List of Four-letter word projects by class and alphabettically by word

Kindly post your final four-letter word projects to your blog.

9:05 class

dump                         – by Garret

fade                         – by Adama A

fire                         – by Tom M

hair                         - by Emily N

help                        - by Taylor H

hugs                         – by Joseph F

joke                         – by Jeremy M

kill                         – by Cameron K

life                         – by Catherine M

life                        - by Parth D

love                         – by Michael V

obey                        - by Matt G

pure                         – by Anthony C

rich                        - by Amanda V

rise                         – by Deeba C

save                         – by Dayna S

team                         – by Jonel B

time                         – by Toni S

10:10 class

blah – by Steven H

book – by Emily K

dive – by Chris O

fall – by Linda L

fall – by Sean W

fire - by Tyler K

home  - by Sydney R

hope – by Briana G

kiss – by Jhenna Z

grow – Jessica S-R

heal – by Kaitlin N

live – by Taylor E

lost  - by Kat D

move – by Irina

play -  by Kaitlyn A

play – by Andrew M

riot – by Leah S

scar – by Ani F

sink – by Justin B

snow – by Kyle B

tear – by Amanda L

12:50 class

best - by Mattia R

door - by Mike B 

envy - by Allen P

feed - by Priyanka J

grow - by Genevieve P

hand - by Anna

help - by Jen W
hold - by Morgan D

lies - by Kelsey B

move  - by Kristin M

play - by Brendan M

pray/prey by Joe S 

rage - by Brianna C

ring - by Jon D

risk - by Vickie J-B 

stop - by Megan A

talk - by Rebecca K

walk - by Chelsea G

work - by Jon F

A dozen by a dozen.... blog post 12 of 12

Read this poem by Ron Koertge; consider his advice to writers; then draft a few paragraphs of your ownd advice for debutante writers taking WSC 001.

“Do You Have Any Advice For Those of Us Just Starting Out?"

Ron Koertge

Give up sitting dutifully at your desk. Leave
your house or apartment. Go out into the world.
It's all right to carry a notebook but a cheap
one is best, with pages the color of weak tea
and on the front a kitten or a space ship.
Avoid any enclosed space where more than
three people are wearing turtlenecks. Beware
any snow-covered chalet with deer tracks
across the muffled tennis courts.
Not surprisingly, libraries are a good place to write.
And the perfect place in a library is near an aisle
where a child a year or two old is playing as his
mother browses the ranks of the dead.
Often he will pull books from the bottom shelf.
The title, the author's name, the brooding photo
on the flap mean nothing. Red book on black, gray
book on brown, he builds a tower. And the higher
it gets, the wider he grins.
You who asked for advice, listen: When the tower
falls, be like that child. Laugh so loud everybody
in the world frowns and says, "Shhhh."
Then start again.

from Fever, 2006
Red Hen Press

A dozen by a dozen.... blog post 11 of 12

Are the four-letter word projects writing?  (What is writing?) 

Or, are they something else -- an argument?  a composition?  an inscription?  something else?

A dozen by a dozen ... Blog post 10 of 12

What is Rodney Jones arguing in this poem?

Hubris at Zunzal

by Rodney Jones June 22, 2009

Nearly sunset, and time on the water

of 1984. Language its tracer.

No image like the image of language.

I had waded out about thigh deep.

Then a shout from the beach.

I held in my hand half a coconut shell

of coconut milk and 150-proof rum

and dumped it white into the waves

when it came on me how sweet it had been,

then the idea I was not finished,

then the act of reaching down

with the idea I would get it back.

A dozen by a dozen ... Blog post 9 of 12

We have been ruminating about various writing spaces and various readerships for the kinds of writing we produce.  Here are my questions for you: 

When you put on text -- as T-shirt (TEXTile), tattoo, and jewelry -- do you really consider that you will have an audience for that text?  (To whom are you writing?  What kind of composition is a text a porter?)

When you use twitter, who do you anticipate is your readership?

And how do the texts we wear and the texts we tweet succeed at making meaning?  (Sub-question:  are these as constrained adn limited as those crayon responses we composed?)

A dozen by a dozen.... Blog 8 of 12

 Transcribe the text of the sample onto your blog.  Do not edit.  (If there are any images provided, describe them briefly in a notes section.)  Return the crayon sample to me.


Be sure to continue commenting on your peers' blog posts!

A dozen by a dozen.... Blog 7 of 12

Consider the material nature of the crayon response you are reviewing -- this is not your own writing!  Is the writer influenced by the writing implement s/he uses?  Is the writer more expressive or less expressive as a result of the physical constraints of the crayoned page?  

Is this writing any good?  How do you know that it is good (or not)?

A dozen by a dozen.... blog post 6 of 12

Take a look at this parody of twitter on youtube.com called "Twouble with Twitter."   

Respond to the character's question as he enters the twittersphere:  "Who are they talking to?"  Do you wonder who your audience is when you post on twitter?  Do you feel differently about your audience in online writing environments?  Is your relationship to your online audience distinct?  Who do you imagine is reading your tweets, for example?

This animation clearly doubts the viability of twitter as a valuable tool?  What do you think?   What is the purpose of microblogging?

A dozen by a dozen.... Blog 5 of 12

To conclude her essay, Zadie Smith discloses: “In this lecture I have been seeking to tentatively suggest that the voice that speaks with such freedom, thus unburdened by dogma and personal bias, thus flooded with empathy, might make a good president” (192).  However, she rejects this claim by advocating for the many-voiced role of the poet.  What is the difference between the rhetoric of a president and that of a poet?  Does Smith suggest there should be a difference?

A dozen by a dozen .... Blog post 4 of 12

For Friday, December 2nd, 2011, read Zadie Smith's "Speaking in Tongues" (Hitchens 179- 194).

We will be discussing, writing, and blogging about it inclass.  To prepare kindly post (here as blog post 4 of 12), your own six questions you have following your reading of this text.  Make sure you ask the right questions though.  Craft questions that are whole and hale and honest in their inquiring.  Post these six questions on your blog.

You should use language from the essay and cite the page, as follows in this sample question 1: 

Zadie Smith exclaims in an apostrophe to the reader:  "How persistent this horror of the middling spot is, this dread of  the interim place!  It extends through the specter of the tragic mulatto, to the plight of the transsexual, to our present anxiety -- disguised as genteel concern -- for the contemporary immigrant, tragically split, we are sure, between worlds, ideas, cultures, voices -- whatever will become of them?(181-2)"  Why does  Smith lament so vociferously the in-between?  Does her own sense of self involve such doubling?  such ambiguity?

A dozen by a dozen.... Blog post 3 of 12

What I really think about the writing space that twitter affords is ________________________.


Think about this first:  is tweeting writing?  what is writing?  what's a tweet's purpose?

A dozen by a dozen.... Blog post 2 of 12

I'm not sure why so many people wear texts on their clothing and on their skin.  Perhaps they feel that such portable writing serves to ______________________.

Before you respond to this post, you may want to review the collective posts on twitter for #puttingontext

You can also see many of them @EthnaLay as well, for I have retweeted as many as I could catch.

A dozen by a dozen.... Blog post 1 of 12 (with directions about commenting)

A dozen by a dozen: Finishing up your Invention Blog
Second Blog Review due on December 11, 2011 (worth 50 points)

The subjects of the last twelve blog posts (about three paragraphs each) will be posted on this blog.

Here is  blog post 1 of 12: 
Read the following poem and respond to the questions below.

Robert Hass, “The Problem of Describing Trees”  

The aspen glitters in the wind
 And that delights us.

The leaf flutters, turning,
 Because that motion in the heat of August
 Protects its cells from drying out. Likewise the leaf
 Of the cottonwood.

The gene pool threw up a wobbly stem
 And the tree danced. No.
 The tree capitalized.
 No. There are limits to saying,
 In language, what the tree did.

 It is good sometimes for poetry to disenchant us.
 
Dance with me, dancer.  Oh, I will.

Mountains, sky,
 The aspen doing something in the wind.
 
 What is the argument of this poem?

What does the italicized line signify?

 ______________________________________________________________

Then you will comment substantively on twelve of your peers’ posts.  Blogs are after all a [pseudo-]conversation after all.

 Your first comments may follow this format.  After you are comfortable, craft your own responses in the way you see fit.  Be sure though that you comment in substantial ways.

1.  Write four to eight sentences per comment. 
2.  Start by thanking the writer for the intelligent, thoughtful post.  Then ask a question: “hey, have you thought about this?”
3.  Continue by justifying your question:  “The reason I ask this is because ________.”
4.  Then direct the poster to other information:  “You might want to take a look at this _____________.”
5.  Conclude by suggesting some alternate rhetorical move to try in the writer’s next post:  “I see that you frequently access metaphoric thinking in your writing.  Perhaps you might like to try more analytically in your next posting.”
6. What I really admire about your writing here is that you are positively _________ about  ____________.
 

Brooke and Carson's project on body parts in _Twelfth Night_

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P1LBTVZogus&layer_token=2d671cc03e62e0fd

Carson and Brooke's place project - Tattoo Parlor

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=APvv3HiUrX0&NR=1

Virginia's four-letter word MODE

http://vrayyy.blogspot.com/2011_03_01_archive.html


Jenna's four-letter word project SAVE
http://jtanzola.blogspot.com/2011/03/save.html

About Taylor Mali: what role does performance or writng space play in the making of meaning?

Taylor Mali, "Like You Know"

How does the poem differ in its two recensions?

Spoken word:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SCNIBV87wV4

[Unconventional ] Print text:
http://www.taylormali.com/index.cfm?webid=9
What reading or interpretation does spoken word (orality) privilege?  What does the textual writing space (unconventional as it is) play in the transmission of meaning?

About Project 2

Project 2 has two substantial parts.

Part 1  (worth fifty points; each group member must post the collaborative prezi on her Invention blog on the date due)

Part 1 is an argument-based, collaborative prezi, which focuses on one chapter from Jay David Bolter’s Writing Space: Computers, Hypertext, and the Remediation of Print  (New York: Routledge, 2001).  For this prezi, each garage band will develop and present a argument responding to Bolter’s claims in the chapter at hand.  This prezi is not a summary nor a reader response.  A profitable argument will consider the data proffered by Bolter and then present some contribution or participation in the making of new or additional meaning.  Essentially, the makers of each prezi must enter into a conversation with Bolter, or at least with the ideas that Bolter promulgates.

Each prezi should have 15 – 20 spots; should incorporate image, video, audio, and layout as appropriate; should cite work(s) and be proofread.

Part 2  (five-page zero draft in hard copy due in class on Monday, October 17^th ; final, revised copy is worth 100 points)

Bolter confides that his book’s purpose is to offer an extensive consideration of the relationship of print technology to new media (xii).  He explains:  “This edition of Writing Space is meant to fill that gap: to show how hypertext and other forms of electronic writing refashion or “remediate” the forms and genres of print” (xii).  He makes use of the metaphor of the old spaces and new spaces in which we write to comment on the changing nature and materiality of the written word.  How does the space (or spaces) in which we write influence what we write?  How does the technology of writing impact writing?

Select a particular aspect of the refashioning or remediation of print to digital writing.  In the change or re-making of print text to digital text, what do you find consistent with Bolter’s theory?  What is amiss? 

In your opinion, and in response to Bolter’s findings,

what is happening to writing?

Your five-page essay should use data from all three chapters in Bolter.  You may also incorporate and cite material from the argumentative prezis, your blog, and your peers’ blogs.  Be sure that you directly comment on all included material.  (Use what you include.)  Do not let another writer take control over your writing.

 

You are always welcome to work with the consultants in the Writing Center in Mason Hall on any writing project.  The consultants are trained to help you in all phases of drafting through revising.

Aside:  You might want to view an essay on a similar topic  written by one of my former students.  Here’s a link to his blog:

http://breenbrain.blogspot.com/2011_04_01_archive.html

Note that the student wrote the essay, refashioned its space via ISSUU, and refashioned it again by posting it to his blog. 

What's a garage band? Why are we collaborating in writing class?

Here's the short version.  (You can read a more indepth presentation of the importance of social knowing in Kenneth Bruffee and Gregory Ulmer.)

- Thinking doesn't happen until you have a conversation.  (Interiorized, isolated sensations or apprehension of experiences are not knowing.)

- Knowledge is a social artifact -- that is, it is determined by a group or cohort.



- You cannot know (or think)  unless you collaborate.

Notes on the Fall 2011 Twitter Project

Fall 2011Twitter Project Title:

Tshirts, tattoos, and tweets:
A Discussion of Textual Orientation

In 1982, Gombrich claimed we are a culture bombarded with the image.  Now, in 2011, we are a culture bombarded with the text, and  not just in our own digital drafting, as noted by the Stanford Study of Writing, but in our consumption, promotion, promulgation, and adoption of the text as part of our identity presentation to the rest of the world.  Whereas Jameson (1991) calls the linguistic element flabby, we are witnessing a new moment of streamlined, lean, active textuality.  How do students apprehend the many texts in (unconventional) space they witness everyday?  By making weekly tweets, we raise our awareness about what we are reading in the fragmented texts around us.

This project will focus on texts that are worn or displayed on the body.  If you would like to participate (or invite others to participate) in this project, kindly tweet your observations of worn texts – as clothing, tattoos, jewelry, handbags, totebags, and the like – with the following hashtag:

#puttingontext

Being lettered has a whole new meaning.

Looking forward to your tweets,

Ethna Dempsey Lay
Assistant Professor of Writing Studies and Composition
Hofstra University
Ethna.D.Lay@hofstra.edu

on twitter:  EthnaLay

Learning in Public: Setting up your Invention Blog

To begin, you should create an Invention Blog by following these steps:

1.  Go to blogger.com and sign in with your gmail account.  All Hofstra student email accounts are gmail.

2.  Use this convention to name your Invention Blog:   

   Inventing  FirstName LastNameInitial                  

Note:  You will have much more flexibility choosing the name for your Portfolio Blog.  By naming your Invention Blog according to this standard, we will be able to more easily locate each others' Invention Blogs in Google Reader.

3.  Choose a template for your blog.  You can modify this later, if you like.

4.  Create your first blog post.  Your first prompt begins:  "So here I am at Hofstra and I am blogging.  Writing online makes me feel...."  Keep freewriting for twelve minutes.  Freewriting entails writing in a forward, nonstop approach.  Do not look back.  Do not edit.  Advance only.  Free associate.  Write copiously.

5.  By email, send me the url for your blog.  I will add it to our course Blackboard site.

This Invention Blog is in a public space, unless you elect to limit your readership to our class.  I encourage you to leave it open.  You can invite readers and commenters from other places, as you wish.  You may get interesting readers from some interesting places. I think there is a lot to gain from a far-reaching audience.  Oftentimes, writers write for a limited or protracted audience.  Blogging opens up the possibility of greater access.

What's an Invention Blog?

For this first course in Writing Studies and Composition, each student will be making an Invention Blog.  In this space, you will draft and comment on your pre-writing experiences.  You will collaborate with other readers and writers, reflect on their suggestions, read other material, and reallocate meaning.  This is a generative, messy, creative workspace.  Feel free to attach and link and respond liberally and generously here.  Inclass writing and freewriting activities should be created here also.  Revision practices go here, too. 

Remember that in the university, writing courses must fulfill two seemingly contradictory demands. Student writers must think critically and contribute their own ideas to an existing body of knowledge (or knowing), but they must also work within and strive toward a standard kind of presentation or respectability, one that follows the measured rules of presenting such information.  For this reason, students in this class will make two blogs.  The first space is this generative, process space, the Invention Blog.  The second space is the finished product space, the Portfolio Blog.  We will talk more about that after we have generated the written pieces that will be stored there.