Ideas for teaching a writing in politics class

[joeroberts]

Hi there:
I'm teaching a writing in politics class for the first time next term and I was looking for a few tips, comments, bits of advice. It is a 3rd year class, enrollment expected to be around 50 students.

I'd like to mix the class between practical work doing different kinds of writing (e.g. press release, op-ed, speech, briefing memo) with some more theoretical material on the nature of language in politics.

Assume no TA support for this class.

1. How do I balance getting students writing as much as possible without letting grading get out of control? Do more pass-fail assessments? Tighter rubrics that I can use to get through assignments quicker? Talk openly about how I won't be able to closely correct each piece of writing for grammar?
2. How do I navigate the challenges with AI. A significant part of me is inclined to completely give up the ghost and have them use it and submit their entries and responses as part of the assignment. So, I assume that AI would deliver moderately good contributions for each assignment, so I'm sort of imagining getting two pieces from each student: an initial submission to AI and then what they edit and revise for the final product? I sort of assume that's what most people are doing in the real world now, anyway.
 
3. I'm tempted to do a class where we basically wade into the whole debate about post-modernism and language. So I sort of think it would be fun to have them read the Sokal Hoax paper and some of the commentary on it and get them thinking about scholarship, language and power. I actually downloaded Ch. 1 of Gender Trouble and read through it and it's obviously exactly what Sokal was on about. I thought about having students do a compare and contrast with that and Orwell's Politics and the English Language. .


3a. My personal inclination is that hte Sokal Hoax was important and a valuable insight into the bankruptcy of post-modernism. But it's probably important to give a charitable response. Does anyone know of any good defences of post-modernism or social construction?

4. I imagine this class not being lecture-heavy. It seems better to actually doing stuff. Any suggestions for in-class exercises or assignments? Some of my initial ideas for in-class activities are:
- scrutinize Canadian constitutional documents for tricky language, obvious omissions, or strategic compromises
- Write a meme
- Watch / read some great speeches and talk about what makes them great
- Anything else?
- look through examples of Tiktok videos that went viral and talk about why and what it means

5. I am also thinking about treading into the pronoun debate. Obviously it is a 3rd rail, but honestly, isn't it kind of at the heart of the whole question? Why are people writing their pronouns everywhere? What does it mean? Is there anything lost in that? What would Orwell say about that? What would a post-structuralist say about that? Good idea? Crazy idea?

If anyone has any thoughts on any of these, I would be grateful.

Thank you!

[Sun_Worshiper]

Q1: It is a writing class, so there is no getting around a heavy amount of essay grading, but you could try to make it easier on yourself by having students peer review each other. You could also try using ChatGPT to grade - train it based on your rubric, then upload the students' papers into it. You'll have to go over its responses, of course, but it can potentially save you a lot of time (I have not yet tried this myself, but I know colleagues who swear by it).

Q2: I have taken to letting students use AI in their writing, on the bases that they should learn how to use these tools and that I can't really stop them anyway. From what I have seen, the lazier students that rely too much on AI turn in crappy essays and the students who use it as a supplement to make their writing stronger turn in very good work. I know that not everyone is on board with this approach, but it is working well enough for me. A colleague told me that she has students critique ChatGPT essays in class and that this can be fruitful for teaching them the strengths and weaknesses of AI.

Q3-5: I don't have any advice to offer on these, except to say that the pronoun debate seems like quite a mine field to walk through, so tread carefully.

[Parasaurolophus]

If you're going to discuss social construction, you need to be careful to make sure you know what you're talking about. It's one of those ideas that gets bandied about a lot, but tends to be significantly misrepresented in public discourse (in fact, much of it is not particularly controversial), as well as by some academics who think of themselves as being on-side. At a minimum, you should have a read of the SEP entry on social ontology . Simply placing social construction alongside Sokal and postmodernism is, I think, irresponsible.

(Much the same might be said about postmodernism, too; if one is going to dump on it, one ought to first give it a fair shake. Doing that is complicated by its uptake in different fields, some of which engage with the ideas more rigorously than others--but it's not always rigorous work that's the most influential. I'm not the one to defend 'postmodernism', but I can definitely tell you that Derrida and his ilk have real ideas of value; likewise, beneath the verbiage Gender Trouble really does make substantive contributions to thinking about the nature of gender and its role in the constitution of personal identity.)

On ChatGPT: my experience is that many, many students will use it for all parts of the assignment, scaffolding be damned. I don't have any good solutions to offer.

[Kron3007]

I am in a STEM field, so take everything with a grain of salt.

I have switched more to oral presentations.  They are easier to grade, and helps deal with AI since it becomes a little more clear who has done the reading etc.  I don't know how this would work in a writing class, but perhaps there is a way to include some.

Regarding AI, fighting it seems futile and it really is a part of real world writing, so I would embrace it as you mention.  I just try to point out the weaknesses (one being that current models are factually inaccurate), and that they should use it as a tool, not a complete replacement.

As for pronouns, it does seem like a mine field but is very much a political topic.  I feel it is appropriate to discuss, but I would try to focus on the politicization of it rather than the actual underlying debate (unless you are well versed on the topic). 

[marshwiggle]

As for pronouns, it does seem like a mine field but is very much a political topic.  I feel it is appropriate to discuss, but I would try to focus on the politicization of it rather than the actual underlying debate (unless you are well versed on the topic). 

Is there any way to talk about the politicization of pronouns that isn't essentially one-sided? The historical usage in the English language was based on the idea that there were only two, which were based on biological sex, so people did not choose them, and certainly could not make them up. Is it "politicized" to defend the historical usage, which was universal until the very recent past?

 

[Wahoo Redux]

That's a lot of students to grade.  Three ideas:

• Make use of your writing center.  Send your assignment sheets ahead of time to the director and tell them that you are encouraging your students to visit.  Maybe make it a course requirement to have a tutoring session.  This should improve the writing a lot.
• Tell them ahead of time what your specific criteria for grading are.  Keep it to 4 or 5 manageable items, one of which is grammar.  This will make grading much easier.
• Only comment and mark the first half of their essays.  At approximately the halfway mark, write "Can you go through the rest of this essay yourself and correct it?"  This assumes they can do rewrites, but even if they can't, it is very pedagogically sound to 'put the pencil in their hand,' so to speak, and tasks them with being responsible for correcting their own writing.

Good luck.

[Hegemony]

Steer clear of pronouns. It is more an ideological debate than a writing debate. Sure, it involves words, but it's not really about rhetoric as much as what underlies language. You will get people being offended (on many sides of the debate); you will have students vociferously denouncing the side they don't believe in, however much you try to shut them down during class; you will have students enraged at the denouncers; you will have student complaints to your chair; and you may attract the attention of national debate-watchers, in which case you will be vilified widely on social media, have to answer to your university as to why you've become a lightning rod for controversy, etc. Not worth it.

You need a lot of careful training to wade into these waters, and even so, people find themselves dealing with way more controversy than they signed up for.

If you want to give students the skills to spot and analyze and think about politics and writing, start out calmly with topics that don't rouse high emotions, and approach the more controversial topics very carefully, with strategies to discuss things calmly and defuse anger. Also, think through your objectives very carefully.

[Myword]

 A pronoun? Is that a noun that's gone pro?   Lol.

Seriously, too much is made from that. Don't bother. I taught political philosophy using the classics. Mostly a deadend to them--too hard and not relevant to today. You can contrast Plato's CRITO dialogue to Martin Luther King's letter from the Birmingham jail. That works. Maybe a presidential speech--you pick the president.
  When I took the course in college, it was a terrible bore and learned nothing.

[Wahoo Redux]

The pronoun business is a fad.  It will go away, probably faster than we realize.  Don't waste class time on it.

[Kron3007]

As for pronouns, it does seem like a mine field but is very much a political topic.  I feel it is appropriate to discuss, but I would try to focus on the politicization of it rather than the actual underlying debate (unless you are well versed on the topic). 

Is there any way to talk about the politicization of pronouns that isn't essentially one-sided? The historical usage in the English language was based on the idea that there were only two, which were based on biological sex, so people did not choose them, and certainly could not make them up. Is it "politicized" to defend the historical usage, which was universal until the very recent past?

 

I think so.  You can believe whatever you want.  I wouldn't get into that side of it.  I just mean you could look at how it as an example of identity politics and how they are used to motivate voters etc. 

Regardless of what side you fall, it has become larger than life and being used as a wedge.  In my opinion, taking up far too much of the focus instead of more important issues.

However, this is so far outside my field that others are probably right that it is best to avoid. 

[mythbuster]

I'm in science so this may not be relevant. I would include a focus on misinformation and reliable sources. Maybe use AI to generate an "article" with misinformation/hallucinations. How would you determine the veracity of what it says? My experience with AI is that it spits out at best broad generalities and all too often fake information. It would be interesting to get them to use the AI to come up with outlandish (or at least false) claims that politician might make as a starting point.