Syllabus

Course Description

This is a HASS -CI course. Like other communications-intensive courses in the humanities, arts, and social sciences, it allows students to produce 20 pages of polished writing with careful attention to revision. It also offers substantial opportunities for oral expression, through presentations of written work, student-led discussion, and class participation. The class has a low enrollment that ensures maximum attention to student writing and opportunity for oral expression, and a writing fellow/tutor is available for consultation on drafts and revisions.

Required Texts

Charters, Ann, ed. The Story and Its Writer. Compact Fifth edition. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin's, 1999.

Hacker, Diana. A Pocket Style Manual, 3 rd ed. Boston: Bedford, 2000.

Melville, Herman. Billy Budd, Sailor. Ed. Harrison Hayford and Merton M. Sealts Jr. Chicago: Univ. of Chicago Press, 1962.

1. Attendance and Participation  (20 %)

This is a discussion course where your attendance and participation in class are vital to your success and that of the group. Bring your text to class and be prepared to read aloud, debate vigorously, listen, and enjoy. If you must miss class, please notify me beforehand of the fact by phone, email, or in person; you are responsible for the information you missed. Any absence deducts a percentage point from your final grade: two latenesses count as one absence.  Repeated absences will lead to a formal warning and can affect your grade and status in the class. If you have a conflict, like a recitation, lab, sports commitment, or job that meets during this class, you should not take the course.
Half of this grade is based on classroom attendance and participation; the other half is based on participation in an online discussion forum (one weekly posting and at least one weekly response).

2. Written Work (80 %)

Journals (20%)  Each student will keep a writing journal (handwritten or typed) and must complete a minumum number of entries: one per week before the unit on Billy Budd (for a total of 10) and then each Billy Budd assignment (another 10). Topics are suggested on the syllabus, but you may approach them in any way you like. There will also be opportunities in class for free writing and brainstorming. Bring journals to class every day, and be prepared to submit them at any time. Journals will receive credit but no grade until the end of the course.

Essays (10%, 15%, 15%) and Revision (20%):  Each essay will be written in stages, with a first draft (ungraded) and a graded final essay, except for the Billy Budd assignment, for which there will be a graded essay and also a graded revision. Essays and revisions are due at the beginning of class on the day assigned. In a course that depends so much on timing (i.e. getting the papers in, getting back comments in time to revise before the next essay is due), it is better to hand in something less than perfect than to delay. All final essays and the final revision should include a brief self-evaluation, a statement summarizing the process of revision.

Essays must be typed or word-processed, double-spaced, and adequately margined, should include a title, and need to observe the conventions of grammar and spelling. Use the Diana Hacker A Pocket Manual for all drafts and revisions.

Statement on Plagiarism

Plagiarism attacks the freedom and integrity of thought. Especially in a class that will depend to some extent on online research, you must know what constitutes plagiarism and avoid it. The Literature Department has formulated this statement and policy for all plagiarism cases:
Plagiarism-- use of another's intellectual work without acknowledgement-- is a serious offense. It is the policy of the Literature Faculty that students who plagiarize will receive an F in the subject, and that the instructor will forward the case to the Committee on Discipline. Full acknowledgement for all information obtained from sources outside the classroom must be clearly stated in all written work submitted. All ideas, arguments, and direct phrasings taken from someone else's work must be identified and properly footnoted. Quotations from other sources must be clearly marked as distinct from the student's own work.
MIT's academic honesty policy can be found at the following link: http://web.mit.edu/policies/10.0.html

3.  Workshops, Tutorials, Conferences

On days when papers fall due, we will hold writing workshops, where students will post essays on the course website for peer review. Each student will be scheduled at least once during the term to present his or her work in workshop and lead the discussion of his or her essay. Other workshops will use student writing or collaboration to focus on particular writing issues.

Students meet weekly with the course tutor to go over drafts and revisions. These meetings are required, and attendance will be taken. Meetings will take place at the same time each week. Come to meetings prepared with notes, outlines, or drafts to discuss.

Each student will also hold one conference with the instructor at the end of the term to discuss topics for the Billy Budd essay.

4.  Phase One

Achieving a grade of "B" or better in this class allows students to pass the Phase One Writing Reqirement.