OVERVIEW
Using a WOVEN approach to communication that considers the interrelationship between Written, Oral, Visual, Electronic, and Nonverbal modes, this course will give you practice in analyzing the rhetorical strategies of others and discerning the most successful strategies for articulating your own ideas. Emerging from Saidiya Hartman’s insight that the legacy of transatlantic slavery has profoundly shaped contemporary political and cultural life, this class will explore how writers, artists, and performers respond to and remake that legacy. “Afterlives of Slavery” is a course about how our understanding of the past is mediated and even remade through cultural forms. By analyzing the rhetorical strategies and implicit arguments artists and writers make about how to represent a past that is at once inaccessible and immediate, we will hone cultural literacy and expand our repertoire of interpretive and creative strategies. The course will consider the affordances of creative genres for responding to the social and material legacy of slavery and the ways representations shape our understanding of the contemporary world. Assignments will contribute to a digital encyclopedia documenting contemporary portrayals of transatlantic slavery.
OBJECTIVES
| Expected Outcomes | Method for Developing Ability | Method for Assessing Learning |
| Students will be able to comprehend and analyze complex arguments about how contemporary representations of US slavery make claims about the past and the present | Class discussions
Small-group discussions Reading annotations and responses
|
Class Participation
Group Blog Digital Encyclopedia Essay |
| Students will be able to synthesize multiple claims and perspectives, and to evaluate claims and theories based on critical engagement with evidence | Class discussions
Small-group discussions Annotated bibliography Written drafts Brainstorming activities |
Class Participation
Group Blog Proposal Digital Encyclopedia Essay |
| Students will be able to create coherent, multimodal arguments about how the relationship between form, content, and context | Class discussions
Small-group discussions Workshops Multimodal drafts |
Group Blog
Proposal Digital Encyclopedia Essay |
| Students will be able to assess the rhetorical situation in which they are communicating and make informed choices about how to structure their communication | Diagnostic Video
Multimodal drafts |
Diagnostic Video
Group Blog Proposal Digital Encyclopedia Final Portfolio |
| Students will develop flexible strategies for drafting, revising, and editing their own and others’ arguments | Workshops
Multimodal drafts
|
Class Participation
Group Blog Proposal Digital Encyclopedia Essay Final Portfolio |
REQUIRED MATERIALS AND TEXTS
BOOKS (available at the Georgia Tech bookstore and on Amazon):
WOVENText
Kindred, Octavia Butler, John Jennings, and Damian Duffy
FILMS (available on T-Square):
Get Out
Lemonade
OTHER READINGS are available as PDFs on the Schedule page. I strongly encourage you to print out hard copies to bring to class.
ADDITIONAL REQUIREMENTS:
A laptop for in-class drafting and online class participation
A notebook and writing utensil for in-class drafting and note-taking
Access to Microsoft Word, Google Drive, the course website, Canvas, and printing services
IMPORTANT DATES
Common First Week Video Due: January 16
Artifact One Due: February 8
Artifact Two Due: March 6
Artifact Three Due: April 12
Final Portfolio Due: D3: April 30 / N8: April 30 / F8: May 3
This course is part of Georgia Tech’s Serve-Learn-Sustain (SLS) initiative, which provides students with opportunities inside and outside the classroom designed to help them combine their academic and career interests with their desire to improve the human condition, allowing them to help build healthier, more sustainable communities where people and nature thrive. More information about SLS can be found at sls.gatech.edu. Visit the website to sign up for the SLS ListServ, view the full list of affiliated courses and projects, and find links to Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.
HYBRID COURSE DESIGN
What is a hybrid course? A hybrid course is a blend of traditional face-to-face class meetings and online meetings. These online meetings might be designed as a set of interactive modules to be completed by the student, as a recorded or broadcast lecture from the professor, followed by a written response from the student, or as a seminar-style discussion that replaces face-to-face interaction with an online discussion board. In our course, however, “online” class days will almost always have you meet with your workshop groups, where you will be collaborating on an assignment or sharing your writing in a workshop. Unless otherwise noted, you are expected to meet with your group during the class meeting time. At the beginning of every online class day, you will be required to read a new post on our course blog, which will include short directions and/or a short video introducing the learning goals for the day. This post will also outline a deliverable due by 11:59 pm that day, either in the form of an artifact itself or a short reflection, which you can submit as a comment on the post. Occasionally, I will meet with your workshop group via Google Hangouts during this session: these meetings will be scheduled in advance.
What will students do during online days? Our hybrid course design is closely tied to our digital project, in which we will be contributing to the online “Afterlives of Slavery” encyclopedia. In general, face-to-face sessions will focus on developing analytical and communication skills through engagement with literary and cultural texts in a more traditional seminar-style discussion. Our online days will focus on your artifacts, allowing you to exercise the interpretive and rhetorical techniques honed in our discussion. While online days will occasionally include virtual meetings in the form of Google Hangouts sessions, they will generally focus on collaboration with your workshop group. In other words, online days will generally look like small workshop meetings, where you and your group will work on your artifacts, guided by my instructions on the course blog. Every online day will begin with a new blog post, and you will be required to post a response, as detailed in the post, in the comment thread.
What will the professor do during online days? During course meeting times, I will always be online and available via Google Hangouts. We will also schedule time throughout the semester during which I will meet with your workshop group via Google Hangouts. During course meeting times, all questions should be directed to me through Piazza, which can be accessed on our Canvas page. Occasionally, I will direct an online discussion through Canvas; you will receive instructions for participating ahead of time. Although you will see me in person less than in a traditional classroom, our hybrid course design allows me to provide extra attention to your work in the course, and you can expect to see feedback from me on work-in-progress throughout the semester. I will also hold virtual office hours (Tuesday and Thursday, 3:00-5:00) during which you can meet with me via the video chat function on Google Hangouts. Please let me know (via email or Google Hangout) at least 30 minutes before my office hours if you would like to meet with me that day, and feel free to send along a draft of your work-in-progress that we can discuss via video chat.
English II: Afterlives of Slavery 