Since the publication of my colleague Mike DePalma's article about rhetorical education, civic engagement, and religious discourse, a few folks have asked about seeing the course syllabus of mine that he described alongside one he designed and one designed by Jeffrey Ringer. I've posted below the syllabus for that senior-level rhetorical theory seminar, and I've removed most of the institutional boilerplate material. I taught this course in Spring 2011, when I was a little more than halfway through my doctoral program.
WRT 424: Writing, Rhetoric, and Identity
Writing and Spirituality: Reading, Writing, and Speaking
of Faith
Let’s begin our conversation with others’ words:
When scholars in
rhetoric and composition discuss writing and power, they most often mean economic
or political power first, intellectual or social power second—power over
others. Perhaps it is time for us to include spiritual power. It is time for us
to see all the multifaceted ways actual human beings use literacy to compose
power in their daily lives.
—Beth
Daniell
Something occurred to me. In all the sociology courses on identity
I had taken, in all the late night conversations we had at Allen Hall on the
subject, the issue of religion rarely came up. . . . [F]aith was nowhere to be found in the diversity discussion.
—Eboo
Patel
Course
Description
Some
of the voices actively participating in contemporary conversations about what
individuals and societies should value come from communities and perspectives
of faith. Think about the controversy over the proposed Islamic cultural center
in New York City or the fact that there is an Office of Faith-Based Initiatives
at the White House or the televised memorial service for the victims of the
recent armed assault in Tucson that included a traditional Native American
blessing and a Shaker hymn as well as readings from Jewish and Christian
scriptures. The examples could go on and on. Regardless of what political or
religious affiliations a person claims, if any at all, it seems unlikely that anyone
would deny that religious traditions and spiritual sentiments function as
powerful social forces throughout history and in the contemporary moment. Thus, in this course, we will study
religion/spirituality, but not as theologians might. Rather, we will use our
perspective as students of writing and rhetoric. How can a rhetorical perspective provide insight
into some of the many intersections of religion, writing/literacy, and
identity? Our
work will proceed with a concern for the same questions that we would ask when
examining or writing political messages, popular essays, academic arguments,
public service announcements, text messages, tweets, or webpages: What
arguments are being forwarded? What are the effects or implications of these
arguments? How might some arguments have unintended consequences? What
audiences do rhetors imagine? Which ones do they reach? We’ll take up these
and other questions as we look at a range of genres: spiritual memoirs,
theoretical treatments, historical inquiries, academic scholarship, popular
essays, news stories, and others. In pursuing these questions and looking at
these genres, you will engage in a number of composing practices and projects.
Major projects include a short first essay in which you discuss your knowledge
about and interests in the course topic, a synthesis and analysis project using
course readings, and a final project that consists of a proposal, an analysis
of the genre and audience for your project, a presentation, and a paper that
can take a range of potential forms. Daily assignments include a mix of short
responses, discussion questions based on the readings, and summaries of
selected texts.
Course
Goals
Students will be able to:
-apply and refine the skills of rhetorical
analysis.
-evaluate audience expectations and respond to
them.
-summarize and evaluate scholarly research and
popular discourses about selected topics.
-evaluate a variety of genres, including
spiritual memoir, journalism, opinion pieces, and scholarly research, with
attention to their rhetorical situation and to the possibilities they afford
for social action.
-recall, describe, and apply some select methods
and theories used to investigate rhetoric, literacy, and identity with special
attention to religion/spirituality.
-recognize and analyze arguments made using
religious evidence, texts, experiences, and claims.
-describe and explain some of the ways in which
religion/spirituality, race, ethnicity, sexuality, gender, class, and other
dimensions of identity and social life interact in national and transnational
contexts.
Course
Readings
These texts are available for purchase at the SU
Bookstore: A Communion of Friendship:
Literacy, Spiritual Practice, and Women in Recovery by Beth Daniell, Jesus Freak: Feeding, Healing, Raising the Dead by Sara Miles, and Acts of Faith: The Story of an American
Muslim by Eboo Patel. They are also all available used
through a variety of online bookstores. All other readings will be available as
PDFs on Blackboard. Please set aside appropriate funds for making copies. You
may bring in a laptop to access course readings and to write your notes if that
format is most effective for you.
Grading
Major
Projects
What I (Want to) Know 10%
Bringin’ Everything
Together 20%
Final Project:
Proposal
and Genre Analysis 5%
Symposium
Presentation 5%
Paper 25%
Daily
Work
Discussion Questions 5%
Any-Genre Responses 10%
Summaries 10%
Professionalism/Presence 10%
Assignments
What
I (Want to) Know — Definitions: This first writing
project is a short (4 to 5 pages) self-reflective essay in which you write
about what you know about rhetoric and about religion/spirituality, where this
knowledge came from, how that knowledge and its sources have shaped your
understanding of religion/spirituality, and what questions/concerns you want to
pursue in this course. Begin by offering a statement about how this course fits
into your own academic or professional goals (why did you choose this course
[besides or in addition to “I needed a histories and theories course” or “It
fit my schedule”]) and a definition of “rhetoric.” From there, select three or
four terms/words/phrases that seem important to you when you think about
religion or spirituality. For example, you could choose those broad terms
“religion” or “spirituality” or any number of others directly or indirectly
connected to them: faith, Jewish, Islam, Qur’an, Bible, Christian, values,
atheist, humanist, grace, blessing, meditation, prayer, hope. . . . You get the
idea. Take those words and phrases and offer your best attempt to define them.
Kathleen Norris’s essays might suggest a way to approach this definitional part
of the assignment. Last, offer any burning questions or interests you have
about rhetoric and spirituality that you hope we’ll explore. This paper will
begin our journey together by allowing us to examine our previous
understandings, experiences, and assumptions—as well as our hopes—about the
inquiry.
Any-Genre
Responses: These 1- to 2-page responses to course
readings will be written for and submitted on specific days. We’ll develop
expectations for them in conversation together, but let me briefly introduce
what I imagine. I see these short papers providing you a way to engage with
selected readings through writing in whatever genres and/or modes that are most
meaningful for you. Perhaps you’re struck by the way Patel’s theory of
interfaith activism is informed by his several interfaith romances, and you’ll
want to write a brief narrative that explores how an encounter you remember
that showed you the difficulties and importance of speaking across significant
lines of social, cultural, or political difference. Or maybe you’ll find it
useful to write a poem that imagines what it might mean to walk with Anzaldua
on the path of El Mundo Zurdo. You will select one of these any-genre responses
to share with the whole class at some point in the semester. For each of these
responses, include at the beginning a two or three sentences that frame the
piece for your readers—a brief summary or what your response is and what it’s
doing. Regardless of whether you choose to read your response on any given day,
your writing should help you generate ideas that might spark in-class
discussion. I will grade your best five out of six.
Summaries:
For selected texts, you will compose summaries that present in fresh language
the ideas of the source you’ve read for that day. Summary (whole source
understanding) is the basis for serious, sustained academic writing and for
thoughtful participation in the larger civic discourses and professional tasks
in which we participate. I’ll provide guidelines for summary writing after the
first class meeting.
Discussion Questions:
For selected classes noted on the course
schedule, you will each design one discussion question, a question which you
have about the week’s readings that you’d like to explore in class. The
question can deal specifically with one of the assigned readings, or it can be
a bit broader and engage several readings. Even though you will not have to
read your questions to the class, they will give us potential starting points
for conversation and serve at least three additional purposes: 1) They offer
opportunities for you to reflect more deeply on the assigned readings and,
through this reflection, to deepen your learning. 2) They enhance your
accountability for making the course work and give you more control over class
time. 3) They allow me to assess your interests and learning. Question format
instructions: If you ask a question about a specific
passage, please provide the quotation and page number(s); if you ask a question
about an issue found on specific pages, please include the page numbers. (There
is no need to provide full bibliographic information for these questions.)
Questions should be emailed to me by the start of class time. Here are two
sample discussion questions:
1) In “The
Transformation of Silence into Language and Action,” Lorde writes: “I am not
only a casualty, I am also a warrior” (41). What does Lorde mean when she
refers to herself as a “warrior”? What weapons does she carry? What is her
battlefield? Who is she warring against? Given the answers to these questions,
what are the rhetorical implications of this self-definition? What audiences
does her rhetoric call into being?
2) In “The
Transformation of Silence Into Language and Action," Lorde challenges us
to break silences and speak out, but in “Imagining Differently: The Politics of
Listening in a Feminist Classroom” Cervenak et. al. suggest that we need to
listen, rather than speak out. (Or do others read these pieces differently?)
What are we to do when using rhetoric for social change work: speak out?
listen? both? neither? I’m interested in hearing what my classmates think about
this apparent contradiction, especially as it might impact our class
discussions and, more generally, thinking about rhetoric and ethical
relationships.
Do not ask definition-based or other too-easily
answered/framed questions (for instance: “What does the word ‘hegemonic’ mean?”
or “What forms of logos are used in this piece?” or “When did the Islamic
Revolution in Iran occur, and how many people did it affect?”). Questions must
be a minimum of 50 words. I will grade your best five out of six.
Bringin’
Everything Together Options: Regardless of the option you decide on
for this assignment, my goals for you in this paper are these: make thoughtful
claims informed by our shared reading and conversations, demonstrate your
understanding of the course texts, accurately summarize and skillfully
synthesize the sources you use, develop an effective essay structure, and
convey your ideas through precise and clear language. Take 6-10 pages to
accomplish your writing goals. Use MLA format and citation guidelines.
1) Beth Daniell argues, “In their circle, what
the [Mountain City] women feel and say and think is valued more than some
mythical ‘correct’ reading. . . . For them, school reading, literary reading,
becomes irrelevancy. In this group of women, reading is a matter of life, and
interpretation—meaning—begins with feeling and is something to be shared
discussed, and questioned, not for abstract, intellectual, cognitive, or
artistic reasons but for immediate, personal, spiritual, and social ones”
(124). She goes on to write, “For Mountain City women, literacy as a state of
grace is not an isolated occurrence but rather part of a habitual reading and
writing for spiritual growth. They read and write … with the purpose of
changing their minds—changing their hearts” (134). You should make a claim in
this paper that is in conversation with Daniell’s position regarding literacy,
rhetoric, and spirituality and that addresses how Daniell’s view interacts with
other writers we’ve read so far. Early in your essay, explicate the
understanding of literacy and rhetoric articulated in the quotes. What vision of
rhetoric and literacy does Daniell offer here? How does her vision interact
with spirituality? What about this vision seems most important or useful to
you? Then explain how that position is complicated, complemented, or extended
by two or three other course readings.
2) Select an artifact (a visual, a speech, an
essay, a website, a news story, etc) relevant to our course inquiry and use two
or three course readings to help you conduct an analysis of your chosen item.
You should do several things in this paper: make a claim about your artifact
that focuses on how it functions rhetorically, address what audience it
assumes, and explain why is it important/interesting to write about now. It will also be important to be
quite discerning about which course texts and which parts of them to use in
making sense of your artifact.
Proposal:
You will submit
a 2- to 3-page proposal for your final project. This summary should outline
which final project option you’re going to do, a rationale that explains your
choice, the questions/issues you’ll pursue, the genre of your final project,
and an audience for your project. Make copies of your proposal to distribute to
all members of the class.
Audience/Genre Analysis: Write a 2- to 3-page paper that
offers an analysis of the features of the genre you have chosen for your final
project and of what characterizes the audience for whom you are writing. What
does that audience expect? How do you know what they expect it? What does the
genre you will write in allow you to do? Are there writing goals you have that
are made difficult (or possible at all!) by this genre?
Professionalism/Presence: Regular, punctual attendance is a
vital part of meeting the objectives of this course. This course requires your
professionalism and engaged participation. Such requirements take many forms:
active discussion, collaboration, punctual attendance, preparation for class,
taking notes, asking questions of me and your classmates. Please do not use a
cell phone during class, either for conversation or texting. You are allowed
two absences without penalty; more than two absences may negatively affect your
final grade in the course. Missing three weeks (6 sessions) will cause you to
fail the course. Please note that you are responsible for submitting
assignments on time regardless of absence.
Final Project
Options: Regardless
of which option you select, I will ask you for short, periodic updates about
your progress during the last third of the course in the form of writer’s
memos. We’ll develop guidelines for these in class. Also, we will have workshop
days during which you’ll share your work and respond to others’ work. Not
turning in these memos and not bringing drafts to workshop days will negatively
impact your grade because you will miss out on opportunities for feedback and
you will demonstrate that you’re not making consistent, ongoing progress toward
project completion. Use MLA format and citation guidelines.
1) Write an essay that could be submitted to the “This I
Believe” website (2 pages) and then compose a 6- to 8-page reflective essay
that draws on two or three course readings to help you explain and situate your
“This I Believe” statement. This reflective essay is not a rationale for you
beliefs. Rather, it is a kind of analysis, taking your own writing as a
historically located, rhetorical artifact. What does your text do in the world?
Think of the extended essay as an opportunity to illustrate how this course has
informed your thinking about the rhetorical nature of any belief statement
(religious or secular).
2) Return to your “What I (Want to) Know” paper.
Significantly revise it and extend it to 11- to 12-pages. In light of the
course, how have your definitions been extended and/or complicated and your
questions addressed and/or changed through engagement with course readings and
class discussions? It’s possible that you might want to return to you “Bringin’
Everything Together” paper as well as all of your summaries and Any-Genre
Responses for insights about the development of your thinking and your
questions. Think of this second option as an opportunity to explain to your
classmates and me your intellectual journey.
3) Write an 8- to 10-page paper that advances an argument
about some intersection of rhetoric/writing/literacy and religion/spirituality.
Your approach can be rhetorical analysis of an artifact or you can conduct
primary research (survey, interviews, observation, etc). Your paper should demonstrate
your developing familiarity with relevant secondary material about the topic.
Imagine this paper as the beginning of a paper that might, with further
revision, find a home in a journal dedicated to undergraduate research, such as
YSIW.
4) Write an 8- to 10-page paper that advances an argument
about a figure, text, or theme, that we have read and discussed this semester.
Your paper should present your claim about the topic, supported by ample
references from primary sources. It should also demonstrate your developing
familiarity with relevant secondary material about the topic. As with option 3,
imagine this paper as the beginning of an article that might, with further
revision, find a home in a journal dedicated to undergraduate research, such as
YSIW.
5) Propose a project that falls
outside any of these options, but that allows you to pursue your professional
or academic goals while also illustrating how the work of the course has
informed your thinking about the intersections of rhetoric, writing, and
identity with some particular attention to religion/spirituality or ethics/beliefs/meaning-making
more broadly.
Symposium Presentation: We will develop guidelines as
a class for the presentation component of your final project a bit later in the
term.
Late Work
As a rule, I don’t accept late work for a grade. You can
request—ahead of time—a twenty-four hour extension for any one assignment. I also recognize that sometimes life intervenes and
prevents some work from getting done or getting done as well as we’d like.
Thus, for the Any-Genre Responses and Discussion Questions, I’ve scheduled for
six of each to be turned in, but I’ll only grade your best five.
Commenting on Student Writing
You will engage in
great deal of formal and informal writing over the course of the semester. How
I respond to this work will differ depending on whether it’s a freewrite or a
discussion question or your final project or your very first essay. Sometimes I
will return short assignments with a sentence or two at the end, asking a
question or responding with a comment about the ideas in the piece and their
development. Sometimes I may return them with no comments, but with a check on
top and will use your writing to inform how we discuss something in the next
class meeting (and I try to make the connections between your writing and how
they shape our class agenda clear). In marginal comments (those items written
next to specific sections of your text) and endnotes (comments written at the
end of the paper with the whole piece in mind) to rough and final drafts of
your essays, I will call your attention to areas 1) where you accomplished the
goals of the assignment and 2) where you could extend or complicate your
thinking and development. I’ll also issue you challenges to consider for future
writing. Sentence-level, usage, and grammar concerns do matter, and we will
work on those issues. As writing professionals, this much should be clear.
Polish matters. Stylistic variety, it matters. Sophisticated syntax? Yep. You
guessed it. That matters, too. Thus, we’ll take time to practice editing
skills. However, I’m not in the business of “fixing” papers because your
writing is not broken.
Returning Graded Work
Given how much work we
have to do, I will strive to get your assignments back to you as quickly as
possible—one week at the very most. If you wish to speak with me about my
comments on any assignment and what you can do as you move forward, wait a
minimum of 24 hours before contacting me. Getting papers back is often an
emotional as well as intellectual experience—the heart beats faster, the pulse
races a bit, the stomach moves. This lag time allows you a chance to process my
assessment of your work and to clearly express any questions or concerns you
might have.
CALENDAR
(Note:
Readings and assignments might shift as necessary.)
WEEK ONE
Tues, 1/18 Introductions. Review syllabus in groups.
Review the current Park51 situation. Groups work with different
articles/blogs/transcripts. Share findings and use rhetorical terms.
Thurs, 1/20 Speaking of Faith
video; Sex
and the Single Savoir—excerpt of ch 2 and “Can Rhetorology
Yield More Than a Mere Truce, in Any of Our ‘Wars’?”
Writing
Due: Any-Genre
Response
WEEK TWO
Tues, 1/25 Amazing Grace: A Vocabulary of Faith
excerpts: “Bible,” “Righteous,” “Intolerance,” “Christ,” “Prayer as Mystery,”
“Imagination”; and ch 1-3 of A Communion
of Friendship
Writing Due: Summary—trail run with Daniell Chapter 1
Plan to conference with me at some point within
the next week to discuss your writing and your goals and expectations as
expressed in your paper.
Thurs, 1/27 Ch
4-5 of A Communion of Friendship;
selections from “This I Believe”; Begin the second major project
Writing Due: “What I (Want to)
Know” paper
WEEK THREE
Tues, 2/1 “La Prieta,” “Cowboy
for Christ,” and “‘I am just so glad you’re alive’: New Perspectives on
Non-Traditional, Non-Conforming, and Transgressive Expressions of Gender,
Sexuality, and Race Among African Americans”
Writing Due: Summary of “‘I am just so glad’”
Thurs, 2/3 Excerpt from Sweet
Tea: Gay Black Men of the South; “Feeling the Spirit in the Dark”
Writing Due: Any-Genre Response
WEEK FOUR
Tues, 2/8 Jesus Freak: Feeding, Healing, Raising the
Dead
Writing Due: Discussion Question
Thurs, 2/10 Jesus Freak: Feeding, Healing, Raising the
Dead; “On Gender and Rhetorical Space”
Writing Due: Any-Genre Response
WEEK FIVE
Plan to conference with me at some point this
next week to discuss your paper ideas.
Tues, 2/15 Pieces
from Young Scholars in Writing:
“Ocutl, Or ‘Being The Torch’: Examining the Conversation Between Indigenous
Voices and Colonialist Discourses” and “A Response to Andrew Noel”
Writing Due: Any-Genre Response
Thurs, 2/17 Bearing Witness: A Zen Master’s Lessons
and workshop drafts
Writing Due: Discussion Question; Draft of Bringin’
Everything Together
WEEK SIX
Tues, 2/22 “Writing to Believe”
Writing Due: Summary of “Writing to Believe”
Thurs, 2/24 On
Christian Doctrine—excerpt of Book IV
Writing Due: Bringin’ Everything Together (Submitted by 9am
Saturday 2/26)
WEEK SEVEN
Tues, 3/1 “Pedagogies
of the Sacred”; A Community Text Arises intro;
planning final projects
Writing Due: Summary of ACTA
Plan to conference with me at some point within
the next week to discuss your final project ideas.
Thurs, 3/3 “Healing
Suenos for Academia”; “Our Work is Our Prayer”; “Blood and Scholarship”
Writing Due: Discussion Question
WEEK EIGHT
Tues, 3/8 Acts of Faith
Writing Due: Any-Genre Response
Thurs,
3/10 Acts
of Faith
Writing Due: Discussion Question; Final Project Proposal
WEEK
NINE ******SPRING
BREAK******
WEEK
TEN
Tues, 3/22 “Transing and Tranpassing Sex-Gender Walls in
Iran”
Writing Due: Discussion Question
Thurs, 3/24 Devotion
excerpts: 2, 7, 9, 11, 12, 17, 25, 31, 32, 33, 53, 54, 63,
64
Writing Due: Any-Genre Response
WEEK ELEVEN
Tues, 3/29 “Tongues Untied:
Memoirs of a Pentecostal Boyhood” and Intro to Secularisms
Writing Due: Discussion Question; Genre/Audience Analysis
for final project
Thurs, 3/31 Discuss
Genre/Audience Analysis and how you will respond to audience issues.
WEEK
TWELVE:
Tues, 4/5 Attention
to working with evidence; Workshop
Thurs, 4/7 Attention
to idea development; Workshop
Writing Due: Writer’s Memo
WEEK
THIRTEEN:
Tues, 4/12 Attention
to source use and responding to the “ongoing conversation”; Workshop
Plan to conference with me at some point within
the next week to discuss your final project drafts.
Thurs, 4/14 No
class—Conferences
Writing Due: Draft of Final Project due to me for a
sustained reading
WEEK
FOURTEEN:
Tues, 4/19 Style; Workshop
Thurs, 4/21 Intros
and conclusions; Workshop
Writing due: Writer’s Memo
WEEK
FIFTEEN:
Tues, 4/26 Symposium
Thurs, 4/28 Symposium
WEEK
SIXTEEN:
Tues, 5/3 Symposium;
Course Evaluations
WRT 424 Reading List
·
A Communion of Friendship:
Literacy, Spiritual Practice, and Women in Recovery by Beth Daniell
·
Jesus Freak: Feeding, Healing,
Raising the Dead by Sara Miles
·
Acts of Faith: The Story of an
American Muslim by Eboo Patel
·
Bearing Witness: A Zen Master’s
Lessons in Making Peace by Bernie Glassman—excerpts
·
Sex and the Single Savoir by Dale Martin—excerpt of ch 2
·
“Can Rhetorology Yield More Than a Mere Truce, in Any of Our
‘Wars’?” from The Rhetoric of Rhetoric by Wayne Booth
·
Amazing Grace: A Vocabulary of
Faith by
Kathleen Norris excerpts: “Bible,” “Righteous,” “Intolerance,” “Christ,”
“Prayer as Mystery,” “Imagination”
·
selections from the NPR “This I Believe”
·
“La Prieta” by Gloria Anzaldua in This Bridge Called My Back
·
“Cowboy for Christ” by Quince Mountain
·
“‘I am just so glad you’re alive’: New Perspectives on
Non-Traditional, Non-Conforming, and Transgressive Expressions of Gender,
Sexuality, and Race Among African Americans” by L. Phillips and M. R.
Stewart in the Journal of African American Studies (2008) 12:378–400
·
Excerpt from Sweet Tea: Gay
Black Men of the South and “Feeling the Spirit in the Dark” by E. Patrick
Johnson
·
Pieces from Young Scholars
in Writing: “Ocutl, Or ‘Being The Torch’: Examining the Conversation
Between Indigenous Voices and Colonialist Discourses” and “A Response to Andrew
Noel”
·
“Writing to Believe” from Spiritual
Literacy in John Wesley’s Methodism by Vicki Tolar Burton
·
On Christian Doctrine by Augustine—excerpt of Book IV
·
“Pedagogies of the Sacred” from Pedagogies of Crossing by M.
Jacqui Alexander
·
Intro to A Community Text
Arises by Beverly Moss
·
“Healing Suenos for Academia” by Irene Lara in this bridge we call home
·
“Our Work is Our Prayer” by T J Geiger in Peitho
·
“Blood and Scholarship” by Malea Powell
·
“Transing and Transpassing Sex-Gender Walls in Iran” by Afsaneh
Najmabadi in WSQ:Women’s Studies
Quarterly 36: 3 & 4 (Fall/Winter 2008)
·
Devotion excerpts: 2, 7, 9, 11, 12, 17, 25,
31, 32, 33, 53, 54, 63, 64 by Dani Shapiro
·
“Tongues Untied: Memoirs of a Pentecostal Boyhood” by Michael
Warner
·
Intro to Secularisms
edited by Janet Jakobsen and Anne Pellegrini
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