| Freshman Seminar: Where We Live | |
| Prof. Bruce Umbaugh, Webster University | |
The Freshman Seminar program has been designed to help introduce you to Webster University and to build skills necessary for success here, while at the same time providing a valuable academic experience. Welcome to your seminar: Where We Live.
Class meets Mondays and Wednesdays from 2:30 to 3:50 p.m. We will ordinarily meet in Pearson House Room 2, but a few meetings will be different. A detailed schedule appears below.
Instructor Information
Dr. Bruce Umbaugh
office: Pearson House basement
phone: 961-2660 x7826 (office)
968-7170 (main office)
office hours: M 1:30-2:30
and by appointment
Course Description
Winston Churchill once said that we make our buildings and our buildings make us. That's not the half of it.
We live in many different buildings: homes, schools, or work places, but also in cafeterias, coffee shops, bars, and other hangouts. Besides buildings, though, we live in cars and out of doors. We live "out of town," or in cities, or in suburbs. We live with other people--in families, neighborhoods, societies, and communities--in associations that may be voluntary and deliberate or entirely accidental.
Where we live affects how we live and what we are. Who are our close friends: family members, neighbors, coworkers, electronic pen pals? Can we easily find novelty, to "get out of a rut?" Is there anywhere to rest? To get someone else's perspective? To have fun?
This seminar is about choosing and planning the spaces where we live based on what we want to be. We will make extensive use of the Internet, in addition to more traditional resources.
Students in the seminar will require computer access and accounts to gain facility in the use of electronic mail, familiarity with Usenet news and the World Wide Web, and exposure to some of the vast resources available via the Internet. Students will occasionally be assigned to read from or meet in virtual environments on "the Net."
This seminar is meant for the humanistically, artistically, and technically inclined, for students from small towns, vast cities, suburbs, or the middle of nowhere. We presume no special knowledge of architecture, urban planning, life online, of MTV.
Textbooks
Diana Hacker, A Writer's Reference, fourth edition, Boston: Bedford Books of St. Martin's Press, 1999.
Julian Dibbell, My Tiny Life: crime and passion in a virtual world, New York: Henry Holt, 1998.
Ray Oldenburg, The Great Good Place: Cafes, Coffee Shops, Community Centers, Beauty Parlors, General Stores, Bars, Hangouts & How They Get You Through the Day, second edition, New York: Marlowe and Company, 1997.
Neal Stephenson, Snow Crash, New York: Bantam, 1992.
A packet of readings including works by Elliot Liebow, James Howard, Kunstler, Lois Smith Brady, Zoë Ingalls, and Akiko Busch.
as well as various handouts and texts available via the Net
and either
Arlie Russell Hochschild, The Time Bind: When Work Becomes Home and Home Becomes Work, New York: Henry Holt, 1997.
or
William J. Mitchell, City of Bits: Space, Place, and the Infobahn, Cambridge, Massachusetts: the MIT Press, 1995.
Course Schedule
Course overview and introductions. August 23.
Read Oldenburg, Introduction, and "The Problem of Place In America." Where I Sit .1b Due. August 25.
Read Liebow, excerpts from Tally's Corner, in readings packet. August 30.
Library tour! Meet in library. September 1.
Labor Day! No class meeting. Sept. 6.
Read Stephenson, Snow Crash, through p. 249. Sept. 8.
Read Kunstler, Home from Nowhere, excerpts 1, in readings packet. Sept. 13.
CIRP Survey. Where I Sit 1.0 Due. Sept. 15.
Read Home from Nowhere excerpts 2. Individual presentations begin. Sept. 22.
Read Home from Nowhere excerpts 3. Presentations. Sept. 27.
Presentations. Essay Worksheet Due. Sept. 29.
Webster Works Worldwide, no class meeting. Oct. 6.
Read My Tiny Life, pp. ix-121. Oct. 11.
Read My Tiny Life, pp. 123-192. Where I Sit 2.0 Due. Oct. 13.
Presentations. Oct. 25.
Presentations. Oct. 27.
To be announced. Nov. 3.
No meeting in classroom. Class meets online from Nov 9-16. Nov. 10.
Group presentations. Nov. 17.
To be announced. Nov. 24.
Read Oldenburg, "A Hostile Habitat." Nov. 29.
Read Oldenburg, "The Sexes and the Third Place," "Shutting Out Youth." December 1.
Where We Live. Course summary and review. Dec. 8.
Grading
Essays 40%
Where I Sit
Review
Individual Topic
Presentations 20%
Individual
Group
Individual meeting + other
occasional work 10%
Collegial participation 15%
Exam 15%
Bonus points ?????
During the semester, you will write a review and two essays on assigned topics. Forty percent of your course grade will be based on my evaluation of these essays. Essays are due at the start of class and should be typewritten or word processed. In all cases, they should be grammatically correct and show evidence of having been proofread as necessary. The "Where I Sit" essay will be written and reviewed in several stages, beginning the first week of classes.
Each student will be expected to participate in class discussion, to be intellectually engaged and respectful during student presentations, and otherwise to help make the seminar a good one. Your efforts and success at contributing to your colleagues' education will be the basis for fifteen percent of your grade in the course. This includes your regular contributions to class discussion and group work.
Early in the term, the class will be divided into four groups for projects. Each group will be responsible for a persuasive presentation based on its thinking about one of two texts: The Time Bind or City of Bits.
Students will also make individual, informative presentations on assigned topics through the term. Topics will be assigned before the Library tour, to allow students to make best use of the information presented.
Once again, more details will be forthcoming at a later date. The presentations account for twenty percent of your grade in the course.
The final exam on December 13 gives you the opportunity to show what you have learned in the course. We will review for the final exam the week before finals, and you will get study questions that give at least broad hints what you might expect on the exam. (Do note that the class meeting schedule for finals week departs from the schedule for meetings during the term. Do not blithely assume that your classes will sit for exams at the hours they met all semester long.) The exam accounts for fifteen percent of your grade.
In the early part of the semester, a meeting with me is required. Easy points for doing what you should do anyway--discussing how best to approach research for your individual presentation and essay, and discussing your progress in the course. You will have a small research assignment to complete after the class visit to Luhr Library. Also, I will from time to time administer "pop" quizzes or brief writing assignments in class. These items, together, constitute ten percent of your grade in the course.
From time to time, extra points will be available during the term. For example, additional credit might be earned by rewriting a portion of some piece of written work. These opportunities will be announced in class.
Technically speaking, attendance in class is not required. The basic structure of grading in the course does not involve me awarding you credits in virtue of your presence in the classroom each Monday and Wednesday. Nonetheless, students are encouraged to attend every class. There is ordinarily a strong correlation between good class attendance and good grades in a class such as this one. Much information will be presented in class, including examples and elaboration not to be found in our texts. Announcements will be made. Questions will be answered. Bonus point opportunities will be raised. You are responsible for knowing all this and for having any additional materials distributed in class.
Although I will make myself available to help students outside class, students who do not attend class meetings should not expect to be rewarded with intensive assistance. In addition, students who do not attend class cannot earn collegial participation credit in their absence. Finally, note that I reserve the right to reward students who have attended class faithfully, displayed significant effort, and made significant contributions to the class.
On computer facilities
All students enrolled in the seminar need computer accounts with full Internet access. Students are eligible to have characters at CollegeTown MOO and will be assigned accounts on the Arts and Sciences Motet Web conferencing system. Netscape clients are available at a variety of points on campus. The University has made special arrangements with an Internet service provider for discounts on accounts with them. We extend these privileges (a) to permit students to experience the "on-line" world of cyberspace that is one focus of the course, and (b) to permit students to read relevant Usenet newsgroups and Web pages, collaborate with others in cyberspace, and otherwise to gather pertinent information. These purposes endorse a wide range of legitimate educational and recreational uses of these student accounts.
Nonetheless, some uses are explicitly forbidden, including sharing your account with other users and attempting to gain access to accounts other than your own. Were any student to abuse this privilege, the future of such a practice could be threatened. Be careful out there!
Be aware, also, that some computer facilities are used heavily. It will probably not be possible for you to use them as often as you would wish. We are working to make more facilities available, but in the meantime, other users will likely be there when you are on-line. Do be respectful of others in the lab. Try to be accomodating in sharing scarce resources with other students. Try to avoid offending others in the lab by way of your screen displays or behavior.
Follow the Academic Computing Services guidelines, including the prohibitions on smoking, eating, and drinking in the labs, and on futzing with the computer hardware inappropriately. Don't walk away from the computer when you are still logged in--that has been known to yield nasty surprises. Be careful in here, too!
On academic dishonesty
Students in this class are expected to do their own work and not to rely on the work of others. While students are welcome to work with one another to understand the material, any student plagiarizing, cheating on an exam, aiding another student to cheat, or committing any other act of academic dishonesty will be referred for appropriate disciplinary action. Please consult with me if you have any questions in this regard, either about your own work or that of another person.