Academic
Writing, Fall Semester 2010-11
Dr. Michael Barry
English 1310-02
9:00 a.m.-9:50 a.m. MWF
Briggs 125
Objectives and ground rules
Texts:
Behrens, Laurence and Leonard Rosen. Writing and Reading across the Curriculum. Eleventh Edition. New York: Bedford-St. Martin’s, 2007.
Aaron, Jane. Little, Brown Essential Handbook. [Custom Edition.] Pearson, 2010.
General
guidelines for grading of individual essays in all courses (MB)
Assignment #1, for final week in September
Documentation: What, Where, How?
Summary and Commentary Assignment, due
Oct. 8
Course
Aims:
By the end of a course in academic writing, writers should be able to do the
following: (a) write an essay that is interesting and convincing to the
audience that it targets; (b) organize an essay such that it stays with a
central focus and proceeds logically; (c) write clearly! (d) paraphrase
somebody else’s writing; (e) complete a research project and responsibly
document it; (f) follow a tightly-reasoned written argument (as more than the
mere formulation of a thesis); (g) observe keenly the particularity of their
experience; (h) sense a difference, with their audience in mind, between a
cliché and a freshly formulated idea, between sincerity of voice and a lack of
individuality and commitment, and between a five-paragraph essay and a more
advanced and innovative form; (i) engage in
reflection about writing tasks and critique other students’ writing; (j)
demonstrate an ability to revise; (k) recognize some grammatical terms, so that
they are better able to describe what is right and wrong about a sentence; (l)
write an essay without serious mechanical interference.
This course, by virtue of the book that
we will use and the assignments that you will be given, will have a few special
emphases. (i) Under the “observe keenly” heading, we
will be trying to envision alternatives to what we are given, especially in the
third assignment. (ii) Under the “follow a tightly-reasoned argument” heading,
we will be stressing some extended readings from intellectuals whose thought is
full of import; at the end of the semester, I will ask you to include in your
research writers who are considered to be experts in their respective areas.
(iii) We will also be attending often to journalistic writing; it may not share
a lot with the great authors to which I just referred, but it offers important
lessons in conciseness and the ability to construct a hierarchy of importance
of the ideas you are discussing.
Attendance: Regular
attendance and participation are a necessity for the smooth progression of this
course, as are timely submissions of essays and exercises. If you slack off, it
will show in your grade. This is particularly true since you are graded on
something just about every class day. Your attendance grade (4% of your final
grade) is computed as follows: A=0 or 1 absence, B=2 absences, C=3 absences,
D=4 absences, F=5 absences. 12 absences means failure
for the course. I will accept late essay submissions, but they will be
penalized. The easiest way to spoil your grade and your experience in the
course is to start ignoring deadlines and class meetings.
Missed
work:
Failure entirely to turn in an essay is not comparable to turning in a failing
essay; it is worse. The same is true for drafts and for the final revision--if
the steps are on the syllabus, they are mandatory. Even when an assignment is
not included in the percentages that make up the grade (or minimally included),
it still represents part of the minimum requirement for the course. Failure to
complete such a step will indicate to me that you are withdrawing from the
course, and I will encourage you to do so formally.
UDM
Policy on Plagiarism and Academic Integrity
As members of an academic community engaged in the pursuit of truth
and with a special concern for values, students are expected to conform to a
high standard of honesty and integrity in their academic work. The fundamental
assumption under which the University operates is that work submitted by a
student is a product of his/her own efforts.
Among the most serious academic offensives is plagiarism, submitting
the style of another author or source without acknowledgment or formal
documentation. Plagiarism occurs when specific phrases
or entire passages, whether a sentence, paragraph or longer excerpt, are
incorporated into one’s own writing without quotation marks or documentation.
One also plagiarizes by paraphrasing the work of another,
that is, retaining another writer’s ideas and structure without
documentation.
Students are advised always to set off another writer’s exact words by
quotation marks, with appropriate references. Students avoid plagiarism by
concentrating on their own words and ideas and by fully crediting others’ words
and ideas when they find their way into the writing. Whenever in doubt, cite
the source.
Students that purchase essays from other students or agencies or who
copy from one another or from prohibited sources, commit the most serious type
of academic dishonesty. The consequences of plagiarism, or any act of academic
dishonesty, may range from failure on an assignment or in a course to dismissal
from the University.
Students
with Disabilities
UDM is committed to all students achieving
their potential. If a student has a disability or believes that s/he may have a
disability (including a physical, mental, or emotional disability) that may
require an accommodation, students should contact Emilie Gallegos in the
University Academic Services (UAS) office for further discussion. The UAS
office is located on the ground floor of the
Conferences: You may stop by my office or make an appointment whenever you want. My office is 218 Briggs, and office hours are M 10:00 -11:00 and Th 2:00 -3:00. And by appointment.
Email: barrymg@udmercy.edu
Phone: 313-993-1050.
Web address: barrymg.faculty.udmercy.edu or knowledge.udmercy.edu
Proposals
to make up for missed work: If you miss a quiz and wish to make it up, or if
you do poorly on a quiz and wish to take it again, or miss a class and do not
want it to count as an absence (and, let's say, you want me to count the
completed writing-process step for that day), write me a proposal. Perhaps it
will look something like the example below--but it should also depart from the
example in a way significant enough so that it does not look like a form
letter. I will evaluate the proposal on its merits—its specificity and its
proactive quality will go much farther with me than the excuse that is offered,
and it should be typed and business-like. Proposals can be submitted after the
work is missed, but are more likely to be approved if they are submitted ahead
of time. Emailed proposals should be supplemented by a paper copy.
Sample proposal:
Date: Oct. 20, 2020
To: Michael Barry, Professor of English
From: your name here
Subject: Absence from class on Oct. 23
I will not be in class October 23 because of a family emergency, so I will miss the scheduled quiz. I would like to make it up by talking to you in your office about the assigned reading, and I am free during your office hours on Wednesday, October 25. I will talk to you more about this in class (today—October 20).
Breakdown
of the Course Grade by Percentage:
First essay -- 8%
Second essay – 14%
Third essay – 12%
Fourth essay – 20%
Fifth essay – 30%
Documentation Style exam – 4%
Attendance -- 4%
Exercises – 8%
(A mandatory revision due on date of
final exam – the effect on your grade of the revision will be discussed at the
end of the semester.)
The second-to-last item, “exercises,”
does not include prewriting, reading notes, first drafts, or peer review
worksheets. They will often be included in the grade for the individual
assignment. Under “exercises,” I do include blog entries or contributions to an
online discussion board, informal individual oral presentations, quizzes,
writing on the first day of class, a journalism exercise or two (and requests
that you bring in newspaper clippings), a logic exercise, a topic sentence
exercise, a parallelism exercise, and conciseness exercises, including
passive-voice-to-active-voice. (Note that the 8% of the grade devoted to
exercises may be reduced to 6% if there is no group-authored summary of an oral
presentation assignment, currently envisioned for October 4. The other 2% will
be allocated to the semester’s very first assignment, which will then be 10%.)
Calendar
|
W
Sept 8 |
In-class
essay-writing, and first assignment assigned. (Back
page of syllabus.) |
|
F
Sept 10 |
Essay
by Appiah on cosmopolitan ethics (photocopies). Documentation
style. Important aspects of note-taking. Notes due for first essay. |
|
M
Sept 13 |
Essay
by Sennett on the characteristics rewarded by modern work (Behrens and Rosen
220-230). More notes for first essay. |
|
W
Sept 15 |
Essay
by Carskadon
(Behrens and Rosen 489-496). More notes for first essay. The importance
of audience (your audience and the
source essayists’ audience) … and more on attribution and
documentation. |
|
F
Sept 17 |
Essay
by Coontz (Behrens and Rosen 376-389). Summarizing
(reading for a hierarchy of importance, writing with commitment and
directness). |
|
M Sept 20 |
Appeals
to audience and argumentative warrants. Probably an exercise on journalistic
writing. |
|
W
Sept 22 |
First draft of
argument/ synthesis essay due. |
|
F Sept 24 |
Continued
reflection on first essay. |
|
M
Sept 27 |
First essay due, an argument/
synthesis of several essays on one of the following topics: Twenty-first
Century Work (Ch. 7 of Writing and
Reading across the Curriculum), Family (Ch. 9), or Sleep (Ch. 10). Turn in, as well, the
worksheet that a fellow class member filled in for your first draft.
Information about library online databases. Second essay, summary and
commentary, assigned. |
|
W
Sept 29 |
Contemporary
persuasive or analytic essays for practice with summary. (Probably Blinder on
job exports (Behrens and Rosen 8-13), and
Friedman on saving the earth (Behrens and Rosen 289-300). Blog entries
(for this class period or the next). Quiz likely. |
|
F
Oct 1 |
More
on appeals and warrants. More discussion--or writing--on Blinder and Friedman
and other readings. Possible oral presentation. |
|
M
Oct 4 |
First draft
due of summary for the summary and commentary assignment. |
|
W
Oct 6 |
Further
work on ideas for a commentary. |
|
F Oct 8 |
Second essay due, summary and
commentary. Personal
essays and stories. (Dillard, Walker, Hampl
(photocopies)).Discussion of essays by Joan Kron on
“Semiotics of Home Decor” (photocopies) and Desmond Morris on “Territorial
Behavior” (photocopies). Quiz likely. |
|
M
Oct 11 |
More
on narrative. Strength of verbs, clarity of observation. |
|
W
Oct 13 |
Cliché,
sentence structure variation. |
|
F
Oct 15 |
Third essay due, an analysis of
social codes or socially inflected cultural artifacts. Fourth essay assigned, similar
to the first essay. |
|
M
Oct 18 |
Essay
by Parker on obedience (Behrens and Rosen 712-723). Quiz likely. Brief review
of documentation style exam format. |
|
W
Oct 20 |
Test
on documentation style. |
|
F
Oct 22 |
M.L.
King’s “Letter from a Birmingham Jail” (photocopies). Blog entries (for this
class period or the next). |
|
M
Oct 25 |
Topic
sentences, paragraph unity, |
|
W
Oct 27 |
Patterns
of organization, first paragraphs. |
|
F
Oct 29 |
Essay
by Bettelheim (Behrens and Rosen 651-658). |
|
M
Nov 1 |
First
draft due of fourth essay, and peer review. |
|
W
Nov 3 |
Fourth essay due, a synthesis
of essays in chapters 8 (Green Power), 12 (Fairy Tales), or 13 (Obedience to
Authority). Fifth
essay assigned, a synthesis/argument essay requiring research. Conversation
and collaboration on topics and experts. |
|
F
Nov 5 |
More
on databases. Topics reviewed. Exercises in preparation for selecting and
narrowing your topic. |
|
M
Nov 8 |
Lethem,
“The Ecstasy of Influence” (photocopies, or Academic Onefile). |
|
W
Nov 10 |
Talbot,
“Brain Gain” (photocopies, or Academic Onefile).
Quiz likely. |
|
F
Nov 12 |
Rauch,
“Will Frankenfood Save the Planet?” (photocopies, or Academic Onefile).
Exercise pertaining to December 6 essay topic, including notes on a
substantive source. |
|
M
Nov 15 |
Discussion
of critical thinking. (Reframing the topic, examining assumptions/warrants,
discussing correlation and causality.) |
|
W
Nov 17 |
Catching
up. |
|
F
Nov 19 |
Fowles on advertising appeals
(Behrens and Rosen 539-557). Quiz likely. Parallel structure. See Aaron
29-31. |
|
M
Nov 22 |
Review
of course essentials. |
|
W
Nov 24 |
Exercises
on conciseness. See Aaron 27-29. Also 24, 51 for definition of active and
passive voice. |
|
M
Nov 29 |
First
draft of fifth essay (researched) due.
Some photocopies of sources necessary. |
|
W
Dec 1 |
Pronoun
reference and other grammar interventions. See Aaron 55-62. |
|
F
Dec 3 |
Format
for submission of fifth essay. |
|
M
Dec 6 |
Fifth essay due, pertaining to
the topic of food production, intellectual property, or human enhancement—its
list of sources should look a little like the Table of Contents for one of
the chapters in Writing and Reading
across the Curriculum, and it should include a historical angle. |
|
W
Dec 8 |
More
exercises. |
|
F
Dec 10 |
Instructions
for revision. |
|
Final
exam: Wednesday, Dec 15, 8:00 a.m.-9:50 a.m. |
Due
date for revision of one of the previous essays. |
University
of Detroit Mercy Catalogue Description of this course:
Engages students in
academic inquiry, research, and argumentation: designing research questions;
locating, evaluating, and synthesizing secondary research; performing primary
research to construct new knowledge; employing critical thinking strategies to
develop arguments with purpose, meaning, and significance. In addition to
exploring the influence of traditional print-based genres and rhetorical
contexts, students will develop an awareness of how these contexts are likewise
affected by emerging media. Prerequisite: Placement through SOAR, successful
completion of ENL 130 (College Writing), or approved transfer of 3 credits of
college composition.