Due Date

Friday, October 28 by class

The Unit 4 blog post is designed to help you prepare for our second take-home exam. It has 2 parts.

Part 1

You can choose from 2 options in completing this part of the blog post.

Option A:

This option is just like blog post 2. You will choose a specific pattern from EITHER The People of Paper OR Citizen, and you will write a 500-750-word analysis of that pattern. See the unit 2 prompt for the specifics about how to complete this post.

Option B:

If you choose this option, you will write a 500-750-word response to the following question: What is an “artist’s book,” and how are artist’s books different from so-called “experimental literature”?

You should incorporate at least 1 of the secondary sources we have read in Units 3 or 4 (Franzen, Marcus, Hong, Benjamin, Drucker), and at least 1 of the artist’s books we have examined in Unit 4 (Henderson, Tan, one of the books from special collections) into your answer. As always, be specific. I am not looking for general answers, summaries, or paraphrases here. Instead, I am looking for responses that use specific ideas/quotes from at least one of our secondary sources as a launching point for their own ideas, and that illustrate these ideas by referring to specific aspects of at least one artist’s book.

Part 2: Exam Question

As with your Unit 2 blog post, in this part of your post, you will help me in formulating a potential question (or a series of related questions) for our second take-home exam. The exam format will be the same as our first take-home exam:

  • 3 shorter essay questions OR 1 long essay question (you will choose which format you want to complete)
  • 5-6 double-spaced pages (about 1600-2000 words)

You will help me to formulate the shorter essay questions. I will review the questions you submit and base the exam questions on those you submit, although I reserve the right to revise/reword/edit/expand on/combine and otherwise alter your initial questions. The final form the questions take will be up to my discretion. You will receive the exam questions for Exam 2 in class one week before the first take-home exam is due (Exam 2 is due Monday, Nov 7, so you will receive the questions on Monday, Oct 31).

The question or series of related questions you submit should focus on one concept or idea that we have covered in Units 3 and/or 4 of this course (in either/both the readings and/or class discussion), and on how that one concept or idea is discussed/enacted in at least one of the texts we read in Units 3 and/or 4. Your question should ask the examinee for what you consider to be a fair assessment of this material. Here are some general guidelines to follow:

  • Your question(s) should be answerable in about 500-750 words.
  • It should cover material from Units 3 and 4.
  • It should be as specific as possible. This means it should refer specifically to at least one text we have read in class, and to at least one concept/idea we have read about/discussed.
  • You might also think about putting two or more texts in dialogue with one another in some way (comparison/contrast, for example).
  • It should provide the opportunity for independent, creative and critical reflection and/or analysis. In other words, it should NOT be a yes/no type of question; in fact, it doesn’t necessarily need to have only one “right” answer. Nor should it be an opinion-based question (i.e., “Do you think x is a good idea/fair/unfair/etc? Why or why not?”).
  • Think about the short essay questions from Exam 1. What are they like? How might you structure your question like those?