Instructor Expectations
- Guide students to sources and help them critically evaluate and synthesize the sources into their own writing.
- Require multiple drafts on all major papers that include instructor and peer response to student writing, as well as revised writing.
- Require 12-15 pages of polished writing.
- At least two major essays.
- A persuasive writing project of at least six pages that includes at least four cited sources documented according to MLA style.
- Assign approximately 10-15 pages of informal writing, which might include exploratory writing, journal writing, audience analysis, and responses to assigned readings.
- Require at least 100 pages of reading including authors representing diverse perspectives.
- Assign 2-4 pages of formal or informal writing that reflects the student’s understanding of the writing process.
Course Requirements
To pass this course, you must complete all the major assignments, fulfill all the weekly assignments, and submit all the writing assignments on time. You need at least a C- (70%) in order to complete the course i.e. not be compelled by the University to retake it. You are expected to attend all class sessions, participate in discussions, writing workshops, and in-class group exercises. Because this is a reading and writing course, you will be expected to read and write thoughtfully in response to the texts each week—luckily for you, we will be reading & watching some interesting, entertaining, intellectually engaging texts this semester!
Completion of all peer evaluation & feedback workshops is mandatory! Failure to complete both rounds of peer review for each of the two formal essays (without making other arrangements with me well in advance) will result in a loss of those point—around 2.5% each, all told 20% of your final grade! If you can’t complete a peer workshop for any reason, make arrangements ASAP!
Grades
40% | Essays:
- 15% - Essay 1: Personal Mission Statement (1500 words, about 6 pages)
- 5% - Essay 2: Research Proposal & Outline
- 20% - Essay 2: Rhetorical Analysis of Yourself (2000 words, about 8 pages)
10% | Peer Workshop Evaluation & Revision
- 5% - 2 evaluations & revisions of Essay 1 (5%)
- 5% - 2 evaluations & revisions of Essay 2 (5%)
25% | Weekly Canvas Assignments:
- Writing Experiments
- Reading Responses
15%| Participation
- Engagement with peers in weekly discussions
10%| Self-evaluation
- 15 points - Essay 1 Self Evaluation
- 15 points - Essay 2 Self-Evaluation
- 20 points - Grade Yourself
| 100% to 94% = A | 93% to 90 % = A- | 89% to 86% = B+ | 85% to 83% = B | 82% to 80% = B- |
| 79% to 76% = C+ | 75% to 73% = C | 72% to 70% = C- | Below C- must retake the course! |
Major Essays
Essay 1: Researched Mission Statement (150 points, 15%)
Specifications:
- 1500 words,
- double-spaced, 1-inch margins, numbered pages
- 12-point Times New Roman font
- 8 research sources
- 3 of which MUST be Peer-Reviewed Academic Journals
- Liberal use of direct quotes
- A correctly formatted MLA-style Works Cited page
You will research your future ambitions & write a mission statement in which you will layout a tentative roadmap for the attainment of your professional and personal goals, the life you are working towards right now as young, newly legal adults.
Consider: Who do I want to become?
You get to decide!
We can’t control what happens to us, nor our privileges, nor our lack thereof, but we can be artful, strategic, confident, powerful in the way we claim ownership of our lives, our stories, on the page. Writing in academia is about presenting yourself for the intellectual consideration of others. Developing these core writing skills will help you actualize the future you imagine, if you learn how to present yourself most persuasively on the page! The page is a space where we can take ownership of our stories, our lives, in a way that benefits us.
People speak and write very often about the “journey” to find oneself. People go on journeys of self-discovery and then return to pronounce “I found myself” or “I got in touch with myself.” Humans all lose ourselves, very often in one another. Sometimes this is wonderful! But for this essay, your assignment, rather than tell me who you believe you are, is to write about the person you want to become; project yourself into the future.
Think of the assignment as a declaration to yourself, an announcement of intent to the future! Tell the story about how you envision getting from today to tomorrow—that ideal future toward which you are working by being here at this fine university whether you know what exactly you want to become. Focus on the broad stroke—the things you most want for yourself in the future, and then research to find a viable trajectory!
What is your career path?
What are some projected salary and benefits associated with your professional development?
What is your quality of life? Where do you live? With whom? What kind of home/neighborhood do you imagine? Do you have a partner, an active social life, professional success? What do these things look like, based upon your informed projections?
This is not a contract with the future. This essay is an imaginative exercise. I want you to project yourselves into the future; daydream on the page, and then research a path to get there.
Writing is a recursive (cyclical) process, and research is an essential part of that—even when you are writing about yourself!
Consider how practical/sensible/likely are your chances of living the life you envision for yourself and evaluate that on the page.
You may use narrative or rhetorical analysis to craft an essay about who you might become 1500 words! That’s not many words for such a big task, so you’ll need to be strategic and focused!
Consider what are the most important aspects of your identity, your interests, your ambitions, and ask how you might convey these things clearly and succinctly in a well-researched projection of your future life.
Consider your unique and particular privileges1, not only associated with identity, but family and community. What are your support systems? How will these structures help you achieve your goals?
Here are some generative questions to help guide your process:
Where do you imagine yourself in 5, 10 years?
What does your life look like?
Where do you want to be vs. where else might you be?
Who do you want to become?
What kind of work are you doing? What does it pay? What is your mortgage? Where do you live?
How does your day play out? You wake up, get ready, do you eat, workout? Where do you go next?
How do you get there? What people do you encounter? What do things cost? How do you pay?
How are you dressed? What technology exits? What trends in innovation that you see know make your ideas about future technology credible?
Address those aspects of your imagined future life seem most rich for exploration and research. These questions are suggestions, and many more than you could answer in such a short paper. Paint the reader a picture with words of what your life looks like in 5, 10 years (however far into the future you like). Persuade us that you can get from there to here by demonstrating your understanding of the steps along the way. In other words: RESEARCH.
Essay 2: Rhetorical Analysis of Yourself (200 points, 20%)
- 2500 words
- Double spaced, Times New Roman 12 pt. font, 1 in. margins
- Name, class #, professor, semester in upper left-hand corner, single spaced
- An original title!
- 8 research sources
- 4 of which must be from peer-reviewed academic journals
You will write a 2500-word rhetorical analysis of yourself, drawing upon familial history, biographical information, interview with family/friends, research related to your focus (for example: genetic traits and markers), cultural identity, ethnography, biology, aesthetics, personal experiences as you develop an understanding of yourself and present it to the reader.
Your task is to persuade the reader that you understand yourself, your contexts; in other words: that you understand who you are in relation to the world, your family and culture, the past and the future.
You establish ethos here by interrogating those elements of yourself that bear consideration.
This is not a deconstruction but rather a reconstruction of your life, your experiences, in coordination/ conflict with the people and culture around you.
As a rhetorical analysis, your task is to “examine and explain how an author [in this case you] attempts to influence an audience.” Interrogate yourself on the page. What things are you doing to project the person you wish to project vs. the person you are? How might you better navigate the world, society, toward the realization of those goals you imagined in paper one.
Your analysis should not simply paraphrase or summarize what you have said, but rather should provide a way of understanding how the text—you—persuades the audience. You want to record interviews with family members about your life, their lives. Use direct quotes. How does the past filter into your life? This analysis will draw your people and life experiences. Examine and explain your decisions, your history, your predispositions