Writing Program - Winter 1999

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, revision, 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.

Writing 1, Section 1 Jeff Arnett TTH 2:00P-3:45P Oakes 102

Writing & Well-Being

A writing course that explores personal and public well-being; in fact, defining well-being will be an ongoing challenge for each of us. Focusing on our writing as both text and tool, we will use our own experiences and concerns as subject matter; we will utilize forms as diverse as poetry, autobiography, argumentation, and research to better understand how we can be well (or better) in this ailing world of ours. We will pay close attention to the nuts and bolts of composition as well as the importance of style in writing. Journals will also play a crucial role in our work, as will a willingness to challenge our assumptions about writing's role in our lives. We will read, write and, I hope, journey together into realms yet uncharged. We have much to teach one another.

Writing 1, Section 2 Jeff Arnett TTH 4:00P-5:45P Eight 242

Same as Section 1 above.

Writing 1, Section 3 Roger Bunch MWF 11:00A-12:10P Eight 242

Writing About Latin America

In this writing course, students analyze texts from a variety of genres, including fiction, poetry, "testimonios," and essays, on a wide range of topics and issues related to Latin America, including culture, politics, economics, religion, ecology, and human rights. Texts focus on Central America and Chiapas in Southern Mexico, though students interested in other regions of Latin America will be encouraged to read and write about those regions. In addition to journal entries and in-class writing, students will write essays, among them, a personal narrative incorporating analysis, a textual analysis, and an independent research paper on a topic the student generates. Students will engage in response groups, written peer response, and multiple revisions with the objective of learning to write clear, compelling, engaging essays.

Writing 1, Section 4 Carol Freeman MWF 9:30A-10:40A Stevenson 151

In this section, we will explore the multitudinous manifestations and dimensions of the essay itself. We will read and write autobiographical narratives, reflective essays, reports on research, arguments, and analyses, always paying particular attention to the interplay between writers' intentions and readers' responses.

We will work on developing a writing process and polishing a prose style suitable for academic discourse as well as experiment with more informal styles. Above all, we will explore the notion of effectiveness: that is, what makes a particular piece of writing work in a particular situation? The texts for the course include a collection of magnificent essays. Writing assignments (almost one per week) involve writing and rewriting different kinds of essays on topics of each student's choice.

Writing 1, Section 5 Cissy Freeman MWF 12:30P-1:40P Crown 202

Where We Live: Writing About Our Environment

In this class we will consider our interaction with the unique environment we inhabit through writing, investigating current issues, and examining the work of some noted California writers. Reading will include a mix of fiction and essays in three books--Living Up the Street by Gary Soto, The Pastures of Heaven by John Steinbeck, and The Practice of the Wild by Gary Snyder--and shorter pieces by Edward Abbey, William Cronon, Joan Didion, Gerald Haslam and Wallace Stegner. As we read, we will critically examine the ideas, purposes, rhetorical strategies and writing styles of the authors to inform and inspire our own writing. Writing will include informal opinion pieces, descriptive sketches and reflections,

and responses to reading, as well as several formal essays based on reading, research, discussion of current issues, and outdoor exploration. Coursework will emphasize strategies for drafting, revising and editing papers, with attention to grammar and effective language use. Everyone will participate in writing group workshops and share responsibility for discussion--all viewpoints welcome.

Writing 1, Section 6 Ellen Louise Hart TTH 10:00A-11:45A Stevenson 151

Poetry and the News: The poet Ezra Pound has written that "Literature is news that stays news."

In this course we'll look at the ways in which two 19th century American poets--Emily Dickinson and Walt Whitman--and a group of their 20th century successors (including Sandra Cisneros, Robert Frost, Allen Ginsberg, Langston Hughes, and Adrienne Rich) record the news--about history--their personal, political, philosophical, and cultural histories. This is a good course for those who love poetry and those who fear poetry to learn even more about reading it, writing about it, and enjoying it. The research component for the course includes exploring internet sources and making use of Dickinson and Whitman web sites.

Writing 1, Section 7 Ellen Newberry TTH 2:00P-3:45P Crown 203

Writing and Identity

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 way to assist in their processes of discovery. We will read books by such authors as Toni Morrison, Luis Rodriguez, Daphne Scholinski and others, and mix films and music 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.

Writing 1, Section 8 Robin King MWF 11:00A-12:10P Oakes 103

Writing About Television, Film and Advertising

The influence of mass media on society is the focus of this Writing 1 section. Students will locate themselves as consumers and critics of mass media by writing extensively about film, television, and advertising. We will study media literacy by examining reviews and critical essays about mass communications.

Students will complete informal writing assignments exploring their own perspectives about mass communications as they move to develop effective formal essays. In the course we will establish a strong link between analytical reading of essays written by media critics and writing thoughtful and convincing arguments about mass media.

Writing 1, Section 9 Cancelled

Writing 1, Section 10 Patrick McKercher TTH 10:00A-11:45A TBA

This course will create a community of learners who will investigate community itself: What is it? What is its value? What is your community and its significance? How is that community regarded, and what is the role of the media in its perception? Are new kinds of community possible in cyberspace? Not coincidentally, this section will afford the opportunity to do field research, as well as service-learning by mentoring Watsonville High School students. We'll do five papers, one in collaboration with WHS students, which will be anthologized in a book we will publish. One of the five papers generally dealing with criticism of film, novels, advertising and television will be researched, expanded and revised. Because of its outreach efforts, this section will meet occasionally in the computer lab and outside of normal class hours.

Writing 1, Section 11 Patrick McKercher TTH 2:00P-3:45P TBA

Same as Section 10 above.

Writing 1, Section 12 Ellen Newberry MWF 9:30A-10:40A Crown 203

Writing From the Neighborhood

This section of Writing 1 will focus on the notion of the neighborhood--its people, its activities, its potential and its problems. We will look at physical neighborhoods as well as communities formed by groups of people bound by forces other than geographic proximity. In particular we will look at the social dynamics and the larger issues of race, class and gender as they are played out in groups of people learning to live together. We will read works by authors like Gloria Naylor, Amy Tan, Luis Rodriguez, and Sandra Cisneros, and we will watch films by such directors as Spike Lee. 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 center on a research topic of your choice, examining some aspect of the concept of the neighborhood.

Writing 1, Section 13 Ellen Newberry MWF 12:30P-1:40P Crown 203

Same as Section 12 above.

Writing 1, Section 14 Dora Katheryn Nur TTH 4:00P-5:45P Stevenson 151

It's About Time

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? Analyzing essays, articles, video clips, and sociologist Robert Levine's A Geography of Time, we'll explore and write about time as others have thought about it and as we understand it. In addition to 30 journal entries, we'll write one reflective essay, three academic essays, and a research paper. (This offer good for a limited time only!)

Writing 1, Section 15 Sherri Paris TTH 10:00A-11:45A Soc Sci I 153

The 1960s

This course will focus on social and political movements of the Nineteen-Sixties. 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 Nineties"? Cultural influences will be examined through primary source material, including excerpts of tracts, novels, films, and guerrilla theater. This course continues themes which began in the Merrill Core Course regarding the Civil Rights movement and the Viet Nam War. Students will be required to write and completely revise a 30-page paper.

Writing 1, Section 16 Sherri Paris TTH 12:00P-1:45P Soc Sci I 153

Same as Section 15 above.

Writing 1, Section 17 Sarah-Hope Parmeter MWF 3:30P-4:40P Crown 202

Women's Ways of Writing: Una exploración bicultural

This course will explore the concept of a women's rhetoric by looking both at specific forms of writing that have historically been available to women and at themes that seem particular to women's writing. Readings will vary widely, but will focus on two primary areas: contemporary Chicana literature and English-language "classics." Authors will include Ana Castillo, Sandra Cisneros, Glória Anzaldúa, Jane Austen, the Brönte sisters, and Mary Shelley. This course will require bi-weekly essays, daily journals, and regular correspondence with individuals of your choice. A knowledge of Spanish will be helpful, but is not required; an ability to work comfortably in multicultural setting is a necessity.

Writing 1, Section 18 Sarah-Hope Parmeter MW 5:00P-6:45P Crown 202

Same as Section 17 above.

Writing 1, Section 19 Sarah Rabkin TTH 2:00P-3:45P Eight 242

A Writer's Journal

This section focuses on journals as tools for enriching and improving your writing. While working on the essential ideas featured in all Writing 1 courses (brainstorming, planning, drafting, revising, research, argument, audience, form, style, voice), we look at ways of cultivating the journal as a daily practice, a refuge, and a resource. Each student will keep a journal and work in it regularly in addition to turning in formal papers. (The journals will not be collected or scrutinized except when writers request it.) Readings include books and articles about journal-keeping as well as excerpts from published journals and diaries. There will be lots of guidance and suggestions, but you will benefit from this course most if you contribute your own initiative and creativity. Longtime journal keepers and those interested in beginning are equally welcome.

Writing 1, Section 20 Roz Spafford TTH 12:00P-1:45P Kresge 319

Researching Ourselves

Who do you think of as your community--or communities (by community I mean people with backgrounds and/or concerns somewhat similar to yours)? How do people in your communities develop their values--about politics, sexuality, religion, manners? What do they read? What music do they listen to? What do they know? What are they worried about? How do their interests intersect with or challenge those of mainstream American society?

In this section of Writing 1, you will gain research and analytical skills by investigating the diverse behavior and belief systems of a group or groups you identify. Students enrolling in this section should be willing to work both independently and collaboratively, doing library research as well as field work (observing and interviewing other students). Papers will be based on this research as well as on the texts for the course: pieces of popular culture, stories, essays, sociological studies--and of course on your own ideas. Students in this section will participate in a partnership project with students in a high school classroom.

Writing 1, Section 21 Jude Todd TTH 4:00P-5:45P Kresge 325

Earth Dwelling: Exploring the Human Place in Nature

How might humans live in physical, mental, and spiritual harmony with the rest of nature? Buddhist, Jain, and Native American conceptions of the human place in nature, Western scientific ecology, and contemporary nature writers of sundry stripes will inform our developing understanding of what it means to dwell on the Earth. What fundamental assumptions about the nature of nature hamper our capacity to live harmoniously within it? 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? Do language limitations impede articulation of crucial insights that could help heal ecological distress? What light can we, as a group and individually, bring to the question: How can humans appropriately take our place (and give our share) within nature?

Students will enhance writing skills through composing and revising essays that explore such questions. The final research project allows students to delve deeply into a course-related topic of their choice. Required texts, all non-fictional, include a reader, Rules for Writers , by Diana Hacker, and Ecopsychology: Restoring the Earth, Healing the Mind, ed. by Theodore Roszak et al.

Additionally, students will select one other volume of their choice from a list of supplementary texts. For this list or other information, email todd@cats.

Note: Due to my multiple-chemical sensitivity, I need to have 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., to class. Thank you.

Writing 1, Section 22 Sarah Whittier MWF 8:00A-9:10A Oakes 103

The Short Story

The short story is, in the words of Joyce Carol Oates, "a concentration of imagination [that]... no matter its mysteries or experimental properties...achieves closure-meaning that, when it ends, the attentive reader understands why." In this class we will be reading a wide selection of short stories, exploring the form from the nineteenth century to the present day. As we work to understand the form itself, in terms of language, image, and "the elements of fiction," we will also be examining the issues raised in the stories we read, from personal discovery to social critique and everything in between. Students will be asked to keep a daily reading journal in addition to writing five 4-5 page essays and one 10-page research paper. All papers will be worked through a series of drafts, which students will have the opportunity to "workshop" together both in class and, at least twice during the quarter, in assigned small-group meetings in my office.

Writing 1, Section 23 James Wilson MW 5:00P-6:45P Crown 203

20th Century Italy

This course will explore fiction and film on several themes (in reverse chronological order): post-modernism, political activism, neo-realism, and women authors during Mussolini's regime. Students can expect to write five papers (plus two revisions), and to participate in small group discussions and draft workshops. Authors and directors include Calvino, Fo, Negri, Tartufari, Wertmuller, Fellini, and de Sica.

Writing 1, Section 24 James Wilson MW 7:00P-8:45P Crown 202

France Since WWII

This course will explore fiction and film on several themes: pre-war 'gentility,' existentialism, feminism, and post-modernism. Students can expect to write five papers (plus two revisions), and to participate in small group discussion and draft workshops. Authors and directors include Colette, Camus, Duras, Redonnet, Renoir, Rohmer, and Klapish.

Writing 1, Section 25 Amy Weaver MWF 2:00P-3:10P Stevenson 151

Knowledge, Education, and the University

Do these words go together? Recent attacks on the university from both the political left and the right suggest not. Though with profoundly different agendas, many of these battles over higher education have focused on the extent to which universities have moved--either too far or not far enough--away from traditional forms of education. Rarely have these critiques moved beyond a superficial discussion of old ways versus new. The idea of this course is to begin such a move, and in doing so to consider questions such as: What is knowledge? Says who? Education? What constitutes a good one? And the university? What is it and why are you here? 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 participate in a critical inquiry into an area of study that should be of concern to both. Materials for the first part of the quarter will be drawn from recent debates about curriculum and multiculturalism, as well as philosophical works on knowledge and education. For the remainder of the quarter, students will be asked to work with the instructor to outline the path the course will follow based on the research interests of the students. Students will write both formal and informal essays, at least one based on research.

Writing 1, Section 26 Persis Karim TTH 8:00A-9:45A Porter 249

Writing Self, Reading Race: Autobiographical Writing in American Literature

This course will take American literature and autobiography as its focus, but we will particularly emphasize the works of African-American, Asian-American and Chicano/a writers to explore human rites of passage and the project of writing about race and ethnicity in America. In addition to reading the works of several American writers, you will be required to write four papers for this class and to keep a weekly reading and writing journal. This course will ask you to consider autobiographical and life writing in the context of race and identity and the particular importance this genre has for American ethnic and racial groups who are often writing against racial prejudice, stereotypes, and aspects of internalized oppression. We will read six books (most of them are quite short) and will analyze them for their attention to audience, style, language, and for the overall picture they paint for the group they might be representing. We will look at the differences between autobiography and fiction, and explore the ways that these authors blur some of these generic categories. The course will require you to think through the way that fiction, autobiography, and literature have been an essential part of thinking through individual and collective identities. In addition to producing three short (3-5 pp.) papers, you will write an autobiographical essay for your final project. Books: Zora Neale Hurston, Dust Tracks on a Road; James Baldwin, Go Tell it on the Mountain; Maxine Hong Kingston, Woman Warrior; Carlos Bulosan, America is in the Heart; Thomas Rivera, And the Earth Did Not Move; Sandra Cisneros, House on Mango Street; and a pack of xeroxed readings including poems, short stories and essays.

Writing 1, Section 27 Luz Calvo TTH 8:00A-9:45A Kresge 319

Sex In The Public Imaginary

In this writing course, we will explore ways that sex enters into public discourse. As the nation reflects on the President's definition of "sex," this course will analyze the rhetorical strategies of President Clinton and Independent Counsel Kenneth Starr as well as (and in relation to) other vigorously debated topics in sexual politics. Students may do research projects on such topics as gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender rights; inter-racial sexuality; teen pregnancy, AIDS education, or pornography. Readings will include excerpts of Foucault's History of Sexuality, the Starr Report, and critical essays by Toni Morrison, Lisa Duggan and Pat Califia. In addition to frequent informal response papers, students will be asked to write and revise a number of formal essay assignments. These formal essays will focus on close reading, exposition, argumentation, and research. We will use peer writing groups, turning the classroom into a community of writers.

Writing 1, Section 28 Nouma Issa MWF 2:00P-3:10P Kresge 325

"Bad Girls" of the Twentieth Century

How does a woman become a "bad girl"? In this course, we will examine the lives and works of women who violated American conventions of gendered behavior such as Angela Davis, Georgia O'Keefe, Margaret Mead, Billie Holiday, Grace Metalious and Madonna. In popular and high art, music, literature, politics and science, these celebrated women reacted to and altered the roles available to women in the US. We will ask what the dominant scripts for American women have been and how they have changed in the last ninety-odd years. We will also be investigating how these changes relate to overall changes in American society. Towards the end of the course, students will try to predict which battles a new generation of "bad girls" will be fighting in the future.

We will examine visual arts, film, autobiography, music, fiction, history and cultural criticism to sharpen our rhetorical skills. You should expect to participate actively in class and on paper. Writing assignments will include regular informal pieces, a few short essays in a variety of styles and a longer research project. Readings may include selections from Angela Davis's Women, Race and Class, Margaret Mead's Blackberry Winter, Billie Holiday's Lady Sings the Blues, Grace Metalious's Peyton Place, Georgia O'Keefe's Art and Letters, Matthew Rettenmund's Encyclopedia Madonnica, William Chafe, The Paradox of Change: American Women in the Twentieth Century, and Nancy Cott's Roots of Bitterness: Documents of Social History.

Writing 1, Section 29 Charla Ogaz MWF 11:00A-12:10P Porter 249

Using the text "Rereading America," this course will teach the student critical thinking about contemporary social issues. Students will write three essay assignments with extensive revisions. Using our analytical skills, we will focus on contemporary debates about diversity and multiculturalism. Because these issues shape students' lives, the class will explore how their own lives, as well as their writing, connect the personal with the academic. Students will be interested in exploring current events and the dominant cultural forces in our assumptions, ideas and values.

Writing 1, Section 30 Candace Calsoyas MWF 2:00P-3:10P Crown 203

Portraits of Place: Water, Desert, Mountains

We will explore how authors treat geographical aspects of place. A sequence of essays from Words From the Land will provide the framework to analyze style and rhetorical strategies. We will read and analyze essays by Peter Mathieson, Annie Dillard, Edward Abbey, and John McPhee examining stylistic devices---imagery, language, metaphors--to evaluate how authors convey their sense of place. Your own writing will include four essays--autobiographical, expository, and narrative essays--exploring how physical aspects of place affect your intellectual and spiritual sense of self. In addition, informal writing assignments will be required based on reading responses along with free-writes of observations in different environmental settings.

Writing 1, Section 31 Sondra Archimedes TTH 2:00P-3:45P Stevenson 151

The Femme Fatale in Nineteenth-Century Literature

In this course we will explore the representation of the femme fatale in a wide range of nineteenth-century American, British and European stories, poems and paintings. Images of the femme fatale pervade nineteenth century literature and art, indicating both a fear of and fascination with the nature of female sexuality and offering a provocative starting point for discussions about gender and culture. Among the authors we will consider are: Louisa May Alcott, Wilkie Collins, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Sheridan LeFanu, and Edgar Allan Poe. Students will write both formal and informal essays, revise papers, and participate in writing groups, all of which will lead to a final research project.

Writing 1, Section 32 Valerie Forman TTH 6:00P-7:45P Crown 203

This is a course in critical thinking, reading, and writing. The readings for this course will help us to think about how we read and write: both the processes we use and the perspectives through which we understand the texts that we read and organize the texts that we write. Many of the readings and class discussions will challenge these perspectives. I hope that by thinking hard about them we will become more careful readers and writers.

To this end, we will experiment with retelling and revising. How can the retelling of a story from a different perspective radically alter its significance? What makes a narrative or argument effective or seductive? What can readers or interpreters do with the stories they hear? The texts for the course include: Herculine Barbin, the autobiography of a French hermaphrodite, which we will compare with the medical and legal documents that tried to determine his/her "true" sex; a selection from Marguerite de Navarre's Heptameron, in which authors vigorously debate the issues raised by the stories they tell; essays by Virginia Woolf, bell hooks, and others; the film Kiss of the Spider Woman; and the Simon & Schuster Handbook for Writers. Texts: (*available at BayTree Bookstore) *Michel Foucault, Herculine Barbin; *Lynn Troyka, Simon and Schuster Handbook for Writers; A Course Reader, a good college dictionary.

Instructor: Jude Todd

How might humans live in physical, mental, and spiritual harmony with the rest of nature? Buddhist, Jain, and Native American conceptions of the human place in nature, Western scientific ecology, andcontemporary nature writers of sundry stripes will inform our developing understanding of what it means to dwell on the Earth. What fundamental assumptions about the nature of nature hamper our capacity tolive harmoniously within it? What's the relationship between our own bodies and that of the Earth, andwhat do our attitudes toward one imply about our conceptions of the other? Do language limitations impede articulation of crucial insights that could help heal ecological distress? What light can we, as a group and individually, bring to the question: How can humans appropriately take our place (and give our share) within nature?

Students will enhance writing skills through composing and revising essays that explore such questions. The final research project allows students to delve deeply into a course-related topic of their choice.

Required texts, all non-fictional, include a reader, Rules for Writers, by Diana Hacker, and Ecopsychology: Restoring the Earth, Healing the Mind, ed. by Theodore Roszak et al.

Additionally, students will select one other volume of their choice from a list of supplementary texts. For this list or other information, email todd@cats.

Note: Due to my multiple-chemical sensitivity, Ineed to have 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., to class. Thank you.

Revised 7/28/04.