English 140 Schedule of Assignments

First-Year Seminar:
Language's Power to Write Our Worlds

English 140
Fall 2003
Professor Portnoy
Email Address: alisse@umich.edu

Schedule of Assignments

Assignments are due at the beginning of class on the date listed.
Please note that this schedule of assignments is subject to change.
We will be adding viewings of movies and some readings during the semester.
Texts in [brackets] are not included in the course readings.
Changes will be announced in class and posted on the course website,
http://www.umich.edu/~alisse/ENGL140f03/index.html.
You are responsible for all changes announced in class.

A very special thanks to Anne Curzan, Rebecca Ingalls, Joshua Miller, and Kavita Padiyar
for their suggestions and assistance with readings for this class.

September

October

November

December

Date	Day	Topics for Discussion and Assignments Due
September 2	Tuesday	First day of class Welcome and introductions Declaration of Independence
September 4	Thursday	Course Information, Schedule of Assignments Derrida, "Declarations of Independence" (PDF, 317 KB) Crowley and Hawhee, Ancient Rhetorics for Contemporary Students, Chapter 1 (PDF, 1.0 MB)
September 9	Tuesday	Terministic Screens Burke, "Terministic Screens" Postman and Powers, "The Bias of Language" Bohannan, "Shakespeare in the Bush"
September 11	Thursday	Discussions of theory and texts continue from Tuesday
September 16	Tuesday	Words, Words, Words [Carlin, "They're Only Words" and "Euphemisms"] Steinem, "Words and Change" Dyer, "In a Word" Naylor, "The Meanings of a Word" (two versions) Fears, "Latinos or Hispanics?"
September 18	Thursday	Communities of Practice and Discourse Communities Eckert and McConnell-Ginet, "Communities of Practice" Bizzell, "What is a Discourse Community?"
September 23	Tuesday	Identification Heath, "Identification" Jasinski, "Identification"
September 25	Thursday	Discussions continue Have you stopped by to chat during office hours yet?
September 30	Tuesday	Constitutive Rhetoric Charland, "Constitutive Rhetoric" Jasinski, "Constitutive Rhetoric" [Macintosh "1984" Advertisement, Musical Selections]
October 2	Thursday	Guest Lecture: Anne Curzan
October 7	Tuesday	Politics Lakoff, "We First" and "Language, Politics, and Power" Carmichael, "What We Want" King, Black Power White, "Mandela's Speech . . . Lincoln's Second Inaugural"
October 9	Thursday	Discussions continue
October 14	Tuesday	No Class: Fall Break
October 16	Thursday	Gender Nilsen, "Sexism in English: A 1990s Update" Miller and Swift, "Who's In Charge of the English Language?"
October 21	Tuesday	[Killing Us Softly 3: Advertising's Image of Women]
October 23	Thursday	Speech Codes Toobin, "Speechless" Hentoff, "'Speech Codes' on the Campus and the Problems of Free Speech" Mid-semester evaluation of the course
October 28	Tuesday	Discussions continue
October 30	Thursday	First Exam
November 4	Tuesday	Bilingualism Anzaldúa, "How to Tame a Wild Tongue" Fusco, "Bilingualism, Biculturalism, and Borders" Rodriguez, "Public and Private Language" Hayakawa, "Bilingualism in America: English Should be the Only Language"
November 6	Thursday	Discussions continue
November 11	Tuesday	Black English Jones, "What's Wrong with Black English" Jordan, "Nobody Mean More to Me Than You And the Future Life of Willie Jordan" Baldwin, "If Black English Isn't a Language, Then Tell Me, What Is?" Rickford and Rickford, "What's Going On?" Smitherman, "English Teacher, Why You Be Doing the Thangs You Don't Do?"
November 13	Thursday	Discussions continue
November 18	Tuesday	Constructions of Categories and History Tompkins,"'Indians': Textualism, Morality, and the Problem of History" ["Real Indian" Advertisement]
November 20	Thursday	[Off the Straight and Narrow: Lesbians, Gays, Bisexuals, and Television]
November 25	Tuesday	Discussions continue
November 27	Thursday	No class: Thanksgiving recess
December 2	Tuesday	Dyer, "White" (excerpt) [Being White]
December 4	Thursday	Wrap-up, review, and class evaluations
December 9	Tuesday	Second Exam