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York University Faculty of Liberal Arts & Professional Studies Writing Centre
Fall/Winter 2012-13
WRIT 2100. 3.0: STUDIES IN NONFICTION
Course Director: Dr. John Blazina
Office: S329F Ross Tel: 416-736-2100 x77473
Email: Office hours: in Lab hours or by appointment
Course Website: moodle.yorku.ca (see below for details)
Lecture: Tuesday at 10:00 NB: lectures in Fall term only and TBA
Lab 1 Tues 11:30
WRIT 2100.03 will introduce students to the history and practice of several nonfiction genres, from the personal essay to magazine articles and reviews, profiles and investigative journalism. Online, students will find lectures on the history of prose, on genre, style and rhetoric, along with lectures modeling rhetorical and stylistic analyses of each week’s reading. Also online, students will engage in class discussion, responding each week to the reading and to one another’s opinions and arguments, and engaging with writing as craft and process on several levels: grammar, rhetoric, style, and argument. NB: This is a half course extended over the full year. Bi-weekly labs of 90 minutes will take place online. A computer lab, ACW 204, will be available for your convenience at the times above. Previous computer experience is not required. My lectures are posted online. There will be no live lectures other than introductions to the course in the first two weeks.
Course rationale
In the computer lab you will engage in dialogue, in writing - written conversation. You will gain the “experience of reasoning in writing,” and the competence you already have in speech and informal writing when reasoning about public issues and conflicts will begin to show up in your performance of written reasoning.The idea is that although you are all competent when talking and arguing, you are likely to be less competent when writing university essays. Written conversation, informal reasoning in writing, can be a bridge to, and a tempering of, the kind of analytic rigour required in academic papers, where you have to defend a precisely stated thesis in a logically developing.
Purpose: 2100 is not a creative writing course intended to teach you to write creatively, though you may do so. It is not an essay writing course intended to teach you how to write academic essays. Our emphasis will rest on the rhetorical analysis of nonfiction essays and on online discussion. In each class you will post a (rhetorically attuned) response to the week’s reading(s), and reply to at least one other student’sresponse.
Required Texts
Phillip Lopate, ed. The Art of the Personal Essay, 1994. (Some readings will be available on the course web site or elsewhere online.)
Grading, Assignments, Submission
Reflection (750 words) 15 %
Magazine article summary15%
Essay (1500 words)30 %
Conferencing 30 % (12 online posts to class discussions)
Participation 10% (-1 when late participating in online class)
Lateness Penalties and Missed Tests
Grading: The grading scheme for the course conforms to the 9-point grading system used in undergraduate programs at York (e.g., A+ = 9, A = 8, B+ - 7, C+ = 5, etc.). Assignments and tests* will bear either a letter grade designation or a corresponding number grade (e.g. A+ = 90 to 100, A = 80 to 90, B+ = 75 to 79, etc.)
(For a full description of York grading system see the York University Undergraduate Calendar -
Students may take a limited number of courses for degree credit on an ungraded (pass/fail) basis. For full information on this option see Alternative Grading Option in the (Faculty name) section of the Undergraduate Calendar: (provide web link to calendar description of this option for the Faculty offering the course)
Assignment Submission: Proper academic performance depends on students doing their work not only well, but on time. Accordingly,assignments for this course must be received on the due date specified for the assignment.
Lateness Penalty: Class discussion postsreceived later than the due date will be penalized 1 grade point. Other assignments by 5%.Exceptions to the lateness penalty for valid reasons such as illness, compassionate grounds, etc., may be entertained by the Course Instructor but will require supporting documentation (e.g., a doctor’s letter).
IMPORTANT COURSE INFORMATION FOR STUDENTS
All students are expected to familiarize themselves with the following information, available on the Senate Committee on Curriculum & Academic Standards webpage (see Reports, Initiatives, Documents) -
• York’s Academic Honesty Policy and Procedures/Academic Integrity Website
• Ethics Review Process for research involving human participants
• Course requirement accommodation for students with disabilities, including physical, medical, systemic, learning and psychiatric disabilities
• Student Conduct Standards
• Religious Observance Accommodation
What is a rhetorical analysis?
It’s an evaluation of a piece of writing from the perspective of the reader or audience. You will judge, by means of a detailed analysis of the writing, how successfully the piece communicates its ideas or feelings, and how successfully the rhetorical strategies support the writer’s aims.
Useful questions for rhetorical analysis
1 What expectations does the title arouse?
2 What is the effect on you of the opening passages?
3 What kind of essay is it: e.g., formal, informal expository, argumentative, narrative, speculative, meditative deliberative, forensic, epideictic, autobiographical? If the essay is argumentative, what kind of evidence does the writer present? What kind of appeal does she make - to reason (logos), emotion (pathos), character (ethos)?
4 What is the writer’s purpose (to amuse, instruct, entertain, argue, disturb, impress, educate, etc.)? What is she trying to persuade her audience to do and/or think and/or feel?
5 Who is the audience and are you part of it? Who is the narrator “talking” to? Does the piece “define” or “construct” its audience in any way?
6 What are the main rhetorical strategies (analysis, definition classification, description, exposition, comparison, contrast, narrative, dialogue, deduction, induction)? Are there distinct divisions and transitions? Is the form syllogistic or associative or ....
7 What is the tone of voice,* the writer’s attitude to her subject (eg commanding, cajoling, reflective, detached, urgent, insistent, witty, charming, angry, compassionate, quiet, controlled, familiar, intimate, reserved, distant, humorous, ironic, etc, etc)? How audible is the voice - personal, impersonal, objective, sermonic, academic, etc? How is the voice created - eg by Latinate or colloquial diction, archaisms, neologisms or tropes like simile, metaphor, hyperbole aposiopesis, antithesis, or schemes like asyndeton, anaphora, ploce? Are there any highly charged terms, positive or negative?
8 What level of style is apparent - formal/colloquial, simple/elaborate, etc. Is the writing verbal, adjectival, connective, nominative? On the sentence level note sentence length and structure, connectives, subordination, qualifications, questions, etc.
9 What other rhetorical devices serve character or tone or argument or affect? Are there any gaps or omissions that stimulate your reading?
10 How effectively does the essay end? With a moral, or insight, pathos or wit, comfort or discomfiture, confrontation, pathos?
11 What do you know about the author, the time when and the place where the essay first appeared? Are there any social or cultural values that seem problematic?
12 What is the essay’s overall effect on you – boredom, interest, fascination, surprise, shock, disgust, irritation, amusement, all of the above? Why?
* (tone: the emotional element in language, created by lexis, denotation, connotation, allusion, metaphor, repetition, sound, rhythm, sentence patterning, speech acts).
Reading Schedule: NB: Class discussion is due by Friday evening
Sept 11 Introduction, Moodle account - read Lopate’s preface xx111-xxxv
18 Edward Hoagland, “Turtles” 657,.
25Natalia Ginzburg, “He and I” 423 Finish Lopate’s preface
Oct 2
9 Ivan Turgenev, “The Execution of Tropmann” 306
16
23 James Baldwin, “Notes of a Native Son” 587
31- Nov 4 * Co-curricular week (1st assignment due as hard copy in S329)
Nov 6Adrienne Rich, “Split at the Root”640
13
20 Virginia Woolf, “Street Haunting” 256
27 Richard Selzer, “Knife” 708; Shonagan, “Hateful Things” 24 – choose one
Dec 4 * No class - Fall classes end Dec 3
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Jan 8 William Hazlitt, “The Pleasures of Hating” 189
15
22 F. Scott Fitzgerald, “The Crack-Up” 520
29 (Article Summary due as hard copy in S329 Ross)
31 G. K. Chesterton, “Chalk,” 249, Charles Lamb, “Superannuated Man” 172
Feb 5
12 Wendell Berry, “An Entrance to the Woods” 641
16-22 *** Co-Curricular / Reading Week ***
19 Hazlitt, “The Fight” 198
Mar 5
12 Woolf, “Death of the Moth” 265-7, Lu Hsun, “Death” 329-33 - both
19
26 Orwell, “Such, Such Were the Joys” 269
Apr 2 ESSAY DUE – both online and hard copy in S329 Ross