Extra Credit Opportunity: Testify at the Legislature

Since you are all now experts on Columbus Day, you can receive extra credit if you testify or e-mail the House Education Committee about Columbus Day.

Bridget Smith (D – Wolf Point) is proposing a bill to change Columbus Day to Indigenous People’s Day in the school system. The bill is coming up for a hearing Friday at 3 pm (in room 137).

You can also receive extra credit if you send an e-mail to these committee members by today at 9:00 p.m. The e-mail should be professional, courteous, and express your views clearly. Make sure you reference the bill number (HB 514) in your e-mail, which can certainly include excerpts from your essay this fall. Please print the e-mail you sent and give it to me in class on Monday.

Rep. FRED ANDERSON (R): (406) 761-4042
Rep. BECKY BEARD (R): (406) 479-3048 or becky4hd80@blackfoot.net
Rep. SETH BERGLEE (R)–Chair: (406) 690-9329 or Rep.Seth.Berglee@mt.gov
Rep. JEFF ESSMANN (R)–Vice Chair: (406) 534-3345 or jessmann@mt.gov
Rep. EDWARD GREEF (R): (406) 370-0581 or edgreef@hotmail.com
Rep. GREG HERTZ (R): (406) 253-9505 or greghertz11@gmail.com
Rep. LOLA SHELDON-GALLOWAY (R): (406) 727-4963 or Rep.Lola.Sheldon-Galloway@mt.gov
Rep. SCOTT STAFFANSON (R): (406) 480-0467
Rep. SUE VINTON (R): (406) 855-2625 or Rep.Sue.Vinton@mt.gov
Rep. PEGGY WEBB (R): (406) 248-1953 or Webb4house@gmail.com

There will be more extra credit for actually going to testify. 🙂

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Carson Analysis Essay Revisions

The revisions for the Carson Analysis essay will be due on Monday or Tuesday, depending on when you get the essay back. Those of you who receive it on Thursday should expect to turn yours in on Monday and those who receive it on Friday will be expected to turn it in on Tuesday.

As always, your revision should be printed to give me in class and include the following:

  • the new draft
  • the first draft
  • the checklist for revision

You can begin work on your revision as soon as this evening, as the revision guide is available now. One additional resource you’ll want to consult for this revision is the CRISPING handout, as sentence combining and sharp sentences were consistent problems for many of these essays.

You might also want to read over the Frank N. Stein version of the Carson essay.

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New Feature: Monday Morning Mental Mix

Feel like your brain needs a jolt of energy to start the week? Want to learn about culture, news, science, history, and more? Every Monday, I’ll post a collection of interesting links to get your week started off with some undiscovered knowledge that might just inspire or infuriate.

Come across an interesting piece in your own reading online? Please send it my way.

The link is on the left-hand side of the main page or you can simply bookmark this link.

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Revising and Perfecting Rhetorical Device Assignments

Formatting and Proofreading

  • Please pay attention to formatting. The three sections of analysis need to be clearly separated, as do the definition and passage. There is a template you can fill in. It’s not that complicated.
  • Proofread your document. It is simply unacceptable to have multiple errors in capitalization, commas, and other basic issues. It’s hard to believe that much time was spent on the assignment when those basic elements look like they were done in a rush and almost certainly without review before submission.
  • Use consistent tense in your analysis section.
  • Put your name on your assignment.

Context Section

  • The context section should be detailed, with date, place, and audience provided. You might have to search for this information online, but it shouldn’t be that difficult to find. If you take a specific passage from another work, you need to cite it. The section should be your own writing, though.
  • 2-3 sentences should suffice.

Concept

  • The most challenging part of the assignment is the concept section. In it, you need to analyze how the language of the device is used to create meaning and why the author chose the words she did. Don’t simply tell me that it “had an impact” on the audience, but explain how.
  • Avoid literal analysis and summary. For instance, reporting that King’s use of “withering flames of injustice” was designed to discuss the pain of injustice is not analysis, but a bad paraphrase. Ask yourself (and then answer) why he chose the particular language and image he did.
  • When discussing a device, focus on the particular word choice for that device.
  • If the language you could use for the device you are analyzing could be applied to any example of the device, you need better analysis. Take out, for instance, generic descriptions about how antithesis uses opposing images and ideas and break down the specific opposing images and ideas the author uses in your example.

Connection

  • In the context section, you need to identify a theme of the work as a whole and show how the device you analyzed in the concept section contributes to that theme. Be specific.
  • Explicitly connect the passage you’re addressing with the broader meaning of the work. If, for instance, you believe that King used the juxtaposition of light and dark to expose the injustices of racism in his time, show how it does that.

Deadlines

  • Revisions (printed and stapled to the original assignment) are due Tuesday in class. In class. Not after, not at lunch, but in class.
  • Rhetorical devices #3 and #4 should come from “Thinking Like a Mountain” by Aldo Leopold. Device #3 is due in class on Wednesday and Device #4 is due in class on Friday.

 

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Sanders Essay Assistance

Some assistance for the Sanders essay you’re all so excited to write this weekend.

The prompt is here (on page 9) in the event any of you have misplaced it.

 

Two sample first draft paragraphs are located below:

Sample #1

Sanders opens (paragraph 1) by analyzing our infatuation with migration, subtly emphasizing our carelessness. He describes us as being “familiar” with “restless moving,” which shows us that migration has become a habit, something we are accustomed to. Sanders uses asyndeton to emphasize our start as “sailors, explorers, cowboys” changing into simple “rainbow-chasers” and “vagabonds;” we have become unoriginal and uninteresting. He criticizes our inability to shake off the “romance of unlimited space,” saying that we can truly never be satisfied nor can we understand the implications of our actions. “Our Promised Land” is a biblical reference furthering Sanders’s argument that Americans move on too quickly and they cannot fully appreciate the beauty of staying put, continually striving to be the best and rise over everyone. Never being truly satisfied, we continue leave behind us a wreckage of what was once new. According to Sanders, we are a “populace drunk on driving” and we are unable to fix what we have destroyed; we simply pack up and move away. Sanders describes taking advantage as a “myth,” a “game,” “romance,” and “seductive,” implying our movement lets us believe migration is the only way to preserve our virtues when in reality, movement destroys all that we should hold dear. Sanders’s tone seems light and almost playful; however,there is underlying accusation as he analyzes our obsession with finding and owning the next best thing. It is with this attitude that Sanders expresses his concerns about migration.

Sample #2

Sanders argues (paragraph 1) that Americans, fearful of stagnation, are consumed with migration. From the very beginning of the essay, Sanders makes it clear that he doesn’t take those infatuated with movement seriously. He shifts from describing migrators as “explorers” to “rainbow-chasers” to show that he feels that these people are ridiculous and wrongly put on a pedestal. Sanders also refers to American migration as “romance of unlimited space”, suggesting that the so-called “explorers” are unrealistic. He points out how the obsession with exploring is more dangerous than romantic, as people constantly “wear out” the land they inhabit before moving on to the next plot of space. People associate movement with reinvention, a way of ending a “played-out game.” Sanders shows that people are so infatuated with changing themselves that they will change everything about their surroundings, even destroy them, in order to get the effect they desire. In a short sentence that contrasts with his previous long-winded sentences, he reveals that Americans view migration with such intensity that they believe that they will “die” if they stand still. He calls the American population “drunk on driving,” associating movement with extremely reckless, thoughtless behavior. In addition, Sanders constantly refers to migration as a “myth”, completely disregarding the opposing side. In this paragraph, he completely makes the argument advocating for migration irrelevant.

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