For next week’s HW, half of the class will write a blog post and half of the class will post two comments (on different posts) responding to classmate’s posts. (Next week I will flip around the assignments so that the bloggers become commenters and vice versa). Blog posts are due by Wednesday at 4pm. Comments are due by the time class starts on Friday.

While the posts and comments will not be graded, they will be factored into your participation for the quarter. You do not need to feel constrained by conventions of academic writing– I encourage you to use an informal and personal voice — but do demonstrate effort, creativity, and thoughtful engagement with the text. For more on blogging, check out my page “How to blog well” on the website menu.

Please click here to see what you’ve been assigned this week: Blogging/commenting assignments.

Blog assignment:

Your task is to choose a current phenomenon in society and respond to it as if you were Rousseau (yes, pretend you literally are Rousseau in the post). This will require applying Rousseau’s philosophy to present day. You must include at least one Rousseau quote in your response (provide page #).  

The “current phenomenon” can be media (movie, tv, song); current events (news, politics); personal anecdote; campus affairs, or anything else you see fit. Whatever you choose, you must have at least one link or embedded media object for readers to refer to.

Your blog post must have a clever or funny title, three tags, and categorized for “week 4.”  

Comment assignment:

Please read the tab on our website titled “how to comment well” for more information on how to comment (hint – it must be more than I agree or disagree). Also, if you wish, you can talk from the perspective of any other author we’ve read in HUM 4 thus far in your response to “Rousseau.” (So, you can respond as Locke, Hume, etc.)