Spring 2020 - ENGL 101B Online - University of Waterloo
Course Schedule
Important: ALL TIMES EASTERN - Please see the University Policies section of your Syllabus for details
| Week | Readings and Other Assigned Material | Activities and Assignments | Due Date | Weight (%) |
| Week 1: Introduction | Introduce Yourself | Sunday, May 17, 2020 at 11:55 PM | Ungraded | |
| Week 2: Classical Rhetoric | Gorgias, "The Encomium of Helen" from The Rhetorical Tradition: Readings from Classical Times to the Present 2nd Edition. Ed. Patricia Bizzell and Bruce Herzberg. Bedford Books, 2001. 44-46. (PDF) | Weekly Reading Responses: Gorgias, "The Encomium of Helen" | Tuesday, May 19, 2020 at 11:55 PM | Contributes to 20% of your final grade |
| Aristotle, "Rhetoric." The Rhetorical Tradition: Readings from Classical Times to the Present 2nd Edition. Ed. Patricia Bizzell and Bruce Herzberg. Bedford Books, 2001. 179- 187. (PDF) | Weekly Reading Responses: Aristotle, "Rhetoric" | Thursday, May 21, 2020 at 11:55 PM | Contributes to 20% of your final grade | |
| Groups for Blogora will be created by Technical Support | Check after Friday, May 22, 2020 at 4:30 PM | |||
| Week 3: Rhetoric and Drama | Shakespeare, "Othello" Open Source Shakespeare (PDF) [Line numbers not included] | Weekly Reading Responses: William Shakespeare, Othello | Thursday, May 28, 2020 at 11:55 PM | Contributes to 20% of your final grade |
| Blogora 1 | Sunday, May 31, 2020 at 11:55 PM | Contributes to 10% of your final grade | ||
| Week 4: The Rhetorical Field | Kennedy, George. "A Hoot in the Dark: The Evolution of General Rhetoric" from Rhetoric: Concepts, Definitions, Boundaries. Ed. William Covino and David Jolliffe. Longman, 1994. 105-121. (PDF) | Weekly Reading Responses: George Kennedy, "A Hoot in the Dark: The Evolution of General Rhetoric" | Tuesday, June 2, 2020 at 11:55 PM | Contributes to 20% of your final grade |
| Fish, Stanley. "Rhetoric" from Rhetoric: Concepts, Definitions, Boundaries, Ed. William Covino and David Jolliffe. Longman, 1995. 122-140. (PDF) | Weekly Reading Responses: Stanley Fish,"Rhetoric" | Thursday, June 4, 2020 at 11:55 PM | Contributes to 20% of your final grade | |
| Blogora 2 | Sunday, June 7, 2020 at 11:55 PM | Contributes to 10% of your final grade | ||
| Week 5: Rhetoric and Philosophy | Nietzsche, Friedrich. "On Truth and Lying in an Extra-Moral Sense" from Friedrich Nietzsche on Rhetoric and Language. Public Domain, 1989. 246- 257. (PDF) | Weekly Reading Responses: Friedrich Nietzsche, "On Truth and Lying in an Extra-Moral Sense" | Tuesday, June 9, 2020 at 11:55 PM | Contributes to 20% of your final grade |
| Burke, Kenneth. "Terministic Screens" from The Rhetorical Tradition Bedford Books, 2001. 1340- 1347. (PDF) | Weekly Reading Responses: Kenneth Burke, "Terministic Screens" | Thursday, June 11, 2020 at 11:55 PM | Contributes to 20% of your final grade | |
| Week 6: Rhetoric, Gender, and Feminism | Cixous, Hélène. "The Laugh of the Medusa" from The Critical Tradition. Bedford Books, 2001. 289-320. (PDF) | Weekly Reading Responses: Hélène Cixous, "The Laugh of the Medusa" | Thursday, June 18, 2020 at 11:55 PM | Contributes to 20% of your final grade |
| Blogora 3 | Sunday, June 21, 2020 at 11:55 PM | Contributes to 10% of your final grade | ||
| Week 7: Rhetoric and Propaganda | Ellul, Jacques."The Characteristics of Propaganda." from Propaganda: The Formation of Men's Attitudes, Ed. Konrad Kellen and Jean Lerner. New York: Vintage Books, 1965. 3-43. (PDF) | Weekly Reading Responses: Jacques Ellul, "The Characteristics of Propaganda" | Tuesday, June 23, 2020 at 11:55 PM | Contributes to 20% of your final grade |
| Hitler, Adolf. "Mein Kampf". Internet Archive. 166-186, 702-716, 846-857. (PDF) | Weekly Reading Responses: Adolf Hitler, Mein Kampf | Thursday, June 25, 2020 at 11:55 PM | Contributes to 20% of your final grade | |
| Week 8: Rhetoric and Information Warfare | Szafranski, Richard. "Neocortical Warfare? The Acme of Skill" from In Athena's Camp: Preparing for Conflict in the Information Age. John Arquilla and David Ronfeldt. RAND Corporation, 1997. 395-416. (PDF) | Weekly Reading Responses: Richard Szafranski: "Neocortical Warfare? The Acme of Skill" | Thursday, July 2, 2020 at 11:55 PM | Contributes to 20% of your final grade |
| Blogora 4 | Sunday, July 5, 2020 at 11:55 PM | Contributes to 10% of your final grade | ||
| Week 9: Rhetoric and Advertising | McQuarrie, Edward F. "Figures of Rhetoric in Advertising Language" from Journal of Consumer Research, Vol. 22, No. 4, 1996. 424- 438. | Weekly Reading Responses: Edward McQuarrie, "Figures of Rhetoric in Advertising" | Tuesday, July 7, 2020 at 11:55 PM | Contributes to 20% of your final grade |
| Scott, Linda M. "Images in Advertising" from Journal of Consumer Research, Vol. 22, No. 4, 1996. 252- 273. | Weekly Reading Responses: Linda Scott, "Images in Advertising" | Thursday, July 9, 2020 at 11:55 PM | Contributes to 20% of your final grade | |
| Week 10: Rhetoric, Semiotics, and Popular Culture | Barthes, Roland. "Excerpts" from Mythologies: The Complete Edition, Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2013. 3-14, 79-82, 83-85, 100-102, 103-105. | Weekly Reading Responses: Roland Barthes, "Excerpts" from Mythologies: The Complete Edition | Thursday, July 16, 2020 at 11:55 PM | Contributes to 20% of your final grade |
| Blogora 5 | Sunday, July 19, 2020 at 11:55 PM | Contributes to 10% of your final grade | ||
| Week 11: Rhetoric and New Media | Bogost, Ian. "The Rhetoric of Video Games" from The Ecology of Games: Connecting Youth, Games, and Learning MIT Press, 2008. 117– 140. (PDF) | Weekly Reading Responses: Ian Bogost, "The Rhetoric of Video Games" | Thursday, July 23, 2020 at 11:55 PM | Contributes to 20% of your final grade |
| Blogora 6 | Sunday, July 26, 2020 at 11:55 PM | Contributes to 10% of your final grade | ||
| Week 12: Review | No readings this week | Essay | Monday, August 4, 2020 at 11:55PM | 30% |
| Final Examination | Due: Friday, August 14, 2020 at 11:55 PM | 40% | ||
Official Grades and Course Access
Official Grades and Academic Standings are available through Quest.
Your access to this course will continue for the duration of the current term. You will not have access to this course once the next term begins.
Contact Information
Announcements
Your instructor uses the Announcements widget on the Course Home page during the term to communicate new or changing information regarding due dates, instructor absence, etc., as needed. You are expected to read the announcements on a regular basis.
To ensure you are viewing the complete list of announcements, you may need to click Show All Announcements.
Discussions
A General Discussion topic* has also been made available to allow students to communicate with peers in the course. Your instructor may drop in at this discussion topic.
Contact Us
| Who and Why | Contact Details |
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Instructor
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Post your course-related questions to the Ask the Instructor discussion topic*. This allows other students to benefit from your question as well. Questions of a personal nature can be directed to your instructor. Instructor: Jessica Van de Kemp Your instructor checks email and the Ask the Instructor discussion topic* frequently and will make every effort to reply to your questions within 24–48 hours, Monday to Friday. |
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Technical Support, Centre for Extended Learning
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Include your full name, WatIAM user ID, student number, and course name and number. Technical support is available during regular business hours, Monday to Friday, 8:30 AM to 4:30 PM (Eastern Time). |
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Learner Support Services, Centre for Extended Learning
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+1 519-888-4002 Include your full name, WatIAM user ID, student number, and course name and number. |
*Discussion topics can be accessed by clicking Connect and then Discussions on the course navigation bar above.
Course Description and Learning Outcomes
Description
The systematic study of effective communication—the art of rhetoric—dates back at least to the epics of Homer and flourishes today in countless academic disciplines and fields of business. In fact, the historical “empire” of rhetoric is so vast and enduring that it “digests regimes, religions, and civilizations” (Roland Barthes). This class seeks to introduce students to the essential concepts, frameworks, and controversies in the history and theory of rhetoric by analyzing key selections from foundational texts, both ancient and contemporary. In addition to demonstrating the relevance of rhetorical theory and criticism to a variety of social, intellectual, and cultural fields (law, politics, philosophy, literature, advertising, etc.), the class also explores emerging forms of rhetorical practice made possible by new media technologies, such as propaganda, computational gaming, and information warfare. Students will leave the class with a firm grasp of basic concepts of rhetorical theory, a sense of the history of rhetoric, and a deeper appreciation for rhetoric as an inventive, critical, multimodal, and multidisciplinary enterprise—what Quintilian calls an “encompassing art” (ars circumcurrens).
Learning Outcomes
Upon successful completion of this course, you should be able to:
- Define basic rhetorical concepts
- Describe the historical scope of rhetoric
- Read texts critically
- Analyze artifacts rhetorically
- Appreciate rhetoric as an inventive, critical, multimodal and richly interdisciplinary enterprise
This online course was developed by Michael MacDonald, with instructional design and multimedia development support provided by the Centre for Extended Learning.
Grade Breakdown
The following table represents the grade breakdown of this course.
Activities and Assignments Weight (%)
Introduce Yourself Ungraded
Blogora Participation 10%
Weekly Reading Responses 20%
Essay 30%
Final Examination
About the Course Instructor and the Course Author
Jessica Van de Kemp - Course Instructor
Educational Background
BA, English, St. Jerome's University
B.Ed, Teacher Education, Western University
MA, Rhetoric, University of Waterloo
Current Research
Research interests include cybercrime, film adaptation, and gender in media. Dr. MacDonald is my PhD supervisor and he sparked my interest in InfoWar (which you will learn about in Week 8). My dissertation is on gender-based violence in crime drama TV series.
Philosophy of Teaching
My philosophy of teaching is student-centered, which means I care about helping you grow as a student and as a person (think of me as a coach or a mentor), and I often engage students through the arts.
Hobbies/Interests/Sports
When not involved in research, I enjoy creative writing, volunteering, hiking, and kayaking.
Michael MacDonald - Course Author
Educational Background
BA, English, University of British Columbia
MA, Rhetoric, University of California at Berkeley
PhD, Rhetoric, University of California at Berkeley
Current Research
Research interests include the history and theory of rhetoric, rhetoric and philosophy, and media studies. I am currently finishing a large editorial project: the Oxford Handbook of Rhetorical Studies (1200 pages), which includes 60 chapters that trace the evolution of rhetoric across disciplines from Greek antiquity to the present day.
Philosophy of Teaching
My philosophy of teaching emphasizes the close reading of primary texts and takes an interdisciplinary approach to rhetoric that encourages students to draw their own connections between rhetoric and other fields in the sciences and humanities.
Hobbies/Interests/Sports
When not involved in research, I enjoy exercising, cooking, playing the drums, and composing music.
Family/Children/Travel
I am married, and often travel to my wife's home city of Chicago, where I also taught for a number of years (at the University of Illinois at Chicago). I enjoy traveling to Europe for conferences and lectures, and I taught for a semester at the American University of Paris.
Materials and Resources
Textbook
There is no textbook to purchase for this course. All required readings are available for download, in PDF form, from the Course Schedule and the Content Modules. If you prefer hard copies, they can be purchased through the W Store listed below.
For textbook ordering information, please contact the W Store | Course Materials + Supplies.
For your convenience, you can compile a list of required and optional course materials through BookLook using your Quest userID and password. If you are having difficulties ordering online and wish to call the Waterloo Bookstore, their phone number is +1 519 888 4673 or toll-free at +1 866 330 7933. Please be aware that textbook orders CANNOT be taken over the phone.
Resources
Course and Department Policies
Late Policy
Late Weekly Reading Responses will not be counted toward your grade unless medical documentation is provided. In the case of late Essays, the instructor reserves the right to subtract 5% per day from the assignment grade.
Intellectual Property
Students should be aware that this course contains the intellectual property of their instructor, TA, and/or the University of Waterloo. Intellectual property includes items such as:
- Lecture content, spoken and written (and any audio/video recording thereof);
- Lecture handouts, presentations, and other materials prepared for the course (e.g., PowerPoint slides);
- Questions or solution sets from various types of assessments (e.g., assignments, quizzes, tests, final exams); and
- Work protected by copyright (e.g., any work authored by the instructor or TA or used by the instructor or TA with permission of the copyright owner).
Course materials and the intellectual property contained therein are used to enhance a student’s educational experience. However, sharing this intellectual property without the intellectual property owner’s permission is a violation of intellectual property rights. For this reason, it is necessary to ask the instructor, TA and/or the University of Waterloo for permission before uploading and sharing the intellectual property of others online (e.g., to an online repository).
Permission from an instructor, TA or the University is also necessary before sharing the intellectual property of others from completed courses with students taking the same/similar courses in subsequent terms/years. In many cases, instructors might be happy to allow distribution of certain materials. However, doing so without expressed permission is considered a violation of intellectual property rights.
Please alert the instructor if you become aware of intellectual property belonging to others (past or present) circulating, either through the student body or online. The intellectual property rights owner deserves to know (and may have already given their consent).
University Policies
Submission Times
Please be aware that the University of Waterloo is located in the Eastern Time Zone (GMT or UTC-5 during standard time and UTC-4 during daylight saving time) and, as such, the time that your activities and/or assignments are due is based on this zone. If you are outside the Eastern Time Zone and require assistance with converting your time, please try the Ontario, Canada Time Converter.
Accommodation Due to Illness
If your instructor has provided specific procedures for you to follow if you miss assignment due dates, term tests, or a final examination, adhere to those instructions. Otherwise:
Missed Assignments/Tests/Quizzes
Contact the instructor as soon as you realize there will be a problem, and preferably within 48 hours, but no more than 72 hours, have a medical practitioner complete a Verification of Illness Form.
Email a scanned copy of the Verification of Illness Form to your instructor. In your email to the instructor, provide your name, student ID number, and exactly what course activity you missed.
Further information regarding Management of Requests for Accommodation Due to Illness can be found on the Accommodation due to illness page.
Academic Integrity
In order to maintain a culture of academic integrity, members of the University of Waterloo community are expected to promote honesty, trust, fairness, respect, and responsibility. If you have not already completed the online tutorial regarding academic integrity you should do so as soon as possible. Undergraduate students should see the Academic Integrity Tutorial and graduate students should see the Graduate Students and Academic Integrity website.
Proper citations are part of academic integrity. Citations in this course follow MLA style. If you are uncertain how to format your assignments, please confirm with your instructor.
For further information on academic integrity, please visit the Office of Academic Integrity.
Turnitin
Turnitin.com: Text matching software (Turnitin®) may be used to screen assignments in this course. Turnitin® is used to verify that all materials and sources in assignments are documented. Students’ submissions are stored on a U.S. server, therefore students must be given an alternative (e.g., scaffolded assignment or annotated bibliography), if they are concerned about their privacy and/or security. Students will be given due notice, in the first week of the term and/or at the time assignment details are provided, about arrangements and alternatives for the use of Turnitin® in this course.
It is the responsibility of the student to notify the instructor if they, in the first week of term or at the time assignment details are provided, wish to submit the alternate assignment.
Discipline
A student is expected to know what constitutes academic integrity to avoid committing an academic offence, and to take responsibility for his/her actions. A student who is unsure whether an action constitutes an offence, or who needs help in learning how to avoid offences (e.g., plagiarism, cheating) or about “rules” for group work/collaboration, should seek guidance from the course instructor, academic advisor, or the undergraduate Associate Dean. For information on categories of offences and types of penalties, students should refer to Policy 71 - Student Discipline. For typical penalties, check Guidelines for the Assessment of Penalties.
Appeals
A decision made or penalty imposed under Policy 70 - Student Petitions and Grievances, (other than a petition) or Policy 71 - Student Discipline, may be appealed if there is a ground. A student who believes he/she has a ground for an appeal should refer to Policy 72 - Student Appeals.
Grievance
A student who believes that a decision affecting some aspect of his/her university life has been unfair or unreasonable may have grounds for initiating a grievance. Read Policy 70 - Student Petitions and Grievances, Section 4. When in doubt please be certain to contact the department’s administrative assistant who will provide further assistance.
Final Grades
In accordance with Policy 46 - Information Management, Appendix A - Access to and Release of Student Information, the Centre for Extended Learning does not release final examination grades or final course grades to students. Students must go to Quest to see all final grades. Any grades posted in Waterloo LEARN are unofficial.
AccessAbility Services
AccessAbility Services, located in Needles Hall, collaborates with all academic departments to arrange appropriate accommodations for students with disabilities without compromising the academic integrity of the curriculum. If you require academic accommodation to lessen the impact of your disability, please register with AccessAbility Services at the beginning of each academic term and for each course.
Accessibility Statement
The Centre for Extended Learning strives to meet the needs of all our online learners. Our ongoing efforts to become aligned with the Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act (AODA) are guided by University of Waterloo accessibility Legislation and policy and the World Wide Web Consortium's (W3C) Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.0. The majority of our online courses are currently delivered via the Desire2Learn Learning Environment. Learn more about Desire2Learn’s Accessibility Standards Compliance.
Use of Computing and Network Resources
Please see the Guidelines on Use of Waterloo Computing and Network Resources.
Copyright Information
UWaterloo’s Web Pages
All rights, including copyright, images, slides, audio, and video components, of the content of this course are owned by the course author and the University of Waterloo, unless otherwise stated. By accessing this course, you agree that you may only download the content for your own personal, non-commercial use. You are not permitted to copy, broadcast, download, store (in any medium), transmit, show or play in public, adapt, or change in any way the content of these web pages for any other purpose whatsoever without the prior written permission of the course author and the University of Waterloo, Centre for Extended Learning.
Other Sources
Respect the copyright of others and abide by all copyright notices and regulations when using the computing facilities provided for your course of study by the University of Waterloo. No material on the Internet or World Wide Web may be reproduced or distributed in any material form or in any medium, without permission from copyright holders or their assignees. To support your course of study, the University of Waterloo has provided hypertext links to relevant websites, resources, and services on the web. These resources must be used in accordance with any registration requirements or conditions which may be specified. You must be aware that in providing such hypertext links, the University of Waterloo has not authorized any acts (including reproduction or distribution) which, if undertaken without permission of copyright owners or their assignees, may be infringement of copyright. Permission for such acts can only be granted by copyright owners or their assignees.
If there are any questions about this notice, please contact the University of Waterloo, Centre for Extended Learning, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada, N2L 3G1 or extendedlearning@uwaterloo.ca.
Territorial Acknowledgement
We acknowledge that we live and work on the traditional territory of the Attawandaron (Neutral), Anishinaabeg, and Haudenosaunee peoples. The University of Waterloo is situated on the Haldimand Tract, the land promised to the Six Nations that includes ten kilometers on each side of the Grand River.
Credits and Copyright
Credits
Homepage banner:
- Inventio: Leysan/iStock/Thinkstock
- Dispositio: designaart/iStock/Thinkstock
- Elocutio: designaart/iStock/Thinkstock
- Memoria: serkorkin/iStock/Thinkstock
- Actio: alexandrayurkina/iStock/Thinkstock
Copyright
All rights, including copyright, in the content of these web pages are owned by the course author unless otherwise stated.
These web pages are owned or controlled by the University of Waterloo.
© Course Author(s) and University of Waterloo.
For further information, please contact the Centre for Extended Learning, University of Waterloo, 200 University Ave. W., Waterloo, ON, Canada, N2L 3G1, extendedlearning@uwaterloo.ca.