Assignments

Assignment Values

Assignment Descriptions

Participation

To get credit for participation, you need to say at least one thing of substance per week in seminar. Such substantive statements can include answering someone’s question with your own reading of the text, pointing out additional supporting claims, showing at length a comparison between the text and something else we have read, or asking a question that generates further discussion.

I will be keeping track of who speaks in class.

Exit Ticket

At the end of each class, I will give you five minutes to write an exit ticket, registering your attendance in class. An exit ticket is a 3”x5” notecard on which you write:

1. Your name
2. One of the following:
   • An issue we did not address that you would like addressed
   • A question you have based on today’s discussion
   • A point you still do not understand that you want clarified
   • A question you wanted to ask but did not

I will collect these cards at the end of class and, based on your feedback, will structure the beginning of next week’s seminar accordingly.

You will be required to bring a 3”x5” notecard with you to each class.

Book Review

For this class, you will be required to review a book that touches on the topic of infrastructure. I have compiled a list here, though you may speak to me in office hours about a different text. Have a target journal in mind, though keep in mind that most book reviews are around 750 words in length. Your review should situate the book in the field covered by your target journal, while critiquing the specific accomplishments and impact of the book itself.

On book review day (designated on the schedule), you must bring four printed copies of your review to class for group evaluation and upload the rough draft to eCampus (before class). We will workshop these in class.

After you have received feedback from your group, you may choose to revise your review before submitting your final version, due one week after the review.

Seminar Paper

For your seminar paper, you will be asked to explore some aspect of infrastructure in your field of study. I realize that most of you will not be working in rhetoric and/or composition as your research field, so I want to read papers that expand on infrastructural topics in your area of expertise. Alternately, if you would like, you may develop a theoretical or methodological concern or theme from the readings themselves, and thus intervene in the development of infrastructure studies as a field.

Seminar papers should be 20 pages (give or take 5 pages), include sources documented in MLA format, and should constitute a polished, focused, and sustained argument on a particular topic.

Conference Paper

During the last week of class (or two depending on enrollment), you will present 10 minute versions of your paper. You will need to condense your entire argument into a shorter form and may end up offering an overview or report on the longer essay.

You will group yourselves into panels of 3 to 4 and, working together, submit an abstract for your panel, just as you would for a conference. Based on this submission, I will give you a report on if I would except the panel or not and how you might improve upon it. Whether accepted or rejected, your panel will present as a group on the last day of class and take questions from the audience. One of you will need to chair the panel.