Daily Archives: February 6, 2013

Bloggers for Monday’s class

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If you were asked to blog by end-of-day on Friday so that everyone can comment on your posts by 10:00am Monday, what do you plan to blog about? Here are some ideas, and I hope that others will reply here with additional ideas.

  • What effect does the style of narration have on your experience of the plot or characters? Use two different styles to reflect on this, at least one from one of the stories we’ve read or are reading for Monday.
  • In class we talked briefly about how “Young Goodman Brown” is an allegory. What does that mean, how does it play out in the story, and how does it strike you as a reader?
  • We’re going to look at three very different pieces by Charlotte Perkins Gilman for Monday’s class: two short stories, “The Yellow Wall-Paper” and “The Cottagette,” and a chapter (XIV) from a non-fiction work called Women and Economics. How do the different narrative styles compare? Or how does the information conveyed in the non-fiction chapter come through in either of the short stories?
  • What connections do you see among the stories assigned from the start of the semester through Monday? Are there trends you can identify? Or contrasting situations/characters/styles that are worth noting in their difference? Be specific!

These are just a few ideas that you might consider. For your post, choose one of these, or venture off on your own topic, using any of these as a guide to make sure your topic is as focused. Use the texts to guide you, consider that your audience will have read the same materials but might not have thought about them as much as you have or in the same way that you did, and enjoy sharing your ideas. On the nitty-gritty end of things, remember to include a title that reflects what you’re writing (it shouldn’t be able to apply to everyone’s post!), choose appropriate categories and tags (or add if you want a tag that isn’t there already), write at least 300 words, proofread, and publish! If there are links or media you want to include, please do.

Commenters–get ready! Everyone who isn’t writing a blog post will need to comment by 10:00am Monday, so make sure you’re ready with 100-150 words of insights and reactions to share with the class.

This semester’s blogging assignment

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Throughout the semester, we will use the blog to develop and share our ideas about and analyses of the materials for this course. For each class, you will need to share something, whether it be a blog post , a comment or a summary. You are always welcome to do more than the schedule requires, and I hope we will develop a lively online community that becomes integral to our course.

For each class session, I may suggest a blog topic, or bloggers can choose their own topics. Blog posts should be focused, using direct quotations from the text to drive the responses or reflections in the post. A post should be about something we are about to read or something we have just read, but it might also bring in materials we have read earlier in the semester or materials that interest you from outside of class. Authors of these posts should think critically about the reading material, and should consider how a particular element of fiction or term relating to narrative functions in the material—it might amplify the text, or it could be complicated or problematic, but any of these would be interesting opportunities to explore. Blog posts should be approximately 300 words, and should be proofread before posting. Please include links, images, etc, as appropriate.

Those who are not responsible for contributing a blog post on a given day will be responsible for commenting. Commenting shouldn’t just be “I agree” or “Good point.” These might be the start of a comment. Use the space to offer a counterpoint, to bring together different ideas, or to direct us to a particular point the blogger didn’t include. Comments should be approximately 100-150 words. If you want to add additional comments that are shorter, feel free to.