College Motivation:
Why Bother to Try When Life Feels Like One Big Cruel Joke?
In 12 Rules for Life, Jordan Peterson says there comes a time when we all feel like life is one big cruel joke. We reach the point where we say, like George Carlin, “This place is a freak show. Why even bother?”
Peterson uses Tolstoy as an example of a successful, privileged, wealthy person, the Russian novelist Leo Tolstoy, who came to that point at the peak of his powers.
Tolstoy looked at the world, and said, and I paraphrase, “I hate this place. Evil triumphs over good more than not. Stupid people rise to high positions in the bureaucracies and make our lives miserable. And no matter how great our achievements, all those successes will be cancelled by death, so what’s the point? Planet Earth is a joke, man.”
Nihilism
When you’ve reached this point in your life, you’ve arrived at the Door of Nihilism, the belief that nothing matters in this world because there is no meaning. Nihilism tells us there is nothing to live for.
There are 5 ways to respond to this crisis of Nihilism.
One. You can retreat into childlike ignorance and pretend that evil and stupidity don’t exist.
Two. You can pursue mindless pleasures and hope to erase the pain of existence through sheer oblivion.
Three. You can grit your teeth and bear the misery of life like a stoic.
Four. You can end your life and be gone from this miserable place.
Thankfully, there is a fifth response.
ive. You can clean your room.
I mean this literally and metaphorically.
Here’s an example:
I remember when I was ten, I went out to the front of he house where my dad was changing the oil on his 1967 Chrysler Newport. I said, “Dad, I’m not happy. I’m bored.”
My dad was a military man, and he always spoke in a loud voice. He said, “Of course you’re unhappy. Have you looked at your room lately? It looks like a pigsty. What are you, a professional slob? Go clean your room. You’ll feel better afterwards.”
I cleaned my room and told my father I felt a lot better.
“Of course you feel better,” he said. “Did you think being a professional slob was going to make you happy?”
Jordan Peterson is also talking about cleaning our room in the spiritual, moral, and psychological sense.
We clean our room in the moral sense in 3 ways.
Number One: Cleaning your room means you stop doing what you know is wrong.
You could be spending too much time on your screen.
You could be hanging out with losers unworthy of your friendship who are dragging you down.
You could spending your money in irresponsible ways.
You could be eating in irresponsible ways.
You could be disrespectful to the people you care about most.
You could be driving too aggressively, especially when there are children in the car.
You could be whining about your kids on social media when you should get off social media and do something about your kids.
You might not brush your teeth and your breath is so bad you could breath on an elephant and it would collapse and die from anaphylactic shock. Stop telling me how depressed you are, and brush your teeth.
Cleaning up these behaviors is like cleaning your room. It’s a good step toward feeling less miserable about your existence.
Number Two. Cleaning up your life means taking stock of your bad behaviors rather than blaming the world.
It’s easy to blame external forces for our misery when too often 95% of our misery results from our own self-destructive behavior. Scapegoats are convenient because they give us an excuse to let ourselves off the hook.
Number Three. Don’t expect all of life answers to be presented to you at once. Be comforted by one piece of helpful wisdom at a time.
I had a student from Taiwan who shared a story with the class about a story his father told him about a young man who refused to live his life until God gave him all the answers.
My Risk and Success Factors in College
In 1979, I went to a Cal State in Northern California at the age of 17 shortly after my parents divorced. My mother was constantly short of money, and I was stressed out over finances to the point that I wanted to drop out of college and be a garbage man. During my freshman year in college, I was very close to dropping out or being expelled. These were the risk factors I faced:
Risk Factor #1: Garbage Man Temptation
I worked out at a gym with a lot of garbage men who said they could get me a garbage man job. They made about 35K a year, a lot of money in 1979, with full medical benefits. They worked from 5 to 10 a.m., went to the gym, then went home for the rest of their day. They owned their own house. A lot of them had beautiful wives and girlfriends.
From my vantage point, their lives seemed simple, relatively easy, financially secure. I found the whole thing very tempting. Being a garbage man felt like an instant way to become a man, to have spending power, and to take charge of my own destiny.
Ego, Insecurity, and Career Choice
But my father persuaded me that a garbage man job was a bad move for me. He explained it to me. “You’re too insecure to be a garbage man. You’ll be at a cocktail party and people will be introducing themselves: doctor, lawyer, engineer, architect, and you’ll have to blurt out your professional title as a garbageman. How do you think that’s going to fly? Knowing you, the whole thing will be an exercise in emasculation.”
He was right. He had a clear understanding of my personality: I couldn’t bear the thought of announcing to the world, especially at a cocktail party, that I was a garbage man. So that one imaginary scenario put the kibosh on my whole garbage man fantasy.
Nevertheless, for a long time my garbage man aspirations tempted me to drop out of college to the point that I didn’t focus on my studies my first year.
Risk Factor #2: High School Gave Me a False 4.0 GPA
My senior year my counselor larded me with praise for getting a 4.0 GPA at my high school in Northern California, but it wasn’t until I got into college that I realized my 4.0 was an inflated GPA and a completely worthless measure of my preparation for college.
I had no basic math, grammar, or writing skills. I had to take remedial math, and I got kicked out of my freshman composition class, what is called 1A at many community colleges.
Not only did I get kicked out of freshman composition class, I got kicked out of remedial English, what at the time was called “Bonehead English.” I’ll repeat that: I got kicked out of Bonehead English and was put into Pre-Bonehead English, a class so low they wouldn’t even give us a grade. They gave us a Pass or Fail.
Thank God we didn't have Facebook back then. Can you imagine my Facebook status: "Pre-Bonehead English student at College Such and Such."
Lack of basic math and writing skills made me an “at-risk” college freshman.
Risk Factor #3: My High School Buddies Ridiculed and Denigrated Me for Going to College Because Higher Education Wasn’t Considered Manly
I was at a party once and when my buddies got wind that I was attending Cal State, they laughed at me, and Steve Mumma said to me, “You know you’re just a bum like the rest of us. I guarantee next summer you’ll have dropped out of college and you’ll be drinking beer with us in the mud flats.”
Number one, I didn’t like the taste of beer, so Mumma was wrong on that count. Number two, I didn’t know anything about these “mud flats” he was referring to.
But the point is this: My buddies ridiculed me for going to college for two reasons: One, they believed I was too stupid for college, and, two, going to college was somehow an affront to my masculinity.
Not going to college and getting a full-time job, something like being a garbage man, was the most manly thing I could do.
Risk Factor #4: I Hated the Physical and Emotional Experience of Going to College
I was a big dude. I benched pressed over 400 pounds, squatted over 600 pounds. I had a beard. I didn’t smile. I had that thousand-mile stare that you’ll see in some homeless people. My professors were scared of me. Dogs were scared of me.
College Made Me Feel Claustrophobic
I hated the college environment. I was used to the big places, outdoors, gyms, football fields. That’s where I felt physically comfortable. But if you stuck me inside a classroom and I had to squeeze my body behind a little cramped desk, I became physically uncomfortable, tense, anxious, and claustrophobic to the point that I wanted to explode.
As a result, I had a difficult time listening to my professors. I would fidget and squirm in my seat and wait for the class to end the way a prisoner waits to get out of jail.
I hated driving to college. As soon I ascended the hill that led to the campus, and I could see the tip of the Administration Building, my stomach would tighten up, and I thought I was going to puke.
Risk Factor #5: I Lacked a Mentor Figure to Give Me Guidance
My father was remarried and busy tending to his new life, so he was not a big presence during this time.
My professors were smart, but none of them mentored me, partly because they were scared of me. I cultivated a burly physique and an intimidating personality.
Working on My Mad-Dog Affect
My mother was dating, and when she’d introduce me to her boyfriends and have me shake their hand, I'd mad-dog them before giving them a Bone-Crusher Handshake, one of those painful handshakes that squeeze their tendons just enough to let them know that I was the alpha male of the household. I was in charge, I was in control, I called the shots.
This angry persona repelled any potential mentor figures.
TV Mentor
The only mentor I can think of was a TV personality, a late-night comedian named David Letterman. I could tell by his deadpan persona and acid humor that he was a Partner in Crime in Being Pissed Off at the World, and I immediately identified with him, so I imitated a lot of his caustic, cynical humor and sarcastic word play.
I Eventually Became a Mentor
Because I lacked a mentor and because I ended up being a college professor, I decided many years ago to be a mentor at my college. I do two mentorships, Puente and Project Success, because I find a lot of young men are in a similar place I was at when I was their age.
So there I was:
One, worried about money
Two, discouraged from constant ridicule from my non-college-attending buddies
Three, distracted by dreams of being a garbage man
Four, humiliated that I was in Pre-Bonehead English
Five, stunned that my high school “4.0” GPA was a worthless measure of my college preparedness
Six, feeling physically sick while sitting in the classroom
Seven, lacking a mentor figure to give me any kind of direction with the possible exception of snide TV personalities like David Letterman
I had 7 strikes against me.
How do you think I did my first year of college?
Not surprisingly, not so well. I dropped a lot of classes, my GPA was barely 2.0, and I received a letter from the college telling me that my subpar, crappy performance put me on academic probation, and that if I did not improve, I could face expulsion.
Academic Probation Was the Turning Point
Getting that letter of probation was more of an affront to my masculinity that being berated by my high school buddies. My honor was on the line. My intelligence was being questioned.
I was pissed off in a good way because I wanted to defend my pride. After receiving that letter, I received mostly A grades and went on to get my Masters degree in English.
What were the success factors?
Success Factor #1: I Learned That Fear Could be a Tool for Self-Improvement
The very fear that made me hate college and gave me anxiety attacks inside the classroom could also be a tool for self-improvement: I saw my high school buddies with dead-end jobs, and I saw my Letter of Probation as motivational tools to take college seriously, to focus, and to develop consistent study habits.
Fear, Not Self-Will, Was the Motivator
I never felt I succeeded in college because of an act of will or an act of discipline but because every morning I felt a cold gun to my head threatening me with failure if I did not adhere to a consistent routine.
Success Factor #2: I Learned to Crave Solitude
The only way to advance in my studies was to be alone for long stretches in what is often called “time blocking,” those periods of the day where you give yourself a big chunk of time for isolated, sustained, focused study.
As my grades improved, I became dependent on my discipline as a way of giving me assurance that I was following the right path.
No Technology
I discovered the intellectual appeal of solitude in the early 1980s. This was long before the mass consumption of personal computers and smartphones, two devices that are vectors of social media and other forms of stimulation that are an impediment to solitude and achieving long stretches of sustained focus.
I don’t know if I could have succeeded in college if I had, like most contemporary Americans, the constant need to be tied to my smartphone, the constant need to text, and the constant need to check my social media status.
My guess is that I may have failed college and ended up being a garbage man.
Success Factor #3: I Learned to Hate My Own Ignorance
The more I learned, the more I realized how ignorant I was, and I detested my own sense of ignorance and stupidity and felt compelled to make up for lost time by reading like a demon.
For example, I learned through reading The Autobiography of Malcolm X that the version of American history that public school taught me was a saccharine fairy tale, that in fact real American history was a narrative about a racist kleptocracy.
Through reading, I could see the curtain of delusion and deceptive mythologies part before my eyes and I could see the truth lurking backstage.
I’d read several books a week, books that were not even assigned on my college syllabus.
Success Factor #4: I Broke My Past Ties
I never resented or officially rejected my high school buddies. I simply lost contact with them. It was a slow entropy (decline) of my past ties. We simply parted ways.
I find a lot of college students don’t find success until they break away from their past. Failure to break from past ties often leads to stagnation and failure to progress in college.
Success Factor #5: I Was Smart Enough to Know I Was Too Dumb and Emotionally Unstable to Organize My Life Without College
As a college student, I was completely lost in many ways: I was emotionally disoriented so that I could only see the outside world through the blurry haze of several layers of emotional upheaval; I lacked a clear career objective. I didn’t know what I what do with a college degree.
But I was smart enough to know that I was an unstable, angry young man who needed the responsibility of showing up to class and turning in assignments.
I knew that adhering to a strict routine would prevent me from going completely crazy and give me the credentials I would need to get some kind of decent job, the kind of job that wouldn’t make me feel ashamed when I introduced myself to someone at a cocktail party.
Probably Most of Us Will Benefit from College
Some of us don’t need college, but in my experience those people are the exception; they constitute less than 1% of us.
You can alway point to some tech genius or entrepreneurial super star or famous YouTuber who becomes a marquee name in the business world. But these people are rare, less than one percent.
Relying on anecdotal evidence to argue that you don’t need a college degree is faulty reasoning and shows a lack of critical thinking skills.
In all probability, most people will find the time and investment in college is a long-term benefit.
People will say, “McMahon you’re so talented you don’t need a college degree.”
“Really? I’m talented. How so?”
“You play piano.”
“I know piano players who play better than I do, and they’re homeless.”
“You’re a novelist. You could write best-selling novels.”
“I know novelists who write better than I do, and they’re homeless.”
“You’re funny. You could be a comedian.”
“I know comedians who are funnier than I am, and they’re homeless.”
“McMahon, you’re edgy. You could be a TV writer.”
“I know aspiring TV writers who are sleeping behind alley trash cans in North Hollywood, who haven’t had a decent meal or a shower in six months, and whose only friend is a stray three-legged pitbull with one eye and a bad case of mange.”
College is probably your best bet.
Turnitin Code: 18587657
Password: Endure
McMahon English 1A Syllabus Fall 2018
Office H121P; Phone Extension: 5673
Office Hours:
Monday and Wednesday: 2:35-3:45
Tuesday and Thursday: 12:30-1 and 3:25-4:15
Email: [email protected]
Books and Materials You Need to Buy for This Class
Cooked by Jeff Henderson
Rules for Writers, 8th Edition by Diana Hacker
1 pocketed, flat folder for your Homework Portfolio
Work You Must Do in This Class
One. You will write five typed, 1,200-word essays in MLA format. The fifth essay, your capstone essay, will need 5 sources for your Works Cited. These essays will be uploaded on turnitin.
Late Essays
Late essays are accepted for a week after deadline and are marked down a full grade. Essays 1-4 are 135 points. Your fifth essay, your capstone, is 260 points.
Two. You must generate a writing response to every reading. Instead of getting quizzed on the readings, you will write 3-paragraph reading-response essays to the readings. Each mini essay should have at least 3 signal phrases citing the text of the assigned reading. You will not be uploading these essays on turnitin.com. Instead, you will bring a typed hard copy to class and discussing it with your team of 3 or 4 students. Classes will typically start with a 20-minute discussion about the reading response while I mark them with a teacher’s signature. The mini essay will be signed with either an excellent top-grade mark or a middling mediocre mark. An unacceptable essay won’t be marked. You will keep these essays in a flat, pocketed folder, which I will grade during Finals Week. Unless you have a doctor’s note, you cannot make-up missing mini essays. You should be motivated to show up to every class. Your portfolio is worth 200 points, 20% of your total grade.
Three. Before the 1,200-word typed essays are due on turnitin, there is a peer edit session with some exceptions like when a holiday falls the week before final due date. You bring hard copies of your completed typed draft so your team can review your work, and you can review theirs. Like your mini essays, the completed draft gets a stamp, either a top-tier stamp or a middling one.
Grading Based on 1,000 Points and 13,500 Words Written Over the Semester (about 110 words a day).
One. First four 1,200-word essays are 135 points each (540 subtotal).
Two. Final Capstone Essay with 5 sources: 1,200-word essay is 260 points.
Three. Homework Portfolio includes all your mini essays and peer edit drafts (kept in flat pocketed folders) parts 1 and 2, 100 each, for 200 points
Grading Point Scheme
Total Points: 1,000 (A is 900-100; B is 800-899; C is 700-799; D is 600 to 699)
Essay #1 Options with 2 sources (Brooks and Henderson) Due 9-17-18
Option One. Apply the wisdom of Arthur C. Brooks’ essay “Love People, Not Pleasure” to develop a thesis that analyzes the personal transformation of Jeff Henderson rendered in his memoir Cooked.
Suggested Outline:
Paragraph 1: Summarize Brooks’ essay.
Paragraph 2: Summarize Henderson’s memoir.
Paragraph 3: Your thesis that shows how Henderson’s transformation illustrated Brooks’ ideas.
Paragraphs 4-8 will support your thesis.
Paragraph 9, your conclusion, will restate your thesis in dramatic form.
1,200-word total
Sources and Signal Phrases for Essay #1
You need only two sources, Henderson’s book and Brooks’ essay, but you must use at least 6 different signal phrases for using in-text citations in the form of quotations, paraphrase and summary.
Option Two. A wise man once said that when we think we're rising in life, we're really falling and when we think we're falling, we're really rising. In a 6-page essay, apply this wisdom, in all of its psychological complexity, to Jeff Henderson's journey and compare to someone from a personal interview. Use blog, book, and personal interview for your sixth page, your Works Cited page.
Suggested Outline:
Paragraph 1: Write a narrative of someone who thought he or she was rising but was actually falling.
Paragraph 2: Summarize Henderson’s memoir.
Paragraph 3: Your thesis analyzes how Henderson’s memoir is an illustration of the wise man’s adage with 5 mapping components.
Paragraphs 4-8 will support your thesis.
Conclusion, a dramatic restatement of your thesis.
1,200 words
Sources and Signal Phrases for Essay #1, Option B:
You need only one source, Henderson’s book, but you must use at least 6 different signal phrases for using in-text citations in the form of quotations, paraphrase and summary.
Essay #2 Due on 10-3-18
For Essay #2, you need 2 credible sources minimum for your MLA format Works Cited page.
Option One: In the context of Debra Dickerson’s “The Great White Way,” develop a thesis that evaluates the assertion that race is not an objective reality but a malignant fabrication designed to enable a history of American kleptocracy in order to give power to one group and take away power from other groups. I recommend you consult the online essay “The Case for Reparations” by Ta-Nehisi Coates.
Option Two. Compare the theme of kleptocracy in Debra Dickerson’s “The Great White Way” with Jordan Peele’s movie Get Out.
Option Three. In the context of Jamelle Bouie’s “Remembering History as Fable,” develop a thesis that evaluates the assertion that for many Americans the Civil War denies real history and replaces that real history with a pernicious mythology that perpetuates the false doctrine of white supremacy.
Option Four. In an essay of appropriate length, defend, refute, or complicate Cal Newport’s argument from his book excerpt (available online) from So Good They Can't Ignore You that the Passion Hypothesis is dangerous and should be replaced by the craftsman mindset.
Option Five. Develop a thesis that analyzes the human inclination for staying within the tribe of sameness as explained in David Brooks’ “People Like Us.”
Essay #3 Options Due 10-22-18
You need minimum of 3 sources for your MLA Works Cited page.
Option One. In the context of “Prudence Or Cruelty?” by Nicholas Kristoff, develop an argument that defends, refutes, or complicates Kristoff’s claim that food stamps are an essential good for the vulnerable population.
Option Two. In the contest of Leslie Morgan Steiner’s “Who Becomes a Surrogate?”, defend, support, or complicate the assertion that surrogate motherhood is a moral abomination or at the very least too tied up with legal complications to make it a viable and moral service.
Option Three. In the context of Julia Belluz’s “We’re barely using the best tool we have to fight obesity,” develop a thesis that argues for or against the effectiveness and safety of bariatric surgery.
Option Four. Read Linda Tirado’s famous blog post “This Is Why Poor People’s Bad Decisions Make Perfect Sense” and Derek Thompson’s “Your Brain on Poverty” and develop a thesis that defends, refutes, or complicates the assertion that Tirado and Thompson’s essays are guilty of painting the poor as helpless victims and as a result doing a disservice to the poor.
Essay #4 Due Date: 11-14-18
You need a minimum of 3 sources for your Works Cited page.
Option One. Read Tristan Harris’ “Our Minds Have Been Hijacked by Our Phones,” “How Technology Hijacks People’s Minds,” and his Ted Talk video. Then develop a thesis that evaluates the validity of his claim that technology, especially smartphones, are not empowering us but “hijacking” our freedom and autonomy and working against our best interests.
Option Two. Read Jean Twenge’s “Have Smartphones Destroyed a Generation?” and write an essay that argues for or against Twenge’s claim that smartphones combined with helicopter parenting are resulting in delayed development of Millennials and Generation Z (born after mid 90s).
Option Three. Read Adam Gopnik’s “The Caging of America” and write a thesis that supports, refutes, or complicates the claim that mass incarceration is “The New Jim Crow.”
Option Four. Watch John Oliver’s critique of Sinclair news and support, refute, or complicate Oliver’s argument that Sinclair is morally wrong to “insert political opinions into local news.”
Option Five. Read Richard Florida’s “Immigrants Boost Wages for Everyone” and write an essay that analyzes the validity of Florida’s claim. I recommend you see Vice Video “Home Sweet Alabama.”
Essay #5 Due Date: 12-12-18
You need 5 credible sources for the MLA Works Cited page in your final capstone essay.
Option One. In context of Alfie Kohn’s “From Degrading to De-Grading,” support, refute, or complicate Alfie Kohn’s assertion that grading is an inferior education tool that all conscientious teachers should abandon. In other words, will students benefit from an accountability-free education? Why? Explain.
Option Two. Read Bell Hooks’ “Learning in the Shadow of Race and her essay “keeping close to home.” In the context of those essays, support, refute, or complicate the inferred lesson from bell hooks’ essay, “Learning in the Shadow of Race and Class” that upward mobility requires a betrayal of one’s economic class and even family. To rub shoulders with the privileged, do we have to "sell out," to conform to their snobbish ways, and in doing so, are we betraying our core values and turning our backs on our roots?
Option Three. Read Cryan Caplan’s “The World Might be Better Off Without College for Everyone” and write an essay that analyzes the validity of his claim. You should see this critical review in The Washington Post of Caplan’s ideas.
Option Four. Watch John Oliver’s video about standardized testing and support, refute, or complicate Oliver’s claim that standardized education is a fiasco in every sense of the word.
Option Five. Read “Choosing School for My Daughter in a Segregated City” and develop an argument over what the best moral choice is for Nikole Hannah-Jones as she decides on what kind of school is best for her daughter (vs. the interests of society at large?)
Option Five. Read “Are Private Schools Immoral?” and write an argument about the moral implications of sending one’s children to private schools.
Option Six. Read Will Stancil’s “School Segregation Is Not a Myth” and develop a thesis about the inequality of education in America.
Your guidelines for your Final Research Paper are as follows:
This research paper should present a thesis that is specific, manageable, provable, and contestable—in other words, the thesis should offer a clear position, stand, or opinion that will be proven with research.
You should analyze and prove your thesis using examples and quotes from a variety of sources.
You need to research and cite from at least five sources. You must use at least 3 different types of sources.
At least one source must be from an ECC library database.
At least one source must be a book, anthology or textbook.
At least one source must be from a credible website, appropriate for academic use.
The paper should not over-rely on one main source for most of the information. Rather, it should use multiple sources and synthesize the information found in them.
This paper will be approximately 5-7 pages in length, not including the Works Cited page, which is also required. This means at least 5 full pages of text. The Works Cited page does NOT count towards length requirement.
You must use MLA format for the document, in-text citations, and Works Cited page.
You must integrate quotations and paraphrases using signal phrases and analysis or commentary.
You must sustain your argument, use transitions effectively, and use correct grammar, spelling, and punctuation.
Your paper must be logically organized and focused.
Late papers reduced a full grade. No late papers accepted a week past due date.
Peer Edit
You must do a peer edit. You must show up to class on peer edit day with a completed typed draft for 20 points.
You Can’t “Ride” the Class
If you’re “riding” the class, that is missing more than 10% of classes and not keeping up with assignments, you can’t fulfill the Student Learning Outcomes, and you will be dropped.
You Must Use turnitin to submit essay and bring hard copy on due date
Each essay must be submitted to www.turnitin.com where it will be checked for illegal copying/plagiarism. I cannot give credit for an essay that is not submitted to this site by the deadline.
The process is very simple; if you need help, detailed instructions are available at http://turnitin.com/en_us/training/student-training/student-quickstart-guide
You will need two pieces of information to use the site:
Class ID and Enrollment Password, which I will give you first week of class
Classroom Decorum: No smart phones can be used in class. If you’re on your smartphone and I see you, you get a warning the first time. Second time, you must leave the class and take an absence
Tardies: Two tardies equals one absence.
Homework for Your Portfolio
Your Homework Portfolio connects with a 20-minute class activity that begins the class in your team (of 3 or 4 people).
Your essays are of the “mini” variety: 3 paragraphs, 350 words long, and have at least 3 signal phrases citing the text in the form of direct quotations, paraphrase, or summary.
Almost every class-assigned reading has a mini essay that you will keep in your portfolio.
Every class, while you discuss the study question with your team, I will come around and put a stamp on the completed typed mini essay.
Even though I grade your Portfolio mid-way into the semester as “Portfolio 1,” keep all your subsequent essays in the same Homework Portfolio. In other words, don’t throw your hard-copies of your essay away after I grade “Portfolio 1.”
Course Catalog Description:
This course is designed to strengthen the students’ ability to read with understanding and discernment, to discuss assigned readings intelligently, and to write clearly. Emphasis will be on writing essays in which each paragraph relates to a controlling idea, has an introduction and a conclusion, and contains primary and secondary support. College-level reading material will be assigned to provide the stimulus for class discussion and writing assignments, including a required research paper.
Course Objectives:
One. Recognize and revise sentence-level grammar and usage errors.
Two. Read and apply critical-thinking skills to numerous published articles and to college-level, book-length works for the purpose of writing and discussion.
Three. Apply appropriate strategies in the writing process including prewriting, composing, revising, and editing techniques.
Four. Compose multi-paragraph, thesis-driven essays with logical and appropriate supporting ideas, and with unity and coherence.
Five. Demonstrate ability to locate and utilize a variety of academic databases, peer-reviewed journals, and scholarly websites.
Six. Utilize MLA guidelines to format essays, cite sources in the texts of essays, and compile Works Cited lists.
Student Learning Outcomes:
Upon completion of this course, students will:
- Complete a research-based essay that has been written out of class and undergone revision. It should demonstrate the student’s ability to thoughtfully support a single thesis using analysis and synthesis.
- Integrate multiple sources, including a book-length work and a variety of academic databases, peer-reviewed journals, and scholarly websites. Citations must be in MLA format and include a Works Cited page.
- Demonstrate logical paragraph composition and sentence structure. The essay should have correct grammar, spelling, and word use.
Students with Disabilities:
It is the policy of the El Camino Community College District to encourage full inclusion of people with disabilities in all programs and services. Students with disabilities who believe they may need accommodations in this class should contact the campus Special Resource Center (310) 660-3295, as soon as possible. This will ensure that students are able to fully participate.
Academic Honesty and Plagiarism:
El Camino College places a high value on the integrity of its student scholars. When an instructor determines that there is evidence of dishonesty in any academic work (including, but not limited to cheating, plagiarism, or theft of exam materials), disciplinary action appropriate to the misconduct as defined in BP 5500 may be taken. A failing grade on an assignment in which academic dishonesty has occurred and suspension from class are among the disciplinary actions for academic dishonesty (AP 5520). Students with any questions about the Academic Honesty or discipline policies are encouraged to speak with their instructor in advance.
Attendance and Class Participation
You can’t miss more than 4 classes. A tardy counts as one half an absence. These rules are designed so that we will be compliant with Title 5 Contact Hour Laws prescribed by the State of California.
Student Resources:
- Reading Success Center (East Library Basement E-36)
- Software and tutors are available for vocabulary development & reading comprehension.
- Library Media Technology Center - LMTC (East Library Basement)
- Computers are available for free use. Bring your student ID # & flash drive. There’s a charge for printing.
- Writing Center (H122)
- Computers are available for free use. Free tutoring is available for writing assignments, grammar, and vocabulary. Bring your student ID & flash drive to save work. Printing is NOT available.
- Learning Resource Center - LRC (West Wing of the Library, 2nd floor)
- The LRC Tutorial Program offers free drop-in tutoring. For the tutoring schedule, go to www.elcamino.edu/library/lrc/tutoring .The LRC also offers individualized computer adaptive programs to help build your reading comprehension skills.
- Student Health Center (Next to the Pool)
- The Health Center offers free medical and psychological services as well as free workshops on topics like “test anxiety.” Low cost medical testing is also available.
- Special Resource Center – SRC (Southwest Wing of Student Services Building)
The SRC provides free disability services, including interpreters, testing accommodations, counseling, and adaptive computer technology.
Reading and Writing Schedule
Note: Because current events can be fluid and because online essays can without warning become unavailable, the professor can, at his discretion, modify the syllabus to accommodate the aforementioned conditions.
8-27 Introduction, Syllabus, password for turnitin, look at first writing assignment, read Arthur C. Brooks’ essay “Love People, Not Pleasure.” Find a team of 3 or 4 classmates for your peer edit classes.
8-29 Cooked, read 1-60; homework #1 due: Write a 3-paragraph typed essay that explains 3 ways Henderson’s childhood shaped his personality. Comma splice lesson.
9-3 Holiday
9-5 Cooked, read 61-200; homework #2 due: Write a 3-paragraph typed essay that analyzes the causes of Henderson’s initial self-pity in prison. Signal phrase lesson.
9-10 Cooked, read 201 to end; homework #3 due: Write a 3-paragraph essay that analyzes the proposition that Henderson’s post-prison struggles were more difficult than his in-prison struggles. Sentence fragment lesson.
9-12 Peer Edit; bring typed draft for your team members.
9-17 Essay #1 due to be uploaded on turnitin; go over Essay 2 options, read Debra Dickerson’s “The Great White Way.”
9-19 Homework #4: Read Jamelle Bouie’s “Remembering History as Fable” and write a 3-paragraph essay that explains how an absence of black voices contributes to a pernicious mythology about the Civil War.
9-24 Homework #5: Read Cal Newport’s book excerpt from So Good They Can’t Ignore You and write a 3-paragraph essay that explains 3 dangerous features of the Passion Hypothesis.
9-26 Homework #6: Read David Brooks’ “People Like Us” and provide 3 reasons people stick to their tribe in a 3-paragraph essay.
10-1 Peer Edit
10-3 Essay #2 Due; We will go over Essay 3 options and read “Prudence Or Cruelty?” by Nicholas Kristoff.
10-8 Homework #7: Read Leslie Morgan Steiner’s “Who Becomes a Surrogate?” and analyze the tensions between paying parents and paid surrogate in a 3-paragraph essay. We will also read part of “Is a Surrogate a Mother?” by Michelle Goldberg and look for updates on the horrible case of Melissa Cook.
10-10 Homework #8: Read Julia Belluz’s “We’re barely using the best tool we have to fight obesity” and in a 3-paragraph essay analyze the causes of Bulluz’s optimism about bariatric surgery.
10-15 Homework #9: Read Linda Tirado’s famous blog post “This Is Why Poor People’s Bad Decisions Make Perfect Sense,” Barbara Ehrenreich’s “It Is Expensive to be Poor,” and Derek Thompson’s “Your Brain on Poverty” and in a 3-paragraph essay analyze the validity of their claim that poverty is a vicious cycle of helplessness and victimization.
10-17 Peer Edit for Essay #3 and Portfolio Part 1 up to Homework #9.
10-22 Essay #3 Due; Read Tristan Harris’ “Our Minds Have Been Hijacked by Our Phones,” “How Technology Hijacks People’s Minds,” and his Ted Talk video.
10-24 Homework #10: Read Jean Twenge’s “Have Smartphones Destroyed a Generation?” and write a 3-paragraph essay about the alleged delayed development Millennials face from smartphones and helicopter parents.
10-29 Homework #11: Read Adam Gopnik’s “The Caging of America” and write a 3-paragraph essay that explains why mass incarceration is America’s greatest scandal.
10-31 Homework #12: Watch John Oliver’s video critique of Sinclair news write a 3-paragraph essay that analyzes why Oliver claims Sinclair is morally wrong to “insert political opinions into local news. Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GvtNyOzGogc
We will also read Vox’s explanation of Sinclair.
11-5 Homework #13: Read Richard Florida’s “Immigrants Boost Wages for Everyone” and write a 3-paragraph essay that analyzes the validity of Florida’s claim. See Vice Video “Home Sweet Alabama.”
11-7 Peer Edit
11-12 Holiday
11-14 Essay # 4 due; look at Essay 5 options; read Alfie Kohn’s “From Degrading to De-Grading.”
11-19 Homework #14: Read Bell Hooks’ “Learning in the Shadow of Race and Class” and write a 3-paragraph essay that explains the conflict Bell Hooks has about how her education gave her privilege on one hand and challenged her not be a sellout on the other. Also look at Bell Hooks’ “keeping close to home.”
11-21 Homework #15: Read Cryan Caplan’s “The World Might be Better Off Without College for Everyone” and write a 3-paragraph essay that analyzes the validity of his claim.
11-26 Watch John Oliver’s video about standardized testing and pursue the arguments against it with appropriate counterarguments. Also see this Daily Beast update. And this YouTube video update.
11-28 Homework #16: Read “Choosing School for My Daughter in a Segregated City” and in a 3-paragraph analyze the crisis of race,class, and structural inequality.
12-3 Homework #17: Read “Are Private Schools Immoral?” and write a 3-paragraph essay that analyzes the validity of the author’s claim.
12-5 Homework #18: Read Will Stancil’s “School Segregation Is Not a Myth” and write a 3-paragraph essay that evaluates the validity of the author’s claim.
12-10 Peer Edit
12-12 Essay 5 Due and Portfolio Check Part 2 up to Homework #18
***
Essay 1, Option A
Essay #1 Options with 2 sources (Brooks and Henderson) Due 9-17-18
Apply the wisdom of Arthur C. Brooks’ essay “Love People, Not Pleasure” to develop a thesis that analyzes the personal transformation of Jeff Henderson rendered in his memoir Cooked.
Suggested Outline:
Paragraph 1: Summarize Brooks’ essay.
Paragraph 2: Summarize Henderson’s memoir.
Paragraph 3: Your thesis that shows how Henderson’s transformation illustrated Brooks’ ideas.
Paragraphs 4-8 will support your thesis.
Paragraph 9, your conclusion, will restate your thesis in dramatic form.
1,200-word total
Sources and Signal Phrases for Essay #1
You need only two sources, Henderson’s book and Brooks’ essay, but you must use at least 6 different signal phrases for using in-text citations in the form of quotations, paraphrase and summary.
"Love People, Not Pleasure" by Arthur C. Brooks
One. Happiness Fallacy:
That a life of power and money can afford you pleasures that will result in happiness. Brooks looks at the most powerful, wealthy people chronicled in history, and even they are miserable 99% of the time.
Part of this misery is due to the "hedonic treadmill," the idea that we acclimate to pleasure so that whatever it is we're addicted to for a spike in endorphins, we become numb to it to the point that we crash and sink into a depression.
All pleasures start out with a spike in dopamine, which becomes addictive, but eventually we need more and more stimulation to experience pleasure and we inevitably burn out.
Jeff Henderson becomes wealthier and wealthier and lives a more and more reckless lifestyle, accumulating cars, flying to Las Vegas with his posse, and his extravagant lifestyle attracts the attention from law enforcement, the feds.
My wife's friend has a cousin who poses with her boyfriend for Instagram photographs, and she has hundreds of thousands of followers. This model can never get enough "likes" and followers. She's addicted to social media attention, she's a slave to posing with her boyfriend for attention, and she is progressively getting more and more miserable. But she can't see her misery. She is in denial.
Like the Instagram model, Jeff Henderson is operating under the fallacy that unbridled pleasure is the key to happiness, and in the process he fails to develop real connections with people.
Two. The Unhappiness Fallacy:
Actually, we're dealing with two fallacies: That unhappiness is a bad thing and that unhappiness excludes happiness.
Unhappiness is not bad. Unhappiness is normal. Life is full of evil and conflict, so a certain degree of unhappiness is a normal thing.
In fact, addressing evil and engaging with conflict gives life meaning, so we must not avoid unhappiness. Rather, we must struggle against the things that make us unhappy.
Also, unhappiness is a state of hard work that leads to positive outcome. Imagine the piano player who is unhappy playing tedious scales and arpeggios on the piano, but all in the service of improving on the piano.
In life, we are miserable if we don't progress and improve towards a meaningful goal, and this type of progress requires focus, isolation, sacrifice, and hard work, the kind that is not associated with happiness and pleasure.
Every semester, I will have about two or three "star students" in a class. These are hard-working perfectionists who take so much pride in their work that if I were a CEO of a company I would hire those 3 students out of a class of 30. I said such to an employer who called me about a former student, and based on my testimony the student got the job.
Such students are not enamored by short-term pleasure. Such students embrace sacrifice, hard work (not hanging out with their buddies at night so they can study), and see a certain amount of drudgery and unhappiness as essential to achieving their goals.
The second fallacy is that unhappiness excludes happiness. Actually, according to Arthur C. Brooks, the most happy people can simultaneously experience unhappiness.
As Brooks observes:
What is unhappiness? Your intuition might be that it is simply the opposite of happiness, just as darkness is the absence of light. That is not correct. Happiness and unhappiness are certainly related, but they are not actually opposites. Images of the brain show that parts of the left cerebral cortex are more active than the right when we are experiencing happiness, while the right side becomes more active when we are unhappy.
As strange as it seems, being happier than average does not mean that one can’t also be unhappier than average. One test for both happiness and unhappiness is the Positive Affectivity and Negative Affectivity Schedule test. I took the test myself. I found that, for happiness, I am at the top for people my age, sex, occupation and education group. But I get a pretty high score for unhappiness as well. I am a cheerful melancholic.
Three. Misguided Attempts at Happiness Backfire
We can look to all sorts of addicts to see how their addiction, an attempt to escape misery and find pleasure, backfires and results in misery. Of course, there is drug addiction, but there are many others: social media attention, Swiss timepieces, shoes, cars, getting ripped muscles, etc. But the drug eventually becomes the poison. As Brooks explains:
Have you ever known an alcoholic? They generally drink to relieve craving or anxiety — in other words, to attenuate a source of unhappiness. Yet it is the drink that ultimately prolongs their suffering. The same principle was at work for Abd al-Rahman in his pursuit of fame, wealth and pleasure.
Four. Intrinsic Vs. Extrinsic Happiness
Intrinsic happiness refers to character building, the state of our soul, defined by the connections we make with others, creative pursuits, our contributions to society, and our ability to find meaning in suffering.
Extrinsic happiness refers to the materialistic script society hands us: Go to college, get a job so you can make money to buy lots of stuff, show off your stuff to family and friends to win their approval, curate your "amazing existence" on Facebook, etc. Then die and have hundreds of people weep at your funeral.
According to Brooks, intrinsic happiness is the way to go. He writes:
Consider fame. In 2009, researchers from the University of Rochester conducted a study tracking the success of 147 recent graduates in reaching their stated goals after graduation. Some had “intrinsic” goals, such as deep, enduring relationships. Others had “extrinsic” goals, such as achieving reputation or fame. The scholars found that intrinsic goals were associated with happier lives. But the people who pursued extrinsic goals experienced more negative emotions, such as shame and fear. They even suffered more physical maladies.
This is one of the cruelest ironies in life. I work in Washington, right in the middle of intensely public political battles. Bar none, the unhappiest people I have ever met are those most dedicated to their own self-aggrandizement — the pundits, the TV loudmouths, the media know-it-alls. They build themselves up and promote their images, but feel awful most of the time.
That’s the paradox of fame. Just like drugs and alcohol, once you become addicted, you can’t live without it. But you can’t live with it, either. Celebrities have described fame like being “an animal in a cage; a toy in a shop window; a Barbie doll; a public facade; a clay figure; or, that guy on TV,” according to research by the psychologist Donna Rockwell. Yet they can’t give it up.
That impulse to fame by everyday people has generated some astonishing innovations. One is the advent of reality television, in which ordinary people become actors in their day-to-day lives for others to watch. Why? “To be noticed, to be wanted, to be loved, to walk into a place and have others care about what you’re doing, even what you had for lunch that day: that’s what people want, in my opinion,” said one 26-year-old participant in an early hit reality show called “Big Brother.”
And then there’s social media. Today, each of us can build a personal little fan base, thanks to Facebook, YouTube, Twitter and the like. We can broadcast the details of our lives to friends and strangers in an astonishingly efficient way. That’s good for staying in touch with friends, but it also puts a minor form of fame-seeking within each person’s reach. And several studies show that it can make us unhappy.
Five. Jeff Henderson's memoir Cooked is largely about a man who transitions from an extrinsic quest for happiness to an intrinsic quest.
Henderson is miserable and suffering from soul rot during his obsession with finding extrinsic notions of happiness, but his soul finds redemption and he becomes a happier man when he helps the community and his family through an intrinsic search for happiness.
Six. Extrinsic Happiness Is Born from Our Inner Reptile
Our Inner Reptile desires dominance and reproductive success by showing signs of power. Therefore, our instincts are to get as rich, famous, and powerful as we can. But Brooks observes that these unbridled instincts can backfire.
As Brooks observes:
From an evolutionary perspective, it makes sense that we are wired to seek fame, wealth and sexual variety. These things make us more likely to pass on our DNA. Had your cave-man ancestors not acquired some version of these things (a fine reputation for being a great rock sharpener; multiple animal skins), they might not have found enough mating partners to create your lineage.
But here’s where the evolutionary cables have crossed: We assume that things we are attracted to will relieve our suffering and raise our happiness. My brain says, “Get famous.” It also says, “Unhappiness is lousy.” I conflate the two, getting, “Get famous and you’ll be less unhappy.”
But that is Mother Nature’s cruel hoax. She doesn’t really care either way whether you are unhappy — she just wants you to want to pass on your genetic material. If you conflate intergenerational survival with well-being, that’s your problem, not nature’s. And matters are hardly helped by nature’s useful idiots in society, who propagate a popular piece of life-ruining advice: “If it feels good, do it.” Unless you share the same existential goals as protozoa, this is often flat-out wrong.
More philosophically, the problem stems from dissatisfaction — the sense that nothing has full flavor, and we want more. We can’t quite pin down what it is that we seek. Without a great deal of reflection and spiritual hard work, the likely candidates seem to be material things, physical pleasures or favor among friends and strangers.
We look for these things to fill an inner emptiness. They may bring a brief satisfaction, but it never lasts, and it is never enough. And so we crave more. This paradox has a word in Sanskrit: upadana, which refers to the cycle of craving and grasping. As the Dhammapada (the Buddha’s path of wisdom) puts it: “The craving of one given to heedless living grows like a creeper. Like the monkey seeking fruits in the forest, he leaps from life to life... Whoever is overcome by this wretched and sticky craving, his sorrows grow like grass after the rains.”
Seven. Extrinsic Happiness Makes Us Users of People
Brooks writes:
This search for fame, the lust for material things and the objectification of others — that is, the cycle of grasping and craving — follows a formula that is elegant, simple and deadly:
Love things, use people.
Jeff Henderson up to about page 100 or so of his memoir, loves things and he uses people.
Eight. Most of us sleepwalk through life in our quest for pleasure
Brooks observes that our default setting is to seek pleasure and use people, and that most of us aren't even aware of this fact because we are "sleepwalking." As he writes:
This was Abd al-Rahman’s formula as he sleepwalked through life. It is the worldly snake oil peddled by the culture makers from Hollywood to Madison Avenue. But you know in your heart that it is morally disordered and a likely road to misery. You want to be free of the sticky cravings of unhappiness and find a formula for happiness instead. How? Simply invert the deadly formula and render it virtuous:
Love people, use things.
Only because Jeff Henderson hit rock bottom and had his "butt handed to him on a stick" did he wake up from his sleepwalking ways and go on a heroic journey to find redemption for his soul. He learned to love people and use things.