In this class, we will take a look at issues in America, particularly issues that result from technology changes. It's no secret that we live in an ever-changing world. From the constant chatter of the 24-hour news cycle to the ubiquity of smart phones, technology has undoubtedly contributed to our fast-paced, and often chaotic, lifestyle. We will ask such questions as: Is fast food addictive? Could TV be good for us? How realistic is economic mobility? And is America still number one? As we scratch the surface of so-called common sense, I hope you find some unexpected truths and deeper wisdom about the wonderful, horrible, crazy, and exciting place we call America.
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This course is a writing-intensive introduction to poetry across cultures. The work of this course is to introduce you both to the pleasures of reading poetry and to the pleasures of deciphering it. The first mark of a good sculpture is that it stands up. Realistic or abstract, every piece of sculpture has an underlying technique that insures it is not constantly toppling over. We can all admire the beauty of art, but we do not all know how the piece maintains its balance, how it works. Like visual or plastic art, poetry depends upon underlying stylistic and formal techniques. By teaching you new tools, concepts and habits of mind, this course will enable you to join (hopefully not sacrifice) your appreciation of a poem with an understanding of its inner structure and form.

We will also be examining the idea of a poetic tradition in English, and the criteria by which poets have been included and excluded from that tradition. What makes a poem good? Who decides? How does poetry shape culture, and how is it shaped by it? Why were some poets, e.g. African-Americans, women, Native Americans, excluded from the canon of poetry in English for so long? How, and how much, has this changed?

The final, and arguably most important, aim of this class is to teach you to love poetry, to let yourself experience its music and magic. To this end, in addition to the critical writing required, you will be doing a variety of creative exercises, including memorization, occasional in-class writing exercises, and poetic imitation.
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These sections of English 003 will focus on argument and the humanities, especially as arguments may be implied by works of short fiction. For that reason, we will be reading and discussing a variety of short stories in this course, particularly as they relate to the theme "The Individual vs. Society" as we explore how authors depict a character who somehow does not fit into his or her surroundings and tries to change them, with differing degrees of success. You will be expected to write essays in which you analyze arguments in selected stories, as well as at least one argumentative essay related to current developments.
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This is a thematic-classical argument course. The theme of the course is double consciousness. Knowledge of one's history is critical in understanding, even appreciating the arduous terrains and improbable contours navigated by the ancestors on whose shoulders we all stand today. W.E.B Du Bois engendered the metaphor of the Veil as double consciousness, first as an internal battle of the individual and then, as an external drive to fight against racism and discrimination, even as black people strove to maintain their cultural distinctiveness without necessarily assimilating. In this course, students will be taught to research profoundly into the concept of double consciousness and explore its evolvement from a disorienting internal tension to an external verve used to battle against the double oppression of racism and discrimination simultaneously. Critical reading and thinking, logical fallacies, literary theories, and rhetorical devices will all form part of this themed-classical argument course. Indeed, double consciousness is as problematic today as it was in 1903 when Du Bois first published The Souls of Black Folk, so we will explore, navigate, investigate, research, and analyze further into the concept as a contemporary problem in essays and books we will read throughout the course to stimulate the writing of excellent argumentative research papers and essays. )
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This course will focus on the African American, Afro-Latino, and Afro-Native American culture production (literature, music, and film) in the United States. As a result, students will explore how discourses of ethnicity, race, and belonging shape these communities' participation in American society and culture. Furthermore, this course will take an interdisciplinary approach to study these cultural products as members of these communities address their own absence or misrepresentation in American culture. Thus, arguments written for this course will particularly examine and explore the contradictions and conflicts in American cultural production as they relate to African Americans, Afro-Latinos, or Afro-Native Americans.
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Students will interrogate responses to acts of intolerance found in popular culture, such as films, hip-hop music, digitalized media, newspapers, and visual texts as well as in literary texts. These acts have often become embedded within cultural memory, as markers of one's identity. The shared cultural memory provides cohesion within a group. On the other hand, the lack of knowledge of one's history, a disconnect to the cultural memory, can destroy the cohesiveness within the group and can result in the inability to read the subtext of textual references that grow out of historical narrative. For example, a Native American must be able to understand what occurred at Wounded Knee in the nineteenth century to appreciate the twentieth century Native American writers who revisit that historical moment to reconstitute the solidarity that the event evoked. This course is designed to examine texts that are rich in textual references that respond to acts of intolerance within American culture. These texts will provide the basis for analysis and writing well developed argumentative essays and research papers.
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Technology continues to change and shape our lives—almost daily. Our class will focus on issues of Web 2.0 and examine the problems from an interdisciplinary perspective. From day one, we will discuss what a "discipline" actually consists of, how disciplinary perspectives and treatments of a problem may differ, and how to approach a problem using more than one discipline.
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The written word—how we use it and even how we comprehend it—is rapidly changing. Most business writing now takes place on the Web. To help better prepare students for this brave new digital world, this class will focus student writing toward that end—the Web. Assignments will integrate research, tools, and methods from business, journalism, and even computer science and visual design. Some research has shown that as a result of the Web, people are becoming more visual, that the lines separating the purely textual and the purely visual are blurring. And that this isn't necessarily a bad thing. Nor is it a new thing. When Galileo wrote about Saturn, he drew drawings of the planet directly into his text, integrating the two seamlessly. This course will require the usual 009 assignments—résumés, proposals, research papers—but revamped with an eye to the Web and the future.
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