlined below, focuses in on finding writers worth following.
But before we get to the details of the proposal, let’s take a look at the communities we have developed:
- Politics
- Pop Culture
- Game of Thrones
- The Ringer Top 100 shows
- Bechdel Test
- Music:Music, Kendrick
- Comic Books / Super Heroes
- Games
- Sports
Homework
Community research assignment. I want you to write a two paragraph (or more) post for Canvas. In the first paragraph, give us some general sense of what community you want to join, your background with the community, your motivations, etc. In the second paragraph I want you to identify 2 writers who regularly write about your topic well. For instance, if I were writing about race, I would begin with Ta-Nehisi Coates. Do some google searching. Make a bulleted list to three sample articles from each writer (6 articles total). You don’t have to read all the articles, but you do have to skim them enough to know what they are about and what makes them good. We’ll compare lists on Friday.
BE SURE TO EMBED LINKS TO ARTICLES. Get used to writing in a hyper environment. You can find quick instructions for hyperlinking in Canvas here.
