ENC 1101 Section 1342

INTRODUCTION TO THE COURSE AND BASIC CONCEPTS

• language(s), codes, and the process of communication;
• text and context;
• interpretation;
• intertextuality;
• multimediality;
• writing and electronic writing;
• computers, multimedial information, and electronic writing in the Network Writing Environment.

1) THE NETWORK WRITING ENVIRONMENT: USING THE TOOLS

• X-Windows
• Services
• Word Perfect 6.0
• File Manager
• E-mail
• Telnet
• Netscape: navigation in cyberspace
• MOOville
• Texts and hypertexts
• Netscape: creating hypertextual documents for the WWW

(text used: M. Conlon & A. Rue: The Network Writing Environment at The IBM Writing Project)

WEEKS 4-8: (Sept. 11 - Oct. 13)

2) THE ANALYTICAL TASK: A WAY TO IMPROVE YOUR OBSERVATION.

• Comparative and dialectic analysis.
• Identification of an "object" and its components:
  • what is it?
  • how does it work?
  • what are its functions?
  • in which contexts?
  • what are its components?
  • what are the relationships among the components?
  • what are the relationships between the components and the whole?

3) THE WRITING PROCESS

• Introduction to the Writing Process:
  • Reading.
  • Pre-writing: brainstorming, free writing, clustering.
  • Drafting.
  • Revising.
• Problems of Critical Thinking:
  • Assumption: What's taken for Granted?
  • Opinions: What's Believed?
  • Evaluation: What's Felt and Judged?
  • Viewpoints: What's the Filter?
• Forms and Standards of Critical Thinking:
  • Inductive Reasoning and Inductive Fallacies: How Do I Reason from Evidence?
  • Deductive Reasoning and Deductive Fallacies: How DO I Reason from Premises?
  • Argument Analyzing and Building: What's a Good Argument?
• Creating With Critical Thinking:
  • Research Skills: How Can I Create Knowledge?
  • Problem Solving: How Can I Create Solutions?
• Writing a Paper: Putting Things Together.

Texts used:

• Marlys Mayfield: Thinking for Yourself;
• Supplemental material on reserve:
  • From P. Eschholz, A. Rosa & V. Clark: Language Awarness, St. Martin Press, New York, 1994 (6th edition):
    
    • H. Keller, The Day Language Came Into My Life (13- 15);
    • P. Farb, The Story of Human Language (17-23).
    • V. Fromkin % R. Rodman, What Is Language? (25-32)
    • S. I. Hayakawa & A. R. Hayakawa, Giving Things Names (39-45).
  • Allais, "A Most Parisian Episode," in U. Eco, The Role of the Reader, Indiana University Press, pp. 263-66.
  • D. Lee, "Lineal and Nonlineal Codification of Reality," in J. Dolgin & D. Kemnitzer (Eds.), Symbolic Anthropology. A Reader in the Study of Symbols and Meanings, Columbia University Press, NY, pp. 151-164.

(Week 5: first paper due)

4) ANALYTICAL TOOLS FOR READING AND INTERPRETING TEXTS

• Languages: verbal and non-verbal languages.
• The critical problem of reading and interpreting: the author, the text, the reader.
• Where is the true meaning of the text?
• Dismissing objectivity: THE truth and the TRUTHS.
• The text: one, none, one-hundred-thousand texts?
• Mono-medial and multimedial texts: texts of words, images, sounds.
• A semiotic approach to texts:
  • the text as a signifying surface;
  • the meaning(s) of texts within communicative contexts;
  • interpretation and evaluation of texts.

(Week 10: second paper due)

5) WRITING ABOUT LITERATURE AND MEDIA:
MULTIMEDIALITY, MULTIPLICITY, MULTI-LINEARITY, NON-LINEARITY

• The multiplicity of multiple texts: fragments, intertextuality, metafiction, hyperfiction, and multimediality:
  • Barthes: from A Lover Discourse;
  • Borges: The Library of Babel, The Garden of Forking Paths;
  • Calvino: The Model of Model;
  • Coover: The Baby-Sitter;
  • Queneau: Exercises in Style;
  • Robbe-Grillet: Snap-shots;
  • Joyce: Afternoon.

(week 14: third paper due)

6) REVIEW AND CONCLUSION

(week 16: final project due)