WRT 105
Studio 1: Practices of Academic Writing
Fall 2009
SyracuseUniversity
Instructor:Mr. Douglas CronkRoom:B123
Phone:422-2154Email:
Office Hours:By Appointment
Course Description and Rationale
WRT 105 is an introduction to academic writing that focuses on the practices of analysis and argument, practices that carry across disciplinary lines and into professional and civic writing. These interdependent practices of critical inquiry are fundamental to the work you will do at SyracuseUniversity and later in your careers and civic engagements.
As Rosenwasser and Stephen claim in Writing Analytically 4th edition, “Analysis is a form of detective work that begins not with the views you already have, but with something you are seeking to understand… [A]nalysis typically pursues something puzzling; it finds questions where there seem not to be any; and it makes connections that might not have been evident at first” (41). You analyze when you think carefully enough to recommend a course to a friend, or prepare an acquisitions memo for the local library, or decide who you will vote for in the Presidential election, or come to understand better the geopolitical situation produced by the US presence in Iraq.
Argument involves analysis – and moves into making claims to a specific audience about how the world is or should be. Argument here goes beyond pro/con debates on abortion or gun control and extends into situated social practices such as when you are working together as a sorority to plan the next event, or persuading your parents that body piercing makes social statements, or taking a stand in an education class on the value of anti-racist pedagogy, or proving that homosexuality is a threat to the US military. Evidence for your arguments comes from analysis, from discussion with others, from your personal experience, and from research in the library and on the web.
Course Goals for WRT 105
• Students will compose a variety of texts as a process (inventing, drafting, revising, editing) that takes place over time, that requires thinking and rethinking ideas, and that addresses diverse audiences and rhetorical contexts.
• Students will develop a working knowledge of strategies and genres of critical analysis and argument.
• Students will learn critical techniques of reading through engagement with texts that raise issues of diversity and community and encourage students to make connections across difference.
• Students will include critical research in their composing processes.
Texts
Nickel and DimedBarbara Ehrenreich
A Pocket Style ManualDiana Hacker
Signs of Life in the USASonia Maasik & Jack Solomon
Writing AnalyticallyDavid Rosenwasser & Jill Stephen
Fast Food NationEric Schlosser
Student ManualSyracuseUniversity
*In addition to these texts, we will read a variety of stories, poems, articles, and other literary and non-literary texts.
Topic of Inquiry
The topic of inquiry for this course is “becoming comfortable with discomfort”. Through readings, class discussions, independent research, and writing we will explore the various ways by which individuals and institutions avoid and hide things that make us uncomfortable. We will consider both how and why this is done. Whom does it benefit? Whom does it victimize? Whom does it ignore? How can we, as readers, writers, thinkers, and citizens, work to consider issues and ideas from a different, and sometimes unsettling, point of view? These are just a few of the ideas we will consider in our classroom community.
Work of the Course
You will devote time, thought, and energy to a variety of informal and formal reading and writing practices. During the course you might be asked to annotate readings, keep a record of ideas and responses, jot down observations, take notes on class discussions, experiment with different styles and organizational choices, and engage in a variety of drafting and revision activities. All these activities are important and will have an impact on your development and success as academic writers (and your final grade).
Writing well depends upon reading well. The course texts will provide you with ideas and arguments, facts and statistics. They will prompt thought as you agree or disagree or qualify those ideas. They enlarge the context for our class discussion. And they illustrate choices other writers have made as they composed. Writing and reading are interdependent practices, and you will move between the two regularly throughout the course.
Formal Papers
All due dates are listed on the course calendar. All due dates are tentative and subject to change as instructor deems appropriate.
- The first formal paper will introduce you to the practices of generating an inquiry, synthesis, and critical reading. It will also introduce me to your skills as a thinker and writer.
- In the second formal paper you will use your analytic skills to make a claim about a subject of your choice.
- In your third formal paper you will build upon the analytic skills you developed in Unit 2 towards writing a documented argument.
- In the fourth formal paper of the course you will explore the way language works in a specific context.
*All papers must follow MLA format and be typed, double-spaced, have one-inch margins, and use a 12-point font – no larger or smaller. Consult Hacker for more details.
Feedback
You will receive many different kinds of feedback during this course. Some will come from fellow students and some will come from me. Both are important; they tell you in various ways how your readers are responding to your writing. This feedback will also help you learn how to assess your own work.
Grading
10%Unit I (Jumpstart)
20%Unit II (Analysis)
30%Unit III (Documented Argument)
20%Unit IV (Language at Work)
10%Informal writing, test writing, and class participation
10%Portfolio
*A late paper loses one letter grade for each day it is late. Please be sure to avoid such consequences by submitting all work on time.
The Portfolio
As this course progresses, you will keep a portfolio of your work that will serve as a “window” to your development. Included in your portfolio will be exercises and informal writing that have helped shape your formal texts, drafts of your formal texts, and final copies of your formal papers. Also included in your portfolio will be written reflections on the processes you’ve used as you’ve completed writing assignments, and on your growth as a writer. These reflections are important texts that will help you understand and articulate your own learning process. (Student Manual)
Attendance and participation
Writing studios are courses in language learning, and language is learned in communities; therefore, it is essential that you attend class and participate. Because this is a demanding college course, your on-time attendance every day is crucial to your success. Consistent attendance will contribute to the participation portion of your final grade for the course. If missing a class is unavoidable, it is your responsibility to get the notes for the missed class, to make up any missed work, and to submit, or have someone else submit for you, assignments due on that day.
Moodle
Our course materials and space for continued discussion can found on Moodle, a University on-line teaching support system. I will teach you how to access our section of WRT 105 on Moodle, and will then expect you to be able to locate, download, and link to a range of course materials with some regularity throughout the semester. I will also expect you to regularly visit the site to post comments and participate in other course activities on-line.
The url for blackboard is
Once you access the main page you will be asked for your username and password.
Special Needs and Situations
Students who need special consideration because of any sort of disability or situation should make an appointment to see me right away.
SyracuseUniversity Student Works Policy
In compliance with the Federal Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act, works in all media produced by students as part of their course participation at SyracuseUniversity may be used for educational purposes, provided that the course syllabus makes clear that such use may occur. It is understood that registration for and continued enrollment in a course where such use of student works is announced constitute permission by the student.
After such a course has been completed, any further use of students works will meet one of the following conditions: 1) the work will be rendered anonymous through the removal of all personal identification of the work’s creator/originator(s); or 2) the creator/originator(s)’ written permission will be secured.
Academic Integrity
All writing submitted for this course is understood to be your original work. In cases where academic dishonesty is detected (the fraudulent submission of another's work, in whole or part, as your own), you may be subject to a failing grade for the project or the course, and in the worst case, to academic probation or expulsion. For a more detailed description of the guidelines for adhering to academic integrity in the College of Arts and Sciences, go to
WRT 105
Writing Studio I
Fall 2008 Calendar
*All assignments are subject to change according to instructor’s judgment.
Unit 1
Week 1Review Syllabus and Student Manual.
9/10 – 9/11Introduction to summarizing as a critical reading and writing practice.
Discuss Unit 1 assignment and evaluation criteria.
Brainstorm “little gems” from Mountains beyond Mountains.
For 9/14: Read and annotate “Shadowy Lines That Still Divide,”
Janny Scott and David Leonhart; write a two paragraph summary.
Week 2Assign Unit 1 paper.
9/14 – 9/18Read Chapter 4 of Writing Analytically (WA); write dialogic response.
In class we will make connections between the books and the article. I will introduce you to the critical practice of synthesis.
For 9/16: Read and annotate “Multiculturalism, Universalism, and the 21st Century Academy,” Nancy Cantor.
For 9/18:Write a 250 word synthesis of the two quotes at the top of the assignment sheet, making sure to include your own thoughts, insights, claims, ideas. Your thinking should take up at least 50% of the synthesis.
Week 3We will share our syntheses in class. We will tackle Cantor’s concept of “communal
9/21 – 9/25responsibility in a diverse society” and brainstorm examples and characteristics of those who “take responsibility.”
Brainstorm a list of people you consider insiders/outsiders; take one example off your list and write 250 words describing the person. Make at least one connection back to MBM.
For 9/29:1. Re-write the five quotes about the book on the back cover, taking as your five identities: an editor of The Roar; an administrator for the World Health Organization; a faculty member at the Harvard School of Medicine; Chancellor Cantor; a book reviewer from the NY Times. 2. Read and annotate pp 17-29 in Writing Analytically.
Week 4We will share our book quotes in class. Introduction to the concept of claim-making (aka “having
9/29 – 10/2an idea”).
Compose a tentative claim for focusing your essay.
Read pp 219-233 in Writing Analytically.
In class we will share and revise our claims and share our evidence from the book. I will also distribute the assignment evaluation criteria.
Workshop on introductions and conclusions.
Compose a draft of your essay.
In class we will swap essay drafts and provide feedback to each other based on our understanding of the assignment criteria. I will distribute the portfolio assignment and reflection guidelines.
For 10/7: Complete your Unit 1 essay.
Unit 2:Analysis
Week 5Assign Unit 2 paper.
10/5 – 10/9Read and annotate “The Banking Concept of Education,” Paolo Freire in Ways of Reading.
Read Chapter 2 in Writing Analytically. Read “Best Practices: Images of Disaster and How They Were Capture,” Toren Beasley at Poynter Onlinee and view accompanying photos. Select an image and complete exercise 2.5.
Week 6Read and annotate “Changing the Face of Poverty,” Diana George.
10/13 – 10/16Read Chapter 3 in Writing Analytically. Using the “Wake-Up Call,”Derrick Z. Jackson, complete exercise 3.6.
Select film for analysis. Begin your observations.
Week 7Read and annotate “Looking at War: Photography’s View of Devastation and Death,”
10/19 – 10/23Susan Sontag
Read Chapter 5 in Writing Analytically.
Read “Class and Virtue,” Michael Parenti, in Signs of life.
Continue your observations.
Begin draft of your paper, due on 10/30.
Week 8Read and annotate “Deep Play: Notes on the Balinese Cockfight,” by Clifford Geertz in Ways of
10/26 – 10/30Reading.
Read Chapter 6 in Writing Analytically.
Revise draft and continue work on paper. Next draft is due on 11/5.
Week 9Read Chapter 12 in Writing Analytically.
11/2 – 11/6MLA citation workshop
Swap papers with a classmate and, using papers, complete exercise 6.4 in Writing Analytically.
Revision workshop
Complete your Unit 2 paper, which is due on 11/9.
Unit 3:Documented Argument
Week 10Assign Unit 3 paper.
11/9 – 11/13Read and annotate “Language,” Amitava Kumar.
View excerpts from When the Levees Broke.
Discuss the idea of being American as played out in school and culture.
Re-read Kumar closely.
Group work with Kumar piece
Week 11Read and annotate “Recognizing Strangers,” Sara Ahmed.
11/16 – 11/20Read and annotate “How to Tame a Wild Tongue,” Gloria Anzaldua in Ways of Reading.
Discuss Readings.
Week 12Read “The Veil,” Marjane Satrapi.
11/23 – 11/25Read “Persimmons,” Li-Youn Li & “Sonrisas,” Pat Mora.
Write a 3-5-page response to the readings and discussion so far – claims, evidence, questions, responses, your own ideas.
THANKSGIVING RECESS
Week 13Discuss responses in small groups.
11/30 – 12/4Write a 2-3-page paper proposal.
Class in library for research
Individual conferences with instructor
Week 14Continue individual conferences with instructor
12/7– 12/11Group brainstorming – sharing ideas, questions, and suggestions
Draft of your paper is due 12/14.
Week 15Revision workshop
12/14 – 12/18Read pp 335-343 in Writing Analytically.
Editing Workshop
Complete your Unit Three Paper, which is due on 12/21.
Unit 4: How Language Does Its Work
Week 16Assign Unit 4 paper.
12/21 – 12/23Representation and Discourse.
Read and annotate “Metaphor and Metonymy” & “Intertextuality,” Robert Scholes & Nancy R. Comley
Read and annotate “Discourse,” Paul A. Bové
WINTER RECESS
For 1/5: Winter Recess assignment: read The Indian Wants the Bronx, Israel Horovitz,
and respond to questions 4, 8, 9, 10, & 12.
Week 17
1/4 – 1/8Read and annotate “Mommy, What Does ‘Nigger’ Mean?,” Gloria Naylor
For 1/11: Read and annotate “Brief Introduction to Saussure and semiotics,” Pat Moody
Write a 1-page essay proposal.
Week 18Read and annotate “Limen,” Gustavo Perez-Firmat; “Refugee Ship,” Lorna Dee Cervantes; and
1/11 – 1/15“Parsley,” Rita Dove.
Group brainstorming – sharing ideas, questions, and suggestions
Draft of your paper is due 1/20.
Week 19Peer Conferences/ Individual Conferences with Instructor
1/19 – 1/22Revision workshop
Editing Workshop
Week 20Unit Three Paper Due
1/25 – 1/29Day of Final Exam: In-Class Reflexive Essay