RWS200: The Rhetoric of Written Arguments in Context
~ Spring 2014 ~
TTh / 9:30-10:45am (Section 44)
E201
Instructor: Cecilia Polkinhorn
Office: SH 116
Office Hours: TH (11:30am-1:00pm)
Email: cpolki987@gmail.com
Mailbox: Storm Hall West 141
RWS Main Office Phone:
(619) 594-6515
Required Texts and Materials:
-Little Seagull Handbook
-Access to computer, Internet, and printer with sufficient ink.
-Single subject notebook to maintain Writer’s Journal.
The Theme of the Course:
This semester, we will focus on the concept of anxiety. This is a condition that has
drastically evolved in the last two centuries thanks to the growing consumerist and
capitalist culture, rapidly evolving technologies, dubious media filters and the
consequences and repercussions of war. Since the Industrial Revolution, we have
become a more jittery, anxious, and insecure collective, prone to addictive and
destructive behaviors. In this class, we will look at a variety of texts, contextualize
anxious characters, and examine the rhetorical strategies at play.
(Note: Think about this during the development of your Writer’s Journal!)
Course Objectives:
RWS200 is one of many courses in the area of general education defined as
“Communication and Critical Thinking.” Focusing particularly on argument, this course
emphasizes four essential general education capacities:
1) The ability to construct, analyze, and communicate argument
2) The ability to contextualize phenomena
3) The ability to negotiate differences
4) The ability to apply theoretical models to the real world.
This course advances general education by helping students understand the general
function of writing, speaking, visual texts, and thinking within the context of the
university at large, rather than within specific disciplines. In addition to featuring the
basic rules and conventions governing composition and presentation, RWS200
establishes intellectual frameworks and analytical tools that help students explore,
construct, critique, and integrate sophisticated texts.
Within this framework of four general capacities, the course realizes four closely related
subsidiary goals. These goals focus on helping students
1) craft well-reasoned arguments for specific audiences;
2) analyze a variety of texts commonly encountered in the academic setting;
3) situate discourse within social, generic, cultural, and historic contexts;
4) assess the relative strengths of arguments and supporting evidence.
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Our student learning outcomes for RWS200 are closely aligned with these goals and
capacities, and reflect the program’s overall objective of helping students attain
“essential skills that underlie all university education.”
The following points describe outcomes to work on throughout the semester, to be
attained over the next 16 weeks:
 Building on the work done in RWS100, students will be able to: articulate what
argument a text is making; describe the work that is done by each section of the
argument; describe elements of the argument—claims, methods of development,
kinds of evidence, persuasive appeals; translate an argument into their own
words;
 Understand and incorporate all aspects of the writing process—including
prewriting, drafting, revising, editing, and proofreading;
 Articulate what key terms, definitions, concepts, statements of a problem or issue
are established by a text;
 Investigate and articulate how an argument is positioned—based on certain kinds
of assumptions, located in a way of thinking and representing issues from a point
of view;
 Work with multiple sources in a paper, deciding what to include and what to
exclude, choosing an effective structure, and creating significant relationships
among sources;
 Craft a cohesive paper, and use effective metadiscourse to articulate the project
of the paper and guide the reader through it;
 Describe their own papers and reflect on how they wrote them; differentiate
between the content of their texts and the language and rhetorical strategies they
employ;
 Assign significance to the arguments they read;
 Revise their own work effectively, re-reading previous work and re-envisioning it
in the light of reflection, feedback, further reading and new sources of
information;
 Edit their writing for the grammar usage conventions appropriate to the project.
Assignment Types:
The following outcomes are directly related to the three main writing projects or
“assignment types” for the course. Students will be able to:
1. Construct an account of an argument and identify elements of context
embedded in it, the clues that show what the argument is responding to—
both in the sense of what has come before it an in the sense that it is written
for an audience in a particular time and place; examine a writer’s language in
relation to audience, context and community;
2. Follow avenues of investigation that are opened by noticing elements of
context; research those elements and show how one’s understanding of the
argument is developed, changed, or evolved by looking into its context;
3. Given the common concerns of two or more arguments, discuss how the
claims of these arguments modify, complicate or qualify one another;
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4. Consider their contemporary, current life as the context within which they are
reading the arguments assigned in the class; position themselves in relation
to these arguments and additional ones they have researched in order to
make an argument; draw on available key terms, concepts or frameworks of
analysis to help shape the argument.
Course Activity Requirements:
-Conference sessions
-Attendance (promptness, no more than 3 absences)
-Readings
-Homework
-In-class writings
-3 original essays
-Class participation
-Writer’s Journal
Grading/Evaluation:
Assignment
3 Essays (Rough Drafts and Final Drafts)
Points
600pts (200pts
each)
150pts
150pts
100pts
1000pts
Assignments (Homework, in-class writing, etc.)
Writer’s Journal
Participation
Total:
Letter Grade
A
AB+
B
BC+
Points
930-1000
900-929
870-899
830-869
800-829
770-799
Due Dates: Subject to Change
Letter Grade
Points
730-769
700-729
670-699
630-669
600-629
0-599
C
CD+
D
DF
Rough Draft
ESSAY 1
Feb 13
ESSAY 2
Mar 20
ESSAY 3
Writer’s Logs
Apr 24
Conferencin
g
Final Draft
2/13
2/14
2/18
3/20
3/24
3/25
4/24
4/29
4/20
Feb 20
Mar 27
May 6
May 6
Course Policies:
Attendance/Missed Assignments:
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More than three missed classes will result in a lower grade. You are responsible for
obtaining any notes or homework assignments on a day you miss, but in-class
assignments cannot be made up. I do not accept late work. If you have an extenuating
circumstance, please see me.
Participation:
You are expected to contribute your ideas to the discussion at large. We will
occasionally hold group activities in which you are also expected to participate in the
group collaboration.
Conduct:
Please be respectful and courteous. Disruptive students will be asked to leave the
class, resulting in an absence. If you are caught using cell phones, iPods, or conversing
in topics unrelated to the class, I will call you out. Please respect my time and the focus
of your peers. College tuition is far too expensive to waste class time on text messages,
games, and social media. IT CAN WAIT.
Conferences:
You are required to meet with me for your first two essays. Each conference will take
approximately fifteen minutes, but if you feel you need more time, let me know. Failure
to show up to a mandatory conference will result in a lower essay grade by one step (an
A- would drop to a B+).
Plagiarism:
If you quote another writer, please provide appropriate citation. Plagiarism is a serious
offense and can result in academic suspension or expulsion. The university catalog
describes plagiarism as follows:
Plagiarism is formal work publicly misrepresented as original; it is any activity wherein one person
knowingly, directly, and for lucre, status, recognition, or any public gain resorts to the published or
unpublished work of another in order to represent it as one’s own. Work shall be deemed
plagiarism: (1) when prior work of another has been demonstrated as the accessible source; (2)
when substantial or material parts of the source have been literally or evasively appropriated
(substance denoting quantity; matter denoting qualitative format or style); and (3) when the work
lacks sufficient r unequivocal citation so as to indicate or imply that the work was neither a copy
nor an imitation. This definition comprises oral, written, and crafted pieces. In short, if one
purports to present an original piece but copies ideas word for word or by paraphrase, those
ideas should be duly noted. SDSU Catalog, 2009.
Student Athletes:
If you are a student athlete with away games scheduled during the semester, let me
know by the end of the first week of class, and present me with a copy of your team
travel schedule.
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Disability:
No otherwise qualified handicapped person shall, on the basis of handicap, be excluded
from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or otherwise subjected to discrimination
under any academic or other postsecondary education program receiving federal funds.
If you are registered with Disabled Student Services (DSS), I am happy to work with you
to accommodate your learning needs.
CLASS SCHEDULE
Jan. 23: Intro to course, discuss syllabus, syllabus quiz.
Jan. 28: PACES, review of RWS 100, key concepts/terms.
Jan. 30 : Evaluating short texts with PACES, qualifying and warrants.
Feb. 4: Identifying conversations in short texts.
------------[Note: Last day to drop classes is February 4th at 11:59pm]---------Feb. 6: Introduction to Paper #1, begin discussion of Coates.
Feb. 11: Coates.
Feb. 13: Paper #1 Rough Draft due, peer review and conferencing.
Feb. 18: Class cancelled for conferencing.
Feb. 20: Paper #1 due in class, key terms, rhetorically analyzing short texts.
Feb. 25: Key terms, rhetorically analyzing short texts.
Feb. 27: Begin discussion of Rosenzweig.
Mar. 4: Rosenzweig, introduction to 2nd paper.
Mar. 6: Library Orientation to Researching.
Mar. 11: Working with/evaluating sources.
Mar. 13: Tips for paper writing and researching, Paper #2.
Mar. 18: Tips for paper writing and researching, Paper #2.
Mar. 20: Paper #2 Rough Draft due, peer review and conferencing.
Mar. 25: Class cancelled for conferencing.
Mar. 27: Paper #2 due in class, begin discussion of Digital Nation, key terms.
Apr. 1: Spring Break!
Apr. 3: Spring Break!
Apr. 8: Digital Nation.
Apr. 10: Digital Nation and tips for Paper #3, short texts.
Apr. 15: Digital Nation and tips for Paper #3, short texts.
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Apr. 17: Digital Nation, short texts.
Apr. 22: Digital Nation, short texts.
Apr. 24: Paper #3 Rough Draft due, peer review and conferencing.
Apr. 29: Class cancelled for conferencing.
May 1: Pleasantville.
May 6: Paper #3 Due, Writer’s Journal due, possible guest speakers from LA/CSUN.
May 8: LAST DAY OF CLASS, overview of WPA, WPA practice.
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