Assignment: Winter Intersession
Guidelines for Writing Assignment
Final paper should be about 1000 words (approximately 4 pages, double-spaced). Use Times New Roman, 12-point font size, if possible. Organize your paper as follows:
• A clear title: Your title should be catchy so that not only it attracts attention of the reader, but reflects your paper.
• A brief introduction: Your introduction should clearly set the stage for the topic with some background information (tell the reader the main topic of discussion) and you should make a hypothesis statement...tell the reader what this paper is all about...
• Avoid using informal style of writing. Use ‘academic' (literate-like) writing style in your essay. Avoid personal experience/views (I think, I feel, my children/friends etc.).
• Your writing style should be structurally complex, and the text should be amenable to processing with little knowledge of the extratextual context.
• Remember! This is an academic article...use descriptive style and not narrative style.
• Write a draft of the paper first, and then read it carefully with regard to its content, clarity, organization, grammar, spellings, etc.
• Avoid using arbitrary pronouns, and do not start a sentence with a pronoun.
• Make sure tenses on the verb is consistent (avoid use of one tense on the verb in one sentence, and another, in the next sentence).
• Check for punctuation and grammar/spelling errors before you submit your draft.
• Organize your paper logically (have a skeletal frame of the topics and sub-topics, fill in the text later)
• In your ‘conclusion', summarize your arguments highlighting the major claims
• Revise the first draft.
• Submit your first draft
• Read the second draft and edit it again, if necessary.
• Save the final version of your paper as a PDF file and submit it by the due date.
Your final paper will be graded on the following rubric:
1. Clear Tile-
2. Proper introduction to the topic of discussion which includes the statement of Hypothesis-
3. Organization of the sub-topics into paragraphs.
4. Use of appropriate ‘connecting' words that connect one paragraph with the next
(Smooth flow of ideas from one section to the next) - 5 points
5. Grammar, spelling, punctuation, and the appropriate use of vocabulary-
6. Conclusion -
7. References/citations given in APA style format-
Keep in mind that plagiarism is a serious breach of academic standards. Be sure to place all borrowed material in quotation marks or indented paragraphs; give the source in parentheses with the author's last name, the year of publication, and the page number--e.g. (Brown 1999:28). Then list your sources in the References section at the end of the paper. Avoid the use of footnotes; use numbered endnotes instead, if necessary.
Writing Assignment Topic.
1. Steven Pinker, supporting Chomsky's ‘Linguistic Autonomy', argues that Linguistic Structure is a genetically endowed, autonomous entity. ‘Linguistic Autonomy Principle' claims that language ability in humans is biologically prewired to process language/languages of the immediate environment. This statement of Chomsky/Pinker delinks or decouples human language with culture, anthropology, and meaning.
2. Whorfian Hypothesis, on the other hand, proposes that Language is intrinsically linked with culture and anthropology. This hypothesis states "the structure of a language determines the way one conceive and experience the world". This principle came to be known a linguistic relativism. A much stronger version,linguistic determinism, claims that the structure of the language determines or causes the cognitive differences among different linguistic communities.
3. Assignment: Summarize both articles from their theoretical perspective, and draw your own conclusion, either supporting Chomsky-Pinker model, or Whorf's model of language.
Additional articles that might help:
http://is.muni.cz/el/1423/podzim2006/SAN205/um/duranti_la_whorf.pdf
http://faculty.washington.edu/losterho/pinker_chapter_9.pdf