SPRING 2001
This information effective for Spring 2001.
Check with instructor the first day of class for any changes.
All sections of Writing 1 explore the power of language to make meaning, to create identities for the writer, to shape communities, and to influence readers. All sections will give you the chance to explore writing as a means of discovery and learning as well as a means of communication. Every section will help you to analyze rhetorical situations: that is, to understand the conventions at work in various situations and the kinds of arguments and evidence that are persuasive in different contexts. And in any section of Writing 1, you will have the chance to develop your particular strengths as a writer of academic prose and work on your particular weaknesses.
All sections of Writing 1 teach writing as a process that involves strategies for generating ideas, revising, and editing. They all will encourage you to work together as readers of each other's papers. And all will require a significant amount of reading and weekly writing which may include informal writing for yourself as well as more formal essays for others.
All course descriptions are subject to change.
Frosh have enrollment priority in Writing 1 courses during spring quarter. This means that they will enroll first (during their scheduled TELESLUG appointment times). On Friday, March 9, at 12:00 P.M., the frosh restriction will be lifted to allow all students to enroll in the remaining open spaces on a first-come, first-served basis.
Instructor: Jeff Arnett
MWF 12:30P-1:40P
Kresge 319
Working with both informal and formal essays, we will examine the role of creativity and the imagination in the development of children, as well as in our own lives. Course readings and individual research will help focus our discussions and refine your own explorations. Onsite visits to a local school will provide opportunities for field research. Your final project will be the creation of an original children's book ($15-20 "lab" fee).
"Imagination is more important than knowledge. " --Albert Einstein
Instructor: Jeff Arnett
MWF 2:00P-3:10P
Kresge 319
Working with both informal and formal essays, we will examine the role of creativity and the imagination in the development of children, as well as in our own lives. Course readings and individual research will help focus our discussions and refine your own explorations. Onsite visits to a local school will provide opportunities for field research. Your final project will be the creation of an original children's book ($15-20 "lab" fee).
"Imagination is more important than knowledge. " --Albert Einstein
Instructor: Mark Baker
TTh 2:00P-3:45P
Soc Sci 2-141
This course will focus on how U.S. culture, at the turn of the century, is ever rapidly fluctuating. With this in mind, we will consider how place, as both a literal and metaphorical entity, can shape who we are, the choices we make, and where we live. While examining what the term "community" has implied throughout the past and up to the present day, we'll explore how groups of people, as well as individuals, react to change within contemporary culture. We will then look at specific instances and issues confronting those within the United States (and oftentimes elsewhere). Areas of exploration will include the media (various forms), political movements, ecology, multi-culturalism, resistance, the politics of gentrification, economics, and others. Readings will potentially include pieces by Noam Chomsky, Howard Zinn, Gloria Anzaldúa, Dave Foreman, Judi Bari, Ed Abbey, Joan Didion, Jon Krakauer, Eric Bogosian, Maxine Hong Kingston, Cherríe Moraga, and others. Students will write and revise several short essays throughout the quarter, as well as one longer research paper.
Instructor: Mark Baker
TTh 4:00P-5:45P
Soc Sci 2-141
This course will focus on how U.S. culture, at the turn of the century, is ever rapidly fluctuating. With this in mind, we will consider how place, as both a literal and metaphorical entity, can shape who we are, the choices we make, and where we live. While examining what the term "community" has implied throughout the past and up to the present day, we'll explore how groups of people, as well as individuals, react to change within contemporary culture. We will then look at specific instances and issues confronting those within the United States (and oftentimes elsewhere). Areas of exploration will include the media (various forms), political movements, ecology, multi-culturalism, resistance, the politics of gentrification, economics, and others. Readings will potentially include pieces by Noam Chomsky, Howard Zinn, Gloria Anzaldúa, Dave Foreman, Judi Bari, Ed Abbey, Joan Didion, Jon Krakauer, Eric Bogosian, Maxine Hong Kingston, Cherríe Moraga, and others. Students will write and revise several short essays throughout the quarter, as well as one longer research paper.
Instructor: Holly Gritsch De Cordova
TTh 8:00A-9:45A
Eight 242
The focus of this course will be on the process of literacy development and the role of writing in academia and society. Readings will include a compilation of essays entitled Perspectives on Literacy, as well as Lives on the Boundary by Mike Rose. Students will also be asked to view several movies including Educating Rita, Dead Poet's Society, and Dangerous Minds. Each student will be required to spend time assisting writers in a K-12 school, community, or community college setting. Writing assignments are as follows: a research paper exploring an issue regarding literacy, four argumentative/analytic essays (essay topics will emerge from reading and class discussion), and a narrative describing/analyzing field experiences. All writing assignments will require a process approach including the preparation and submission of multiple drafts.
Instructor: Brij Lunine
MWF 2:00P-3:10P
Soc Sci 2-141
The purpose of this course is for each student to become a confident, purposeful, versatile writer. Our emphasis will be on analyzing, writing, and debating various issues in America today. The readings for the class critically engage a wide array of topics that affect our lives. We will examine and write about education, family, gender, race, sexuality, class, and their interconnections in America and in our own experiences. Selections include essays, social science writings, comic strips, documents, and the work of Malcom X, bell hooks, Leslie Marmon Silko, Alexis de Tocqueville, Langston Hughes, Gloria Anzaldúa, Gary Soto, and Jamaica Kincaid, among others. We will pay special attention to the form, purposes, rhetorical strategies, and writing styles of authors to inform and inspire our own writing. Students will write and revise a descriptive piece, an analytical essay, an expository research paper, and an argument or position piece, in addition to reflective and free-writing. Students can expect a variety of viewpoints, lively discussion and work with their peers in writing groups and workshops.
Instructor: Farnaz Fatemi
MWF 3:30P-4:40P
Soc Sci 2-141
We are living in a world where we are constantly bombarded by visual images (in art, popular media, and advertising). How can we write about this visual world in order to learn more about what we see? This course will explore the relationship between what we see and how we respond to those stimuli. We will study examples of various visual forms and read written responses, interpretations, criticism of art, and more. At the same time, we will practice writing in these forms and will each begin to articulate our own relationships to the visual world. Course material will include work by painters: Manet, Warhol, and Diebenkorn; photographers: Wendy Ewald, Walker Evans; graphic artist Barbara Kruger; and others. These images will be supplemented by other forms and texts: by student chosen or produced images, slides of traditional and popular American art, images we find in the popular print media. This is a good course, both for those who feel connected to art and for those who don't, but want ways to be.
Instructor: Tim Fitzmaurice
MWF 3:30P-4:40P
Merrill 132
This course in academic writing will concentrate on the skills required for academic research and essay writing. The course presents the skills for writing argumentative essays for all academic disciplines. Our thematic focus will be on violence in the community. Students will write and revise four essays on various topics. Two will be essays that concern issues in violence, with the emphasis on prevention. Students will be asked to read a book of essays, a book of theory, and a novel with violent themes. If you are averse to discussing or writing about this topic, then you should decline to enroll in this section of Writing 1.
Instructor: Tim Fitzmaurice
MW 5:00P-6:45P
Crown 202
This course in academic writing will concentrate on the skills required for academic research and essay writing. The course presents the skills for writing argumentative essays for all academic disciplines. Our thematic focus will be on violence in the community. Students will write and revise four essays on various topics. Two will be essays that concern issues in violence, with the emphasis on prevention. Students will be asked to read a book of essays, a book of theory, and a novel with violent themes. If you are averse to discussing or writing about this topic, then you should decline to enroll in this section of Writing 1.
Instructor: Roxanne Hamilton
TTh 10:00A-11:45A
Oakes 102
We will read and write about work that represents itself as fiction but which is based, however loosely or creatively, on truth, experience, or history. We will also read work that represents itself as truth, but which resembles fiction, either in its techniques or the way the truth is stretched. Writing analytical, argumentative, and reflective essays, we'll research the history in the stories and find the right rhetoric to address issues of audience and purpose. We'll read Frederick Douglass' Narrative, Toni Morrison's Beloved, Willa Cather's My Antonia, James Baldwin's Giovanni's Room and Notes of a Native Son, and a wide selection of personal essays by various authors. One angle we'll pursue is the "documentary impulse in black film and fiction." The films of Julie Dash and Isaac Julien often represent political or literary history within fictionalized films to convey their message. We'll study the American slave narrative as a prototype for telling the truth while telling a story and trace the migration of these techniques outward into other forms and fictions.
Instructor: Roxanne Hamilton
TTh 12:00P-1:45P
Oakes 102
We will read and write about work that represents itself as fiction but which is based, however loosely or creatively, on truth, experience, or history. We will also read work that represents itself as truth, but which resembles fiction, either in its techniques or the way the truth is stretched. Writing analytical, argumentative, and reflective essays, we'll research the history in the stories and find the right rhetoric to address issues of audience and purpose. We'll read Frederick Douglass' Narrative, Toni Morrison's Beloved, Willa Cather's My Antonia, James Baldwin's Giovanni's Room and Notes of a Native Son, and a wide selection of personal essays by various authors. One angle we'll pursue is the "documentary impulse in black film and fiction." The films of Julie Dash and Isaac Julien often represent political or literary history within fictionalized films to convey their message. We'll study the American slave narrative as a prototype for telling the truth while telling a story and trace the migration of these techniques outward into other forms and fictions.
Instructor: Ellen Hart
MWF 9:30A-10:40A
Soc Sci 2-141
The poet Ezra Pound has written that "Literature is news that STAYS news." In this course we'll read a daily newspaper to watch history unfold. And we'll look at the ways in which poets - including Emily Dickinson, Walt Whitman, Langston Hughes, Robert Frost, and Sandra Cisneros - have recorded the news about history: personal, political, and cultural history. This is a good course for those who love poetry, and those who fear poetry, to learn even more about reading poetry, writing about it, and enjoying it. The research component for the course includes exploring Dickinson and Whitman web sites focusing on the Civil War, grief, and consolation.
Instructor: Ellen Hart
MWF 11:00A-12:10P
Soc Sci 2-141
The poet Ezra Pound has written that "Literature is news that STAYS news." In this course we'll read a daily newspaper to watch history unfold. And we'll look at the ways in which poets - including Emily Dickinson, Walt Whitman, Langston Hughes, Robert Frost, and Sandra Cisneros - have recorded the news about history: personal, political, and cultural history. This is a good course for those who love poetry, and those who fear poetry, to learn even more about reading poetry, writing about it, and enjoying it. The research component for the course includes exploring Dickinson and Whitman web sites focusing on the Civil War, grief, and consolation.
Instructor: Robin King
MWF 11:00A-12:10P
Oakes 102
Some researchers claim that emotional intelligence contributes to a person's success in life more than performance on standardized exams. In this section of Writing 1 we will consider this claim and explore concepts of emotional intelligence by writing about the influence of emotions on perception, awareness, behavior, and critical thinking.
Students will complete informal and formal writing assignments in which they will analyze how humans dramatize emotions in socially effective and dysfunctional ways. In peer-led discussion and small response groups, there will be a strong link between analytical reading of essays about the dynamics of human emotions and writing convincing arguments about the connections between emotional intelligence and rational thinking. Students will research and write four papers about the influence of culture and social institutions on emotions, perceptions, and behavior. Course work will emphasize the essentials of academic writing, including grammar, effective language, drafting, rewriting, and editing papers.
Instructor: Robin King
MWF 12:30P-1:40P
Oakes 102
Some researchers claim that emotional intelligence contributes to a person's success in life more than performance on standardized exams. In this section of Writing 1 we will consider this claim and explore concepts of emotional intelligence by writing about the influence of emotions on perception, awareness, behavior, and critical thinking.
Students will complete informal and formal writing assignments in which they will analyze how humans dramatize emotions in socially effective and dysfunctional ways. In peer-led discussion and small response groups, there will be a strong link between analytical reading of essays about the dynamics of human emotions and writing convincing arguments about the connections between emotional intelligence and rational thinking. Students will research and write four papers about the influence of culture and social institutions on emotions, perceptions, and behavior. Course work will emphasize the essentials of academic writing, including grammar, effective language, drafting, rewriting, and editing papers.
Instructor: Catherine Kordich
MW 5:00P-6:45P
Soc Sci 2-141
This class will look at a variety of California narratives in an effort to locate effective writing strategies. Students will be asked to identify what conventions and strategies are and are not effective in selected texts as a means to clarify and strengthen their own writing. Readings will include newspapers from early statehood to the present, essays, poetry, and short fiction by authors such as John Steinbeck, Joan Didion, John Fante, Gary Soto, and Hisaye Yamamoto. The class will also view and discuss Chinatown and Vertigo, two films that have strong, nearly mythic California associations. Topics to analyze and discuss include the ways in which the changing social landscape of California is registered by immigrant authors of early statehood through today; how authors narrate California's natural environment, in both its quietly lovely (coastline, the Sierra Nevada, the desert) and infamously threatening (earthquake, fire, flood, drought) manifestations. Students will write several formal essays and shorter essays and participate in peer editing groups. All writing assignments will focus on methods for planning, drafting, revising, and researching.
Instructor: Nancy Krusoe
TTh 12:00P-1:45P
Cowell 223
What does our state represent? Is California the ultimate product? Is it being consumed? Reproduced? Does its place shift in the American imagination as much as our ground shifts beneath us? In this class we will read and write about our state's mythology, controversies, and matters critical to Californians today. Writing will include regular reading responses as well as several essays and revisions with one extended research project. In addition to analyzing ideas, we will study and practice rhetorical strategies to achieve different purposes and work on developing a written voice, with emphasis on elements of style that give meaning to our writing.
Staff
TTh 4:00P-5:45P
Cowell 223
Instructor: Farnaz Fatemi
MWF 12:30P-1:40P
Porter 249
We are living in a world where we are constantly bombarded by visual images (in art, popular media, and advertising). How can we write about this visual world in order to learn more about what we see? This course will explore the relationship between what we see and how we respond to those stimuli. We will study examples of various visual forms and read written responses, interpretations, criticism of art, and more. At the same time, we will practice writing in these forms and will each begin to articulate our own relationships to the visual world. Course material will include work by painters: Manet, Warhol, and Diebenkorn; photographers: Wendy Ewald, Walker Evans; graphic artist Barbara Kruger; and others. These images will be supplemented by other forms and texts: by student chosen or produced images, slides of traditional and popular American art, images we find in the popular print media. This is a good course, both for those who feel connected to art and for those who don't, but want ways to be.
Instructor: Tera Martin
TTh 8:00A-9:45A
Cowell 223
This course will examine the politics of institutions of higher learning through focusing on the University of California and your individual and community experiences here at UCSC. We will discuss not only the founding mission of UCSC, but also ask if that mission has since been transformed. How do such transformations impact your own education? While focusing on your own educational goals and experiences, we will also position them within the larger context of California's history, demographic realities (where people of color are a majority population), and financial priorities (where prisons are allotted more state funding than public colleges and universities). Writing for this course will take numerous forms, ranging from personal narratives to editorials to individual research projects.
Instructor: Tera Martin
TTh 10:00A-11:45A
Cowell 223
This course will examine the politics of institutions of higher learning through focusing on the University of California and your individual and community experiences here at UCSC. We will discuss not only the founding mission of UCSC, but also ask if that mission has since been transformed. How do such transformations impact your own education? While focusing on your own educational goals and experiences, we will also position them within the larger context of California's history, demographic realities (where people of color are a majority population), and financial priorities (where prisons are allotted more state funding than public colleges and universities). Writing for this course will take numerous forms, ranging from personal narratives to editorials to individual research projects.
Instructor: Gayle McCallum-Spalaris
TTh 8:00A-9:45A
Porter 249
"We are now in possession of a great deal of hard information about ourselves, but we do not use it to improve our institutions and therefore our lives."--Doris Lessing
In this Writing 1 course, we will examine the perils of blind obedience and conformity; we will determine where we fit into the political spectrum; we will re-examine the media with a critical eye. Finally, we will apply our critical thinking skills and newfound understanding of ourselves to investigate a community (including the UC campus) issue for the final, documented research paper.
The student will analyze texts and consider ideas and opinions from various perspectives. The student will also become aware of the strengths and weaknesses of his/her own writing through instructor and peer feedback and self-reflection. He/she will develop formal essays, including the research paper, using MLA format. Class texts: Writing and Reading Across the Curriculum, 7th edition, by Laurence Behrens and Leonard Rosen, A Writer's Reference, by Diana Hacker, and supplemental handouts.
Instructor: Patrick McKercher
MWF 11:00A-12:10P
Eight 242
This course will create a community of learners to investigate community itself: what is it? What value does it have? How is your community regarded by outsiders, how is that view perpetuated by the media, and what are the consequences? Is true community possible in cyberspace? In the spirit of community, we'll do group service-learning projects: tutoring and mentoring high school students, writing and creating web sites for nonprofit organizations, or developing virtual reality learning spaces. These projects require a significant time commitment outside of class. We'll also do five papers based on extensive course readings, one of which will be revised and expanded into a research paper.
Instructor: Peggy Miles
MWF 2:00P-3:10P
Cowell 223
In the words of Morrison, "If you study the culture and art of African-Americans, you are not studying a regional or minor culture. What you are studying is America." Through the works of the Nobel Prize-winning author, we will explore a too-often-overlooked aspect of the American experience. In addition, we will use her novels as models for discovering insights into the craft of writing. Texts will include The Bluest Eye, Beloved, and Jazz. The focus of this course will be on class participation and writing as a process. Students will generate ideas through class discussion, keep weekly learning logs, and develop their written skills through a succession of three drafts each on three different topics, including a research paper. We will look at means of developing a personal style and voice.
Instructor: Ellen Newberry
MWF 11:00A-12:10P
Porter 249
People have often used writing as a tool for exploring their own identity or for presenting their sense of self to the rest of the world. In this section of Writing 1, we will read fictional and autobiographical works which focus on the search for self. In particular, we will examine the ways that race, class, gender, and sexual identity affect this process of exploration, and we will discuss why people might use writing as a part of their processes of discovery. We will read books by such authors as James McBride, Julia Alvarez, Daphne Scholinski, and others and mix other media into our examination of this complex process of self-discovery. We will use the writing process as both a challenge to think critically about the world around us and an opportunity to examine our own lives more thoroughly. There will be five essays, each of which moves from discussion and planning through drafts, peer response, and revision. One essay will be based on research and will allow you to investigate a topic of your choice that centers on an issue connected with the search for identity.
Instructor: Dora-Katheryn Nur
TTh 4:00P-5:45P
Crown 202
The American obsession with time figures fundamentally in what we value and in our decisions about work, school, leisure, and play. How do we use and conceive of time as individuals and in our society as a whole? How are time and pace important in our lives? Analyzing essays, articles, and video clips, along with Robert Levine's A Geography of Time, Lightman's Einstein's Dreams, and chapters from Gleick's Faster, we'll explore and write about time as others have thought about it and as we come to understand it better. In addition to thirty journal entries, each student will write one reflective essay, three academic essays, and an individual research paper. (This offer is good for a limited time only!)
Instructor: Dora-Katheryn Nur
TTh 6:00P-7:45P
Crown 202
The American obsession with time figures fundamentally in what we value and in our decisions about work, school, leisure, and play. How do we use and conceive of time as individuals and in our society as a whole? How are time and pace important in our lives? Analyzing essays, articles, and video clips, along with Robert Levine's A Geography of Time, Lightman's Einstein's Dreams, and chapters from Gleick's Faster, we'll explore and write about time as others have thought about it and as we come to understand it better. In addition to thirty journal entries, each student will write one reflective essay, three academic essays, and an individual research paper. (This offer is good for a limited time only!)
Instructor: Sherri Paris
MWF 9:30A-10:40A
Eight 242
This course will focus on social and political movements of the1960s. Students will be introduced to major events, personalities, and ideas that made the decade unique. We will examine the Old Left roots of movement politics, how organizations like S.N.C.C. and S.D.S. redefined the Left's agenda, and how militant groups like the Weathermen and media-oriented groups like the Hippies changed and perhaps undermined that agenda. We will ask the questions: "What went wrong? What endured? What should the Left do differently in the next decade?" Cultural influences will be examined through primary source material, including excerpts of tracts, novels, films, and guerrilla theater. In addition to writing several short pieces, students will be required to write and completely revise a paper of substantial range.
Instructor: Sherri Paris
MWF 12:30P-1:40P
Eight 242
This course will focus on social and political movements of the 1960s. Students will be introduced to major events, personalities, and ideas that made the decade unique. We will examine the Old Left roots of movement politics, how organizations like S.N.C.C. and S.D.S. redefined the Left's agenda, and how militant groups like the Weathermen and media-oriented groups like the Hippies changed and perhaps undermined that agenda. We will ask the questions: "What went wrong? What endured? What should the Left do differently in the next decade?" Cultural influences will be examined through primary source material, including excerpts of tracts, novels, films, and guerrilla theater. In addition to writing several short pieces, students will be required to write and completely revise a paper of substantial range.
Instructor: Sarah-Hope Parmeter
TTh 8:00A-9:45A
Crown 202
This course is affiliated with a multi-grade early-outreach program focusing on Watsonville schools, so in addition to the regular coursework, students will regularly work on writing directed toward audiences ranging from fifth grade to high school. For this aspect of the course, Spanish-English bilingual skills will be very valuable, but they are not required. This course will explore a range of forms and topics used by women writers and consider their evolution over time. Writing assignments will include letters and journals, as well as essays. We will begin with Mary Shelley's Frankenstein and end with Gloria Anzaldúa's Borderlands/La Frontera and poetry by Sandra Cisneros. In between, we'll read Woolf's A Room of One's Own and Gillman's The Yellow Wallpaper.
Instructor: Dan Scripture
MWF 3:30P-4:40P
Eight 242
In this course, we will read a book called The Other Side of Heaven, edited by Wayne Karlin, Le Minh Khue, and Truong Vu, which offers many different perspectives on the experience of war and its aftermath. We will also read a short book of poetry, Renny Christopher's Viet Nam & California, and a book by Arnold Isaacs, Vietnam Shadows, which is meant as general background and as an information resource. It has an excellent bibliography and a good index, among other things. It is not a history of the war, but a history of the cultural aftermath of the war. These three books raise a number of issues: the history and politics of the War, the stress on families, the mystery of the recent past, the political conflict surrounding the War, personal and political healing, the present state of things in Viet Nam, and many other issues. Overall, we will be examining how the Viet Nam War has entered literary, political, and cultural memory. As a Composition & Rhetoric course, the focus is learning to write capably, fluently, and well. Writing and research in the course will address the issues above and will explore a number of different forms, including a final project or research paper. We will explore the writing process, including prewriting, planning, peer feedback, revision, and research.
Instructor: Jude Todd
TTh 10:00A-11:45A
Soc Sci 2-141
How might people live in physical, mental, and spiritual harmony with the rest of nature? This course approaches that question from a variety of perspectives. While we'll address several pieces of that puzzle, two seemingly disparate topics will attract more sustained attention: Pueblo Indian conceptions of the human place in nature, and recent advances in biotechnology.
Students enhance writing skills through composing and revising essays that explore such questions as: What's the relationship between our own bodies and that of the Earth, and what do our attitudes toward one imply about our conceptions of the other? How might our concepts of nature interfere with alternative ways to inhabit the Earth? What roles might writing play in discovering, as well as articulating, fresh ecological insights? The final research project requires a deeper exploration of a course-related topic of the student's choice.
Note: Due to my sensitivity to chemicals, I need a scent-free classroom. I ask that people not wear perfume, scented hair or body products, or clothing smelling of tobacco smoke, fabric softeners, etc., in class. Thank you.
Instructor: Jude Todd
TTh 4:00P-5:45P
Oakes 103
How might people live in physical, mental, and spiritual harmony with the rest of nature? This course approaches that question from a variety of perspectives. While we'll address several pieces of that puzzle, two seemingly disparate topics will attract more sustained attention: Pueblo Indian conceptions of the human place in nature, and recent advances in biotechnology.
Students enhance writing skills through composing and revising essays that explore such questions as: What's the relationship between our own bodies and that of the Earth, and what do our attitudes toward one imply about our conceptions of the other? How might our concepts of nature interfere with alternative ways to inhabit the Earth? What roles might writing play in discovering, as well as articulating, fresh ecological insights? The final research project requires a deeper exploration of a course-related topic of the student's choice.
Note: Due to my sensitivity to chemicals, I need a scent-free classroom. I ask that people not wear perfume, scented hair or body products, or clothing smelling of tobacco smoke, fabric softeners, etc., in class. Thank you.
Instructor: Amy Weaver
MWF 8:00A-9:10A
Cowell 223
Through writing and discussion, the participants in this course will work together on issues concerning the role of the university in our lives and our societies. Among others, we might consider questions such as: What is the university, who "gets" to go there, and who decides? Does a public university have a public responsibility, and what might that entail?
Admittedly, these questions are enormous ones that will not be resolved during the course of a quarter. The more limited goal of this seminar is to allow students and the instructor to begin a critical inquiry into personal, social, and political aspects of a university education. Students will be asked to work with the instructor to outline the path the course will follow based on the current interests of the students. As this course is foremost a writing course, students will participate in weekly writing groups and will be constantly engaged in both informal and formal writing, culminating in a final research project.
Instructor: Jim Wilson
MWF 9:30A-10:40A
Kresge 319
We will explore fiction and film relevant to important cultural and intellectual moments of the past 50+ years: post-colonialism, feminism, Paris '68, and existentialism. Writing will include regular logs, essays, and revisions; discussions and draft sessions will be mostly student-directed. Texts include Pig Tales and The Stranger; films include Breathless and The Battle of Algiers.
Instructor: Robert Michalski
MWF 8:00A-9:10A
Stevenson 151
In this section we will concentrate upon developing the critical reading and writing skills necessary for college-level academic work. In order to help develop these skills, we will read and discuss provocative essays which confront the challenges presented by an attempt to understand popular culture in America. Through class discussions and short writing assignments on the readings and on such everyday examples of popular culture like advertisements, TV shows, and movies, students will generate ideas for longer essay assignments. These assignments will be of varying lengths and will include assignments involving research. In addition to working on your own writing, you will also read and discuss the work of your peers.
Instructor: Rosalind Warfield-Brown
MW 5:00P-6:45P
Soc Sci 1-153
With Mary Shelley's Frankenstein and John Gardner's Grendel, as well as several films, as our texts, this course will explore what constitutes "human" behavior. Using these two famous literary examples of "monsters," we will examine our attitudes about others who are different from ourselves and how prejudices and fears arise. Beauty and ugliness, conformity and individuality, and powerlessness and cruelty are related topics. We will write three or four short (3-4 page) essays; a longer paper (7-9 pages) will be a quarter-long project to which the shorter papers may contribute. The course will emphasize constructing persuasive arguments and gathering evidence from sources, accurately documented. Class participation and attendance, as well as the written work, will affect students' success in the course.
Instructor: Rosalind Warfield-Brown
MW 7:00P-8:45P
Soc Sci 2-141
With Mary Shelley's Frankenstein and John Gardner's Grendel, as well as several films, as our texts, this course will explore what constitutes "human" behavior. Using these two famous literary examples of "monsters," we will examine our attitudes about others who are different from ourselves and how prejudices and fears arise. Beauty and ugliness, conformity and individuality, and powerlessness and cruelty are related topics. We will write three or four short (3-4 page) essays; a longer paper (7-9 pages) will be a quarter-long project to which the shorter papers may contribute. The course will emphasize constructing persuasive arguments and gathering evidence from sources, accurately documented. Class participation and attendance, as well as the written work, will affect students' success in the course.
Instructor: Jessica Breheny
MW 7:00P-8:45P
Eight 242
How are we able to affect our world through writing? In what ways can writing bring about change in our societies and communities? In this course we will focus on writing as a way to critically engage with issues in our communities. We will study short works by authors attempting to change or challenge the world(s) in which they live, including essays, short stories, poetry, and film. And we will identify and evaluate the methods they use to advance their projects. Requirements will include short response papers, essays, group presentations, and research. Writing assignments will welcome your creativity, and peer response will be integral to the development of drafts and revisions.
Instructor: Michelle Morton
TTh 2:00P-3:45P
Porter 249
In this course we will examine different approaches to representing self, place, and community in writing. Focusing on representations generated from California's social and geographic landscape, we will look at works from a number of different genres--including testimonial, autobiography, short story, and the novel--analyzing their narrative qualities and conventions and comparing the representations created by these distinct modes. We will identify and examine the diverse rhetorical strategies used to convey images of the individual in a variety of historical, social, cultural, and geographic contexts, considering the work of authors such as Mary Paik Lee, Gary Soto, Raymond Chandler, and Walter Mosley. In addition to regular informal responses to the readings, students will write a series of formal essays and a research paper, taking each essay through several drafts in response to feedback from the instructor and their peers. Our work in this course will focus on strategies for planning, researching, drafting, and revising.
Instructor: Steve Walton-Hadlock
TTh 2:00P-3:45P
Crown 202
We will study a range of literary works which present the metaphorical "Magic Island" as a place for attempted growth and the resolution of conflict. Texts will include Plato's Phaedo, Shakespeare's play The Tempest, Zora Neal Hurston's novel Their Eyes Were Watching God, and Robert Towne's screenplay Chinatown. Not just a study of fictional utopian models, the course will encourage students to create their own Magic Islands and also analyze recent attempts at utopian communities, including--dare we stretch it?--the City on the Hill itself. We will address such themes as redemption and identity, the (ir)responsibility of power, and the role of "madness" in the creation of myth and community. Students will write an informal essay, several academic essays on the texts, and a longer research paper. Coursework will encourage all aspects of the writing process: generation of ideas, planning, drafting, revising, and editing the work of others in peer groups. "O brave new world that has such people in it!"
Instructor: Sarah-Hope Parmeter
TTh 10:00A-11:45A
Crown 202
This course is affiliated with a multi-grade early-outreach program focusing on Watsonville schools, so in addition to the regular coursework, students will regularly work on writing directed toward audiences ranging from fifth grade to high school. For this aspect of the course, Spanish-English bilingual skills will be very valuable, but they are not required. This course will explore a range of forms and topics used by women writers and consider their evolution over time. Writing assignments will include letters and journals, as well as essays. We will begin with Mary Shelley's Frankenstein and end with Gloria Anzaldúa's Borderlands/La Frontera and poetry by Sandra Cisneros. In between, we'll read Woolf's A Room of One's Own and Gillman's The Yellow Wallpaper.
Instructor: Steve Walton-Hadlock
TTh 6:00P-7:45P
Crown 203
We will study a range of literary works which present the metaphorical "Magic Island" as a place for attempted growth and the resolution of conflict. Texts will include Plato's Phaedo, Shakespeare's play The Tempest, Zora Neal Hurston's novel Their Eyes Were Watching God, and Robert Towne's screenplay Chinatown. Not just a study of fictional utopian models, the course will encourage students to create their own Magic Islands and also analyze recent attempts at utopian communities, including--dare we stretch it?--the City on the Hill itself. We will address such themes as redemption and identity, the (ir)responsibility of power, and the role of "madness" in the creation of myth and community. Students will write an informal essay, several academic essays on the texts, and a longer research paper. Coursework will encourage all aspects of the writing process: generation of ideas, planning, drafting, revising, and editing the work of others in peer groups. "O brave new world that has such people in it!
Staff
TBA
TBA
Instructor: Nancy Krusoe
TTh 2:00P-3:45P
Merrill 002
This writing course will focus on the essay and the further development of critical thinking, writing, and reading skills. Our text will be The Best American Essays, a variety of interesting essays written in the past few years. We will study the language and rhetorical strategies used by these writers to achieve powerful writing. Students will write weekly papers with special attention to issues of grammar and usage and alternative sentence structures in academic writing as well as the connection between thinking and writing. Essays will be generated from our reading material and drafted, critiqued, and revised--often more than once--with the help of a writing tutor.
Instructor: Ellen Newberry
MWF 9:30A-10:40A
Porter 249
This course will combine two areas of exploration. We will look at language and its potential as a tool for critical thinking and discovery, and we will also explore the world around us and our role in a complex and constantly changing society. Readings will include fictional stories and non-fiction essays which center on cultural criticism and the challenges that face us in today's communities. Students will write weekly short essays as well as a series of longer papers, each one moving from discussion and planning through drafts, peer response, and revision, with particular help from a writing assistant. We will also be working on the mechanics of writing, set in the context of the essays themselves. Class discussions will provide opportunities to examine the readings, share ideas, and work through problems in the writing process.
Instructor: Elizabeth Abrams
TTh 2:00P-3:45P
Kresge 325
Artists write regularly about their work. They apply for funding, advertise performances, prepare exhibit and program notes, and more. Those in art-related fields write, too - curators, children's theater directors, and arts journalists, among them. This course is meant for people interested in writing clearly and effectively about art. It focuses on various genres of practical writing about the visual and performing arts. Participants will study and compose writing meant for a general audience (press releases, program notes, exhibit catalogue copy) and for more specialized audiences (grant proposals, artists' statements about their own work, academic journal or professional magazine articles). Peer review, revision, and the development of a practical collection of art-related writing will be focal points of this class. This course satisfies the "W" requirement.
Instructor: Patrick McKercher
MWF 2:00P-3:10P
Stevenson 152
We will investigate what makes writing successful in real-world situations by using personal experience or a case study approach to create resumes, reports, proposals, end-user manuals, audio-visual presentations, and web sites. Because such writing is invariably collaborative, a significant amount of the course will involve group projects. Moreover, since so much professional communication is digital, we'll cover the basics of web and multimedia authoring tools (no experience at all is needed, but committed technophobes will probably be unhappy). Group projects can be for a local for-profit or nonprofit organization. We will also interact with professional writers and designers currently working in the field.
Instructor: Jim Wilson
MWF 11:00A-12:10P
Oakes 106
An investigation of contemporary persuasive discourse with special attention to the elements and forms of argument, the nature of evidence, questions of validity and probability, and the workings of rhetorical reasoning. Emphasizes the analysis of arguments rather than their construction. Prerequisites: satisfaction of the Subject A requirement and composition (C) general education requirement. Enrollment limited to 40.
Instructor: Virginia Draper, Lecturer in Writing
T/Th 4-5:45, Stevenson 151
Office: 275 Stevenson, phone 459-2827
e-mail: vdraper@cats.ucsc.edu
This is a composition course for students who, having mastered basic writing skills, wish to increase their effectiveness as rhetoricians, prose stylists, and editors. The central concern of the course is what makes writing effective, given the writer's purposes and readers. In the past students have written autobiographical essays, academic papers, senior theses, editorials, graduation speeches, funding proposals, etc. We also read and experiment with non-traditional prose styles and formats.
Writing 163 satisfies the (W) component of the General Education requirements.
Prerequisites: Subj. A and (C) requirement.
You should expect to spend 10+ hours a week outside of class. Class meetings are required and more than two absences could jeopardize your passing the course.
Please make every effort to come to each class meeting during the first four weeks of the course as we create a writing/learning community. If you must miss class at any time, please give me a written note explaining your absence when you return to class.
1. Writing Assignments: A draft or revision of a piece of expository prose is due 8 times during the quarter, usually on Tuesdays. "Expository prose" is defined as not fiction or poetry or plays, etc., though writers are encouraged to use fictional, poetic, or dramatic techniques as they serve their purposes.
At least two of the pieces you submit, but no more than five, will be revisions of drafts previously submitted. You are free to choose your topic, tone, style, and strategies.
The only stipulations for these papers are that you write with other members of the class in mind as your readers and that one of your papers be in an "alternate style" (more on this later). The length of the pieces is up to you, but it is hard to write anything significant in less than three pages, and it is hard for readers to deal with anything much longer than 6 pages.
You can submit papers or pieces of works in progress you are working on for other courses with these guidelines: You check with the instructor of the other course. You get me the draft in time to read for you to do a revision before you turn it in to the other course. You give me the revision you have done with reflections on what you've changed and why. The draft will count as one of your 8 submissions for this course, but the revision will not.
At least once during the quarter, each of you will have the chance to lead a discussion of your paper in class. When it is your turn, you make copies of your paper available outside my office by noon, the day before the paper is to be discussed.
2. Responding to Others' Writing: In addition to the papers discussed in class, everyone will read and carefully comment on at least three papers each week. There are two possibilities for doing this task, and you can decide which you'd like to do during the second week of the class:
If you choose (a), you will put a copy of each essay in the Library by Tuesday's class. Readings should be done by Friday.
If you choose (b), you will meet with your group once a week at a time convenient for all of you. We will form groups during the second week of class and they will meet weeks 2-10.
3. Style & Editing: We will work through the advice, strategies, and selected exercises in J. Williams, Style. Williams has excellent insights on how to make your writing more clear and graceful at the sentence and paragraph level. Every time I teach this course, my writing improves because of Williams' suggestions!
And we will explore the possibilities of writing in what Winston Weathers calls "alternate styles," the best part of the course for some previous students in Writing 163!
4. Field Notes & Writer's Book: During the quarter, you will keep "Field Notes" on your reading in Murray and Williams and on any other reading or experiences that relate to your growth as a writer. These Field Notes should include observations on how other writers pursue their craft, a collection of favorite passages and sentences, and ideas for essays of your own. At the end of the quarter, you will use your Field Notes to create your own "Writer's Book" which will be due at the examination time for this class. At that time, each of you will present your book and say something about its evolution and contents.
5. Possible First Assignment - for Thursday, March 29: Reader's & Writer's Profile
*Read in Murray, To the Student and Teacher; Ch. 1, Reading as a Writer; Ch. 2. Take a look at the Table of Contents (xiii-xvi). Read Orwell, "Why I Write" and Didion, "Why I Write." Take a look at the list of "Writing Problems Solved."
As you do this reading, begin your field notes. Underline or put checks by ideas, thoughts, sentences you say "Yes!" to. Note puzzlements and questions. Note things that grate or seem wrongheaded.
Does the table of contents suggest any ideas or topics to you for your essays this quarter? Note them. Are your purposes and desires to write more like Orwell's or Didion's or neither? Review the list of Writing Problems Solved. Ever had any of these problems? Look up words that seem interesting to you. Jot down sentences that seem well crafted.
With these responses and other reflections, you are ready to write your Profile. Compose your profile to introduce yourself as a writer to me and the rest of the class. In your profile, you might include descriptions of your writing processes. Tell us what you've written recently and what you hope or plan to write in the future. What kinds of writing come easily? what comes hard? Do you have recurring sticking points and times of smooth sailing?
What sort of writing do you admire? What writers do you admire? What sort of readers do you want to impress, convince, persuade, delight, amuse, and entertain? What other purposes do you have for writing?
What was the most fruitful writing situation for you? the least fruitful? Have you ever been in a writing group? with what results?
If you compared your processes or your styles to some other art or process, what might it (they) be? For instance, rock music? Mozart? New Wave? Brazilian samba? Michaelangelo, Jackson Pollack, Georgia O'Keefe? refried beans, sushi, pizza? the Empire State Building, the Golden Gate Bridge, downtown L.A., the rain forests of the Amazon? Butterflies, leopards, frogs? For you, is writing most like gardening or mining or cooking or hunting?
At the end include what you expect for participation in this class. What are your hopes, goals, aspirations? fears, apprehensions, uneasinesses?
At the top of your profile, put name, address, phone number, and include a picture of yourself. This can be a photocopy of student card or license.
Instructor: Conn Hallinan
TTh 12:00P-1:45P
Porter 249
In-depth, community-based reporting, with an emphasis on skills ranging from interviewing techniques to profiles, integrating research with writing. Students choose a specific area or "desk" of concentration, and all the stories reflect that beat. Prerequisites: satisfaction of the Subject A requirement; and a writing sample, completed in class, is required at first class meeting; priority is given to journalism minors. (General Education Code: W.) Enrollment limited to 20.
Instructor: Kevin Woodward
Th 6:00P & 8:00P
Lab/Room TBA
This course is designed to introduce students to the basics of writing, producing, and designing news content for the World Wide Web. Using a combination of lectures, hands-on labs, and assigned projects, we'll analyze news sites and online style, learn Internet-specific reporting and research techniques, and develop HTML and page design skills. Together, we'll explore the culture of digital journalism and the key issues facing this evolving industry. Students will be expected to participate in critical and reporting exercises, do online research, produce original articles based on online reporting, and to design and produce basic web pages.
Instructor: Conn Hallinan
Th 2:00P-3:45P
Porter 241
Newswriting seminar for City on a Hill editors and writers. Weekly sessions evaluate newspaper in depth, including writing, reporting, and issues in journalism ranging from ethics to legal questions. Prerequisites: instructor determination at the first class meeting; open only to editors, interns, and writers at City on a Hill Press. May be repeated for credit. Enrollment limited to 15.
For more information and copy of syllabus, go to: http://reg.ucsc.edu/soc/aci/spring2001/humn.html
Instructors: Virginia Draper & Cecilia Freeman
M 2:00P-5:00P
Stevenson 221
Open to graduate students from all departments and divisions, this course prepares students to teach undergraduate writing courses. We examine current theories and approaches to teaching writing and examine strategies that are useful in composition courses and in courses throughout the curriculum, such as designing effective assignments, developing critical reading and discussion skills, and giving helpful responses. Students visit Writing 1 classes, try out activities they might use, share teaching strategies and concerns, and create a syllabus for a first-year composition course. Probable texts: T. Newkirk, ed., Nuts and Bolts; P. Elbow, Everyone Can Write; V. Draper, Writing & Learning; and a reader.
This course (or its equivalent) is required for graduate students who wish to be eligible to teach Writing 1, Composition and Rhetoric, at UCSC.