ENGLISH 102

Writing Projects
 WRITING AS INQUIRY

• Writing is a generative process for helping you sort out information you have,
make sense of it, put it in context, figure out what you think, and communicate
it to an audience.
• With that in mind, the projects we do will be question-driven, not driven by a
thesis statement that makes an argument.
• Why?
• We are engaging in writing as academic inquiry, NOT making a claim before
we’ve done our research and then doing research to prop up that claim.
• Our focus for this course is globalization, so every writing project should
examine another country in some way (not the United States).
 YOUR INTERESTS

• What are your interests? Personal, professional?

• What do you worry about?
• What are you looking forward to?
• What do you spend your time doing, when you have free time?
• What do you want to be doing (and where) in five years? Ten years?
CURIOSITY ABOUT OTHER PLACES
 SOLVING COMPLEX PROBLEMS

• Every large society has common problems to solve. The United States has ways
of approaching these problems. But our ways aren’t the only ways.
• Each writing project for this course should focus on a question that asks how a
particular country deals with one of these problems.
• I’m going to show SOME of those problems now.You are not limited to these,
but you will have to get feedback on (and final approval of) your research
question in the planning phase of each project.
 HEALTH CARE

• Affordability
• Accessibility
• Effectiveness
• Public health initiatives (anti-smoking campaigns, vaccination policies, birth
control distribution, etc.)
• Involvement of nonprofits (Doctors Without Borders, etc.)
• Mental health care
 HIGHER EDUCATION

• Funded how?
• Available to everyone?
• Funding for science
• Funding for the arts
• Public sector/private sector involvement and partnerships
 CRIMINAL JUSTICE

• Incarceration rates
• Recidivism
• Prison conditions
• Due process
 CHILD CARE

• Parental leave from work

• Early childhood education (availability of preschool, ways it is funded)
• Temporary foster care
• Support for orphans
• Adoption regulations
• Child abuse laws
 IMMIGRATION

• Laws for how to get asylum, policies for:

• Work visas
• School visas
• Permanent residency
• Naturalization/citizenship
 LGBTQ CONDITIONS

• Marriage
• Living openly as LGBTQ
• Heteronormativity and social norms
• Legal protection from hate crimes
• Employment discrimination
• Right to serve in the military
 RACISM

• Housing policies
• School segregation (including de facto segregation)
• Police use of force
• Incarceration patterns
• Poverty
• Employment discrimination
• Legal protection from hate crimes
 ENVIRONMENT

• Regulations for industry

• Participation in global initiatives (Paris Climate Agreement)
• Recycling/waste disposal
• Energy sources (green energy efforts such as solar, wind, nuclear power)
• Protecting endangered species
• Agriculture (factory farming, organic farming, etc.)
• Sustainability initiatives (architecture, etc.)
• Natural disasters: damage prevention efforts, disaster relief
• Protecting the oceans
 MILITARY

• Branches of military
• Funding of military (size of budget)
• Intelligence services
• National security (threats to, ways of managing)
• Nuclear capability
• Surveillance of citizens
• Recent armed conflicts/military operations
 ADDICTION

• Drug laws
• Rehabilitation treatment (funding, availability)
• Prevalence (extent to which it is a problem)
• Education about drugs
 STATUS OF WOMEN

• Sex education
• Employment discrimination
• Right to own property
• Right to education
• Equal pay for equal work
• Presence in positions of power/representation in government
 RELIGION

• Freedom of religion (or mandated religion)

• Separation of (or integration of) church and state
• Church attendance among the population
• Atheism among the population
 SEXUAL HARASSMENT/ASSAULT

• Laws in the workplace

• Typical penalties for rape in the justice system
• Statute of limitations policies
• Assault of minors
 POVERTY

• Income inequality
• Social safety net (food, housing, health care, education)
• Minimum wage laws
• Experiments with universal basic income
• Presence of slavery/forced labor
• Job training programs
 DISABILITY

• Availability of resources for children with disabilities (education, therapy)

• Funding for resources
• Employment discrimination
• Accessibility of spaces (laws requiring that spaces are wheelchair-accessible,
etc.)
• Universal design
• Service animals
 THE ELDERLY

• Funding for senior citizens/retirees

• Assisted living facilities
• End-of-life palliative care/hospice
• Right to die laws
• Burial practices
 HOMELESSNESS

• Shelters for people experiencing homelessness

• Involvement of nonprofits (Habitat for Humanity and similar)
• Public housing