English 680M: Minority Rhetorics
Spring
2002 Section 0101
T TH
HEAV 210
Contact Information
Professor:
Office: 301C
Heavilon Hall
Phone: 494-8122
Email: sblackmon@sla.purdue.edu
Office Hours:
T TH
Course Syllabus On-line at: http://www.sla.purdue.edu/blackmon/engl680
(Syllabus and Calendar are tentative
and subject to change. Please check on-line syllabus for latest changes. Any
hard copy may be obsolete, so be sure to bring it with you to each class to
record all changes.)
Course Description:
In this
course we will look at writings of the 19th and 20th centuries
which, while written primarily by authors of African descent, will gives us the
foundation to discussion how the theories and practices of scholars and
educators, past and present, can come together and serve as the basis for a
pedagogy that can be used to teach all students. Assignments for this
course will include weekly response assignments, Presentation/Productions, and
a seminar project.
Required Texts (Available at Von’s
or check Half.com for cheap books)
Lisa
Delpit, Other People's Children
W.E.B.
DuBois, Souls of Black Folks- (now
available as an e-book at http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/ebooks/)
Keith
Gilyard, Voices of the Self
bell
hooks, Teaching to Transgress
Richard
Rodriguez, Hunger of Memory
Mike
Rose. Lives on the Boundary
Victor
Villanueva, Bootstraps: From an American
Academic of Color
Booker
T. Washington, Up From Slavery- (now
available as an e-book at http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/ebooks/)
Carter
G. Woodson, Mis-education of the Negro
Recommended Texts (and other
interesting related readings):
Eric
Foner, Reconstruction: America’s
Unfinished Revolution
Marcus
Garvey, Message to the People: The Course
on African Philosophy
Henry
A. Giroux, Schooling and the Struggle for
Public Life
William
Labov, Language in the Inner City;
Studies in the Black English Vernacular
Stephen
Parks, Class Politics: The Movement for
the Students’ Right to Their Own Language
David
Schaafsma, Eating on the Street: Teaching
Literacy in a Multicultural Society.
W.E.B.
DuBois, Dusk of Dawn
---,
Black Reconstruction in America1860-1880
Course Expectations: In order to accomplish the course
goals, you must come to each class prepared.
This means coming to class on time, as well as completing your readings
and outside assignments. Active and
informed participation in class discussions and collaborative work is also
crucial. In terms of writing assignments, you will be required to complete one
seminar paper proposal (ten points each), weekly responses to reading (fifty
points total), and one semester project (forty points).
Late assignments will only be accepted with the prior specific permission of
the instructor and will be penalized 10% for every calendar day late.
Grading Scale: The
grading scale for this course is straightforward with no curve.
|
100-90 |
A |
|
89-80 |
B |
|
79-70 |
C |
|
69-60 |
D |
|
59-below |
F |
Note about Incompletes: The mark
of ‘I’ is inappropriate if, in the instructor’s judgment, it will be necessary
for the student regularly to attend subsequent sessions of the class. I will give
an Incomplete only in cases of extreme emergency.
Class Participation & Assignments: This is one of the most important
components to the success of the course. All reading and outside assignments
are to be completed prior to class. This means reading carefully and
critically, bringing materials to class, and coming prepared to engage with the
ideas and your class. Class investigations are participatory assignments that
include critical and active discussions as well as in-class collaborative work.
Attendance: Attendance is welcomed, expected,
and mandatory. To best utilize our time, come to class on time. You are
considered absent if 1) you are more than 15 minutes late and/or 2) you are
unprepared for class. There will be regular in-class work to record your
attendance and preparation for class. You may miss three sessions without
penalty. For every class after the first
three, I will lower your final grade by five points. After three absences you
must attend a conference with me to discuss whether you should continue in this
course. Seven absences constitute automatic failure of the course.
Conferences and Contact: I am open to discussing matters pertaining to the
course, readings, and your writing; please feel free to contact me via email or
phone as well as in person. I hope you will also take advantage of my office
hours and email.
Academic Dishonesty: Cheating: All written
work submitted for a grade in this course must be the product of your own
composition. Ideas generated due to reading and group discussion may provide
the inspiration for your work, but should not be the sole ideas represented.
With collaborative projects, of course, ideas should be representative of the
group’s work.
Plagiarism is the act of presenting as your own work
another individual’s ideas, words, data, or research material. The concept
applies equally to written, spoken, or electronic texts, published or
unpublished. All ideas and quotations that you borrow from any source must be
acknowledged: at a minimum, you should give the name of your author, the title
of the text cited, and the page number(s) of the citation. The only exceptions
to this requirement would involve what is familiar and commonly held (e.g. the
fact that the earth is round). You should know that penalties for plagiarism
are severe and can entail suspension from the University. Students are
responsible for reading and understanding the University policy on Cheating and
Plagiarism set forth in
Classroom Behavior: I am sure that at this level this
goes without saying, but here goes. Insults,
slurs, or attacks of any kind will not be allowed in my class. Any student who
engages in this type of behavior in the classroom will be permanently removed
from the class. In other words, forced
to drop the course, in addition to other possible punishment given by