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For two of the three “seminar days” on our schedule, you will write and submit a short paper;
each paper counts for 20% of your total grade (and thus, together, the two papers count for
40% of your total grade). You will choose the order in which you will complete these
assignments, using a sign up sheet distributed early in the term.
A. Overview
Your papers will be written in a unique format, called an “engaged close reading.”
For each paper, you will [a] choose roughly one page from one reading and [b] recount the
argument of that page in your own words while also [c] mobilizing that argument to answer – or
otherwise directly engage with – one of the course’s guiding questions (see the “Guiding
Themes and Questions” handout). Your paper should be no more than 750 words. Review the
assignment checklist handout before submitting the assignment.
Papers are due at the start of class on “seminar days” (see schedule): there are three seminar
days, but only two required papers, so there will be one day/unit for which you do not need to
write a paper.
B. Guidelines for Written Work
Papers are to be turned in via the “Assignments” section of Canvas.
Papers must cover one of the primary thinkers being examined in the current unit of the class:
Plato, Lorde, or Pateman for Unit I; Hume, Kant, Du Bois, or Arendt for Unit II; and Simpson,
Kimmerer, or Simplican for Unit III. For example, if you choose to write a paper on Plato, it must
be turned in before the start of the first “seminar day,” as that is the last day of Unit I.
Five points will be deducted per day from any late work; writing turned in on the day it is due
but after class begins will be considered one day late.
Your paper will be graded according to the “Criteria for Evaluating Written Work” on the next
page of this syllabus.
Requirements III — Discussion Questions
On the seminar day where you are not scheduled to submit a paper, you will be responsible for
submitting at least two discussion questions; this counts for 15% of your total grade.
Our “seminar day” meetings will be centered around student-submitted discussion questions;
you must write and submit at least two discussion questions on the seminar day when you are
not scheduled to write a paper. Your questions should always focus primarily on the readings
from the current unit of the course, and to receive credit, must be submitted via the
“Assignments” section of Canvas by 8:00 AM on the day of that class. (For example, if you are
submitting a discussion question for our first seminar day [see schedule], you should have it in
by 8:00 AM on April 25th.)
The strongest questions will be the most discussable, which will usually mean they are
[a] concrete (related to specific points from the reading), [b] open-ended (not something we
can directly answer by pointing to the text), and [c] real questions (not something for which you
already have a single, confident answer prepared).
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