TEXT: Dillon, George L. Contending Rhetorics: Writing in
Academic Disciplines. Bloomington: IUP, 1991.
January 20 Overview
27 Contending Rhetorics
February 3 Sample Arguments
10 First Journal Reports
17 Initial Conferences
24 Second Journal Reports
March 3 Conferences Third Journal Reports
SPRING VACATION Article Analyses Article Analyses
April 7 Conferences Conferences Conferences
28 Research Projects Due
JOURNAL REPORTS: Each member of the class will be assigned professional journals (in Rhetoric/Composition/Criticism) to examine and inform the rest of the class about. Minimally, each report is to answer the questions provided below. A written version of each report is to be turned in for a grade on the same night the report is given.
ARTICLE ANALYSES: Each member of the class will present an analysis of the argumentative strategies in one article/essay chosen from one of the professional journals: What are the crucial grounding assumptions of that article/essay, and how does it get from those grounding assumptions to its conclusions? A written version of each analysis is to be turned in for a grade on the same night the analysis is presented.
RESEARCH PROJECTS/CONFERENCES: The semester-long research project (due April 28) is to be a critical review of either (1) what has been published recently in one of the assigned journals or (2) what has been published recently about a particular topic in more than one of the journals. To say that the research project is to be a critical review is to say that it is to examine and evaluate the argumentative strategies employed in the articles/essays selected. (Note that this project makes every article/essay in every journal a source of primary data.) Its purpose is not only to deepen our familiarity with the professional journals but also to put ourselves in a better position to contribute to them. The initial scheduled conference (February 17) will require a readable draft of an examination of the argumentative strategies employed in some articles/essays; subsequent conferences will require an examination of additional ones. The final paper should argue for some nonobvious claim about the argumentative strategies encountered. It should not exceed 20 (double spaced) pages and should be done in MLA style.
PROFESSIONAL JOURNALS (print)
American Anthropologist (GN1 .A5)
Argumentation and Advocacy: Journal of the American Forensic
Association (PN4001 .A54)
Classical Philology (PA1 .C5)
College Composition and Communication (PE1001 .C6)
Communication Quarterly (PN4071 .T6)
Composition Studies: Freshman English News (PE1 .F74)
Critical Inquiry (NX1 .C64)
Diacritics (PN80 .D5)
ETC.: A Review of General Semantics (B840 .E85)
Journal of Basic Writing (PE1404 .J68)
Journal of Reading (LB1050 .J6)
Journal of the History of Ideas (B1 .J75)
Language and Speech (P1 .L317)
Language and Society (P41. L34)
New Literary History (PR1 .N44)
Pre/Text (PS301 .P68)
Publications of the Modern Language Association (PB6 .M6)
Quarterly Journal of Speech (PN4071 .Q3)
Research in the Teaching of English (PE1066 .R47)
Rhetorica: A Journal of the History of Rhetoric (PN183 .R43)
Rhetoric Review (PN171.4 .R44)
Rhetoric Society Quarterly (PN171.4 .R6)
Style (PE1 .S89) Text (P302 .T36)
Written Communication (P211 .W74)
PROFESSIONAL JOURNALS (electronic)
Postmodern Culture: An Electronic Journal of
Interdisciplinary Criticism (http://www.iath.virginia.edu/pmc/text-only)
Pre/Text (Electra)Lite (http://www.pre-text.com/)
QUESTIONS FOR REPORTS ON JOURNALS: Is the journal officially associated with any particular professional organization or institution? If so, what effect does that association have on the journal? What is its stated (or implied) purpose? Are issues of the journal consistent with that purpose? For whom is the journal intended? Does it exhibit a particular conceptual/theoretical orientation and/or set of editorial preferences in what it publishes? If the journal has undergone a recent change in editor(s), is that change reflected in what is being published? What topics does it characteristically address? Does it devote special issues to others? 5. If it exhibits a characteristic writing style, what is that style? 6. What has the overall quality of the scholarship in the journal been over the last five years (or so)?
REQUIRED ANNOUNCEMENTS:
Attendance: Attendance is required. If you must miss class, you are responsible for getting whatever was missed. If excessive absences are unavoidable, it is best to withdraw from the course. You must officially withdraw yourself; faculty can no longer do it for you.
Scholastic Dishonesty: University regulations include the following: "Scholastic dishonesty includes but is not limited to cheating, plagiarism, collusion, the submission for credit of any work or materials that are attributable in whole or in part to another person, taking an examination for another person, any act designed to give unfair advantage to a student or the attempt to commit such acts."
ADA: Students with documented disabilities should make arrangements for accomodations immediately.
Grading: The research project will count 50% of the course grade, the journal reports and article analyses, together, 50%.
Rhetoric Seminars
Rhetoric, Composition, Critical Theory HP & Program
The ENGLISH HOME PAGE
Robert Reddick's HP.