Change in Plans for Wednesday - Please Read

On this sort of occasion I'm very happy to keep a class blog - this would have taken days to figure out otherwise.

Apparently the book store didn't order enough copies of the Richard Scarry, which means that I can't realistically expect everyone to have it read by Wednesday. We'll work with it at some point in the near future. Thanks to Lauren, Chris and Colin for getting in touch with me.

For Wednesday, then, your new reading assignment is to read Bill Joy's "Why the Future Doesn't Need Us." Sorry for the change - occasionally things get confused when the book store makes errors, as they occasionally do at the beginning of the semester.

Print a copy of Joy's article to take to class.

Now, if you're in group one you have two choices. You're welcome to go ahead and do the original assignment on Richard Scarry if you're able to track down a copy. If not, you can write on Bill Joy - here's the prompt.

Blog #1, Option 2:

One thing you'll note from reading Joy's article is that it is long on problems and short on solutions. Focusing on one problem raised by Joy, present a detailed argument about what our response to Joy should be. By "response" I don't mean emotion - I mean action. What, specifically, should we (as individuals or as a culture) do.

Note that this doesn't mean that you need to agree with Joy. You should take him seriously (one important thing to do in this article is to pay attention to the ways in which he establishes his credibility), but you might just as well attack him as defend him.

If you defend him on some point, you should both discuss why you find him credible and what the appropriate response to the situation is. If you attack him, you should explain why you don't find him credible and what we should do in response.

In any case, you should focus on specific passages, citing page numbers and making use of quotes.

Short MLA reminder: you generally cite page numbers and authors in parentheses at the end of a sentence or quote, except when the page number or author is clear from the context.

Examples:

"Adam Johns has argued that Freshman Composition workloads should be drastically increased" (Rehm 67).

"Maggie Rehm's book Insane Plans for Freshman Composition notes that Dr. Johns has argued that freshmen composition doesn't make sufficent demands of students" (82).