Dec 11, 2024

2018-2019 Catalog

2018-2019 Catalog [ARCHIVED CATALOG]

WRI 101 - Course list for Writing in the Liberal Arts

WRI 101 helps students develop the skills of writing in the liberal arts: critical analysis of texts, exploration of and deliberation about public and intellectual issues; familiarity with research strategies; understanding the conventions for using with integrity the work of others; and crafting inventive, correct, and rhetorically sophisticated prose. The subjects for writing in the course vary by instructors.

Spring 2019 Sections

WRITING 101 [0] Know Thyself: Writing, Editing, and Self-Knowledge
T R 1:40 - 2:55
Lawless

How well do you know yourself? We sometimes imagine that we come by our knowledge of ourselves in quite acts of introspection, executed in long bouts of solitude. But when you reflect on what it means to be you, you do not do so in a vacuum. You rely on resources that your society has provided for you. You draw on the language and stories of your community to make sense of your experiences, needs, and aspirations. And you benefit from conversation with others, who will challenge your assumptions and provide perspectives that transcend your own. In this course, we will explore the ways in which public discourse affects our senses of who we are, for better or for worse.

Throughout the semester, students will complete a series of short, ungraded assignments, in which they will practice the diverse skills involved in writing, editing, and revising. In addition, students will draft and revise four major writing projects. First, students will analyze and critique a published personal essay, identifying ways in which the author fails to recognize or to comprehend important aspects of his or her own story. In the second and third projects, students will analyze and critique public discourses about anger and disease (respectively). Here, our goal will be to identify the unspoken (and sometimes pernicious) assumptions that underlie these discourses, and the ways in which these assumptions distort our senses of ourselves. Finally, students will write their own personal essays, in which they will attempt to grapple with the ways in which public discourse has shaped their self-conceptions.

WRITING 101 [A] Astrobiology: Life in the Universe
TR 8:15 - 9:30
Thompson

Are we alone? Is there life elsewhere in the Universe? These questions hold much public interest, and the answers to them would have profound scientific, religious, and philosophical implications. To fully appreciate any answer that may be found, we must first explore a different question: What is life? The answer to this seemingly straightforward question is not simple at all, and has been one of the great debates among scientists. Is there one definitive answer as to what constitutes life? Does the answer to this question depend upon where in the Universe the life in question resides? In this course, we will explore life on a variety of scales, including life on and near Earth, life on Mars, life in the Solar System, and life in the Universe. As we move farther into space away from our Earthly home, science has provided less evidence and we therefore must rely more heavily on our own beliefs, knowledge, and creativity to formulate meaningful stances about the possibility of life on the grandest of scales. The course will be organized in four sections, each exploring the meaning and current understanding of life on the scales mentioned above, from Earth to the Universe at large. Students will be asked to complete four writing projects, each exploring the meaning and current understanding of life on one of the size scales mentioned above. Each project will consist of one or two low-stakes, unrevised writing assignments and one larger piece that will be drafted and revised.

WRITING 101 [C] Fantastic Fanatics: Studying Fandom
MWF 8:30 - 9:20
Campbell, S.

When you imagine devoted fans, you might think of people waiting all night in line for Infinity Wars tickets, screaming at a concert, or painting themselves blue before every home football game (and maybe some away ones). The word fan comes to us from the mid 16th century (from the French fanatique or Latin Fanaticus), when it was used to describe people who behaved as if possessed by a god or a demon. In America, the word “fan” was derived from fanatic in the late 19th century and used to characterize people passionate about the new sport of baseball. Today, we cannot deny the power of fandom in contemporary culture, as evidenced by massive fanfiction output, merchandise purchasing, sports popularity, and all types of cons.

Over the semester, we will consider this topic from a multi-disciplinary perspective through four major units, each culminating in a writing project. We will begin with the rise of modern fandom in literature, then consider fandom as a gendered and gender blending/bending phenomenon before turning to the economics of sports fandom. The semester will culminate in researching fan communities (literal or virtual). Through diverse readings, discussions, and writings, we will explore the concept of fandom, asking, and attempting to answer, one key question: what does it mean to be a fan?

WRITING 101 [D] Language and Identity
TR 12:15 - 1:30
Fernandez

This course invites you to examine and evaluate the relationship between language, identity, and the expression of voice and agency in academic and public life. In generations past, academic and professional success often depended on a person’s ability to conform to privileged discourses-ways of thinking and using language valued by the upper classes-while shedding all traces of a home language, culture, and identity. Although some individuals achieved public success this way, numerous personal testimonies attest to the painful losses, both to oneself and one’s community. Some literacy scholars, concerned with inclusive classroom spaces and communities, have proposed alternatives such as greater acceptance for codeswitching, English vernaculars, and multilingualism, in school and at the workplace. Others argue that the rules of the past still apply, that while inclusive and flexible approaches toward linguistic and cultural difference may help some individuals in the short term, the lack of emphasis on traditionally privileged discourses undermines students’ academic and long-term career prospects. These critics suggest, first, that the power of individuals to change the status quo is limited, and second, that personal and/or cultural losses, are a small price to pay for success in academic and public life. Because these issues touch each of our lives as students and as citizens of the world, all students, regardless of linguistic or cultural background, will find the course relevant.

WRITING 101 [E] Fake News, Real Science
TR 3:05 - 4:20
Campbell, A.

We are inundated with information from multiple sources, but how do we know what is fake news vs. valid information? Students will compare some well-known biological misconceptions as depicted in the popular press and in scientific literature. We will apply scientific principles and experimental data to evaluate fake news and substantiated understandings. Students will be guided in methods for drafting and revising their work which will be critiqued by classmates. Course work includes a number of brief, low-stakes written assignments, as well as consistent engagement with course readings through regular participation in class discussion. Two minor the three major written projects are required, each of which involves detailed analysis of texts, while also challenging students to articulate and defend their own positions based on publicly available data.

WRITING 101 [F] Disadvantage and Privilege
TR 9:40 - 10:55
Delia Deckard

In the United States, the best predictor of being a poor adult is having been born to poor parents. Children of incarcerated parents are six times more likely than their peers to be incarcerated as adults. Each of the writing assignments, and the majority of the seminar’s discussion will ask you to attend to a single question: “What are the systems through which disadvantage and privilege replicate across generations in the United States?” Students will be asked to complete daily reflection assignments - short, low-stakes, unrevised and evaluated for improvement - as well as draft and revise four major projects. The first project asks students to reflect on a contemporary debate about an issue of inequality, critically engaging with the argument being made. The second and third projects require the student to construct arguments parallel to those exemplified in articles. The fourth and final writing assignment is an original argument, made in response to a specific prompt.

WRITING 101 [G] Know Thyself: Writing, Editing, and Self-Knowledge
TR 3:05-4:20
Lawless

WRITING 101 [J] #MeToo: Speaking Sexual Violence
TR 9:40 - 10:55
Horowitz

This course examines the rhetoric of #MeToo, the most recent iteration of the movement against gender-based violence, in the context of earlier representations of sexual harassment and assault. We will begin by studying recent historical flashpoints in the national dialog about sexual abuse, including the Anita Hill hearings (1991); David Mamet’s play Oleander (1992); President Bill Clinton’s impeachment (1998); and the Boston Globe’s exposé on the Catholic Church (2002). Approaching #MeToo as a genre of storytelling still taking shape, we will uncover emerging tropes and patterns in the narration of experiences of sexual abuse, in media portrayals thereof, and in the critical backlash. Based on our investigations, we will attempt to answer the questions, “Whose and what kinds of stories of sexual violence are likeliest to capture a national audience? Whose and what kinds are likeliest to be silenced or ignored, and why? Our rhetorical analyses will follow the method advanced in David Rosenwasser’s and Jill Stephens’s Writing Analytically. The first assignment asks students to analyze the organizing themes and contrasts of a popularly circulated #MeToo story of their choosing. In the second, we will uncover assumptions about who and what constitutes an “ideal victim” in our class readings. The third assignment asks students to use a theoretical text on narratives of sexual abuse as a lens through which to interpret characters’ actions and motivations in a fictional work on the topic. For their final project, students will perform close textual analyses of interviews with women faculty about their experiences of workplace sexual harassment and situate them with respect to the narrative properties, possibilities, and limitations we have identified as shaping the broader movement.

WRITING 101 [K] Voice, Noise, Sound, Sense
MWF 10;30 - 11:20
Rippeon

If “voice” commonly refers to both human “speech” and a writer’s “style,” how do literary artists, cultural critics, theorists, and philosophers engage with these simultaneously overlapping and divergent concepts of “voice”? What does it mean to “find your voice,” to “have a voice,” or to “lose your voice”? What is “noise,” who decides, and what are the stakes of making this determination? This seminar will encourage its members to consider how speaking and writing-and their complimentary concepts listening and reading-mutually inform one another in various literary, artistic, and cultural contexts. We will furthermore explore and experiment with our own practice of “voice,” and will consider the acoustic ecology of the Davidson campus and community.

In this course, students will complete numerous low-stakes writing assignments (e.g., blog posts, Response Papers, discussion outlines, etc.), as well as four major writing projects that will each be subject to a series of process drafts and peer revision. In the first project, students will begin writing about sound and voice as objects of critical study. The second project asks students to analyze the function of sound and/or voice in a specific literary, cultural, artistic, or cinematic text, and the third project asks students to explore issues of acoustic ecology. The fourth project asks students to apply sound-studies discourse to texts and/or conditions of the contemporary social and technological moment.

WRITING 101 [L] Voice, Noise, Sound, Sense
MWF 11:30 - 12:20
Rippeon

WRITING 101 [M] The Ethical Diet
TR 12:15 - 1:30
Jankovic

What is good food? The simple answer-that it is tasty and healthy food-is too quick. In addition to ourselves, our food choices affect non-human animals, local and non-local economies, and the environment. We should seriously consider the idea that in deciding what to eat we make important moral choices.

In this course, we aim to acquire tools that will help us enter a reasoned public and academic discussion about our food choices. We will ask questions such as: Does the suffering involved in the industrial farming of animals make it immoral to consume animal products? Do we have moral obligations to non-human animals? To what extent do our food habits contribute to social injustice? Is the amount of food wasted in rich countries immoral, given that billions of people are hungry? We will look at several contemporary movements that try to address the ethical problems with the standard American diet: vegetarianism, veganism, locavorism. We will aim to articulate and assess the conception of good eating developed by these movements.

You will be asked to complete four writing projects. Each will consist of a series of assignments spread over four weeks. Only the final paper in each project will be graded.

WRITING 101 [N] Writing India and Pakistan
TR 3:05 - 4:20
Waheed

How has a lack of critical historical thinking contributed to the ways in which the peoples of India and Pakistan have been misrepresented through the lenses of modern empires (British and American) and narrow nationalist frames (Indian and Pakistani)? What are the political implications and consequences for South Asia today, as a result of the abuse of history? In this course, we will examine the construction of historical myths when it comes to India and Pakistan. This writing course introduces you to the tools and interpretive practices associated with historical writing. Moreover, you will learn about the importance of closely reading primary sources, and how to write about them. You will examine a range of issues of caste, as well as Hindu-Muslim relations. The overall aim is to introduce you to modes of historical writing and analysis. In addition, we will examine the dangers of historical narratives that are not grounded in close archival research, as well as the implications of political writing that misunderstands or misconstrues history to advance arguments without relying on contextualized evidence. You will also be introduced to writing historical analysis by avoiding flawed reasoning. Lastly, while most of the readings will deal with the region of South Asia, not all texts we encounter will be specifically about South Asia, but will introduce you to the importance of historical discourse.

Fall 2018 Sections

WRITING 101 [A] Writing about Modern Physics and Technology
T R 9:40 - 10:55
Yukich

This is a writing-intensive course designed for first-year students. We will examine the fundamentals of several areas of 20th-century physics and related technology, including quantum physics and nuclear energy, and development of the transistor, the atom bomb, and the laser. We will also consider the social ramifications of these technologies. The central theme of the course is to learn to write concisely and unambiguously-for the educated public-about science and technology. All of the major assignments and much of our discussion in this course will focus on this theme; however, the skills developed through this theme and immediately applicable in all technical areas, including business, law, medicine, and engineering.

Readings will include a book, book reviews, news reports, and journal articles. We will examine readings with various degrees of formality and critique texts of varying quality. We will consider how good science writing must depend on the intended audience. The major assignments will include a book review of QED by Richard Feynman, a physics news report on a recent development in physics, a persuasive essay for or against nuclear power, a narrative of an historical development in physics or technology, and a final project. Secondary assignments will include a scientific abstract, peer review critiques, other informal writings, and regular grammar exercises. The course focuses on writing about science and does not assume any background in physics.

WRITING 101 [B] From Campfire to Cloud: The Evolution of Jewish, Christian, and Muslim Scripture
MWF 11:30 - 12:20
Snyder

The Hebrew Bible, the Christian Bible, and the Qur’an all have their origins in speech: oral stories from nomadic people about God, about Satan, about angels, patriarchs, matriarchs, kings, queens and prophets, collections of parables, aphorisms and tales of miraculous events. Eventually, these oral stories were committed to writing and assumed new life as scriptures that continued to evolve from handwritten manuscripts, to standardized, printed editions, and now, to digitized form in the cloud. We’ll begin by exploring the profoundly different mentalities of oral and literate societies. Then, by creating our own hand-written papyrus manuscript with ink and reed pens, we’ll experience the difficulties encountered by scribes and readers. What happens when scriptures are refracted by the act of translation? We’ll examine this question with special reference to the Hebrew Bible and the Qur’an. What happens when all these scriptures are standardized
in print? And how is the meaning and authority of scripture being affected right now as it is digitized and committed to the cloud? These questions can be explored by looking at our very own phones and other digital media.

The course features four writing projects, each of which passes through distinct stages that will prepare you for every paper you’ll write in college: assimilating academic books and articles, capturing your ideas, drafting, revising, and revising again. Along the way, we’ll form a collaborative community of writers and editors, learning how to comment helpfully on the work of others and to benefit from the comments of our fellow writers.

WRITING 101 [C] Voice, Noise, Sound, Sense
MWF 11:30 - 12:20
Rippeon

WRITING 101 [D] Writing Medicine
T R 8:15 - 9:30
Vaz

Writing involves more than putting pen to paper or fingertip to keyboard. It is a challenge that invites us to go beyond the mundane and the obvious to the intriguing complexities inherent in any subject. In this course, we will extend ourselves to this invitation by exploring the knotty, ethical issues that emerge in the patient-physician relationship and in the application of certain medical technologies; our topics will range from patient rights to cosmetic surgery to neuroenhancement.

You will write six essays in this course (ranging from close reading exercises to a research paper), and each successive essay will help you practice and build upon the skills you learned in the previous ones. We will approach writing as a process of critique and craft that begins when we generate ideas and continues through the stages of revision; we will pay close attention to the texts we read, and practice how to effectively incorporate them through intertextual argumentation; we will shape our writing to suit various audiences by tailoring our style and content; we will learn to evaluate sources and synthesize research materials so that we can tackle arguments with increased complexity.

WRITING 101 [E] Writing China
T R 9:40 - 10:55
Rigger

How can we write about China in ways that capture its nuance and complexity yet are accessible to English-speaking readers? The rise of China from self-isolation to global economic, political, and cultural influence is one of the most powerful developments in our age. It is a fast-changing story; it seizes our attention and doesn’t let go. Easy answers elude us; complexity overwhelms certainty. Writers who seek to tell the story of China’s rise face both technical and ethical challenges. It is impossible to capture the full range and variety of experiences within China in a single text; simplification is inevitable. But when does simplification become oversimplification-even stereotyping? What is the appropriate balance between presenting factual information and placing that information within a broader context? Does judgment automatically imply bias? These are questions journalists and scholars who write about China struggle with every day. In this course we will look at writing about China with these questions in mind. We will develop skills and practices of good writing through reading good writing that takes China as its subject and by analyzing texts to see how they respond to the question, “How should we write about China?” Through a sequence of writing assignments, students will cultivate skills in reading, argumentation, research, revision, and editing.

WRITING 101 [F] Building Stories
T R 9:40 - 10:55
Churchill

How does architecture influence what we can do and who we can be? How do the structures we inhabit (including language, stories, and arguments) shape what’s possible in our lives? Architecture is not a passive structure we occupy; it shapes our minds and imaginations, influencing what we do and how we do it. In this course, we’ll explore physical and virtual spaces, ranging from homes, prisons, and hospitals to blogs, websites, and digital archives. We’ll also approach writing as a form of architecture, breaking out of the predictable five-paragraph essay blueprint in order to imagine essays as more enticing dwelling spaces for your readers to inhabit. The course itself inhabits the digital realm; this website is the course hub; you will learn to write for web publication; and you will design a WordPress site on your own Davidson Domain to showcase your work throughout your career at Davidson. No previous technological training is needed, but creativity, critical thinking, and a collaborative spirit are required.

WRITING 101 [G] Democracy’s Bodies
T R 12:15 - 1:30
Fox

Typically, we think of democracy as a political arrangement based on particular ideals, a mode of participatory governance first enacted in ancient Greece and valued today for its commitments to communal decision-making, civic inclusivity, and its preference for freedom over tyranny. In the case of the United States, the promise of democracy is echoed in the words of the Declaration of Independence, which asserts “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” as the primary virtues to be cherished and preserved for all citizens.

But democracy is more than abstract values and governmental procedures. It is, as we will argue in the course, a way of engaging in social life-in a very real sense, a mode of being, or at least a generative idea about which much of our lives are managed and measured. How has democratic life in the United States been experienced by persons who find disjunctures between democracy’s promises and their everyday lives? How have citizens addressed their frustrations, disappointments, and critiques of democratic life, and what are the special challenges of publicly representing those interest? Likewise, how have citizens, in articulating such concerns, enacted the rhetorical promise of open inquiry, critical thought, and autonomous self-governance which lies at the heart of the Declaration itself?

Students will be invited to respond to a variety of discourses that disentangle the complexities of democratic life, among them Susan Griffin’s Wrestling with the Angel of Democracy, Danielle Allen’s Our Declaration, Tony Kushner’s Angels in America, and several essays written by public intellectuals. In four major writing projects, students will analyze how the experience of democratic life has been variously represented in discourse, will argue about how independence and autonomy are carried out in social and political contexts, and will create personal declarations of independence intended to be made public. The course has been designed to help students identify and respond carefully and critically to others’ claims and arguments in ways that activate their own intellectual sensibilities, informed points of view, and rhetorical interests as writers.

WRITING 101 [H] Voice, Noise, Sound, Sense
MWF 12:30 - 1:20
Rippeon

WRITING 101 [I] The American West
M W 2:30 -3:45
Garcia Peacock

What is the American West? Where is the American West? And, why does discussion of the ways in which its diverse people, places, and spaces have changed over time ignite passionate debate among historians and the public alike? In this writing seminar, we will pursue answers to this region since the nineteenth century. A series of writing projects will help students gain broader and more nuanced understandings of the West by pursuing three key themes: race, environment, and representation. Each of these writing projects will take the form of a multi-week sequence of activities aimed at encouraging critical and close engagement with a wide range of texts, including: journalistic writing, creative non-fiction, scholarly articles, historical monographs, and visual material such as painting, photography, public art, and the landscape itself. By the end of the course, students will emerge with a portfolio of five essays that should, as set, offer a unique perspective on how and why the American West remains a relevant topic and site of debate in early twenty-first century.

WRITING 101 [J] In a Family Way
M W F 11:30 - 12:20
Plank

This course focuses on the nature and diversity of American family experience as it shows itself in selected literary memoirs. In doing so, it will ask throughout about the process of recollecting a life and writing about it, how the story we tell ourselves is also a story of others, especially those we know as kin; and, it will probe these stories for what they tell us about the impact of gender, race, class, generation, and ethnicity in the shaping of family experience. These are big questions. We get at them by the smaller tasks of reading and good texts well day after day and writing clearly about them. The smaller tasks add up and may be the greater endeavor after all.

The writing assignments include a number of short essays (in the vicinity of 5-6) that may range from a paragraph to 4-5 pages. These may involve matters of style (the power of a well-chosen word, a paragraph that does what paragraph ought to), questions of interpretation (explanation, analysis), or thematic concerns (back to that family and why everyone is talking about his or her father). As a final project, each student will write an episode of family narrative (7-8 pages) with commentary (2-3 pages) relating that narrative to two other works read in the course. We will focus less on how much we write than how well. Texts for the course include: Alison Bechdel, Fun Home; Mary Karr, The Liar’s Club; Li-Young Lee, The Winged Seed; Tracy Smith, Ordinary Light; and Tobias Wolff, This Boy’s Life.

WRITING 101 [K] Justice and Piety
M W F 8:30 - 9:20
Shaw

This course offers students a chance to investigate an age-old and central question of political life: what is the relation of political justice and religious faith? While most of us in 21st century liberal democracies assume that politics and religion have nothing in common-or at least, ought to remain entirely separate-political philosophers have long acknowledged their intimate and mutually implicative relationship.

We’ll explore this relationship by reading closely and discussing extensively writings that span several literary genres (epic poetry, history, drama, and philosophy) by four Greek authors: Homer, Thucydides, Sophocles, and Plato. We’ll attempt this task as well by means of both informal (ungraded) and formal (graded) writing assignments, including an independent research paper. In all assignments students will be encouraged to articulate and defend their own interpretations and points of view.

WRITING 101 [L] Embracing Good Argument: Deliberation in Democratic Life
T R 9:40 - 10:55
Hogan

Critics and citizens alike worry about the quality of our political and civic discourses, pointing to hostile interactions, propagandistic tendencies, flawed reasoning, and a general agonistic atmosphere as symptoms of an eroded and corrupted contemporary discourse. Many Davidson students are interested in pushing back at this new status quo in order to help the country return to more civil and reciprocal exchanges. This course offers students the tools for doing so by focusing on the social and rhetorical action called deliberation, the act of weighing alternative claims and positions through robust conversation among persons who disagree about issues that matter and are eager to discover commonalities as they are to acknowledge differences. The course poses an overarching question that will revisited as the seminar evolves: How can public disagreement become productive rather than combative? Drawing upon classical rhetorical techniques, students will evaluate and produce arguments in response to four contemporary issues that have been approached and valued differently by persons who hold contrasting personal and/or political commitments, are shaped by multiple ideological assumptions, or adhere to various values, norms, and ideals. Students will be guided in methods for drafting and revising their work and will be given opportunities to have their arguments responded to by interested readers.

WRITING 101 [M] Imagining Africa
T R 12:15 - 1:30
Wiemers

How has the idea of Africa been produced, contested, and used as a political tool? In the late nineteenth century, the concept of Africa emerged as an instrument of imperial power. At the same time, it became the basis for a wide variety of projects for solidarity and liberation by people of African descent in and beyond the continent. Both of these imaginations of Africa have continued, in various forms, to the present. The course centers on a set of central questions: What are the implications of how we imagine and describe the world? How have the categories that governments, activists, and scholars used to describe “Africa” helped them shape and reshape the world? What kinds of politics, interactions, and knowledge were made possible by particular visions? What possibilities were foreclosed? As we work to develop facility with argumentative writing, we will also use these questions to become more critical about the terms of our own analysis.

In the class, you will produce four major writing assignments, each of which will be drafted, peer-reviewed, and revised. You will also complete a number of low-stakes, unrevised, analytical pieces, including reading reflections and brief film and media reviews. Students will spend significant time reading, commenting, and offering suggestions on each other’s writing. Over the course of the first three essays, you will learn to engage critically with a wide variety of texts, including critiques of category of African from V.Y. Mudimbe’s 1988 The Invention of Africa to Binyavanga Wainaina’s popular 2006 satire “How to Write About Africa”, as well as the works of scholars and activists who have used the idea of Africa as a platform for critique, community, and social change (including Marcus Garvey, Aimé Cesaire, Julius Nyerere, Walter Rodney, and others). We will put these texts in conversation with one another, and use them to analyze primary sources ranging from turn-of-the-20th-century West African newspapers to contemporary movies and music videos. In the final project, you will analyze a contemporary imagining of Africa from a popular media source of your own choosing.

WRITING 101 [N] Democracy’s Bodies
T R 12:15 - 1:30
Hillard

WRITING 101 [O] Democracy’s Bodies
T R 9:40 - 10:55
Hillard

WRITING 101 [Q] Know Thyself: Writing, Editing, and Self-Knowledge
M W F 11:30 - 12:20
Lawless

How well do you know yourself? We sometimes imagine that we come by our knowledge of ourselves in quiet acts of introspection, executed best in long bouts of solitude. But when you reflect on what it means to be you, you do not do so in a vacuum. You rely on resources that your society has provided for you. You draw on the language and stories of your community to make sense of your experiences, needs, and aspirations. And you benefit from conversation with others, who will challenge your assumptions and provide perspectives that transcend your own. In this course, we will explore the ways in which public discourse affects our senses of who we are, for better or for worse.

WRITING 101 [R] Speaking Freely
M W F 10:30 - 11:20
McKeever

Freedom of speech is a widely recognized right and value. In the United States, the Constitution confers on it a fundamental legal status. It also enjoys widespread (if not universal) cultural recognition as a core political value. Lying beneath this near consensus that free speech is a good thing, lies a host of disagreements. Some of these concern the basis of free speech rights. Why is a right to free speech important and what goals does it serve? Other disagreements concern the proper limits on free speech. When should we take steps to limits the speech of others and ourselves? Still other disagreements concern the enforcement of limits. Even if we agree that someone should not be speaking as they are, what steps may we take to stop them? If we cannot call the police, can we nevertheless exercise the ‘heckler’s veto’ and shout them down? Finally, we encounter disagreements about the costs of free speech. One may think that free speech is a critical right while also thinking that this imposes costs on others, for example the cost of hearing speech that is insulting, traumatizing, or even threatening. That a piece of speech makes a person feel unsafe is a common complaint. But some take such complaints very seriously while others dismiss them as a symptom of oversensitivity. In this course, our organizing questions will be what are the value, proper limits, and costs of free speech. Obviously, these issues are matters of significant political dispute. This course will assume that these questions lack simple answers and that a wide range of moral and political responses to them merit our attention. We will read legal, political, and philosophical arguments concerning free speech. We will also attend to how public discussion of contemporary events represents free speech as a value. Students will be asked to regularly complete short, low-stakes, and ungraded writing assignments to facilitate skill building. Students will also complete four main writing projects on specific topics bearing on free speech. The process of drafting and revising will be emphasized.

WRITING 101 [T] Critical Reading and Writing
M W F 11:30 -12:20
Gay

During this semester, students and the course instructor will work as a team to answer one complex question: What is critical thinking? In this quest, we will read a series of non-fiction texts intended to develop critical reading skills and write a series of essays intended to develop critical writing skills.

In addition to periodic short writings planned to cultivate composition skills and interpretive powers, students will produce four formal essays: one that demonstrates the capacity to see all sides of an issue and examine new evidence that might challenge previously held beliefs; a second that exhibits the ability to reason dispassionately and integrate claims backed by evidence; a third that displays an aptitude to deduce and infer conclusions from available facts; a fourth that offers an answer to our big question: What is critical thinking?

WRITING 101 [U] The Apocalypse
M W F 9:30 - 10:20
Blum

Television shows like The Walking Dead and Battle star Galactica; the biblical Book of Revelation and Stephen King’s The Stand; movies such as Armageddon, The Day After Tomorrow, and the Terminator series… Across genres, cultures, and history, people are fascinated by stories about the end of the world. This course will examine an array of apocalyptic narratives in order to answer one overarching question: what does the apocalypse mean? By comparing different types of apocalyptic narratives-both religious and not-this class seeks to determine why we continue to create and tell stories about the end of the world. The course will include substantial course papers that explore the apocalyptic theme in different genres and compare its manifestation in different sources, and a number of shorter, lower-stakes writing assignments that engage with specific texts along the way.

WRITING 101 [V] the Apocalypse
M W F 10:30 -11:20
Blum

Television shows like The Walking Dead and Battlestar Galactica; the biblical Book of Revelation and Stephen King’s The Stand; movies such as Armageddon, The Day After Tomorrow, and the Terminator series… Across genres, cultures, and history, people are fascinated by stories about the end of the world. This course will examine an array of apocalyptic narratives in order to answer one overarching question: what does the apocalypse mean? By comparing different types of apocalyptic narratives-both religious and not-this class seeks to determine why we continue to create and tell stories about the end of the world. The course will include substantial course papers that explore the apocalyptic theme in different genres and compare its manifestation in different sources, and a number of shorter, lower-stakes writing assignments that engage with specific texts along the way.

WRITING 101 [W] The Apocalypse
M W F 12:30 -1:20
Blum

Television shows like The Walking Dead and Battlestar Galactica; the biblical Book of Revelation and Stephen King’s The Stand; movies such as Armageddon, The Day After Tomorrow, and the Terminator series… Across genres, cultures, and history, people are fascinated by stories about the end of the world. This course will examine an array of apocalyptic narratives in order to answer one overarching question: what does the apocalypse mean? By comparing different types of apocalyptic narratives-both religious and not-this class seeks to determine why we continue to create and tell stories about the end of the world. The course will include substantial course papers that explore the apocalyptic theme in different genres and compare its manifestation in different sources, and a number of shorter, lower-stakes writing assignments that engage with specific texts along the way.

WRITING 101 [X] Writing India and Pakistan
T R 8:15 - 9:30
Waheed

WRITING 101 [Y] Monsters
M W F 9:30 - 10:20
Sample

Ghosts. Zombies. Vampires and werewolves. What is it about monsters? Why do they both terrify and delight us? Whether it’s the haunted house in Tananarive Due’s The Good House (2004), Kanye’s monster persona in My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy (2010), the walking dead in Colson Whitehead’s Zone One (2011), Native American werewolves in Stephen Graham Jones’ Mongrels (2016), or even white suburbia in Get Out (2017), monsters are always about more than just spine-tingling horror. This writing class explores monstrosity in the 21st century, paying particular attention to intersections with race and gender. Through a sequence of writing projects we will explore a central question: what do monsters mean? Our first project asks students to reflect on the home as a space of monstrosity. Our second and third projects address the idea of the monstrous other. Our final project uses contemporary literary and media theory to understand how monsters expose the limits of what counts as human. Along the way, we’ll experiment with our own little Frankenstein-like compositional monsters…