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Tuesday and Thursday 10:30-12:20 - Smith 407 Web Page: http://staff.washington.edu/mjvechin/engl121b_wi06/ Class email list: engl121b_wi06@u.washington.edu Instructor: Matthew
James Vechinski
In English 121, you will write non-fiction argumentative essays. You will learn about certain conventions, practices, and strategies you can use when composing and revising your essay assignments. However, there is no one formula for writing an essay. Writing is situational, and you will need to approach each writing task differently. This course will expose you to various writing situations, and I intend to help you to become aware of the particulars of each situation so that you will be able to write appropriately for the task at hand. Rather than thinking of the course as adapting to a new style of writing, think of the course as an exploration of how writing is situational because you will need to reconsider what you write as well as how you write. In this course, we will focus on writers and readers (those involved in the act of communication through writing) and justified arguments (the message of the writing). Though writing and reading resembles an exchange involving give and take between writers and readers, it is not like a conversation. Writing and reading are not face-to-face interactions in real time; there is a distance involved. How do we communicate our ideas effectively despite this distance between writers and readers? In the setting of this class, your principal responsibility as a reader or writer is justifying yourself. As a writer, you will learn how to address your readers, and this involves more than making your writing clear and understandable. You will need to explain yourself fully in your argumentative essays, providing the necessary evidence for your ideas and relying on logic and organizational strategies to fulfill your readers’ expectations and predispositions. In addition, your writing must convey a sense of purpose that seems significant for your readers. This is a service learning course, which means that during the quarter you will perform 20-40 hours of community service at one local organization that you choose from the possible organizations the Carlson Center has matched with the course. This course involves a serious time commitment because you will need to perform a total of 20-40 hours of service during the 10 weeks of the quarter in addition to the roughly 4 hours of class each week and the normal workload of a five-credit course. Since this is a composition course, you will write about your service experience, but keep in mind that such writing will be only one “text” you will use. You will learn how to analyze various texts and how to engage with them when writing your own original arguments. You must pair ideas from challenging literary and theoretical texts with your experience to help you reflect critically on your experience. Therefore the essays you write for this course will be less about reporting what you did for your organization and more about explaining how your experience relates to the concepts we've discussed in class.
The theme for this course will be “Self and Other.” We'll explore the concept of otherness through theoretical and literary texts that touch on how we form a sense of identity for ourselves and others through a dialectical interaction. This shows us two things: without contrasting ourselves with others, we cannot know ourselves; and both our self-concepts and our concepts of others are continually shifting rather than static. Otherness, although ambiguous, is necessary to how we see ourselves and others. If we say others are “just like us,” we obviously overlook our differences, which are an important part of who we are. If we say others are completely unlike us, we fail to see that our identity exists only in relation to theirs. We'll read texts about sexual identities, multiculturalism, and gender, but we will extend the concepts in these texts to talk about selves and others and the dialectical construction of identity in general. The two major papers will deal with recognition and service. An other often wants be recognized as other and not as the same. Others often seek acceptance, or positive recognition, from the society as a whole. But in certain ways they are unwilling to give up their differences in order to be recognized. Second, you will focus on your own sense of identity when providing a service to an other. One might argue that someone who helps another reinforces difference because the one receiving the help is always at a disadvantage in comparison to the helper. Service is also said to put us in touch with the fundamental similarities among people. With either subject, it is not a matter of emphasizing similarities or overcoming differences. Instead, I will ask you to explore the interplay of similarities and differences in your respective situations (your community placement as well as your personal histories and sense of self). At this time, I don't know exactly what service learning opportunities the Carlson Center will pair with the course, but I've requested opportunities in organizations where your service would inspire you to think about how you define the people you’re serving and how you define yourself in relation to them. It will not be enough to enumerate the similarities and differences between yourself and the people you’re serving; I will encourage you to consider why certain definitions of self and other exist and persist and the consequences of these definitions, especially the consequences for their service learning experience. In order to focus on definitions, you will serve organizations that target a specific population, such as those of a specific ethnicity, socio-economic standing, age, ability, or sexual orientation. Service organizations limit their scope and activities for practical reasons, and you will explore this situated context and the definitions of self and other that surround it and come out of it. This theme is designed to structure the readings for the course and provide a common means of analyzing the different service placements students will have. English 121 is first and foremost a composition course, not a content-specific course.
REQUIRED
Course
reader Carlson
Center Service Learning Student Guide A means of backing up your computer files An active email account and access to the World Wide Web A simple pocket folder A simple report cover
RECOMMENDED
Access to a computer with MS Word A college-level dictionary An expanding file folder, binder, or similar means of organizing your work
NOTE The three required texts and one optional text are available at the University Bookstore. You may purchase these books elsewhere, but please be certain that you buy the proper edition (check the ISBN). Used copies of all texts can usually be ordered from online booksellers.
Syllabus [PDF file; 74.0 KB] Tentative Course Schedule & Due Dates [PDF file; 47.6 KB] Upon request these files are available in large print and in other formats.
All students of English 121 B have their own public blog where they write about their service experience, complete short homework assignments, and discuss course content. The course instructor uses his blog to recap what was covered in class, post homework descriptions, and clarify and further develop course content. To
view or post to these blogs, visit:
Visit my Online Resources for UW Students page. Carlson Leadership and Public Service Center Resources for Students in CIC English Courses English Department Writing Center UW Writing Centers and Resources
Email Matthew about any technical problems with this web page. |
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©
2005 Matthew James Vechinski |
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