A central feature of this course will be the writing we do on this site. In what follows, I will outline three things:
- a rationale for why I ask you to blog in the first place, rather than write traditional essays
- a quick primer on how to create your first post
- a simple rubric to guide your writing + an example of a good-looking post
First things first: why blog?
1. Blogging is sharable: rather than have a private circuit between you and me, we have a much more dynamic conversation across the entire class.
2. Blogging is public, sort of: I like the idea that we are responsible for our ideas in front of broader audiences. In practical terms, I doubt anyone is listening in most of the time, but I think it’s important that we roll up our sleeves and defend our arguments in an open and public forum as often as possible. And of course, you can show your family/friends/pets what we’ve been up to in class. For those who have reservations about privacy, note that a) I’m happy to help you get a username with some anonymity, so you have relative privacy beyond our class; and b) you are free to delete your posts at the end of class. If anyone has serious reservations despite all this, feel free to contact me.
3. Blogging is sturdy: rather than forget the piece of paper once it’s been handed back, we can link back to prior statements or observations, or to each others’. If you like, you can leave your posts up for future students to see.
4. Blogging is responsive: rather than only getting comments from me, you’ll comment on and get comments on each other’s work.
So how do you post? Here’s a quick guide to posting on WordPress for newbies. It’s super easy once you figure it out the first time. So here goes:
1. Make sure you’re logged in: if you’re logged in, you’ll see your avatar in the upper-right-hand corner of the window. If you aren’t, you’ll see the text “log in.”
2. START A POST: there are several ways to post. Here’s the easiest: click the <+ NEW> icon in the top middle of the screen and select “post.” It looks like this:
3. WRITE SOMETHING: “New Post” will take you to a basic text editor. So write something. If you want to get fancy, you can add italics, bold, indentation, insert images or other media, and whatnot. But most of the time you’ll just try to write some reasonable sentences. When you’re done, click PUBLISH on the right (see image below). Or, if you’re not quite ready, you can save it as a draft and reopen it later, via the “POSTS” section of the dashboard. Helpful hint: WordPress autosaves your work every few seconds, so it’s very, very rare to lose stuff. Nonetheless it’s not a bad idea to compose posts on a word processor and then paste them into WP just in case. I personally live dangerously most of the time and have never lost anything, but your call.
If you want to get really fancy, add a tag or two or some media. In the right-hand column, you’ll see a bunch of options. Most of the time you can ignore most of them, but “tags” allows you to add, say, the name of the author you’re writing about or a topic that you hit in the post. So for a post on Du Bois, you might tag it “Du Bois,” “SOULS,” and/or “double consciousness.” If you want to add media, for example a relevant image, click “add media” in the top left-hand part of the window and follow the prompts.
We’re good, right? Happy blogging.
What makes for an excellent post? For this class, posts should:
- be between 400-800 words (use word count in WordPress or your word processor)
- explain a given text’s argument (for secondary readings) or analyze its form and themes (for primary readings), using quotations and paraphrases of the text with page numbers in parentheses
- engage a text critically, noting its limitations, its links to other texts we’ve read, its unstated assumptions, etc.
Here’s a simple rubric, adapted from Mark Sample, that I will use to evaluate your work (see how the academic blogosphere encourages sharing and exchange? I told you so!):
| Rating |
Characteristics |
| A |
Exceptional. The post articulates a clear, original argument that is well-supported with textual evidence. The argument is “weird,” examining aspects of the text that will not be obvious to casual readers. It develops organically, leaving readers in a different place than they started, preferably with some gestures of introduction and conclusion. Where possible, it gestures to peers’ posts or other relevant criticism. |
| B |
Satisfactory. The post is reasonably focused, and provides textual evidence to support its argument. Its argument is coherent if perhaps a bit predictable. |
| C |
Underdeveloped. The post privileges summary or description over analysis, without consideration of alternative perspectives, and may contain misreadings of the text. The entry reflects passing engagement with the topic. |
| D |
Limited. The journal entry is unfocused, or simply rehashes others’ comments; it fails to settle on any consistent argument. |
| 0 |
No Credit. The journal entry is missing or consists of one or two disconnected sentences. |
Last but not least, here’s an example of a good-looking post. I’ve linked to it in a Word doc so you can see some marginal comments that explain why it’s good. And remember: it’s not an exercise in cookie-cutting: your results may vary, and there are lots of ways to write an excellent post.
