Week 8

If there is no stillness,

there is no silence.

If there is no silence,

there is no insight.

If there is no insight,

there is no clarity.

–Tenzin Priyadarshi

Week 8! I spent a good part of  last week looking at student essays, and I was very pleased with the work you all have done thus far. If you should like clarification or any explanation of the midterm grades that appeared, just ask and I'll be glad to help.  The writing strengths shown thus far put us in a good position for the remaining weeks of the quarter. Over the next few weeks, we'll review verb tense and pronoun use, sentence patterns and punctuation, and other grammar rules involving various parts of speech. As for assignments, as the syllabus indicates, I have in mind a film review or directed response, as we will call it.

The film you will watch today is called Where the Boys Are (1960), released fifty years ago and set in Ft. Lauderdale during spring break. The film premiered at the Gateway Theater on Sunrise Boulevard. It is a piece of local history and helped to popularize Ft. Lauderdale as a spring break destination. Much has changed in our culture and city since that time, but in certain central respects the film is still timely. The story focuses on four young women seeking respite from the winter cold up north, and to one degree or another–love. The adventures and misadventures they have while on break here in Ft. Lauderdale make up the central action of the story. Each of the young women–Merritt, Tuggles, Melanie, and Angie–are distinct characters, each with her own dreams, beliefs, and ways of approaching "the boys." Merritt is the smart, studious, independent thinker who will not be played for a fool; Tuggle is the tall, kind woman who dreams of marrying T.V. and having children; Angie, the singer,  wants to enjoy hersef, and to find a man who mirrors her own talents and spunky character; and Melanie is the flirtatious, vulnerable one who falls in love too easily and gets hurt in the process.

The assignment is to describe by means of comparison or contrast what has changed in the culture and setting, and what has not. Any one of the following topics would provide a suitable

essay focus:

• the clothing fashions
• the club and music scene
• the natural setting and cityscape of motels, restaurants, bars, etc.
• the attitudes towards premarital sex
• the pursuit of romance and love
• the meaning of friendship

An article published by New Times (a free weekly local newspaper) on this year's 50th anniversary of the film can be read at the following URL:  http://blogs.browardpalmbeach.com/juice/2010/03/connie_francis_on_where_the_bo.php

Note: This film was made prior to the Civil Rights movement of the 1960s. The U.S. was then racially segregated. Thus you see few or no people of color represented here (beaches here in Ft. Lauderdale were segregated). The jazz music popular at the time was, of course, the original creation of black Americans.

Assignment #8: Write a 350-500 word essay on a topic of your choice or from the list above that will illuminate some aspect of the film. Introduce the film by title (in italic letters) and year of release, and a brief summary of the film subject and setting. Follow with your thesis. Make your thesis explicit. Underline it. Reserve the body paragraphs of the essay for "proving" your thesis; that is, show the validity of your thesis point by reference to specific aspects and details observable in the film. Use clear, specific descriptions to carry your point. Do not include Internet sourced summaries and observations. Use your own words to express your own ideas.

Title the essay. Double space the lines.

Due week 9.

Week 7

                         The Gumbo Limbo 

Greetings! I trust you enjoyed the weekend, and that the wind is behind you as we go into these last few weeks of classes.

Today we begin putting together an essay that requires you work with one or two others in the class. Each of you will put together a "portrait" of a classmate to exemplify the range of personal experience, background, dreams, and ambitions that have brought the student(s) thus far in their respective journeys. To get to know your subject you will spend some time "interviewing" him or her, recording your impressions of the subject's style, appearance, mannerisms, story, voice, and the specific comments he or she makes that reveal an essence or truth of your subject. Some questions to ask to get your subject's story include the following:

What's this experience or period of your life really about?

What is the emotional truth of your life today? What feelings are you working through? What do you feel good about, uncertain about?

Describe a past or current struggle in some detail to show the kind of challenge you know best.

How did you get to this point or place in life?

Who were the important people in your life? How did they influence or shape you?

What are your near and long term goals?

Assignment #7 is to be organized in one of the following ways:  A) as a multi-paragraph essay, described in detail below; or B) as a series of questions you put to your subject followed by the responses from your subject.  These questions and responses should come between an opening paragraph that introduces the student/subject and a concluding paragraph that records your final authorial comments. Title the piece, and double space the lines.  The 350 word minimum should be observed.

A)

Paragraph one: the lead introduces your subject by name and by means of the dominant impressions your subject creates in terms of character, personality, and appearance. Use the first person POV(the "I" POV).   You the writer are to collect the ideas and views of your subject and convey your own impressions of your subject,  on the basis of your face-to-face interactions and observations.  State clearly your central point or thesis.  The present tense may be used to give an impression of the here and now.

Body paragraph(s): the body moves from the lead-in to the past, reconstructing some of the subjects relevant history (place of origin, schooling, early influences). Past tense verbs may predominate.

Body paragraph(s): the body may move back to the present, to your subject's current situation and story, including struggles, dreams, ambitions. Direct quotation allows the subject to speak directly to his or her struggles and/or successes.

Conclusion: Remarks on the character shown or exemplified in the story elements of the essay. The writer speaks to the subject's heartfelt experience in bringing the essay to a close. The conclusion may also, or alternatively, move to the future, to what lies ahead in the subject's immediate or near term future. Direct quotation here allows the subject to speak directly to his or her hopes and dreams. Tense used may be predominately present and future.

Alternate for groups of three: You may use several classmates (including) yourself to construct an essay exemplifying a range of student experience and background here at AiFL. You will have to determine a focus and let each of your subject's weigh in the issue or focus. You will more briefly introduce and describe each student, as each is to be an element in this mosaic portrait. You may find yourself using comparison and contrast means of development at times.

If you are absent from class, find some suitable subject, a person whose life and/or work interests you and, with any luck, will interest your readers. Bring the essay to class next week.

Week 6

Arranging a bowl of flowers in the morning can give a sense of quiet in a crowded day–like writing a poem or saying a prayer. What matters is that one be for a time inwardly attentive.

–Anne Morrow Lindbergh, b.1906

Good day. I hope you are feeling well, and that you enjoyed yourself over the  weekend.

Today we have several things to do. We will start with a free writing.  Then we will review the essay work assigned last– using process description or cause/effect as means of approach and organization. We will review verb tense use and go on to address some matters of pronoun use. Finally, I will have you write a short essay in class on one of the topics listed below.

. . . . . . .

Midterm essay:  compose a one-paragraph essay of about 175-200 words. The main idea or topic sentence should be clear. Readers expect you to make a clear point and not to wonder if they have missed something.  If the main idea is stated directly (explicitly) in the essay,  underline it. If it is implicit (i.e. not stated anywhere but clearly implied from all you've written), write it below the finished essay. The bulk of the paragraph should develop the topic idea by means of description, specific details and examples, brief narration, commentary and observation (your thoughts on the matter), and so on.  Provide enough support to carry your point well.  The opening sentence should provide a smooth lead-in and/or statement of the essay's central idea (topic idea). The final sentences should be winding up the discussion to provide a sense of finish.  

Title the essay.

Here are the prompts for the essay, with the final one open to your own inclinations. Choose only one of the topics. Remember, you will have one major point to make and support, building the essay around this point (topic or thesis).

1. Walking Home–description and narration.

2. An unwelcome guest–description and narration.

3. A challenging moment–description and narration.

4. A healthy diet–what that means.

5. Going out on limb–the risks and rewards.

6. An inspiring person or idea.
7. A recent discovery.

8. Any topic you would like to explore in this one-paragraph essay.

I will collect the papers at the end of the class. Do not use the Internet for content in this essay.

Week 5

Sea Wrack:  Found on Ft. Lauderdale Beach

Week 5:  Nearly mid-quarter:   Next week, that is week 6, we will have a short essay to do in class that will serve as the midterm exam. You will compose and finish the piece within class time, and you'll have a least one hour to do so. Your midterm grade will appear in your online account a week or so later; the grade is only an indicator of current progress and serves to let you know where you stand as of midterm. I calculate this grade on the basis of work completed and the class essay done week 6. I expect you all to be there and to have submitted all outstanding work by that day.

Today's class will start with a freewriting aimed, ultimately, at generating material for an essay that is structured along the lines of what is called process analysis or, alternately, cause and effect analysis.  

     The process mode of organization is used when explaining the steps, stages, or procedures involved in any natural occurrence or phenomenon, or in any that humans contrive.  How do bees find their way to the hive, how does photosynthesis work, how does one change a tire on a steeply ascending road, make a cheesecake or keep houseplants alive and happy? We all, to some degree, understand how things proceed, or the procedures by which things get done or made. We have followed directions and read instructions from a young age and we have learned how to do a thing or two ourselves; in fact, there are some skills we could actually teach: how to saddle a horse, how to sweep a floor, sew a hem, design an advertisement; and too there are certain experiences we could coach others through, having gone through them ourselves and learned a thing or two about healing, happiness, getting along, starting over–whatever the experience it always involves process. 

     Cause and effect mode sets out to explore the probable reasons why certain events, actions, or manifestations occur, and the effects or consequences of these happenings.  A short paper may be limited to either cause or effect, rather than both.

A few examples follow here:

One holds the knife as one holds the bow of a cello or a tulip–by the stem. Not palmed nor gripped nor grasped, but lightly, with the tips of the fingers. The knife is not for pressing. It is for drawing across the field of skin. Like a slender fish, it waits, at the ready, then, go! It darts, followed by a fine wake of red. The flesh parts, falling away to yellow globules of fat. Even now, after so many times, I still marvel at its power–cold, gleaming, silent. More, I am still struck with a kind of dread that it is I in whose hand the blade travels, that my hand is its vehicle, that yet again this terrible steel-bellied thing and I have conspired for a most unnatural purpose, the laying open of the body of a human being.

from "The Knife," by Richard Seltzer

When a farmer calls in a cheetah capture, it is CCF's job to retrieve the animal from a field trap, gather biological information, and then relocate or release it. Normally the work is done in the field and not in a farmer's kitchen. Until last night, there had not been a call in a month–proof that that farmers are learning to co-exist with cheetahs rather than to shoot first and ask questions later.

from "Blur: Cheetahs. Ranchers. Hope.," by Susan Zimmerman

For centuries, it was assumed that honey bees simply visited flowers and collected the honey ready-made, bringing it back to the hive and storing it there. The truth of the matter is that honey making is an elaborate and complicated process. The first step is the collection of floral nectar from the gullets of colorful and fragrant blossoms. Floral nectar starts out as sugar water enriched with a few amino acids, proteins, lipids, phenolics, and other chemicals. While it sits in floral ponds, waiting to be sampled by pollinators, the nectar takes on the aroma of the flowers that produced it. Though the scent of the nectar itself is faint, the aromas are intensified once it is concentrated into honey. Excess water is driven off and the complex volatile oils and other chemicals from the flower are magnified, becoming part of the honey and adding to its appeal. Single-source honeys reveal their characteristic aromas best at room temperature, especially when drizzled across a warm piece of toast.

from Secrets of the Bee

Wear loose and comfortable clothing when working out. Because a warmed muscle is believed to be more flexible and pliant, you will often see people wearing sweat suits and woolen socks. You should also be sure to position yourself as comfortably as possible to reduce the tension and make the stretching more enjoyable.–from The Science of Stretching, by Michael Alter

    

The fundamental pathology of Alzheimer's disease is the progressive degeneration and loss of vast numbers of nerve cells in those portions of the brain's cortex that are associated with the so-called higher functions, such as memory, learning, and judgment.  The severity and nature of the patient's dementia at any given time are proportional to the number and location of cells that have been affected.  The decrease in in nerve-cell population is in itself sufficient to explain the memory loss and other cognitive disabilities, but there is another factor that seems to play a role as well–namely, a marked decrease in acetylcholine, the chemical used by these cells to transmit messages.

                 Sherwin B. Nuland, How We Die

Freewrite: Make a list of all the things you can do.

Free associate. Imagine the times and places and people these things you do have involved.

Choose one or two from the list as a possible subject of description in process mode.

Brainstorm and/or research the causes or effects of a recent event or habitually observed phenomenon ( the Gulf oil leak, the ascent of Justin Bieber, the red-orange hues produced at sunset, the blue of the sky).

Assignment #5: In a step-by-step or stage-by stage description show the means by which some thing or another happens or gets done, made, or developed. Alternatively, discuss the known or probable cause or effect of some particular occurrence, as of disease, pollution, job loss, fame . . . or happiness, kindness, regular exercise and a healthy diet.  Write 350 words, using an introductory, body, and concluding paragraphs. Title the essay. Double space the lines.

Grammar Practice: Review verb work and introduce pronoun use guidelines for practice.

Do the following exercise/practice work:

http://owl.english.purdue.edu/exercises/2/22/49

Review the material on pronoun use here:

http://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/595/01/

and here: http://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/595/02/