English 404: Senior Writing Workshop

Tuesdays, 1:30-4:15, EC 312

Description:

A workshop for independent critical writing, leading to a substantial (10,000 word) critical research paper on a topic of the student’s choice, subject to approval. Peer review and editing, sequential drafts, and bibliographic exercises will be required throughout the term. In addition to class time, students will meet me in individual conferences, and in small writer’s groups; our seminar will present its work to the department and your peers at the end of the term. The 404 paper may be a revision and expansion of work completed in the 403 seminar, work on a related subject, or work on a different and unrelated subject. To allow time for revision, a full draft of the paper must be presented during three workshops over the course of the term. Students must meet all requirements to pass English 404; English 404 is required to complete the English major.

Texts:

This course has no required texts.

Students will be responsible for the incidental costs of photocopying and binding their work for archival preservation in the May Morris Room of Waidner-Spahr Library. At the end of the term, students must submit three copies of the completed manuscript: one for me; one for the department archives; one for the Library. The departmental guidelines for the format of submitted manuscripts will be distributed closer to the final due date of Monday April 26, 2004. You will not receive a grade for the course until all housekeeping is satisfactorily completed, and the department and library copies are in the hands of Kelly Hoak, the department staff associate.

Logistics:

A workshop is a collective enterprise designed to support your progress and develop your writing of this large project. Both your role as an independent writer-researcher and your role as a reader-editor are important to sustain the work of the class. The class will be divided into three groups; I will assign groups by the end of January. Over the course of the semester, your work-in-progress will be critiqued by all members of the class in workshop and in written comments for you to keep and mull over. At the end of the term, I will evaluate your completed essay by giving it a single grade worth 60% of the total term grade.

Workshop meets on Tuesdays. On the weeks your group is “at bat” you must submit a printed copy of the draft to my department mailbox by 10am the Friday before class. By Friday at 5pm, you must send a word file to all students. If after the first workshop this plan offers no technical challenges for anyone, we will continue to use it throughout the term. I reserve the right to ask that hardcopies be delivered to student HUB boxes should these plans prove difficult. Each student is responsible for printing out and reading the drafts carefully, following the workshop guidelines for the class. I expect line-notes and paragraph-to-page-long end comment on the draft from each editor, to be brought to class. After the essay has been critiqued in class, all edited drafts will be returned to the writer. Each week the writers will meet after workshop with me for a debriefing and planning session, held outside of class at a time of mutual convenience.

Grading:

You will receive no grades on your writing during the term. You may schedule a conference at any time to discuss your progress. Because the course is a workshop, and depends on the efforts of all students, meeting deadlines and active contribution as a reader and discussant in class is crucial to its success and to your improvement as a writer. Missing any single deadline as a writer or reader will result in a grade of F (55%) for the process portion of your term grade: 40% of the total term grade.

I will assess grades as follows:

40% process: fruitful participation in discussion, astuteness and responsibility as a reader-editor, progress toward completion of your project, depth and quality of research and writing, meeting deadlines as a writer and reader

60% final draft

Students must turn in the final draft by 2pm on Monday, April 26, 2004 to pass the class.

Class schedule:

Jan 27 Deadline #1 Logistics and prospectus

Review syllabus and protocols. Discuss all students’ revised prospecti.

By noon of this day, students must distribute a 3-4 page prospectus to the class. Your audience is your peers. Your prospectus should answer the following questions, in a coherent argument. What is the literary problem you are framing for the paper? What critical method do you plan to adopt, and why is it a useful and effective strategy? Which primary literary and critical texts will you employ? How does your study make an original contribution to the critical work published in this area? (This deadline is the exception to the Friday rule.) Append a preliminary bibliography of primary and secondary sources in MLA format.

Feb. 3 No class meeting: conferences Deadline #2

To the conference bring a portfolio of your writing from other classes, and a contract for how you plan to complete your writing, research, and revisions over the course of the term.

Feb. 6: One-page revised prospectus for the bulletin board on the fourth floor. Due to Kelly Hoak by 3pm. Deadline # 3

First Workshops

Feb. 10 Group 1: Workshop One First third of paper [approx.15-20 pp.] Deadline #4

Feb. 17 Group 2: Workshop One Deadline #4

Feb. 24 Group 3: Workshop One Deadline #4

Second Workshops

Mar. 2 Group 1: Workshop Two Second third of paper Deadline #5

NB: I will be in NYC at a conference Mon-Tues. We will need to meet Tuesday late, or some other time this week, at a time of mutual convenience, to stay on schedule.

Mar. 9 Group 2: Workshop Two Deadline #5

Spring Break

Mar. 23 Group 3: Workshop Two Deadline #5

Last Workshops

Mar. 30 Group 1: Workshop Three Last third of paper Deadline #6

All students should bring a single copy of an annotated bibliography with at least twenty useful sources to their final workshop. The format is appended to this syllabus. Deadline #7

Apr. 6 Group 2: Workshop Three Deadline #6 & 7

Apr. 13 Group 3: Workshop Three Deadline #6 & 7

Apr. 20 No class. Departmental Deadline for final drafts is Monday, April 26, at 2pm. Students must take papers to be photocopied and bound to the Service Center. These copies are due to Kelly Hoak by the end of classes, May 7, 2004. Deadline #8

Presentation of papers during the Departmental Common Hour, May 4, noon. Deadline #9

May 4 Assessment and Course Evaluations Deadline #10

In addition to the college evaluation forms, students will complete a short reflective essay addressed to students in English 220.

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Writer’s Self Evaluation Guidelines:

For writers who are submitting a draft to workshop. Append to the draft you distribute.

What are you trying to argue in this part of the paper? What is your main idea?
What would you work on if you had another day to spend on this draft?
3. How can your reader help you to develop this section further?

Evaluation of Reader’s Reports

To be completed by the writer who has critiqued. To be brought to the debriefing. .

1.Whose critiques were especially helpful? Why?

2. Were any critiques absent or inadequate? Use the guidelines for readers to assess this question. Explain. Be honest.

3. Describe a point of consensus in the criticism that makes sense to you. If there was a marked absence of consensus, explain briefly.

Annotated Bibliography

Read a lot. Then choose the 20 most relevant and important secondary sources, no more than 8 from books, reference volumes, or the Web. Read them carefully. For each source, in a paragraph of 75 words:

Summarize the writer’s argument, including thesis and a description of critical method

2. Give a summary of the evidence used to support the writer’s argument

3. Comment on how this source fits into your project: how is it part of a larger debate? How is it useful to you? Do you plan to counter it, or use it as support or context, and why?