GNED 101X.003
Fall 2001
First Written Assignment: Language, Barriers, Walls, and Enculturation
Due Date: Wednesday, Sept. 19 at the beginning of class
Length: at least four double-spaced typed pages

We have considered so far in the class some of the ways in which enculturation and language can affect your thinking, both in terms of helping it and hindering it. Your first formal written assignment will ask you to 1) analyze the language of your peers here at Winthrop in terms of what it tells you about their enculturation, language, barriers, and walls, and then 2) to reflect on how your own language use patterns mirror and/or differ from those of your fellow students.

You should use as a database the slang dictionary compiled by your classmates and the students in my WRIT 102 classes; you will find a link to this database on our class web page (http://faculty.winthrop.edu/kosterj/gned101.htm ). Based on the terms you find in this database, what generalizations can you draw from the language your fellow students collected? What kinds of subjects and attitudes does it reflect? What things do students talk about—and not talk about? What kinds of enculturated values and thinking does this language reflect? What sorts of subjects require slang for students to talk about? What does this database tell you about what’s important to your fellow students?

Your analysis (using evidence from the database) of some of the general patterns you see shouldn’t take more than 60% of the final paper. Leave the rest to analyze your own language use and compare it to the larger trends you see. Do you conform with your peers? To what extent? In what circumstances? And what does your language use say about your own enculturation, walls, barriers, and thinking? This part of the paper will be more reflective and personal. Since you will be writing to me as the audience, feel free to use the pronoun "I" and any other language that you feel reflects your personal style.

From the syllabus:

Prepare all written assignments according to the MLA style demonstrated in Harris. You must use a typewriter, word processor, or computer with clear, legible print and ink. Papers must be double-spaced with one inch margins on all four sides. Refer to page 280 of Harris for a template for the first page of each paper; no extra cover sheet is needed. Staple the pages once in the upper left-hand corner. If you must make last-minute corrections, do so neatly in black ink. I look with great favor on students who use the Writing Center (242 Bancroft, 323-2138) regularly. Hint, hint.