In the wake of Donald Trump’s statement, while visiting England, that he didn’t take questions from CNN because “CNN is ‘fake news,’” Dr. Joshua Habgood-Coote wrote an opinion piece in The Conversation arguing that we should delete the term from our vocabulary: It’s easy to think that everyone knows what “fake news” means—it was Collins Dictionary’s word of the year in 2017, after all. But to think it stops there is mistaken—and politically dangerous. Not only do different people have opposing views about the meaning of “fake news”, in practice the term undermines the intellectual values of democracy—and there is a real possibility that it means nothing. We would be better off if we stopped using it. Habgood-Coote goes on to offer a number of examples of uses of the term to demonstrate that it means wildly different things to different people in different circumstances, so much so that the term is now essentially meaningless. Yet we continue to hear it used daily across a wide range of media and even in college courses that try to deal with the contemporary phenomenon. I’m inclined to agree that the term is no longer helpful in that it has no clear meaning or referent. For my part, I’d rather use “misinformation,” defined as false or incorrect information intended to deceive. This broad definition allows for other subcategories—disinformation, clickbait, propaganda, perhaps even “fake news” if it earns a clear definition. But almost as soon as I wrote these words I said, “Wait a minute: why not just the word ‘lie,’” which the OED defines as “a false statement made with the intent to deceive.” Sounds a lot like the definition of misinformation I’ve come across in many sources. What’s up with that? By coincidence, I happened to hear a piece on NPR that addressed this very issue. When a reporter for NPR called several statements Donald Trump made on his first day in office “not true” or “false,” she said her inbox “exploded” with people asking her why she didn’t just call a lie a lie. Apparently the folks at NPR had discussed this very question and decided that the word “intent” was key: since the reporter could not read Trump’s mind (what a thought!), she could not say anything about his intent but rather about his words. So NPR rarely if ever uses the word “lie” in such situations, preferring to stick with “untrue” or “false.” But that still leaves me with a question about “misinformation.” Turning again to the OED, I find this by-now familiar definition of misinformation: “False or inaccurate information, especially that which is deliberately intended to deceive.” Sounds a lot like a lie, right? And indeed, the OED gives as first definition of the noun lie, “an intentionally false statement.” So now I’m wondering whether “misinformation” is simply a euphemism for “lie,” which term to use in what instances, and especially how best to engage students in making such distinctions and in making sure that they are using such terms with precision. If you have thoughts on dealing with this terminological thicket, please send them along! Image Credit: Pixabay Image 2355686 by Wokandapix, used under a CC0 Creative Commons License ... View more

Today's featured guest blogger is Bill Leach‌,  Liberal Arts Program Chair and Assistant Professor of English at Florida Institute of Technology What do alien abductions, cops chasing robbers, and binge drinking zombies have in common? They’ve all been subjects of one-act plays written by student groups in my introduction to literature classes over the years.   I’ve always been a fan of introducing creative writing opportunities to students as a method of reinforcing the elements of short fiction, poetry, and drama.  Many of my ideas are not really mine at all. Our university uses The Bedford Introduction to Literature, edited by Michael Meyer, and there are gems of writing ideas embedded in the text just waiting to be mined. These ‘Creative Responses” are sprinkled throughout, such as writing your own 55 word short story or writing a three minute phone call or email conversation between two characters based on the brief play Reprimand. These ideas can be incorporated as journal entries, test questions, and group activities.   I introduce group work early in the semester, which allows group members to get to know each other’s strengths and weaknesses and provide a sense of commitment to the group for completing the tasks assigned. Toward the end of the semester, I introduce the groups to the project of writing a script for their own one-act plays. Years ago, I started this activity by asking the groups to write an alternate ending to the play Am I Blue by Beth Henley, which deals with many issues young adults face today. This activity also works in writing an alternate ending to Death of a Salesman. Studying original plays and writing in groups takes up a good chunk of classroom time, so I searched for shorter activities because of the premium associated with classroom time.   That's when I stumbled across the website 10-Minute-Plays.com. The site not only provides multiple examples of short plays, but it also provides students easy to follow directions on how to compose their play, which reinforces the concepts of plot structure.  Here’s an example of directions from the site:   Page 1:  Set up the world of your main characters (exposition) Page 2:  Something happens to throw your characters’ world out of balance Page 3-4:  Your characters struggle to restore order Page 5:  Just when your characters are about to restore order, something happens to complicate matters     Page 6:  Your characters either succeed or fail to restore order   The brevity of the 10 minute play allows students to work with the structure of drama, introducing conflict and providing a resolution just as longer, traditional plays do. In addition, the shortened format saves on group and classroom time, allowing for more in-depth discussions of other genres such as short fiction and poetry.   The students really enjoy the activity and work well together writing the scripts and even acting out the parts. It is a fun way to end the semester, and student feedback shows it to be something they learn from and remember.   As a caution, though, instructors need to be involved in the brainstorming part of the process, guiding students toward appropriate topics. If not, you may find yourself in the middle of many dramatic renderings describing drunken zombies fighting aliens! ... View more

A week ago, I would have cringed, ducked (and maybe even shrieked) at the image on the left, captured recently by a skillful neighbor.   This fall, though, I’m a brand-new student in an evening Master Naturalist course, and so I find myself leaning into such sights, empowered by the fresh knowledge that this is a harmless, even dazzling, yellow garden spider. Not only that, I can see details I would have missed a few days ago. I can discern the telling zipper pattern on the body, and with a quick glance at my notes, I can even confirm the Latin name, Argiope aurantia, and show off my knowledge that the webbed zigzag of silk is called a stabilimentum. What I used to ignore or avoid has now come into focus with fascinating clarity. How have I been missing these details all these years? What more can I learn?   In her essay, “The Language of Discretion,” Amy Tan captures this exhilarating experience concisely: “Once I added ‘mauve” to my vocabulary I began to see it everywhere.”   This is a good time to reflect on both the fear and fascination of learning, since our writing students are also shuttling between fear (“Every assignment still feels like a risk!”) and a bit of growing confidence (“Hey! I can understand at least parts of this difficult reading … and I have something to say about it, too!”).   In my last post, I wrote about inviting students to self-reflect on their reading and writing process in journals. (Their insights are often hilarious, and they are slowly doodling some magnificent covers. I’ll share more in a future post.)   Now, I want to reflect on how challenging these academic “habits of mind” are, as we guide our students to practice them, however tentatively, in our writing classrooms. My co-author, Stuart Greene, and I, open From Inquiry to Academic Writing with the “habits of mind” of academic writers, starting with:   Inquiry — through observation, asking questions, and examining alternatives Seeking and valuing complexity — through reflection, examining issues from multiple points of view, and asking issue-based questions.   Let’s remind ourselves how rare these activities are in our culture. They may have been rare, too, in some of the classrooms in which our students either thrived or failed. After all, in an age of information-overload, people often prize (and are praised for) simplistic summaries that enable them to make a confident-sounding pronouncement, and move on to the next topic. In contrast, the “habits of mind” we ask our students to develop involve seeking more questions than answers, and opening up complex possibilities that include and value their experiences. These habits call for what José Antonio Bowen calls “slow thinking.” Our task is to model for our students the pleasures of what sounds like frustrating work. (Why lean in to peer at that spider? Because a web of meaning becomes visible when we do.)   Here’s an accessible Practice Sequence of activities you could use, or adapt, to demonstrate the value of these habits of mind:   Inquiry — through observation, asking questions, and examining alternatives: Find out through  searching what the most popular majors are on your campus. Is there anything that surprises or puzzles you? Write down any questions you have, including: Why are things the way they are? What alternative explanations can you provide to account for differences in the popularity of the subjects students major in?   Seeking and valuing complexity — through reflection, examining issues from multiple points of view, and asking issue-based questions: Imagine other perspectives on the data you found on the most popular majors on your campus. How might other students, or parents, explain your findings? What explanation might faculty members offer, both those who teach in those majors and those who do not? (You could seed this conversation with any number of recent sources on the workplace value of the humanities.)   Exercises like these can help students “see” aspects of their own campus and community for the first time, and set them to wondering: Why? The answers are multi-faceted, will raise additional questions, and will reveal the way their own experiences and decisions are woven into this new knowledge. And … they’re off and running, if not toward delight, at least toward interest in what had been invisible.   What adult learning experiences have shaped your own teaching? What webs of meaning fascinate your students right now? Photo credit: Anne Brown ... View more

This week I am sharing the second writing assignment in the series of assignments I designed for my technical writing course. The series focuses on tasks related to a fictional business incubator, the Ut Prosim Incubator. The first assignment asks students to share the basic information about their company in a memo. Once they establish a company name and focus, students are ready to undertake messages related to their companies. In the scenario for the second writing assignment, students deal with changes they need to make to support an influx of new employees, hired with the investment funds provided by the incubator. The goal of this assignment is to help students learn about the differences between letters and memos by designing guidelines for the ways that their companies will use the different kinds of correspondence. Specifically, in order to fulfill the assignment, students have to be able to explain how letters are different from memos. The assignment below has some minor changes to remove specific information that is relevant only to the students in my classes. References to “Markel & Selber” in the assignment refer to chapters in the class textbook Technical Communication by Mike Markel & Selber and Stuart Selber. Background You will create guidelines that your employees will use as they communicate with others inside and outside the company. The goal is to ensure that your company’s letters, memos, and emails have a uniform appearance and style. The Scenario Using the investment funds from the Ut Prosim Incubator, you have just expanded your company by hiring 20 new people. When there were just a few of you, it was easy to make sure everyone presented a consistent message. Now that there are nearly two dozen people making contacts, you will need to be more proactive to ensure that your company correspondence with clients, vendors, local regulators, and the public represents your company consistently and professionally. To address this need, you will write a memo to all employees that explains the letter-writing style and format that your company follows and include a sample letter that illustrates the style and format as an attachment. For your assignment, write the related documents: the memo explaining your letter-writing style and format the letter illustrating the style and format Relevant Details Your company’s address is [Your Company Name], Ut Prosim Incubator, 1872 Inventors Way, Suite #[you choose a number], Blacksburg, Virginia 24060. Your company’s phone number is 540-555-5555. You may create a fictional Internet domain for your company, and use that domain for a web page address and your email addresses. If you’d like, you may create other information (including a logo) for your company as appropriate. The Project Assignment Step 1: Explore the characteristics typical of correspondence in your field. Think about the documents that you have seen from businesses in your field as your own. You can search the Internet and the textbook for examples as well. Consider characteristics of these documents such as the following: Are they formal, informal, or somewhere in between? How is the company’s contact information conveyed in/on the document? Does the document take advantage of any special features to establish a company brand? What sets the documents apart from those that would be created by people in a different field? What sets the documents apart from those of competitors in the same field? What strategies does the correspondence typically use to emphasize important information? Step 2: Decide on the general style your business will follow. Decide on the expectations you will set for your company’s correspondence. Brainstorm a list of required information, details on the typical look and feel, and other features you want employees to include in the letters that they write. Include everything from how to open the letter to the closing and expectations for signatures. If there is specific information that should always be included in letters, model how that information should be included and demonstrate it in your example. Be sure to consider how to emphasize important information and create organizational structures in your letters (relying in particular on Markel & Selber, Chapter 14). Additionally, create a letterhead format for your company, using appropriate details. Step 3: Analyze the audiences for your memo. You will write a memo to all employees in your company that explains your company’s style and format for letters. Use the information from Markel & Selber, Chapter 5 to decide how the characteristics of the audiences will influence the writing that you do. Consider the questions in Figure 5.2: Audience Profile Sheet and/or the Writer’s Checklist at the end of the chapter to guide your analysis. Step 4: Compose a letter illustrating the style and format your company will follow. Use the information your gathered in Steps 1 and 2 to write your example letter. Be sure to demonstrate how to emphasize important information and how to organize the letter in a way that makes it clear and easy to read. For the content of the letter, you can use placeholder text. See the article, How to Use Lorem Ipsum Dolor Placeholder Text, for examples. If you prefer, you may use real letter text that you write as well. Despite the use of placeholder text, be sure that the required layout and format is clear and that any specific details required (such as the signature expectations) are demonstrated. Step 5: Write a memo to all your employees with the details on your company’s letter style and format. Compose your memo, as requested in The Scenario above, with all the details you have gathered and created. Attach your example letter, and point to it as examples of your style as appropriate. You may add annotations to your letter, like the examples in the textbook, if you choose; but be sure that you connect your annotations to your memo directly. As you work, keep the following points in mind: Use plain language to make the ideas easy to find and read. Refer to the resources from Module 2 as needed. Follow the suggestions for emphasizing important information, using the Writer’s Checklist for Chapter 9 to check your work. Follow all relevant ethical guidelines as you work using the Writer’s Checklist at the end of Markel & Selber, Chapter 2. Make a good impression with accuracy and correctness. Your correspondence should be polished and professional. Step 6: Check the drafts for your example letter and your memo for correct use of memo style and format. Be sure that you include the appropriate headings and expected features for correspondence. Review your project, using the Writer's Checklist for Chapter 14 (on page 386 of Markel & Selber). Step 7. Review your draft for design and basic writing errors. Everything you write should use accurate/appropriate image editing, grammar, spelling, punctuation, mechanics, linking, and formatting. These are important basic writing skills that you should have developed in high school. Review your project, using the Writer’s Checklist at the end of Markel & Selber, Chapter 10. You can also consult the information on “Sentence-Level Issues” in Markel & Selber, Appendix, Part 😧 Guidelines for Multilingual Writers (ESL). While the section is labeled for multilingual writers, it is useful for everyone. It includes explanations and examples for many common mistakes writers make. Step 8: Submit your draft to your Writing Group in Canvas. Post a rough draft of your info sheet to your Writing Group in Canvas in the 09/05 Draft Feedback Discussion in Canvas. Additional instructions are in the Discussion. Post a draft of your bio by September 6. If you are late submitting a draft, your group may not have time to provide feedback. Step 9: Provide feedback to your Writing Group in Canvas. Provide feedback to the members of your writing group in the 09/05 Draft Feedback Discussion in Canvas, by September 10 (end of the grace period). Use the information on the Writing Groups page to provide constructive feedback that will help your group members make concrete improvements to their drafts.  Step 10: Revise your draft. Use the feedback that you receive from your group members to revise and improve your document. You can share your draft again with your Writing Group, if you desire. As you revise, keep in mind the advice in the steps above, as well as the Assessment Criteria below. Step 11: Include a polished version of your project in Project Portfolio 1, due October 1. Have your Correspondence Project finished and ready for submission in your Project Portfolio 1, which is due Monday, October 1. The grace period for Project Portfolio 1 ends at 11:59PM on Thursday, October 4. Assessment Criteria For All Technical Writing Projects All technical writing projects should meet the following general criteria: Makes a good first impression as a polished and professional document. Meets the needs of the intended audience. Fulfills the purpose or goal of the project. Demonstrates how to emphasize important information. Uses layout and formatting that makes information easy for readers to find and read, and that follows the standards you have set for your company. Is written in plain language, which communicates the ideas clearly. Follows all relevant ethical guidelines. Uses accurate/appropriate grammar, spelling, punctuation, mechanics, linking, and formatting. For Letters Your project should meet the following criteria for effective letters, based on the checklist at the end of Chapter 14 of Markel & Selber: Uses letterhead stationery for the first page. Includes the date. Includes the complete and correct inside address. Uses the appropriate courtesy title. Includes an attention line, if appropriate. Includes a subject line, if appropriate. Uses the appropriate salutation. Capitalizes only the first word of the complimentary close. Includes a legible signature legible, with the writer’s name typed beneath the signature. Includes an enclosure line, if appropriate. Includes a copy and/or courtesy-copy line, if appropriate. Uses one of the standard letter formats. For Memos Your project should meet the following criteria for effective memos, based on the checklist at the end of Chapter 14 of Markel & Selber: Uses the identifying information that adheres to your organization’s standards. Includes a specific subject line. States your purpose clearly at the start of the memo. Summarizes your message, if appropriate. Provides appropriate background for the discussion. Organizes the discussion clearly. Includes informative headings to help your readers. Highlights items requiring action. As I originally designed the assignment, it also included an email message. Students were to write an email to their co-founders, asking them to review the memo and letter and offer any advice for improving the message. I like the idea of asking students to demonstrate an understanding of the characteristics of email messages in addition to letters and memos. Given the other work in the course however, I decided that adding an email component would be too much. With more time for the unit, I would certainly consider including it. The next assignment in the sequence focuses on technical description in a rewrite of an assignment I designed to ask students to think about diversity in the workplace. Come back next week to read more, and if you have any feedback for me, please leave a comment below.   Photo credit: Edwin B. Stimpson Company Rivets (Brooklyn, New York) 1925 by Paul K on Flickr, used under a CC-BY 2.0 license ... View more

Victoria Banks is a graduate student at Kennesaw State University working towards a Masters in the Arts of Professional Writing with a focus in interactive narrative design and script writing in videogames. She teaches First-Year English Composition and Rhetoric courses and writes as a freelance video game journalist. Victoria’s experiences with new media rhetoric influence her teaching philosophy in the classroom, which encourages student exposure to various forms of multimodal composition. Every semester in my first-year composition classes, I receive the same question: “Is it ok for me to do this?” “This” always refers to a definite and unbreakable rule drilled into the students’ subconscious since high school, a rule so ingrained in them that they struggle to trust or rely on their own judgement of the rhetorical situation for which they are writing or to extend their writing into new mediums. Many students zealously follow these rules no matter the situation. However, if FYC instructors allow students to participate in multimodal forms of writing, students can begin to understand that rules, rather than set in stone, are all based on genre conventions and rhetorical situations. Using multimedia projects and themes in English Composition classrooms will expose students to various types of writing they will encounter in academia, in their future careers, and in their everyday lives. Course Themes – Sports and Games As an English instructor, one of my goals is to teach diverse forms of composition and rhetorics, including those in multimedia. In doing so, I hope to change students’ understanding of “unbreakable” writing rules and instead encourage them to practice assessing rhetorical situations. It is for this reason that I chose to theme my courses around a multimodal field, games. In particular, my assignments are related to sports, video games, and board games. Each of these areas often involve intensive writing, despite public perception, and including them in my class changes my students’ preconceived ideas about what writing is and exposes them to multimodal composition. It also allows students to view various rhetorical situations and genre conventions. Another bonus is that students are excited by the prospect of going to a sporting event or playing a video game as a part of their research. Assignment My “New Media Argument” assignment focuses specifically on this goal. Students learn to assess a rhetorical situation before composing their own video around a topic in games. These videos could include anything from sports commentary, athlete interviews, “let’s plays” (documenting gameplay with the player’s commentary), and other video content exploring issues and arguments around games. Background Reading The St. Martin’s Handbook: Chapter 2: Rhetorical Situations: 2a, “Making good Choices for your Situation”; 2f,  “Thinking about Genres and Media”; 2g, “Considering Language and Style” and Chapter 18a, “Consider your Rhetorical context” The Everyday Writer: Chapter 3: Rhetorical Situations; Chapter 4: Exploring Ideas EasyWriter: Chapter 1: Writer’s Choices: 1d, “Considering the Assignment Purpose”; 1f, “Researching Appropriate Audiences”; 1h, “Considering time, genre, medium, and format” Everything’s An Argument: Chapter 16: Multimodal Arguments Assignment Learning Objectives Students will be able to identify the rhetorical situation (purpose, audience, and context) for their multimodal argument. Students will practice defining and working within genre and medium conventions. Students will compose arguments using rhetorical appeals, hands-on research, and multimedia rhetoric.   Project Components Script and Outline 5-10 minute Video Reflection Essay Project Steps Assessing the Rhetorical Situation Before students begin, they must first determine their argument’s purpose and the audience of their video. Once this is defined, students choose a genre that best fits their goals. Writing around sports and games appears in several forms and styles. Together we examine current genres of  videos, including let’s plays, video game walkthroughs, game ratings and critiques, sports commentary, sports interviews, athlete rankings, podcasts, video essays, and more. Each genre has a different purpose, audience, and medium. By analyzing them, students can understand how other writers make composition choices based on rhetorical situations and thus begin making their own argument in the genre of their choice. Planning Once students understand their purpose, audience, and medium, they continue into the planning and research stages. This includes outlining ideas and crafting a schedule for completing components of the project, such as scripting, editing, casting, and so forth. Research Whether it’s making observation notes while watching a sport, reviewing gameplay footage, finding other authors’ viewpoints, or conducting their own surveys, students must compile their research before approaching video composition. Composing Experimenting with creating videos gives students the ability to learn and communicate using new media. For this segment, I spend two days going over the basics of various free video software programs and the benefits and downfalls of each. After conducting tutorials, class time is dedicated to workshopping and assisting any students facing technical difficulties. Revision and Reflection Students refine their project through revision before presenting it to the class and providing a two page reflection essay. I find it important for students to reflect on their composition choices. In doing so, they begin to recognize how they assessed their rhetorical situation and made composition decisions on their own, rather than following strict rules set in place by past teachers. My Reflection My experiences with English 1101 have taught me the value of using media-based themes in the classroom and new media projects to teach rhetorical situations and multimodal composition. When I moved on to teaching English 1102, I was surprised by my students’ disappointment that there was not a final video project. They expressed how the 1101 project made them feel engaged with the research and excited to learn new types of composition other classes had not taught them. Each appreciated the agency over their rhetorical choices and the freedom to express their creativity. It became clear my students valued these skills and opportunities the most in their composition classes. Image: https://www.maxpixel.net/Sony-Gaming-Video-Games-Ps4-Controller-Playstation-2619483 under a CC0 Public Domain license. ... View more

Today’s guest blogger is Audrey Wick, a full-time professor of English at Blinn College in Texas. There, she is a writing teacher who writes. Readers can connect with Audrey to learn more about her projects at audreywick.com or on Twitter and Instagram @WickWrites. The first time I taught Anthony Bourdain’s writing in my freshman composition class at an open enrollment community college in rural Texas, my goal was to get students to actually want to read what I assigned. For years, that had been a struggle. So when I read the first chapter of Bourdain’s memoir Kitchen Confidential, I thought my students might love it as much as I did. I added it to my syllabus. Bourdain was sandwiched between writings by Deborah Tannen (a linguist) and John Krakauer (a mountaineer). Language, food, and the outdoors seemed like a sensible sequence. Although most of the authors I assigned were contemporary, the majority of my students hadn’t heard of them. With Bourdain, that changed a bit through the years. Prior exposure to him grew due to his popularity on television and social media, though even this academic year, there were still only a handful of students in class who held a vague notion of who he was. Most in my composition course had not read anything by him.  So I got to teach them. And what an honor that was. Every time I taught Bourdain’s writing, I would start by having students share memories tied to food. We all have them, after all, and I wasn’t immune to sharing my own. I wanted them to feel the power of Bourdain’s overall message before we looked deeper at specifics. Once we navigated that, I would then share photos of the author along with some television promo shots. I usually had a Parts Unknown clip cued up to play; my favorite was from one of his several trips to Vietnam. Video Link : 2298 In the video, Bourdain ate alone on a low plastic stool with scooters racing by. The colorful bowl he held in his hands steamed with something fresh, though even he admitted that he wasn’t quite sure what it was. He praised the merits of simple eating and adventurous living. His voice echoed through our classroom with the line, “This is the path to true happiness and wisdom.” I never tired of seeing that video. I also coined a fun phrase for students to help them dissect his writing techniques: “What Would Bourdain Do?” With “WWBD” on the board at the front of the room, students would work to uncover a variety of techniques that Bourdain displayed which they could reasonably apply to their own writing. Like learning to cook, they learned the essential ingredients of writing from Bourdain:   Create a compelling title. Make people want to read more. Start strong. A crisp opening sentence with a singular main idea will do.  Write honestly. Everyone has life experiences worth sharing. Shock the reader. A well-placed emotional reaction is powerful. Don’t be afraid to show vulnerability. Readers appreciate this.   Bourdain probably never intended his memoir to be a model for developing writers in a college class, but it was — and it still is. Hundreds and hundreds of my students have benefited over the years. A particularly memorable portion of class was when we discussed the oyster section. Through several paragraphs, Bourdain describes the experience of eating a new food while on vacation with his family in the south of France. It was his first trip abroad, and he had just finished the fourth grade. Needless to assume, his palate wasn’t yet attuned to such a dish. He writes, “I had my first oyster. Now, this was a truly significant event. I remember it like I remember losing my virginity — and in many ways, more fondly.” Typically, I would read this section aloud, seeing students squirm in their seats a bit by hearing it, letting the rawness and emotion reverberate through the room. Of course, they laughed. I’m glad they did. Bourdain wrote humor well. I wanted them to see the power of that too. My new class has reconvened for the academic year, but with Bourdain’s death, I haven’t been ready to teach his work. I don’t like talking about him in the past tense. Still, I realize that because of his death, he may be more accessible to students who have perhaps heard his name on social media or in news reports. When I am ready to teach his work again, I could use an excerpt from Kitchen Confidential, A Cook’s Tour, Medium Raw, or even a transcript from Parts Unknown. Contextualizing it and having students read section A1 “Reading and writing critically” from A Writer’s Reference will prepare them for engaging with the selection. Then, in class, I can guide them through skills of active reading as we put into practice the specific techniques mentioned: previewing a text, annotating a text, conversing with a text, and asking the “So what?” question. After all, “So what?” certainly sounds like a question Bourdain would ask. There’s an allure to Bourdain’s writing, and I hope to be ready to share his work with students again soon. Until that time, I am grateful to the influence he had on students — and on me. ... View more

As American popular culture gets more and more entangled in the political divisions that are rending our country, it may appear to be increasingly difficult to teach cultural analysis without risking painful classroom conflict. Take the current controversy over Nike's Colin Kaepernick campaign: it simply begs for semiotic attention, but how can it be accomplished without having the whole thing blow up into yet another headline on Inside Higher Education, or any other national news outlet?   I wouldn't be writing this blog if I thought that the thing couldn't be done or if my best advice would be to steer clear of the whole matter and anything like it. No, if you have adopted a semiotics-based methodology for your class, you have to engage with the full range of popular culture. And if you stick to the fundamental semiotic axiom that, while a personal opinion can be built upon the foundations of a semiotic analysis, semiotics itself is not an expression of an opinion, the thing can be done.   So, to begin, let's start with the obvious significations of the Nike/Kaepernick campaign and the reaction to it. The first is the way that it joins an ever-growing list of signifiers revealing a widening political gap in America, especially when it comes to anything having to do with race. This one is so apparent that it doesn't require any further explanation, but it does merit recognition.   The second (also quite obvious) signification is that symbols matter. Whether the symbol involved is the American flag or "Silent Sam," deep emotional attitudes towards objects can be just as passionate as attitudes towards people or policies. This too is so obvious that it doesn't require any further explanation, but does need to be mentioned.   The third is that the traditional (and constitutional) right to free speech in America is a shield protecting social protest, until it isn't. On the one hand, juridical rulings on free speech grant to individuals the right to say almost anything short of shouting "fire" in a crowded theater (remember the successful ACLU defense of the Nazi marchers in Skokie?), while, on the other, the courts have allowed employer retaliation against employees who break the speech codes in their places of employment. Such a lack of clarity is a contributing factor in the Nike controversy.   But let's step away from the most obvious significations and get into some more subtle ones. The first I'd like to consider is one that I have seen very ably explored in a Washington Post opinion piece by Michael Serazio, who argues that the Nike campaign isn't a gesture on behalf of social justice; it's simply another expression of the hypercapitalistic nature of America's consumer culture. Here's how Serazio puts it: "At one point in human history, products were bought and sold for their utility. Now, because of the massive and unchecked expansion of corporate power—in terms of not just market share but mind share—products must represent values, lifestyles and, in the age of President Trump, political ideologies." In short, the Nike campaign can be seen as a signifier of the hegemony of consumption in a consumer society.   But Serazio is hardly the only cultural analyst trying to parse the Nike affair. Consider the following two articles, also from the Washington Post. First, there's Megan McArdle's Nike bet that politics would sell. Looks like it was wrong, an op-ed that cites public opinion polls from all sides of the controversy to conclude that Americans are not responding favorably to the Nike/Kaepernick campaign, while arguing that this is a good thing because "as America has divided into distinct camps—geographic, demographic, political—more companies have started chasing explicitly political identities. Starbucks's leftward lean has famously roused conservative ire, but many on the left still haven't forgiven Chick-fil-A owner Dan Cathy's remarks opposing same-sex marriage a few years ago. The result is a world in which every decision, even what kind of fast food to buy, has taken on a political aspect. That's not healthy for America, which needs more points that people have in common, not more ways to divide into separate teams."   But then there's Amy Kittelstrom's counter-argument, which comes to a very different conclusion. Noting that by "[b]urning shoes and snipping swooshes, some white Americans think they are punishing Nike for re-signing Colin Kaepernick, the unemployed quarterback known for quietly kneeling during the national anthem to draw attention to anti-black police brutality. In reality, Nike will profit. The more these angry consumers attack the company, the more attractive they make Nike in the far bigger global market—which is a vital part of why Nike launched the campaign that centers on Kaepernick."   Now, the interesting thing about these articles is that each, in effect, jumps the gun on the future by asserting long-term outcomes that are by no means as certain as their authors argue they are. You may say that Trump started it with his exultant tweet about Nike's stock price decline at the opening of the campaign (Nike stock has, as I write this, fully made up the drop), but, whoever engages in such predictions, making them at all always runs the risk of speaking too soon, of letting one's desires (i.e., the way one wants things to turn out) supersede the available facts.   I'm reminded here of an editorial in the Richmond Examiner from July 7th, 1863 that predicted inevitable victory for the Army of Northern Virginia in its invasion of the North—published three days after Lee's defeat at Gettysburg but two days before news of that defeat reached Richmond. But then again, in 1861 there was a lot of "On to Richmond" confidence in the Union press as well. In the end, as Lincoln sublimely noted in his second inaugural address, neither side got what it expected out of the war, which grimly contradicted that American tendency (which rises to the level of a cultural mythology) to expect that everything will always go the way we want it to—a fundamental cultural optimism that Barbara Ehrenreich calls "bright-sidedness" (you can find her exploration of this peculiarly American tendency in chapter 7 of the 9th edition of Signs of Life in the U.S.A.).   And so, in McArdle's and Kittelstrom's dueling certainties about an uncertain future I find a signifier of something that is profoundly American; but unfortunately, when a divided people are equally certain that everything will go their way, everyone, in the end, loses.     Image Credit: Pixabay Image 1840619 by Pexels, used under a CC0 Creative Commons License ... View more

I was struck a week or so ago when I read Benjamin Hoffman and Tayla Minsberg’s article, “The Deafening Silence of Colin Kaepernick” in The New York Times. My interest was heightened because I had recently re-read some of Cheryl Glenn’s important work on silence, and especially on the difference between silence, which can be powerfully positive, and being silenced, which cannot. And also because I had seen Nike’s powerful new  ad, narrated by Kaepernick and featuring him along with a wide range of other athletes, both disabled and able-bodied, each one showing just how completely they can “do it.”   Most importantly, though, I began thinking about silence because we so seldom encounter it today, with the cacophonous 24/7 newsfeeds, livestreams, social media dumps, and all the other very noisy voices and messages coming at us almost to the point of harassment. At least I sometimes feel harassed, and I need to turn everything off. Everything. And enjoy the peace of silence.   I’m thinking, then, of asking students to engage in some purposeful silence, and to monitor it, its effects on others, and their responses to it. Doing so will make, I believe, for an important class discussion on the uses and importance of silence. I’d also like to ask students to read the Times article on Kaepernick and outline the ways he has used silence strategically, and how he has alternated silence with occasional live appearances, written statements. or speeches (such as his speech in accepting Amnesty International’s Ambassador of Conscience Award).             What do they take away from the article on Kaeperick? Does Kaepernick use silence in different ways for different occasions? How effective do they find his use of silence? What other examples of purposeful silence can they come up with and how do they work, rhetorically?   So I think it’s time for a little attention to silence in this most unquiet time. It’s probably a good idea, too, to turn back to Glenn’s Unspoken: A Rhetoric of Silence for the many lessons it has to teach us today. Image Credit: Pixabay Image 2355859 by kassarcreative, used under a CC0 Creative Commons License ... View more

Ann Charters‌ is the author of The Story and Its Writer. I’ve been a Kerouac fan since 1958, when I read his just-published novel The Dharma Bums.  In the 1950s, the overwhelming majority of Beat Generation authors were men who rarely wrote about women as independent, equally talented individuals or even as equal partners.  Ironically, in the next generation, the discovery of the freedom of Kerouac’s spontaneous prose style helped some of the women who read his books gain the confidence to become experimental writers themselves. The tenth edition of The Story and Its Writer includes Kerouac’s experimental prose narrative “October in the Railroad Earth,” his story about his daily life in California in the autumn of 1952. It is considered the best short example of what Kerouac called “Spontaneous Prose.” He wrote the story in San Francisco while he lived in a skid row hotel and worked as a brakeman-in-training for the Southern Pacific Railroad.  In his commentary “Essentials of Spontaneous Prose” (also included in the tenth edition of The Story and Its Writer), he described his highly personal method of writing.  In his approach, Kerouac tried to write his mind into a text as directly, honestly, and completely as possible, hoping to capture the free, spontaneous flow of his thoughts and feelings at the moment of putting words down on paper.   Kerouac composed “October in the Railroad Earth” eighteen months after he created his most famous novel On the Road during an inspired three weeks in April 1951, though he’d tried unsuccessfully for years to write it.  His novel, now considered an American classic, took nearly seven years to be published in 1957, but only after it had been first rejected and then completely revised into conventional prose by his editors.  The 1951 original so-called “scroll manuscript” of On the Road, unpublished for a half-century until 2007, reads much more like spontaneous prose. As Kerouac once told an interviewer, “I agree with Joyce, as Joyce said to Ezra Pound in the 1920s, ‘Don’t bother me with politics, the only thing that interests me is style.’” Kerouac knew what he was doing. At the time he wrote to his friend Allen Ginsberg that he was “originating. . . a new way of writing about life, no fiction, no craft, no revising afterthoughts.” Later the English critic Michael Horowitz understood that at midcentury Kerouac’s style –“That ingenuous art of spilling the beans – all that’s remembered laced with all that chimes in from the senses at the instant of writing, emptying consciousness as per action painter and jazzman’s delivery” – was to change the direction of American prose. The woman author I have in mind who was influenced by Kerouac’s writing is the novelist and biographer Chris Kraus.  In 1997 she published her second novel I Love Dick, which elicited heated controversy at the time though recently it has become the basis of a successful American television series released on Amazon Video.  Like Kerouac, Kraus used what was happening in her own life as the basis for her fiction.  As a critic noted on the back jacket of I Love Dick, by “tearing away the veil that separates fiction from reality and privacy from self-expression . . . Kraus forged a manifesto for a new kind of feminism that isn’t afraid to burn through itself to embrace the whole world.” I Love Dick is full of references to Beat-era writers, not only Kerouac but also less famous figures such as Lew Welch, John Wieners, Ron Padgett and Paul Blackburn —all males.  As Kraus writes in I Love Dick about the married painters Elaine and Willem de Kooning, the 1950s was a period “that believed in the utter worthlessness of Women.” [sic]  It was a time when the commercial success of women authors, even extremely talented writers like Flannery O’Connor who wrote in a conventional prose style, was the exception, not the rule.  The example of Kerouac’s courage creating his autobiographical, spontaneous prose method and following it despite the repeated rejection of his writing by established publishers, inspired Kraus to find her own voice as a writer.  Kerouac’s story encouraged her to create highly original autobiographical fiction in which she too expressed herself as openly, honestly, and freely as she could. ... View more

Note from Miriam: During Fall 2018, I am sharing the “Real Teaching” blog with colleagues from around the country who will be sharing what works in their writing classrooms.   Guest blogger Melissa Adamo is currently the College Liaison for the Dodge Poetry Festival and an Adjunct Instructor at Montclair State University and Rutgers University-Newark. She primarily teaches composition courses at both institutions but has also taught creative writing and literature courses at Ramapo College of New Jersey. Readers can connect with her on Twitter Melissa Adamo (@mel_adamo) | Twitter .    Students often come into second-level composition or literature courses describing poetry as hard to understand or too abstract. In high school, many students feel forced to “overanalyze” poems, leading to fears of finding “the right answer”; this seems only natural for those accustomed to standardized tests. My desire to reframe poetry as a topic of discussion rather than a place of correct answers led me to Twitter.   In creating this lesson plan, I took inspiration from the book 101 Exercises for the College Classroom in which Jacquelyn Ardam has students pare down a text to six words. My version of this assignment used Twitter, a platform with a 140-character limit. I asked students to Tweet a creative response to a poem and then present their Tweet to the class, supporting their choices by directly connecting the Tweet to lines in the poem.   I wanted to fulfill similar objectives from Ardam whose assignment built “close-reading skills” through examining the author’s style or diction “as deliberate” choices. I wanted to help further these skills as well as analytical thinking through writing, collaboration, and presentation. Another aim for the activity was to decenter my authority on the poem in order to promote more confidence in students.   First, I broke the class into small groups to select a poem from that day’s assigned reading. Next, I instructed them to re-read their poem together, breaking up its parts: What is it about? How is it structured? What effect is produced? What was your reaction to the poem?   I then asked students to create a Tweet based on their group’s understanding of the poem. Students could write as the speaker of the poem to highlight its message, as the author to directly comment on literary choices, or as readers to show their experience of the poem. They could also choose to compose as they actually would on such a platform, modernizing language from the poem or, if writing from the reader perspective, revealing their interpretation through slang. Here, students became the experts in the room, for example, defining what “af” or “savage” meant, thus giving them more agency over vocabulary in an academic setting.   Like most social media platforms, Twitter also uses multimodality through memes, GIFs, and emojis. I encouraged students to play with these modes to practice analytical reading skills, not only on traditional texts but also on visual texts. I also pushed them to see how much they can include in such a small space; because of Twitter’s character limit (currently at 280), students must pare down the text to avoid unnecessary summary and convey more information with less words. Although most Tweets look rather simplistic, the more layers added (e.g. hashtags, pictures, text), the more conversation a group can generate.   After each group created their Tweet, students would present it to the class. Presentation requirements included students explaining their text and images from the Tweet as well as how it directly connects to a line of the poem or the poet’s writing strategy. This presentation component required students to support claims and thus assessed their ability to communicate their reasoning.   After each group presented, the rest of the class was invited to ask the group questions about the Tweet. This larger discussion promoted an even more in-depth analysis of each poem. For example, in one group, students debated characteristics of a GIF’s subject and compared it to the poem’s speaker, drawing parallels between popular culture present in the image and the literary text assigned. Not all students saw connections between the image and poem at first, but in our collective conversation we all built toward it.   Such discussions allowed an opportunity for me to read and learn alongside my students. Because I don’t always know the reference nor do I know how the students will create their tweet, we are all on equal footing. It offered the chance to model that “good” readers do not simply know all the answers, but rather they are comfortable asking questions or reviewing a text together.   Bringing Twitter and its memes, GIFs, and hashtags into the classroom resulted in a class atmosphere that was inviting and playful, rather than inaccessible, meeting my original objective. Seeing the confidence this lesson helped build in students was key in the process of not only reframing their view on poetry but also furthering their critical reading skills. It even prompted students to analyze popular culture and visual media, which they often do not look at with a critical eye.   Changing such perspectives about reading and analysis could apply to more than just poetry, of course. I would be eager to try this with other texts in the composition classroom, hoping to find the same level of student engagement and analytical thinking. ... View more

Today's featured Bedford New Scholar is Kristin vanEyk‌, a student in the Joint PhD program in English and Education at the University of Michigan. Kristin taught high school English for nine years before beginning her PhD in the fall of 2016. She expects to complete her degree in 2021. Kristin teaches first year writing at the university, and is especially interested in the ways students blend register and genre to create meaning. Kristin's research interests include translingual theory and practice, critical race theory and whiteness theory, and critical feminism.   A few weeks ago Leah Rang blogged here about the latest group of Bedford New Scholars (BNS) and promised (or perhaps warned?) that the BNS “notable newcomers” would soon be writing for this space. As one of the BNS cohort, I’m delighted to have this opportunity to ask a few questions and learn from you all. I first started reading the Bits blog in May of 2018, the week Andrea A. Lunsford wrote about “Students’ Right to Their Own Language” and the ongoing efforts for more generous attitudes towards our students’ home languages (see her post African American Rhetoric and Other Englishes). Lunsford recommended Jerry Won Lee’s book titled The Politics of Translingualism: After Englishes (Routledge, 2017), which I had just finished reading, and she concluded her post with an invitation to continue the conversation about translingualism, an orientation where the theory and pedagogy sometimes miss one another. As we head into a new semester, it seems like a good time to revisit this conversation.  Lee’s book helpfully clarified some of my confusion over the need for a distinction between multilingualism and translingualism, and why this matters in a writing classroom. Lee argues that “by focusing on and drawing attention to the simultaneous presence of multiple language resources in a particular utterance, moment, or space, we risk simultaneously gesturing to and reaffirming the disciplinarian linguistic ideologies that have aspired and perhaps conspired to keep such language resources in isolation from one another” (p. 9). My conception of the translingual orientation had been too narrow: code-switching vs. code-meshing or multilingual (parallel monolingualism) vs. translingual (through and beyond linguistic borders). Such stunted views of the translingual turn belied my own stunted imagination about what “counts” in academic writing and what rhetorical magic our students can muster if we convince them that we genuinely want to see what they can do. I’ve been thinking a lot about how translingual theory and anti-racist pedagogy can come together in meaningful and rigorous classroom practice. During my first semester of graduate school, I enrolled in a seminar taught by Anne Gere called “What Makes Writing Good,” which focused on justice-oriented pedagogy and anti-racist writing assessment practices. At the same time, I was working with linguist Anne Curzan on challenging deficit language ideologies in writing classrooms. These courses greatly shaped my approach to translingualism by bringing linguists and compositionists into conversation about the teaching of languaging. I do worry about how my students will fare when they leave the safety of my classroom. As Deborah Cameron and Rosina Lippi-Green and others have demonstrated, there are many who insist on standard varieties of English as a litmus test for intelligence. If people in their lives will require conventions of a so-called “standard” variety of English, what does that mean for a composition teacher with a translingual orientation? How do I reconcile a conviction that I ought to teach beyond linguistic and other borders when I also believe that borders will hem my students in? It seems very practical to ask students to answer these kinds of questions for themselves, to have students write about their own linguistic ideologies and to practice having conversations with people who use standards as a basis of judgement. It seems like part of my job, as a teacher of languaging, to help students find the language they want to use to correct the misinformation they will encounter about language. So that’s where my semester is moving: towards challenging students to think about how cultural language preferences are developed, how they are reinforced (and by whom!), and how they as informed students want to respond when they witness the perpetuation of hegemony. One of my favorite writing assignments to teach is the Literacy Narrative. We read a few example texts in class, like Sherman Alexie’s “The Joy of Reading and Writing: Superman and Me,” and then I ask my students to think about the literacy experiences that have shaped their own linguistic ideologies. Often they discover that reading and writing have played a more critical role in the development of their identities than they realized, and they appreciate the challenge of writing an argument about literacy and identity in a university writing course. As students peer review and share these essays they also expand their understandings of how language and identity are intertwined, and hopefully we all become more compassionate and courageous individuals. If you have insights into how we can guide our students’ thinking about linguistic ideologies or how they can practice standing up for their developing beliefs, I certainly welcome the discussion. To view Kristin's assignment, visit Literacy Narrative Assignment Sheet. To learn more about the Bedford New Scholars advisory board, visit the the Bedford New Scholars page on the Macmillan English Community. ... View more

Almost all community-based projects engage in a consistent discussion about the need for resources. Often those discussions become focused on strategies to raise grant funds. Our disciplinary training, however, doesn’t often provide the tools or frameworks to work through such issues. In what follows, I hope to provide a process to structure conversations about resources and community-based projects.   Listening for Partnerships Values Driven Process A central element of any successful community/university partnership are common values. Prior to seeking any grants, partners should discuss the values that should inform the process of seeking, holding, and distributing funds. A conversation beforehand will ensure a common ground is in place if funds are received. Otherwise, the introduction of funds could bring conflict and weaken the partnership.   Alliance Building Before seeking funds, projects should analyze if existing organizations already undertake the work for which a grant is sought. It is better to broaden your partner alliance than try to rebuild what already exists. Foundations are more likely to support a partnership among allies than to fund you to “reinvent the wheel.” Such partnerships can also soften or even eliminate the need to seek funding at all.   Organizational Networks Alliances not only strengthen a project, they also expand the types of grant funds available. If your only partner is a small non-profit, then you can only apply for grants that support such institutions. If you include a public school or health service organizations in your project, if appropriate, each will bring their own fundraising networks. In this sense, projects that exist within a broad alliance also exist within a stronger network of funding support.   Listening to Funders Solving Foundation Defined Problems Foundations do not provide funds to solve our problems; they provide funds for us to solve their problems. When writing a grant application, then, you need to address the foundation’s primary issue, showing you understand the moral imperative of this work. This shows you want to be part of their mission and join their alliance. If you understand a different problem as being more important, then you should look for a different foundation.   Write in Simple Language Grant officers are deeply embedded within the complexity of their set of issues. They are not necessarily embedded in our particularized academic writing. When writing grant applications, you should not use academic discourse. Instead, write from the moral/ethical impulse which brought your project to this work. If you begin within that language, you are more likely to avoid terms like “counter-hegemonic publics” and convince the foundation you can actually converse with your community partners.   Provide a Concrete Plan This is often the most difficult part of the grant application. To be convincing, the proposal has to offer realistic steps toward completion. This often means very dry prose, such as “will hold four community meetings per month” or “10 Participants will be trained to conduct 200 door to door interviews.” The funder should almost be able to see how one step will logically follow to the next. It is the ability to see concretely see how the project moves from beginning to end that demonstrates the plan can actually be enacted.   Produce Results Be humble in claims about what will change as a result of this project. Assume that the grant officer has been reading applications for decades. She can sense what is feasible versus idealistic. So be specific: “The project will produce a new curriculum for a middle school, introducing extensive writing/revision practices, to be used by over 100 students.” A concrete result is worth more than claims about changing broad-based systemic injustices. Indeed, humility will actually enable you to get funds to undertake difficult social justice work.   Ask for Less Never ask for the total amount available for a grant. Imagine a room of grants officers attempting to dole out the allotted funds. Their goal is to fund several valuable projects rather than one expensive project. By coming under budget, you support this goal. You also show that the request is driven by the needs of the project, not the size of the possible grant.   Listening for Sustainability Don’t Over Raise Money Universities often highlight large grants received by faculty. This can lead to faculty exclusively seeking large grants. When a project is built upon large grants, the project often vanishes when the money is gone. It is better to slowly build grant support, making sure what is built can withstand the loss of funds. Eventually you might need to seek large grants. Seeking large grants at the outset, though, builds your project on very shaky ground. (NOTE: Large grants often also take you away from the actual project and into a morass of paperwork.)   Don’t Chase the Money Finally, as projects grow, there will be a widening pool of grant possibilities. It is tempting to start applying for grants for which “you could qualify” but which are tangential to your project. This is known as “chasing the money” because the goal becomes securing grants, not the work of the project. When considering any grant, a project should first project its’ goals for the next three to five years, then discuss whether the potential funds support or distract from that trajectory. ... View more

In my last post, I described my plan to organize a series of assignments for my technical writing course around a fictional business incubator. This week, I have the first of those assignments to share with you. For the series to work, I need students to choose a company that they will focus on for the assignments they will write. The first assignment asks students to share the basic information about their company in a memo. In the scenario, their information will be combined with that of other new companies that are joining the incubator for a presentation at the first meeting of all the members of the incubator. The assignment below has some minor changes to remove specific information that is relevant only to the students in my classes. References to “Markel” in the assignment refer to chapters in the class textbook Technical Communication by Mike Markel and Stuart Selber. Incubator Info Sheet Background All of the projects will relate to your membership in a fictional business incubator, the Ut Prosim Incubator. The projects you will complete for your portfolios will be documents that you create as a member of this incubator. You will create a business and then write the pieces for your portfolio from the perspective as a starting business owner. You will collaborate with other members of the incubator and contribute materials to the endeavors that the incubator undertakes. You can read more about the incubator and how the projects connect on the Writing Projects Overview page. The Scenario During your first week as an Ut Prosim Incubator member, you receive the following memo:  Ut Prosim Incubator    1872 Inventors Way, Blacksburg, Virginia 24060      Interoffice Memo To: CEOs of New Incubator Companies From: Traci Gardner, Ut Prosim Director Subject: Your Company Info Sheet Date: August 27, 2018 Welcome to the Ut Prosim Incubator! We are all so happy to have you join the Fall 2018 class of entrepreneurs. I know you are still settling into your office, so our first all-company meeting will not take place for a few weeks. At this meeting, you will introduce your company to the other members of the Incubator. The meeting will be informal, but we do want to prepare handouts and slides to share with attendees. We will also post the basic information that you provide on the Incubator website, for the possible research partners on campus, potential investors, and the public. Please send the following information to me by September 7: Your Company Name Your Company CEO (use the name you want to appear in official documentation) Your Company Mission Statement (a statement of your company’s goals and values) Your Company Overview (explain what you company does, including whatever research you do, products your create, or services you provide) Your Company’s Target Audience (who are the customers you serve or hope to serve) Do not worry about formatting or design in your response. We will format the information for all the companies according to the Incubator’s branding and style guidelines. We will send out a meeting announcement once a place and time have been confirmed. In the mean time, if you need any help settling in, please let me know or contact my assistant, Leslie Crow <lcrow@utprosimincubator.org>. The Project Assignment Step 1: Decide on the focus for your business. Decide what your company will do—will you focus on products or services? You will focus on the company that you imagine for the entire term, so choose something that you know well. Sure, you can be creative, but create something doable that you have experience with (or at least strong knowledge of). Additionally, your focus must directly relate to your major. As long as you comply with those two stipulations, you can focus on anything you want to. You have capital, staff, and resources to do whatever you set your mind to. Step 2: Analyze the audiences for your memo. Review the memo above and decide who the audience is for the memo you have to write and for the information that you have to gather. Use the information from Markel, Chapter 5 to decide how the characteristics of the audiences will influence the writing that you do. Consider the questions in Figure 5.2: Audience Profile Sheet and/or the Writer’s Checklist at the end of the chapter to guide your analysis. Step 3: Determine the information that the memo requests. Work through the memo above and find the information that you have to provide in your response. Once you find the list of requested information, decide on your responses. You are creating your business, so you get to create the answers for all the requested information. Don’t get stuck on perfectionism at this point. Compile your ideas, but know you can always come back to revise. Step 4: Write a memo to me with the details. Compose your memo, as requested in The Scenario above, with all the details you have gathered and created. As you work, keep the following points in mind: Even though sophisticated formatting is not required, ensure that your answers are easy to find and read. Check your draft for the use of plain language. Ensure that you follow all relevant ethical guidelines as you create your responses, using the Writer’s Checklist at the end of Markel, Chapter 2. Be sure that your memo makes a good impression with accuracy and correctness. It should be polished and professional. Step 5: Check your draft for correct use of memo format. Be sure that you include the memo headings (To, From, Subject, and Date). For more details on memo format, consult Chapter 14 of Markel. Step 6. Review your draft for design and basic writing errors. Everything you write should use accurate/appropriate image editing, grammar, spelling, punctuation, mechanics, linking, and formatting. These are important basic writing skills that you should have developed in high school. Review your project, using the Writer’s Checklist at the end of Markel, Chapter 10. You can also consult the information on “Sentence-Level Issues” in Markel, Appendix, Part 😧 Guidelines for Multilingual Writers (ESL). While the section is labeled for multilingual writers, it is useful for everyone. It includes explanations and examples for many common mistakes writers make. Step 7: Submit your draft to your Writing Group in Canvas. Post a rough draft of your info sheet to your Writing Group in Canvas in the 08/29 Peer Feedback Discussion in Canvas. Additional instructions are in the Discussion. Post a draft of your memo by August 30. If you are late submitting a draft, your group may not have time to provide feedback. Step 8: Provide feedback to your Writing Group in Canvas. Provide feedback to the members of your writing group by September 4 (end of the grace period). Use the information on the Writing Groups page to provide constructive feedback that will help your group members make concrete improvements to their drafts.  Step 9: Revise your draft. Use the feedback that you receive from your group members to revise and improve your document. You can share your draft again with your Writing Group, if you desire. As you revise, keep in mind the advice in Steps 4, 5, and 6 above, as well as the Assessment Criteria below. Step 10: Include a polished version of your response in Project Portfolio 1, due October 1. Have your Info Sheet memo finished and ready for submission in your Project Portfolio 1, which is due Monday, October 1. The grace period for Project Portfolio 1 ends at 11:59PM on Thursday, October 4. Assessment Criteria Your project should meet the following criteria: Makes a good first impression as a polished and professional document. Uses memo format with the appropriate headers. Meets the needs of the intended audience. Uses layout and formatting that makes information easy for readers to find and read. Is written in plain language, which communicates the ideas clearly. Follows all relevant ethical guidelines. Uses accurate/appropriate grammar, spelling, punctuation, mechanics, linking, and formatting.   Credit: Ut Prosim Incubator logo created with “Incubator” by lastspark from the Noun Project, used under a CC-BY 3.0 license. So far the assignment has gone well. The biggest challenge I have had to deal with (other than the typical questions about due dates and the like) has been ill-chosen companies that do not actually relate to the student’s major. Many of the students are new to the memo format, but the peer feedback activity and the revision time they have should take care of any issues that come up. In my next post, I will share a correspondence assignment that is the next step in the course. In the meantime if you have any comments to share on this assignment of the series in general, I would love to hear from you in the comments below.   Photo: Typer by Caleb Roenigk on Flickr, used under a CC-BY 2.0 license ... View more

The recent decision by the Opinion Desk of the New York Times to publish anonymously an op-ed essay about the Trump presidency by a senior White House official was an unusual one. Readers were invited to submit questions about the essay or the vetting process. Two days later, 23,000 of them had.   The essay, of course, started a media frenzy. Speculation continues to run rampant as to who the anonymous official is. CNN listed thirteen possible authors; by the next day, at least sixteen had denied they wrote it. The author has been called everything from heroic to gutless—but the reactions don’t divide neatly or predictably along party lines.   As is often the case with today’s headlines, the reactions to the op-ed essay can be used to teach the basics of argumentation. A statement of opinion about the writer would be a claim of value. Clear statements of policy have also grown out of the controversy: The writer should identify himself or herself. The writer should resign. The Department of Justice should investigate the authorship in the name of national security. The 25 th Amendment should be invoked.   As is usually the case, it is easier to recognize the claim of an argument than to recognize the assumption underlying it. Given a specific claim, what assumptions does a reader have to accept in order to accept the claim? First, what about those who consider the author of the essay to be heroic? What assumption underlies that judgement? Something like this: It is heroic to work behind the scenes to safeguard our democracy against an incompetent president. That assumption is only valid, of course, if the president is indeed incompetent. It is reassuring for some to know, as the author puts it, that “there are adults in the room.” The author also writes, “We are trying to do what’s right even when Donald Trump won’t.” Assumption: It is a good thing for someone to do what’s right when the President won’t. That assumption is only valid, however, if the writer—and those who agree with him that the president needs someone working behind the scenes in the White House to keep him in check—is a better judge of what is right than the President.   That’s where those on the other side come in. Donald Trump is our duly elected President. Does anyone have the right to take over any of his duties without a mandate from the people? Even former President Obama argued, “That’s not how our democracy is supposed to work.” The 25 th Amendment provides the process for removing a president from office, but for anyone to work behind the scenes against the President in the name of defending the Constitution is to circumvent due process. Can it be applauded as a heroic act? Obviously, it can be by some. Even some of Trump’s harshest critics, however, feel that to undermine the president from within is not a valid solution.   Is the author of the op-ed essay guilty of treason? No, not by the official definition of treason, which can be committed only in time of war. Those who feel that the author should make himself or herself known to the public may assume that a public servant should not continue to work for an administration as flawed as the writer judges Trump’s to be, or that the person could do more good if he or she came out from behind the mask of anonymity. Even better would be for all those the writer claims hold similar views to speak out publicly.   There are complex arguments at work here. Our students need to see the issue from all sides and recognize it for its potential to shape the future of our country.   Image Source: “16114_355136441248988_1333868535_n” by A M on Flickr 12/12/12 via Creative Commons 2.0 License ... View more

The terrible, heartbreaking morning of September 11, 2001, I was preparing to welcome a new class at Stanford as well as preparing to greet the students I’d invited to participate in a five-year longitudinal study of writing. Waking up to the grim news left me, like everyone else, in a haze of shock and grief and sorrow: how could I believe what I was seeing on television as the planes blasted, over and over again, into the towers. We immediately made plans to delay the opening of fall term that year, thinking that students might not be able to get to campus, or not want to get to campus during such a time of national mourning. But since our term begins fairly late in September, we were able to open on time, and to welcome this group of students, many of whom had lost friends or loved ones, all of whom were trapped between the horror that gripped the nation and the excitement of opening a new chapter in their lives. Well over a decade later, I wrote to a number of the student participants in The Stanford Study of Writing, asking them to reflect on their first days at Stanford, in the wake of 9/11. Here are some of their voices today, on the 17th anniversary of the event. I remember visiting my high school on the morning of September 11, for the last time before leaving for Stanford. My sister and I had been numbed by the news, but we went anyway to visit our former teachers. Then one of the things that is strong in my memory about that first week on campus is the acute desire I felt to establish myself as both who I thought I was, and someone more like the others. . . I came to Stanford to meet people, to discover new things, and most of all to learn. I . . . just wanted to sit in my room and read or write in my “electronic diary” as I called it at the time. –SK I remember being depressed every morning waking up to a country at war. I remember being very angry and I was not anti-war at first. I’d say I’m still not into anti-war protests as I think it’s much more productive to be pro-peace as opposed to anti-war. –EL When the first plane hit the World Trade Center, I was asleep on an old twin mattress on the floor of my sister’s room. M paternal grandfather was visiting, so he had my nominal bed and I was relegated to the mattress purchased for me when I was about 3. . . . Intellectually, I comprehended the event as a tragedy, but for the most part my emotions were muted. To me, the mass outpouring of grief had a hint of social manipulation to it . . . –CS Like me, I think a lot of people had been home alone [on 9/11], most of their friends having gone off to college already, when the news hit. I am guessing it would have been a relief to talk and listen to actual people in place of sensationalistic news coverage. What I did feel strongly for a while was a sense that history, which had left me largely untouched to that point, had somehow started again and was setting into motion events that had the potential to be world-changing (in retrospect, and with the benefit of all that I learned at Stanford, I find this feeling problematic in a number of ways). –AC The President pointed his finger to Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda that night, as well as to the Taliban in Afghanistan. He announced the new Department of Homeland Security. He said, “Whether we bring our enemies to justice or bring justice to our enemies, justice will be done.” He said we would fight the War on Terror, and that it would have “decisive liberation of territory and a swift conclusion.” I realized this meant we would go to war. I was scared. –SA The thing about the atmosphere of the country in September of 2001 that I remember is the intense xenophobia that was present in some places. For me, that was perhaps the most surreal thing. I simply couldn’t imagine how you would assume that all Muslims, all Arabs, or all people that wear turbans, were terrorists. Maybe as the sole representative of a minority in my high school, it was simply a given in my world view that everyone is an individual responsible for their own actions and a group can’t be blamed for the actions of an individual. Everything we did at Stanford about tolerance and not being judgmental during Orientation just seemed redundant to me. Looking back now, I understand how naïve I was in that way . . . but I still haven’t given up my sense of optimism. I think it’s one of the things that keeps me going as a teacher: I know that somewhere in their hearts, my students are good people. . . . –HS As we welcome the class of 2022, the last class made up primarily of students born before the devastation of 9/11, it seems worthwhile to think about the reflections from these students of the class of 2005, looking back on that momentous day. Here’s to them, and to the class of 2022. Image Credit:  Pixabay Image 2403465 by MonieLuv, used under a CC0 Creative Commons License ... View more