Subject Area - Course Number:English 364Cross-Listing

University of Wisconsin-Whitewater

Curriculum Proposal Form #3

New Course

Effective Term:{Select from drop-down list} 2123 (Summer 2012)2127 (Fall 2012)2130 (Winterim 2013)2131 (Spring 2013)2133 (Summer 2013)2137 (Fall 2013)2140 (Winterim 2014)2141 (Spring 2014)2143 (Summer 2014)2147 (Fall 2014)2150 (Winterim 2015)2151 (Spring 2015)2153 (Summer 2015)2157 (Fall 2015)2160 (Winterim 2016)2161 (Spring 2016)2163 (Summer 2016)2167 (Fall 2016)2170 (Winterim 2017)2171 (Spring 2017)2173 (Summer 2017)2177 (Fall 2017)2180 (Winterim 2018)2181 (Spring 2018)

Subject Area - Course Number:English 364Cross-listing:

(See Note #1 below)

Course Title:(Limited to 65 characters)Style: Principles and Practices

25-Character Abbreviation: Style

Sponsor(s): Dan Baumgardt

Department(s):Languages and Literatures

College(s):{Select from drop-down list} Arts and CommunicationBusiness and EconomicsEducationLetters and SciencesInterdisciplinaryGrad Studies & Cont Ed

Consultation took place:NA Yes (list departments and attach consultation sheet)

Departments:

Programs Affected:

Is paperwork complete for those programs? (Use "Form 2" for Catalog & Academic Report updates)

NA Yeswill be at future meeting

Prerequisites:English 230 andEnglish 362 or consent of instructor

Grade Basis:Conventional LetterS/NC or Pass/Fail

Course will be offered:Part of Load Above Load

On CampusOff Campus - Location

College:{Select from drop-down list} Arts and CommunicationBusiness and EconomicsEducationLetters and SciencesGrad Studies and Cont EdInterdisciplinary Dept/Area(s):English/Languages and Literature

Instructor:Daniel Baumgardt

Note: If the course is dual-listed, instructor must be a member of Grad Faculty.

Check if the Course is to Meet Any of the Following:

Technological Literacy Requirement Writing Requirement

Diversity General Education Option: Select one:NoneGAGEGHGLGIGMGPGS

Note: For the Gen Ed option, the proposal should address how this course relates to specific core courses, meets the goals of General Education in providing breadth, and incorporates scholarship in the appropriate field relating to women and gender.

Credit/Contact Hours: (per semester)

Total lab hours:Total lecture hours:

Number of credits:3Total contact hours:48

Can course be taken more than once for credit? (Repeatability)

No Yes If "Yes", answer the following questions:

No of times in major:No of credits in major:

No of times in degree:No of credits in degree:

Revised 10/021 of 8

Proposal Information:(Procedures for form #3)

Course justification:

This course will be a core course in the Professional Writing and Publishing sub-major. It should be useful to students of various majors. However, it is specifically geared for students whose career plans include professional writing and editing. It will focus on texts from the world of professional writing and publishing, and it will delve deeply into principles for addressing stylistic concerns in such texts.

Relationship to program assessment objectives:

The objectives of upper-division courses in the Professional Writing and Publishing track are that graduates of the program will be able to:

•analyze discourse used in diverse contexts with attention to audience, purpose, and formal convention;

• use technology employed by professional writers in a variety of media;

• collaborate effectively, orally and in writing, in teams and within groups; and

•write and edit documents to a professional standard in multiple formats.

As part of the 300-level sequence in Professional Writing and Publishing, this course will emphasizethe objectives of analyzing discourse and writing and editing documents to a professional standard.

Budgetary impact: NA

Course description:(50 word limit)

Introduction to analysis and revision of texts for their style by a) assessing the rhetorical situations of these texts and b) becoming conversant with widely accepted principles and categories of style. Focus is on stylistic concerns such as clarity, coherence, cohesion, emphasis, concision, shape, and elegance. Prereq: English 230 and English 362 or consent of instructor.

Course Objectives

By the end of this course, students will:

familiarize themselves with widely accepted principles and categories of style;

understand the nature and importance of common stylistic concerns, including clarity,

cohesion, coherence, emphasis, concision, shape, and elegance;

acquire a basic grammatical vocabulary that will assist them in discussing stylistic

concerns;

acquire a vocabulary of style that will assist them in discussing stylistic concerns;

gain significant experience in analyzing real texts for stylistic concerns, while

considering the rhetorical situation of each text—e.g., its audience and purpose;

gain significant experience in analyzing and revising texts from the world of

professional writing and publishing for stylistic concerns;

gain significant experience in explaining stylistic concerns to those without any

significant knowledge of these concerns;

familiarize themselves with key research that supports important principles and

categories of style; and

understand the nature and role of style in expert discourse, including how style and

ethics intersect in such discourse.

Tentative course syllabus with mandatory information(paste syllabus below):

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English 364 | Fall 2014

Style: Principles and Practices

Class time/place:

Instructor:Dan Baumgardt (Assistant Professor), 3271 Laurentide,

Course Overview

In this course, we focus on stylistic concerns such as clarity, coherence, emphasis, concision, shape, and elegance. While no texts are free from style, not all writers carefully design the style of their texts with an eye toward the above concerns. At least two things are involved in a strategic and informed approach to style. First, writers must assess the rhetorical situation, asking for example, “Who is my audience?” and “What is my purpose?” Second, writers must be conversant with widely accepted principles and categories of style. As with all rhetorical concerns, these principles and categories can, at best, offer writers and editors productive frameworks for recognizing and addressing problems. Writers and editors must use their experience and knowledge of specific texts and situations to wisely apply these principles toward the end of effective discourse.

This tension between prescriptions based on principle and descriptions based on experience presents one of the central problems of style. Students will have many opportunities to understand and negotiate this tension as they analyze and revise their own writing and the writing of others. Ultimately, this course expects that students willlearn to think about style as a series of specific, informed design choices rather than something that is essential to a text or to a person.

Course Objectives

By the end of this course, students will:

familiarize themselves with widely accepted principles and categories of style;

 understand the nature and importance of common stylistic concerns, including clarity, cohesion,

coherence, emphasis, concision, shape,and elegance.

 acquire a basic grammatical vocabulary that will assist them in discussing stylistic concerns;

acquire a vocabulary of style that will allow assist them in discussing stylistic concerns;

gain significant experience in analyzing real texts for stylistic concerns, while considering the

rhetorical situation of each text—e.g., its audience and purpose;

 gain significant experience in explaining stylistic concerns to those without any significant

knowledge of these concerns;

familiarize themselves with key research that supports important principles and categories of

style; and

understand the nature and role of style in expert discourse, including how style and ethics

intersect in this such discourse.

Required Texts

1. Bookstore:Williams, J. M. (2010). Style: Lessons in clarity and grace (10th ed.). Longman.

2. D2L:You can find the remainder of the course readings at the D2L course site.

Assignments

Nearly every day you will be responsible for a reading assignment, a short homework, or both. Be prepared to discuss readings and to discuss and turn in homework. Aim to participate in class discussions and to volunteer to put your work on the board or screen. In order to get credit, you must hand in assignments on the day that they are due: Late assignments are not graded.

The following are the major assignments and grade categories for the course:

style revisionsThere are three of these assignments, Revision 1, Revision 2, and Revision 3. These

assignments ask you to use a technical vocabulary of style to analyze a sample text for stylistic problems, and then to revise that text to solve for the problems you have diagnosed. The sample texts are actual policy statements, articles, documentation, or other sorts of published professional writing. For the third and final revision, we will work with an actual client who needs help with the style of their text.

quiz &examThese are designed to test your knowledge of specific stylistic concepts. The exam will

ask you to correctly identify stylistic problems in sample sentences and paragraphs.

issue paperIn this assignment, you will analyze a text of your choicefor one of the two issues in

style that we cover at the end of the semester, either Ethics or Metaphor.

workshopsIn class we will collectively look at your revision drafts on screen. An electronic version

of your draft, placed in the course drop box, is due on these days.

homeworkThese are short homework assignments that are due throughout the semester.

attendanceYou start the semester with 25 points. One point is deducted for each of the following

classes you miss: third, fourth, and fifth. Two points are deducted for any class you miss

after that. At semester’s end your points are divided by 25 to derive a percent score.

participationThis is based on how often and how well you comment in class, your work at the board,

and whether or not you submit texts due in the D2L dropbox on the assigned days.

Here are the criteria I will use to determine participation grades:

I will post your score on D2L at the end of the semester.

Here are the point values for the above assignments and grade categories in this course:

Overall Course Grade

Here is the grade range for determining your overall score:

Whitewater Policies

The University of Wisconsin-Whitewater is dedicated to a safe, supportive and non-discriminatory learning environment. It is the responsibility of all undergraduate and graduate students to familiarize themselves with University policies regarding Special Accommodations, Academic Misconduct, Religious Beliefs Accommodation, Discrimination and Absence for University Sponsored Events (for details please refer to the Schedule of Classes; the “Rights and Responsibilities” section of the Undergraduate Catalog; the Academic Requirements and Policies and the Facilities and Services sections of the Graduate Catalog; and the “Student Academic Disciplinary Procedures (UWS Chapter 14); and the “Student Nonacademic Disciplinary Procedures" (UWS Chapter 17).

Course Schedule

Bibliography

Born, R. C. (1986). The suspended sentence: A guide for writers. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons.

Corbett, E. P. J. (1996). Introduction to classical rhetoric for the modern student. In M. Wiley, B. Gleason,

and L. Phelps (Eds.),Composition in four keys (p. 140-148). Toronto: Mayfield Publishing Company.

Cutts, M. (1995). The Plain English guide. Oxford / New York: Oxford University Press.

Gage, J. T. (1986). Philosophies of style and implications for composition. College English, 41(6), 615-

622.

Halliday, M. A. K., and Hasan, R. (1976). Cohesion in English. New York: Longman.

Halliday, M. A. K, and Martin, J. R. (1993). Writing science: Literacy and discursive power. Pittsburgh, PA:

University of Pittsburgh Press.

Haviland, S. E., and Clark, H. H. (1974). What’s new? Acquiring new information as a process in

comprehension. Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior, 13, 512-521.

Hodge, R. and Kress, G. (1993). Transformations and truth. In Language as ideology, 2nd ed. (p. 15-37).

New York: Routledge.

Lakoff, G., and Johnson, R. and Johnson. (2003). Metaphors we live by. Chicago: University of Chicago

Press.

Lanham, R. (1983). Analyzing prose. New York: Scribners.

------. (1974). Style: An anti-textbook (p. 21-43). New Haven: Yale University Press.

Mitchell, R. (2000).Less than words can say. Available from

Redish, J. C., and Rosen, C. (1991). Can guidelines help writers? In E. R. Steinberg (Ed.) Plain language:

Principles and practice (p. 83-92). Detroit: Wayne State University Press.

Rosch, E. (1978). Principles of categorization. In E. Rosch and B. B. Lloyd (Eds.) Cognition and

categorization (p. 27-48). Hillsdale, N. J.: Lawrence Erlbaum.

Savin, H. B., Perchonock, E. (1965).Grammatical structure and the immediate recall of English

sentences. Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal Behavior, 4, 348-353.

Suchan and Colucci. An analysis of communication efficiency.Management Communication Quarterly,

4(2), 454-484.

Thompson, G. (1996). Grammatical metaphor. In Introducing functional grammar (p. 163-178). New York.

St. Martin’s Press.

Li, C. N., and Thompson, S. A. (1976). Subject and topic: A new typology of language. In C. N. Li (Ed.) Subject and topic (p. 457-489). New York: Academic Press.

Vande Kopple, W. J. (1989). Clear and coherent prose: a functional approach. Boston: Scott Foresman

and Company.

Van Oosten. (1986).The nature of subjects, topics, and agents: A cognitive explanation. (Doctoral

dissertation). Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Linguistics Club.

Way, E. C. (1991). Knowledge representation and metaphor.Norwell, MA: Kluwer Academic Publishers.

Williams, J.M. (2010). Style: Lessons in clarity and grace (10th ed.). Longman Publishers.

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