Freie Universität Berlin

Thank you all for a very intense double session last Friday! For those who could not be there, here is a recap of what we discussed in photographs:

And for the Appadurai, I tried to collect your explanations of the most important ideas in a very sophisticated graphical display. Judge for yourself:

At the very least, it is food for thought.

Second Writing Assignment

We also took some time to talk about the next writing assignment. In short, it is a free essay, that should be like the first but on a thesis/topic you pick yourself. It must reference texts we read in the second phase “The subject and the global” and you are strongly encouraged to use sources beyond the set readings of the course. The essay must also adhere to academic standards of referencing, although given time constraints I will go lightly on the “alls references must follow one format requirement” for this draft version. You can improve on that in the rework. The same goes for the length requirement – after the rework the essay should be about 2000-2500 words in length, but if you do not hit that mark yet, that’s fine.

As for the style, discussing a strong statement such as the ones I set for the first assignment will do the trick. Try to be bold, as this encourages argumentation and this is what I am looking for here. If you feel, that could best be achieved by a text format beyond the traditional academic essay – a story, an interview – you are invited to try this out. If it really fails, we will have time to fix this in the rework. If you have questions, please contact me. However, the best way is to think of the concrete problem you have and write it down for me (!), because that makes it easier for me to decide how best to assist you. And keep in mind, that you will have time to make improvements.

The final deadline is June 10, 2016 at 19:00!

Send an anonymized version of the paper as well one with your name on it!

There will be a writing session to discuss these texts as well. I have decided to go for the double blind peer review. I will write a little bit next week on the strength and weaknesses of such a process. Some organisational issues result. This is how I will address them:

• Everyone (also those who wrote a paper) must write a short review on ONE paper of approximately 200-250 words. It should answer the same questions as were posed for the first essay.
• These reports must be completed by June 16th and send to me in two versions, one with your name and one without. I will forward the anonymous version to the author.
• I will assign the papers to be commented on.
• You will be required to read at least that one paper and encouraged to read all.

Tags: Appadurai, Bayart, globalization, imagination, review, writing

Der Beitrag wurde am Sunday, den 5. June 2016 um 12:02 Uhr von Ulrike veröffentlicht und wurde unter Marginalia abgelegt. Sie können die Kommentare zu diesem Eintrag durch den RSS 2.0 Feed verfolgen. Sie können einen Kommentar schreiben, oder einen Trackback auf Ihrer Seite einrichten.