The impact of modern technology on human life

Assignment: For your first essay, you examined two quite different perspectives on the effects of our reliance on contemporary technology, digital and otherwise. Now it’s time to examine other perspectives on the same general topic, synthesize and evaluate the information and ideas you gather, and create an argument of your own regarding some aspect of the impact of modern technology on human life. You’ll be directing your argument to members of the academic discourse community—no surprise there, eh?—and, once again, you can assume your readers are generally familiar with the topic you’re discussing, though not specialists on that topic. As with your first essay, be sure to show me a plan for this essay and at least one working draft, and be sure to let at least two peer consultants from our class have a look at drafts as well.
You’ll probably want to review your original articles once more. Following this review, it’ll be time to scout up some sources and perspectives on your own; this, of course, is what we call research and will likely involve material both from the library and from the internet, as well, perhaps, as other possible sources of information. In-class learning activities should be helpful at this stage of things.
Essentially, this is all brainstorming, and by the time you’ve completed all this reading, questioning, and reflecting you should be ready to fashion a thoughtful argument of your own concerning some facet of your topic. Bear in mind that this essay should be relatively brief (probably around four pages, not counting the works cited page), so your specific topic and controlling idea need to be sufficiently limited. That is, rather than attempting to say everything you can think of about technology and/or human cognition, you’ll probably choose to take a side in a current technology-related controversy (Are video games seriously harmful to young minds? Are current surveillance technologies a threat to civil liberties and personal privacy or a boon to personal security and the rule of law?), or to evaluate some important contemporary technology (the cell phone, for instance, or hybrid vehicles, or internet search engines, or. . .), or perhaps to get a little more philosophical, making an argument about, say, the ways the human mind is or is not like computer intelligence. Another possibility—and this one may turn out to be an offshoot of the response piece in your previous essay—is to respond to and directly critique some aspect of either Carr’s or Cascio’s argument, or to do likewise with an argument you encounter in one of your other sources.
And speaking of sources, let me be clear on what this assignment calls for in that regard. As you develop your argument, you must use a minimum of three different sources in your essay (of course many of you will end up using more than three); at least two of your sources must be material you’ve found on your own (i.e. they can’t be readings that I’ve explicitly assigned), at least one source must be generally available in a hard copy format (though you might access that source electronically, via ProQuest, for instance), and all sources should be considered valid and credible by the academic readers you’re addressing. These sources should be documented per MLA guidelines).
As you work through your writing process, planning, drafting, and refining your essay, there are a couple important points to keep in mind. For one thing, don’t forget counter-argument. That is, as well as providing convincing evidence and explanations for your position, you’ll want to consider the most obvious and important objections that those who don’t agree with you might raise, and find ways to minimize or refute those. This consideration of opposing positions is often done all at once in a single paragraph near the end of your essay, but it’s also possible to weave pieces of counter-argument into the fabric of your own arguments throughout your essay. No matter how you elect to organize your counter-argument, though, the bottom line is the same: don’t fail to consider what you’ll say when your reader says, “Yeah, but. . . .” And now, one final question to consider: who’s the boss of your essay, you or your sources? The answer, of course, should be you. Yes, you’ll certainly be using source material as support for your ideas and should be scrupulous about giving credit where credit is due, but this essay should focus on an argument of your own design, and you, rather than your sources, should be in control of that argument. Likewise, the voice a reader hears in the essay should be your voice; the language that presents your argument should be, at least primarily, your language. You should use your sources carefully. Their function is to aid in the development of your claims, not to overwhelm those claims.

In addition the paper must meet these standdards: Re focus and organization the essay manifests:

A coherent sense of beginning, middle, and end

A single sufficiently focused controlling idea

Body paragraphs each of which is based on a single controlling idea and each of which clearly relates to the development of the essay’s overall controlling idea

Material that all “fits” in the paragraph where it’s been put

Re support and development:

Sufficient evidence—i.e. specific examples, concrete details, expert testimony, clear explanations—to make a credible case for the ideas being presented

A sense that obvious reader objections have been considered and attended to (Here you’ll be dealing with obvious inconsistencies and contradictions as well as the most obvious objections from readers opposed to your ideas.)

Little or no redundant, unnecessary, or inappropriate developmental material

Re quality of expression:

A tone appropriate to its subject matter, purpose, and academic audience

Sufficient variety in word choice and syntax to avoid dullness

Re clarity and conventions:

Very few grammatical or mechanical errors serious enough to impair reader understanding (Errors that often fall under this heading include sentence fragments, run-ons, misplaced modifiers, faulty pronoun reference, unwarranted tense shifts, and subject-verb agreement trouble.)

No more than a handful of minor grammatical/mechanical problems (Usually these will include minor spelling errors and misused commas, apostrophes, and quotation marks.)

Observance of MLA conventions for both essay format and citation of sources