Hazlitt Angst

William Hazlitt  a self portrait

As discussed in class, we will have an additional optional timed write on Tuesday. If you are happy with your score, you do not need to write this one unless you want the practice. This score will replace your Hazlitt score, though I'll actually take the higher or the two. If you do not wish to take advantage of this opportunity, please bring a book or something to work on quietly while your classmates write.
4th period, happily we discovered in 6th period that the Hazlitt timed write was miscategorized as a take home paper rather than a timed write, so the damage is not as dire as you saw in class today. See GradeChecker for the accurate percentage.

Hunger of Memory

Blog a personal response to one or more of the implied claims made in the preface to Hunger of Memory. Engage with his claim on a personal level (what you think) and relate it or contrast it with your own life and situation.

Have a wonderful Thanksgiving!!

The Surgeon as Priest

Your homework for Monday is twofold: 

1. Blog answers to the eight Exploring the Text questions on page 204
2. Separately, blog a reading response to The Surgeon as Priest. This is essentially a paragraph or two that shows your understanding of the meaning of a part of the text and its significance to the whole. Instructions are on the link.

4th period: the visual will come later.

Sanctuary: For Harry Potter the Movie

So, Nikki Giovanni wrote a fairly odd piece she classified s a "not quite poem" about the first Harry Potter movie on page 760 of TLC. Please blog the answers to questions 1-4 and 6 by Wednesday.

Parody: Friday (one among so many), MacBook Air, and yeah, I'll not get the last twenty minutes back going, "Hmm, should I post this one? Nah, better look for something better. Wait, don't I need to get the emission checked on the car? Doh!" Or something like that.

Timed Write Tuesday is tomorrow.

Taking our time...

African or European? Well...I don't know.

Finish reading In Praise of a Snail's Pace on page 221 of TLC and do the following:

1. Answer me these questions three--1, 5, and 8
2. How is this a compare and contrast essay? What is Goodman comparing? Describe the technique the author uses to draw out this comparison.

Education: The Ralph Waldo Emerson Way

Ralph Waldo Emerson

Now that you've read Emerson's On Education on page 102 of The Language of Composition (TLC), and now that we have a bit of an idea as to what he is on about, it's time for some analysis of how he does what he does. To that end, thoughtfully respond on your blog to Questions on Rhetoric and Style 1-3, 5-6, and 8-12 on pages 108-109.

And as you do this and your other homework, remember that:

"Not less delightful is the mutual pleasure of teaching and learning the secret of algebra, or of chemistry, or of good reading and good recitation of poetry or of prose, or of chosen facts in history or in biography." -Ralph Waldo Emerson

Take delightful pleasure in this learning activity up through Wednesday evening (due Thursday November 10). Along with the vocabulary quiz 9, we'll discuss this in class on Thursday.

Though we'll stick with analysis, we'll also start talking about the argument question next week.

Of interest...transcendentalism. If that article proves too heady for you,Wikipedia's is okay.

Some thoughts on argument analysis

1. Published arguments seldom begin with a thesis (and may not end with one). Frequently, the thesis is only implied. 
2. An analysis of an argument is rarely “right” or “wrong,” but some answers are much better than others. The answer that explains the text in the most thorough way is superior. 
3. Thinking of yourself as a member of the intended audience for an argument is essential to analyzing argument. 
4. Often when we reject an argument, it is because we are not part of the intended audience. 
5. The analyst needs to pay attention to assumptions concerning the reader’s race, nationality, and gender. 
6. Pay close attention to pronouns. They shift references. 
7. An analytic explanation rarely occurs in a chronological order; it usually involves moving backward and forward within the text being analyzed. Using chronological order usually moves an analysis to summary. 
8. While knowing Aristotle’s three modes is important, it is also important to know the work of Rogers (the psychologist) and Toulmin (the logician). 
9. Whether or not an argument contains fallacies is not germane to understanding it rhetorically. 
10. Analyses need to measured against the evidence of the text itself. 
11. It is usually more important to consider what is implied. 
12. When you read an argument, you should try to determine why it was written in the way it was written. 
13. The analyst needs to determine whether the thesis is direct, indirect, implied, deliberately hidden, or subversive (A Modest Proposal is an example of a subversive thesis).

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Don't forget to do the assignment in the previous post. Also, check out the link under writing on the left for notes on good writing entitled the YES Writing Guide .