LITR 4368
Literature of the Future

Final Exam assignment 2015		   

This webpage constitutes this summer's final exam assignment, which will be updated until Tueday, 7 July, when paper copies are distributed.

Relative weight: 40-50% of final grade

Format & schedule: In-class or email; open-book and open-notebook. Attendance not required on 9 July 2015.

Final grade reports will be emailed between 13-15 July.

Content: 2 essay questions (details below)

Essay 1: Referring to 4 (or more) texts (at least 4 since midterm), organize a comparative discussion of 2 or more “visions or scenarios of the future” (Obj. 2). Compare and contrast your selected scenarios in terms of literary styles and appeals or detractions in their visions of the future.

Essay 2: Referring to 3-4 texts since midterm (+ optional references to pre-midterm texts), develop a personal / professional topic in our course or readings (extended from midterm)

Essay lengths: 6-10 paragraphs for both essays, depending on paragraph length. Better essays are usually longer, more substantial, and fully developed

Special requirements:

(Final exam samples 2013; Final exam samples 2011; Final exam samples 2009; Final exam samples 2007)

Textual requirements: Essay 1 requires 3-4 texts since midterm, but you may also refer to pre-midterm texts for examples. Essay 2 requires 2-3 texts since midterm (pre-midterm texts optional).

Website expectations: You are expected to use the appropriate course instructional pages for the "Scenarios of the Future" you discuss. Essay 2 isn't as easy to prescribe web use, but refer to pages that can help demonstrate comprehension of terms, themes, and objectives.

Evaluation standards: Readability & surface competence, content quality, and thematic organization / unity.

Readability & surface competence: Your reader must be able to process what you're reporting. Given the pressures of a time writing exercise, some rough edges are acceptable, but chronic errors of grammar, punctuation, or spelling, or elementary style limit quality.

Content quality: use of course resources (objectives, terms, lecture, discussion, instructional links, coverage of required texts; comprehension of subject; demonstration of learning.

+ interest & significance: Make your reader want to process your essay. Make the information meaningful. Make everything matter to our study of literature and culture.

Thematic organization: Unify materials along a line of thought that a reader can follow from start to finish.

Essay 1: Referring to 4 (or more) texts (at least 4 since midterm), organize a comparative discussion of 2 or more “visions or scenarios of the future” (Obj. 2). Compare and contrast your selected scenarios in terms of literary styles and appeals or detractions in their visions of the future.

Objective 2—Visions / Scenarios of the Future  

2.     To identify, describe, and criticize typical visions or scenarios of the future (seen from 2015).  

a.      High tech; virtual reality—slick, cool, unreal, easy with power (+ cyberpunk style)

b.     Low tech; actual reality—rough, intimate, messy, hungry, warm, real

c. Utopia / dystopia & ecotopia—perfectly planned worlds / dysfunctional world / + ecology

d.     Alien contact—exploring and being explored

 

Possible prompts: alternative terms for "visions and scenarios": features, dimensions, aspects, possibilities, options

 

Rationale for your choice(s)? What did you know or sense of these scenarios before? Refer to previous readings, films, or other media.

 

What did you learn about how these scenarios are presented? What appeals to readers? What downsides or repulsions?

 

What kind of future is modeled? Decline or progress? Hope or fear? On what basis?

Advice for combining or relating scenarios:

compare / contrast High Tech & Low Tech

compare or combine High Tech & Ecotopia

compare or combine Alien Contact & High Tech

Using "Entertain & Instruct" spectrum, compare / contrast escapist appeals of Alien Contact and High Tech with instructional appeals of Ecotopia and Low Tech.

Essay 2: Referring to 3-4 texts since midterm (+ optional references to pre-midterm texts), develop a personal / professional topic in our course or readings (extended from midterm)

Extend or continue Essay 2 from your midterm, reviewing and rethinking what you wrote then and applying your theme to 2 or more texts since the midterm.

You may continue to refer to and analyze pre-midterm texts, especially if you have additional material; otherwise summarize or review what you accomplished in the midterm's Essay 2. Make connections between pre-midterm and post-midterm texts—e.g., comparisons and contrasts, similarities and differences.

If you feel that your midterm Essay 2 topic no longer works for you, review your situation and transition to a fresh or related topic.

In brief, you must refer to your midterm Essay 2, but you can extend or vary from it in whatever way suits you best or makes the best essay.

Some past final exam Essay 2s actually rewrote parts of their midterm for inclusion in the final exam Essay 2. If you do so, don't just copy and paste the midterm materials, but improve them at least a little.

(Assignment description for Essay 2 from midterm:) [everything from here to next rainbow line is from midterm]

Relating personal and / or professional reactions to course contents, 1+ course objectives, and 2-3 texts, unify these materials to focus on how this course's themes or ideas may work for your future.

"personal" = what you've learned or thought before + personal future

"professional" = application to student career, teaching career, or other professional plans)

Question: What theme(s), idea(s), aspect(s), or element(s) of our course intrigue you or matter most? Why? What issue(s) seem most important and worth reading and discussing? What do you learn about your interests or assumptions? How can you imagine Literature of the Future playing into your future?

Your emphasis may be literary, cultural-social-historical, personal, or combinations, but use examples from texts to illustrate and develop insights, and use terms and objectives to connect to the course.

Required textual references: Across the exam you must refer to at least 6-7 texts overall since the midterm (see Essay 1). References to texts before the midterm are encouraged, but your choices of contents may dictate otherwise.

Welcome to refer to texts in abbreviated form, e. g. "The Logical Legend of Heliopause and Cyberfiddle" > "Cyberfiddle."

No page references necessary unless you're citing something very surprising or obscure.

You are welcome to refer briefly to outside readings, films, other pop or serious culture, but not required.

Texts since midterm

"Johnny Mnemonic," "Burning Chrome," "The Logical Legend of Heliopause and Cyberfiddle" (VN 159-180), "The Onion and I," (VN 8-21)."Drapes and Folds," (VN 126-139)."Speech Sounds"(VN 91-108), “Introduction” to Future Primitive, "Chocco," (FP 189-214); "House of Bones," (FP 85-110), "Hinterlands" (BC 58-79). "They're Made out of Meat," (VN 69-72)."The Poplar Street Study" (VN 140-148); "The Belonging Kind" (BC 43-57).

Texts before midterm: Scriptural Texts of Creation & Apocalypse (esp. Revelation), Parable of the Sower,  "Stone Lives," "Bears Discover Fire," "Somebody up there Likes Me," The Time Machine, "Mozart in Mirrorshades," "Garden of Forking Paths," "The Gernsback Continuum," and "Better Be Ready 'bout Half Past Eight."

Advice: Don't hurry to email exam. When finished, take a break, then edit and improve. Readability, surface quality, and thematic organization are evaluated.

To enhance content, connect the course as offered to your own interests and insights.


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