Time Schedule:
Sharon E. Crowley
B CUSP 135
Bothell Campus
Strengthens performance of college-level argumentative writing and scholarly research, critical reading and thinking, and the critique and the creation of print and new media texts. Prerequisite: either B CUSP 101, B CUSP 114, or B CUSP 134.
Class description
The primary subject of the course is research methods, with an emphasis on using diverse source materials, developing arguments through deep analysis of evidence, and writing those arguments for an academic audience. To give the course cohesion, assigned readings will serve as a scaffold for research and writing assignments. Assigned readings will include complex academic essays and some creative works. Writing assignments will include focused, shorter papers leading into a longer essay.
Student learning goals
Research Methodology: You should be able to generate a core set of questions and use them to help you gather a range of different sources. You should be able to explain why and how various sources “belong” to your project, and what light they shed on your central questions.
Critical Thinking: You should be able to identify the key ideas, arguments, and stakes of various kinds of texts, to extend and complicate those key ideas/arguments, and to put them into critical conversation with each other. You should also be able to articulate your own position and stakes in relation to what you’re analyzing.
Argumentation: You should be able to present your ideas and arguments in clear, coherent prose form. Your papers should have a claim that is well supported with evidence, and should show sensitivity to the rhetorical situation in which you are writing. You should have a clear sense of what is at stake in your arguments, and your papers should reflect that.
Revision and Collaboration: Academic communities are collaborative spaces. Neither knowledge nor writing emerges fully formed from peoples’ foreheads, but instead must be grappled with, shaped, and honed through a process of active conversation, collaboration, and revision. I focus on research and writing as active processes in which the writer gradually builds knowledge, using writing at every stage to organize and sift through information, do preliminary analyses, and explore ideas.
General method of instruction
Seminar-style class discussions, small group work, and some lectures.
Recommended preparation
Prerequisite: a college-level composition course. I recommend that the prerequisite course be one that introduces students to close reading, academic argumentation, and rhetorical writing strategies.
Class assignments and grading
Assigned readings; research tasks; in-class writing assignments; 4-5 short papers (2-3 pages); 2 longer papers (6-7 pages).
Preparation and Participation (includes peer review, a short oral presentation, quizzes, and contributions to class discussions and small group work): 30% of final grade
Final Electronic Portfolio (compilation of work submitted, plus cover letter and fresh revisions of longer papers): 70% of final grade
