EN 105 Week 2 Assignment Help

EN 105 Week 2 Assignment Help | Park University | Assignment Help 

Unit 2: Major Writing Assignment 2

Exploring A Language Community

Learning Goals

By completing this assignment, you will:

·         develop a controlling idea/thesis for an essay

·         use description, examples, and explanations to support, develop, clarify, or extend the focus of your essay

·         practice using common formats and conventions (e.g., structure, tone, mechanics) for academic writing

·         explain connections about language, community, and identity

Task

The famous philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein wrote, "The limits of my language mean the limits of my world." What did he mean by this statement?

As you learned in this unit's readings and discussion, language awareness is central to successfully navigating life. When we are locked into one pattern of speaking, writing, thinking, we limit the boundaries of our existence. Experienced writers know that they belong to many language communities and know how to switch between varieties of language to address specific audiences, subjects, genres, and/or social contexts.

To complete this unit's major writing assignment, write an essay in which you explore one particular "language community" that you belong to. Include discussions of the language habits used by members of the community, and consider discussing how this language community has shaped your own identity. In your essay, assume that your readers are your classmates. Your major source of information should be your own observations and recollections of your language community, and your goal should be to introduce your classmates to your language community.

It will be up to you to determine what particular focus your essay will take and what message you wish to convey to your classmates. You may use one of the prompts below, or expand on your notes from your Writer's Journal assignment or your contributions to this unit's discussion.

Possible Prompts:

1.      How has this language community shaped your sense of identity? How is your sense of self tied in with the language you use? How do you navigate between different language communities -- for instance, how do you move between the language spoken at your job and the language spoken by your family at home?

2.      What are some common misunderstandings of your language community? Why or how is your community so misunderstood? Describe your community -- its membership, practices, dialects, and values -- in order to "set the record straight" and clear up misconceptions and stereotypes.

3.      Write about a time when you (or someone you observed) made a significant linguistic mis-step. What happened? What are some of the things that cause communication breakdowns within or between language communities? How can this be helped?

4.      Given your experiences so far, what do you know about the language community of college? Is college one big language community, or a collection of multiple, smaller ones? Compare and contrast two of the disciplines from which you are taking courses this year (for example, a history class and your biology class). How are those disciplines similar in their expectations of writers? How are they different? What does this mean in terms of the values of the disciplines?

5.      Through observation and interaction, learn about a language community that is brand-new to you. This could be a language community formed around ethnicity, hobby/interest, religion, college major/minor, lifestyle, etc. Like an anthropologist, write an essay that describes, in detail, that new community. Then, reflect on what the experience means to you, what it taught you, perhaps, about keeping an open- mind in the face of difference.

6.      Compare the language used by your community with the languages discussed in this unit's readings. What is similar among your experience and the experiences of Amy Tan, Daniel Felsenfeld, and the other writers you read and discussed this unit?

Your essay should be between 750 and 1,250 words and should be centered a particular message or focus. Your essay should make significant use of description, examples, and explanation to illustrate your focus, and should illustrate some of the connections among language, community, and identity. Your essay should show signs of revision, editing, and proofreading. Assume that your readers are your classmates: educated, interested in your community, and are hoping to learn from you.

Remember that you may use any of the material from this unit's discussion or your Writer's Journal as a starting point for this assignment. 

Cover Letter

When you submit this assignment, include a brief cover letter (no more than 300 words) that answers the following questions:

·         What is your purpose in this assignment? What is it you are trying to do or say in this piece of writing?

·         What are you proud of about this assignment?

·         What challenges did you face while completing this assignment?

·         What sorts of feedback do you want from your instructor on this assignment?

Include your cover letter as a comment on your upload -- not as a separate document. Your cover letter will not count for or against your grade, but will help your instructor respond to your writing.

Length, Design, & Formatting

Your assignment should be between 750 and 1,250 words, not including title or Works Cited page. More important than length is quality. Make sure to fully develop your essay, by including examples, explanations, and descriptions of your language community.

Use MLA guidelines for document design. This includes using 1-inch margins, double-spaced type, a page number in the upper right corner, and a Works Cited page. Both Easy Writer and A Reader's Guide to College Writing include detailed descriptions of how to design documents according to MLA guidelines.

Give your work a unique title -- not "Language Community."

To allow your instructor the ability to post marginal commentary, you must submit this assignment as a .doc, .docx, or .pdf file. You can save files in these formats with most word processors, including Web-based programs like Google Docs, Word Online, and Open Office. If you are using a web-based file storage system like Google Drive or Dropbox, be sure to learn exactly how to transfer files from your storage system to Canvas.

A Note About Sources

Your major source for this assignment will be your own experiences. However, you may also decide to use your assigned readings or mini-lectures from class as sources, and you might decide to incorporate research from outside this course. When referring to any source in the main text of your analysis, use MLA guidelines for in-text citations. This includes placing any quoted material in quotation marks, clearly indicating the author of the work, and providing a page number for the quotation, if applicable.

Include a Works Cited page with an entry for each source that you referred to in the main text. Use MLA guidelines to create your Works Cited page. For examples and discussion of how to work with sources in writing, see the Easy Writer chapters on "Integrating Sources and Avoiding Plagiarism" and "MLA Style." You will practice creating both in-text and end-of-text citations in this unit's discussion.

INSTRUCTOR RESPONSE & GRADING: You can expect your instructor to provide substantive response and feedback to your assignment within 6 days of the deadline. Please review all instructor feedback, including marginal commentary, which you can access by clicking "View Feedback" once your assignment has been graded. Use your instructor's feedback to as a guide to revision and improvement for your future writing assignments.

Your assignment will be graded using a rubric derived from the rubric used to grade your final portfolio. Please note that the rubric for this assignment places importance on insight, focus, analysis, and development.