Exploring Complex Questions A F24

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Fall 2024 First Year Seminar

The Body

Professor Patrick Frierson

Office Hours in Olin 193: Mondays and Wednesdays 9am-10:30am

Class Meets Mondays and Wednesdays from 11-11:50am (typically in Olin 192), and Fridays from 11-11:50am (usually at various locations on campus, see detailed syllabus)

 

Come see me! 

I’m in my office (Olin East 193) and happy to meet with students on Mondays and Wednesdays 9am-10:30am.  We can talk about questions related to class, but you don’t need a specific reason to come.  If you can’t make these times, send me an email and we can make an appointment for another time.  I’m also happy to meet with students over zoom who prefer to meet in that format.  I’ve set aside Monday evenings from 9-10 PM for zoom office hours (at https://whitman.zoom.us/j/92189368747), but if you want to be sure I’m going to be there, please shoot me an email to let me know you are coming.

                                                                  

Course Description

This seminar introduces students to the liberal arts through an interdisciplinary discussion of th­­e locus of a moving, experiencing self as the foundation of cognition and being in the world — the body. The course includes interdisciplinary plenaries that explore both text and movement in the form of somatic/dance practices. Both textual analysis and movement investigate the body's relationship to power as both shaped by, and resisted through, culture, race, gender, and dis/ability. Through exploration of the body historically and politically at both the local and global level, the course begins with and continually returns to the most basic question: What is the body?  How do the boundaries of the body exist in intersection with the environment? How is the body a site of memory, trauma, or resistance? 

Other Instructors in your pod are Mary Raschko (English), Peter deGrasse (Theatre and Dance), and Helen Kim (Sociology).  I offer many thanks to these colleagues, and past colleagues such as Elyse Semerdian, for material that has made its way into this syllabus and this course.

 

Required Materials

A good notebook for keeping a personal journal over the course of the semester. 

Rene Descartes, Selected Philosophical Writings, trans. Cottingham, Stoothoff, and Murdoch, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988, ISBN: 978-05213-5812-5

Sara Hendren, What Can a Body Do?, New York: Riverhead Books, 2020, ISBN: 9789735220003

Recommended Materials:

Ross Gay, Inciting Joy, Chapel Hill: Algonquin Press, ISBN: 9781643753041

Bessel van der Kolk, The Body Keeps the Score

Anatomy Coloring Book. Kaplan Test Prep, ISBN: 978-1-5062-7640-3.  (Selections available here.)

A good set of colored pencils

Course Goals

If you put forth an effort into this course, by the end of the semester you should be able to:

  • Demonstrate improved ability to ask increasingly focused and complex questions
  • Demonstrate improved ability to learn collaboratively with classmates and professor
  • Demonstrate improved ability to use writing as a means to discover and reconsider ideas
  • Demonstrate improved ability to read inquisitively and generously, with attention to detail and nuance
  • Demonstrate improved ability to use discussion as a means to discover and reconsider ideas
  • Demonstrate improved ability to formulate productive questions that guide exploration of a complex text (broadly construed)
  • Demonstrate improved ability to understand how a writer’s overt purposes and readers’ expectations influence the structure and style of writing
  • Demonstrate improved ability to adapt writing to different forms, genres, and/or audience
  • Demonstrate an improved sense of your own body and what it can do
  • Demonstrate improved understanding of how attention to the body can enrich engagement with art, literature, philosophy, and other fields

Course Requirements

Participation

Meaningful classroom participation is essential for the seminar format to work properly.  We are going to have a variety of different classes with different formats.  The majority of class sessions will focus around discussion of a text.  For these classes, your task is to read inquisitively and generously, with attention to detail and nuance.  For each reading, you should come to class having thought about the following:

  • What question is this reading exploring?
  • What questions do you want to explore, having done the reading?
  • Who is the reading addressing?
  • What is it trying to accomplish? What goals are overt?  What are implicit?
  • What do you want to discuss in class today?
  • What do you plan to contribute to the class discussion today?

I will often ask you at the start of class to do some writing that addresses one of these questions, so you should come to class having thought about them already.

Once during the semester, you will also do a presentation for one of these classes.  Other classes may involve participation in various specific forms of embodied practice, often with guest speakers/guides.  You are expected to fully participate in the activities of those classes unless you have specific accommodations that preclude such participation, and to show respect to your guides and your classmates.  In some cases, we will be putting ourselves in unfamiliar bodily situations, which can feel very vulnerable, so we must take care of each other during these sessions.  At any time, you can opt out of an embodied practice if you choose to opt out.

For every class session, you are expected to participate in ways that are responsible, respectful, and fully present.  With rare exceptions, I will ask you to put away all electronic devices when you enter the classroom and to pay attention to yourself, your classmates, and me.  You must show others respect, and you should invite anyone in the class—including me—to reflect on ways that we might be intentionally or unintentionally creating a climate of disrespect.  This class will work best when we are all able to be vulnerable and even uncomfortable around one another.  For related reasons, I ask that you keep our classroom activities confidential unless you have express permission to share what you experience in class. 

Class attendance is mandatory.  If you have more than four absences, whether or not these are excused absences, you will suffer a one grade notch decrease in your final grade for each additional absence (i.e., if you had six absences and otherwise would have gotten an A-, you will get a B).  This means that you should save absences for genuine emergencies.  If you miss more than 8 (eight) class sessions, you cannot pass the class.  Note: Attendance-related accommodations cannot be retroactive.  If you need accommodations, arrange for those as early as possible in the semester.  For any absence related to your accommodation, you need to let me know as soon as possible (ideally, before the absence) that you will need an accommodation for that particular absence.

I will adjust your final grade based on your participation in class.  Excellent participation can boost your final grade by up to a full grade notch (from B+ to A-, for example).  Lack of participation can lower it by a notch.  Poor participation (disruptive or disrespectful) can lower it by a full grade point (from A to B).

In addition, there are two specific participation-related requirements in this course which will count as a specific percentage of your overall grade:

  1. Presentations (10% each, 20% of total grade):

Discussion Leadership Presentation.  In order to encourage participation and collective ownership of our class, students will pair up with a partner once for a 10-minute presentation during the first half (ish) of the semester.  In the presentation, you will lay out a theme from the reading and generate questions to guide our discussion.  Students are also welcome to use their presentation to make a meaningful connection between texts to synthesize the course material.  A great presentation should model close, analytical reading and inquiry for our class.  A presentation should work to pose questions that bring greater understanding to the content of the reading, yet questions can also include provocations that spark a lively debate about the reading.   At the very least, your presentation should

  • Identify at least three important questions the text addresses
  • Identify a thesis that the text defends, and/or an insight that it seeks to communicate
  • Identify how the text advances reflection on the questions it addresses (including, if it has a clear thesis, the overall argument in favor of that thesis)
  • Identify at least three crucial passages worth discussing as a class. At least one of these should be one that you think you understand and that you think is central to the overall point of the text.  At least one should be a passage you find genuinely puzzling (in ways that you can articulate).

While not necessary, this presentation also provides an opportunity for you to connect what we are reading together as a class with material you wish we were reading/discussing as a class.  For example, last year one group connected a discussion of gender identity from the text we were reading with news stories about the feminist revolution taking place at the time in Iran.  Another group shared pop music songs that related to our readings and had the class use songs as a way of summarizing what we had just read.  Another group had the class make paper dolls and adorn them.  Consider this an invitation to get creative and embrace the ways that our texts speak to you and your world!  If you have any questions about your presentation, please consult me at any time or just drop by office hours.

Passion Project Presentation. Your second presentation should be no more than 8 minutes in length, and may be on any topic related to the body, embodiment, or the texts that we read in this class.  This, again, is a chance to be creative and to introduce the class to material we might not otherwise engage with.  You are free to assign up to 15 pages of reading or up to 20 minutes of viewing for your classmates in anticipation of the presentation, but you are not required to do so.  You may present in whatever format you find most suitable for your topic.  If you have any questions about your presentation, please consult me at any time or just drop by office hours.  You may choose to give a passion project presentation in any class that not being led by your classmates and that is not taking place in a special location (e.g. yoga, dance workshops, etc.).  I will also set aside time in the final weeks of the semester for passion project presentations.

 

Written Work

This course has several important writing-related goals, most of which are best served through less formal styles of writing.  At the same time, however, the course will prepare you for college-level writing through more formal assignments.  Note that even though these assignments are typically worth only 10% of your grade, you must complete all of them in order to pass the class, and to complete an assignment, you must (among other things) meet the minimum word count (if there is one for that assignment).

Journal (up to 10% of total grade).  Each of you should have a physical (non-electronic) notebook or journal in which you can hand-write reflections over the course of the semester.  You should bring this notebook with you to class.  During class, as you hear or experience things that you want to reflect on later, you should jot them down in your notebook.  As you encounter something particularly provocative or interesting in the readings, you should jot it down.  You can, if you choose, keep your reading notes in your journal.  In addition to those items, you should spend at least 10 minutes a day, for at least four days a week, writing and reflecting on the themes of this course.  Unless you are unable to do so, you should do this writing with a hand-writing implement (pen or pencil) in a notebook.  This exercise is both an intellectual practice of using writing as means to discover and reconsider ideas and also an embodied practice where you are exercising manual and bodily skills and remaining attentive to the embodied experience of writing in a journal.  I will periodically check on these journals, and may collect them just to make sure you are keeping up with them.  I will not read them, and if there are specific pages you do not want me to read, you may staple those together when you turn in the journal.  This is writing you are doing for you.  If you keep up with the journals regularly, you will get an A for this part of your grade.

Daily Written Prep Work (20%):  Over the course of the semester, there will generally be written assignments due before class (on Canvas).  These will be graded for completion.  You must complete the assignment in good faith and prior to class in order to get credit for it.  Your grade will be based on the percentage of assignments that you complete and submit on time.  (93-100%=A, 90-93%=A-, 87-89%=B+, etc.).  Late assignments will receive no credit, and assignments that are below the required word count will receive no credit.   

Four Short Papers or Projects (35% total; the first is worth 5% of your grade, the others 10% each):  Over the course of the semester, there will be four specific short projects to encourage engagement with the course material; most of these will have a written component.  Generally speaking, papers are to be written with appropriate citations of text (see Diana Hacker, A Pocket Style Manual) and clearly constructed.  (Note that all citations should reference a specific edition of the text--the one we are using in class, for citations to in-class texts--with a specific page number or page numbers for the quotation or paraphrase.)  Assignments are indicators of the students’ proficiency in understanding and critically engaging the course texts.  I will “grade” papers with a score from 1-10.  For my expectations in terms of your writing, and an interpretation of the scores on papers, see my grading criteria.  Short Papers are listed on the timeline below.  You are allowed to revise any short paper as often as you choose until the last day of class.  The final grade on a given short paper will be the average of the grade on your first version and the highest grade that a draft receives on that assignment.[1]  If you prefer to receive a letter grade on any given assignment, simply note that to me when you turn in the assignment.  Unlike short daily writing assignments, you should email me these papers in .docx format or .pdf format (not googledocs) with a filename that has your full name and the writing assignment in it.  (So, for instance, “Patrick Frierson Paper 1.docx” would be my filename for my first writing assignment.)

Final Paper/Project (20%):  At the end of the semester, you must do a final project or paper that deals with Low, Low Woods in a substantive way.  If you choose to do a final project, you should accompany that project with at least 600 words of written content.  (This could be the script for a video, or an artist’s statement explaining a drawing, or something else that gives context for your project.)  If you choose to write a paper as your entire final project, the paper must be at least 1500 words.  As with the short papers, these final papers are to be written with appropriate citations of text, clearly constructed, and meet my grading criteria.  They should be emailed in .docx or .pdf format to frierspr@whitman.edu.

Deadlines: 

Work must be turned in on time.  If you turn in work late, it will be marked as not completed, though I will give you feedback on the work.  You may “rewrite” work that was turned in late, but the initial grade for that work will be an F, so the highest you can get through revision is a C.  Once during the semester, you may take a 48-hour extension on a paper with no penalty.  The purpose of this extension is to deal with genuine emergencies (sudden illness, breakdowns, etc.), so it for such emergencies.  With extremely rare exceptions, I will not give other extensions.

Academic Honesty: 

I expect work that you turn in to be your own.  You are encouraged to talk with your classmates (both in this section and in other sections) about the material.  You are highly discouraged from consulting the internet for help with this material, except in ways that are specifically called for by me.  Part of the goal of this class is to engage with college-level material for yourself, and the internet is a handy shortcut to mindless groupthink.  For one paper this semester, you will be expected to use ChatGPT (or, if you prefer, another AI).  For other papers, I expect you not to make use of AI in any way, including to check spelling and grammar.  (You may use the spelling and grammar checkers included in Microsoft Word or googledocs, but do not use Grammerly or other spelling/grammar checkers.)  While my expectation and hope is that you not consult the internet or AI, it is absolutely essential that if you do consult with other sources (whether people, texts, websites, AI, or anything else), you must cite every source that you consult in any way in a “works consulted” section of your papers (which does not count towards the word count), and I expect any paraphrase or quotation to be properly cited.  If you use AI or a website to help you with the paper, I will be disappointed.  If you do not cite that AI or website, you will fail the assignment and could well fail the entire course (or even be dismissed from the college).

 

Overall Grade

Your final grade will be based on your two presentations (25% total, 15% for group discussion leadership and 10% for passion project), daily written prep work (20%), four short assigned projects (35% total), and your final paper or project (20%).  I will adjust this grade upwards or downwards based on the overall quality of your participation in and preparation for class. Note that your grade in Canvas is your grade only for the daily written prep work, not for the course as a whole.

Accommodations:

Every student in this class is a valued member of the class community.  All students are expected to conduct themselves in ways that maximize the ability of each student to learn in the ways best suited to them.  I will also do what I can to ensure that each student can flourish in this class.

If you are a student with a disability who will need accommodations in this course, please view next steps on the Disability Support Services (DSS) website Links to an external site.. For specific questions about accommodations and/or disabilities please email dss@whitman.edu. To complete an online accommodation request click here Links to an external site). All information about disabilities is considered private. If I receive notification from DSS that you are eligible to receive an accommodation due to a verified disability, I will work to provide it in accordance with the college’s standards.  Moreover, all students should be aware that the Academic Resource Center provides free peer tutoring for many 100 and 200 level courses.  All tutors are students who have already completed the course, earned a B+ or better, and were recommended by their instructor.  If you feel you would benefit from utilizing this service, please visit the ARC webpage and submit a request.  You can also locate a schedule for drop in tutoring on the ARC website.  Likewise, in accordance with the College’s Religious Accommodations Policy, I will provide reasonable accommodations for students who have conflicts with scheduled exams, assignments, or required attendance in class because of religious observances. Please review the course schedule at the beginning of the semester to determine any such potential conflicts and give me written notice (email is acceptable) by the end of the second week of class about your need for religious accommodations. If you believe that I have failed to abide by these policies, you may talk to your academic advisor or contact my Division Chair Lydia McDermott at mcdermlm@whitman.edu or file a grievance in accordance with Whitman’s Grievance Policy.

Note that accommodations are not retroactive.  You need to arrange for formal accommodations at the start of the semester and discuss with me how they will apply to this particular class. In addition, in any instance in which you fail to meet deadlines or requirements (e.g. for attendance or completed work), you must notify as soon as possible, ideally before the failure to meet the requirement but no later than 48 hours afterwards, indicating that that particular divergence from the requirements was due to an accommodation.

Course Timeline Below (Assignments)

(Note: I am in the process of updating the assignments below.  New assignments will be added throughout the semester.)

 

 

Course Summary:

Date Details Due